Trump's Peace Prize

 

Trump said he threatened to bomb Moscow if Putin attacked Ukraine, 2024 fundraiser tapes show

Psalm 52 (Why Do You Boast?)

 

Why do you proudly boast
oh, mighty one,
of all the mischief
that you have done?
Your tongue’s a razor,
cutting cruel.
Why do you proudly boast
oh, mighty one?

That is why God will snatch
and strike you down.
And when he does
the faithful will say,
“He would not trust in God,
only wealth and crime.”
That is why God will snatch
and strike you down.

So, like an olive tree
in the house of God,
I will put my trust
in faithful love.
Praise you forever,
for what you’ve done,
like an olive tree
in the house of God.

It Begins with Shouting,

 shouting loud
We cannot ignore the unqualified distress of these days
the constant cycling from beginning until now and on to never again
A price will be paid
    for exploding cars and rockets falling from the sky
    for elimination juries and empire machines
    for unreliable alarms before and after the floods
A price will be paid

Louder still. Shout it out.

There are newspapers of misery
and newspapers of nonsense
that play the same dynamic upon the stage
    for hour after hour
I see the devils of the world
but I will not accept them.
The weapons of misery
the weapons of despair
    are deadly as the weapons of hate

The future depends on you, on me, on us
on our reason, on our behalf
but we have certainly lost our eyes
unreliable sight and no vision
we have lost our way.

Loudest now – but what does it mean?

Empathy is dead and the villains are still kicking our corpse.

Modern American Evangelical Apostles’ Creed

 

I believe in God the Father of America,
     creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Donald J. Trump, his favorite son, our President.
He was fairly elected by the American people
     despite a totally rigged election.
He suffered under the liberal Democrats
was almost fatally shot, and wounded.
He descended into the liberal hellscape.
On the third day he rose again.
He ascended to the Presidency
     and is seated at the Resolute Desk.
He will come again for a third and fourth term
     to judge his enemies among the living and the dead.

I believe in the MAGA spirit,
the unfettered free market,
that all communists hate America,
that any criticism of Israel is antisemitism,
that Ivermectin cures the body,
and law and order forever. Amen.

Try Again

She’s going to cry
but don’t ask any questions
Stop and stay
or go away
just go away

Warm air and cold feet
the old man’s bones are creaking
What did you say
about life
going on?

Wipe your fingers on your shirt
clean the stains from your hands
Drink some water
have an aspirin
try again

Someone is screaming
but the door slams closed
Run up the stairs
and open the window
it can be done

Are you all right?
I don’t know
What do you need?
They don’t bother me
but that’s not true

Wipe your fingers on your shirt
clean the stains from your hands
Drink some water
have an aspirin
try again

Making Mar-A-Lago Face in the Bar

     I was in a sleazy local bar drinking gin and listening to the band, Loose Change and Whiskey, stumble through another round of twelve bar blues. That’s when I saw her – her face pulled taut and tight like a catcher’s mitt. Leather face and swollen lips like an inflated parade balloon. Her blond hair was piled high in a heap on top of her head. She wore some stars and stripes emblazoned blouse with spangles and sequins. She signaled to the bartender for another rum and coke.

    This bizarre, inverted peahen was signaling her MAGA reproductivity with collagen and silicone. She sipped at her drink and made eyes at me. At least that’s what I assume she was trying to. She didn’t blink. I don’t think she could. And her eyebrows didn’t move. The face-lift and Botox injections didn’t leave her face with much flexibility.

    I nodded, not because I was interested, only offering the basest level of civility. She misconstrued, however, and came around the bar to where I was sitting. “F – Yeah!” she shouted over the music. “I love this place.”

    Up close her orange spray tan skin looked like a terrible leather sofa. Worn. Old and sat upon. “It’s great,” I said – being polite but nothing more. I sipped my gin attentively. She took the hint, but didn’t like it.

    “Well get outta’ my goddamned way if you don’t like it here,” she snarled.

    But I could see it all carved into her plastic surgery – political conformity under the scalpel’s edge – whiplash chaos and her gleeful willingness – her eager anticipation – to shoot trespassers and illegal immigrants. It’s not a reluctant, if it must be done, attitude She wants to do it. She’s waiting for the chance to shoot first and ask questions later. Deport the immigrants. Shoot the misperceived threat before it can become real. She wouldn’t mourn it as a failure. She wouldn’t grieve it as a loss and loss of life. She will celebrate and ask for more. And she would cross state lines to do it.

    “Feed them to the alligators” is her new “feed them to the lions.” Cruelty is the point. For her pleasure. For her satisfaction and her joy. Given half a chance, I’m sure she’d buy a packet of lynch tree postcards.

    “Kick ass!” she shouted, spilling her drink as Loose Change and Whiskey finished their song then she turned to me. “You’re just another whiny bitch brainwashed dumbass liberal cuck, aren’t you?” she said but her lips never moved.

Thunder and Violence

     Thick and humid. I’m all but wearing the air out here today. And I have extra far to go today. Is there thunder? (Yes and Amen. Let it be.)

    On the radio: “Call out the agents and kill the journalists and lawyers that won't comply with our orders. This is the dollar deal.” But the power is blown and the lights go dark. Blackout audience flashlights in the teargas. He’s watching the streets from the thirtieth floor window of the high tower like some Babylonian king.

    This is mild suicidal violence on a national scale. A toxic topic that we will not discuss. The state patrol is a performance. They’re out as a show of force. A demonstration from the demon Stration. There will be fireworks, but no fireflies tonight.

    “Aim for the protesters on their faggy bicycles. Watch it now. We’re not just kicking dogs here. They’re sick people, radical left lunatics. Why can’t we shoot them. Stack the bodies now, figure it out later.”

    This just goes on and on. Doesn’t it? Every day like this. Today even more. And more to come.

    “Let God be true and every man else a liar. Worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. I am your salvation. I am your hope. This doctrine is profitable. And we’re all about the profit. Profit and power. It’s me or nothing and you are nothing to me. Burn one hundred. Burn another one. Let them burn if they won't be true. We need no woke lethality laws. My words or nothing. Anything else doesn’t exist or it is a lie.”

    These things may not be true. I don’t remember. And it’s so hard to tell anymore. Is there thunder? (Yes and Amen. Let it be.) Two democratic lawmakers shot with their spouses in Minnesota. An aggressive act, a blow to kill a smaller man, a smaller woman. Kicked and punched and drinking cough syrup. Covered in broken glass. A bloody bandage and a shattered window. They won’t be content until we’re all dead and choking on the ashes of the world. How far fringe are the voices of violence? Never far enough.

    The shooter was impersonating a police officer. ACAB – especially the cosplay officers. A politically motivated assassination. Evangelical Christians making enemies hit list. Blamed for the moral decay of his home and native land. Security patrols. Overseas security consultant. Mercenary. Assassin.

    A man in a trench coat. In this heat. Someone’s going to notice. This humidity. They’re going to see him. But as a police officer? Ask yourself why? And Why not? Unlocking doors. Security guns. Improvise. Adapt. Overcome. Ambush broad strokes.

    Message from my brother – he’s walked downtown to find a protest to join. Oh, and that he’s borrowed my War Resisters Organization Manual. “Home later. If I’m not arrested.”I wish there was something more I could give him. I wish there was something more I could say. I can’t stop what is falling apart. I’m trying to write on the move. I am staying ahead of the time and the clock. Hoping to stay ahead of the men with clubs and batons. Recording my thoughts and prayers as I move in my illegible handwriting.

    Organize forward support. Stay in the shade and shadows whenever possible. J’ai besoin des medecine et l’eau.

    “Learn the truth about why the left has left and the right is right.” I’ve heard them on the radio. On the news. I hear them everywhere. “Democrats are boasting that they’re going to win. They should be boasting about their prisons. About the darkness. They are beyond the pale and behind the veil. Ignorant and proud of their own conceits. Our enemies of unbelief, without mercy.”

    Is there thunder? (Yes and Amen. Let it be.)

    Will there be lightning? (Please and thank you. Amen.) Let that delay or postpone them. If only for a time. Let it rain, Lord.

    21,813 steps. 11.0 Miles

The Locusts Are Coming

Moving my hands in physical space
You seem surprised when I touch your face
I’m running so slow that I can’t win the race

Light travels fast but not instantly
The reflection in the mirror’s what I used to be
I’d open my eyes but I don’t want to see

Your memory comes back along with the pain
It’s funny how it comes back again and again
But later this afternoon it just might rain

Looking for purpose in history
Trying to find evidence of injury
Overlapping patterns of tragedy

A hundred-thirty degrees and rising higher
Who is the dictator, who’s the liar?
It’s hard to believe in this ceasefire

The golden age of America begins right now
But don’t press for details, don’t ask how
And anything we’ve said we’ll disavow

The rich have it all and they still want more
Judges are bribed to cheat the poor
We’re already losing the next civil war

Come on, little baby, let me hear you sing
Do what I tell you, don’t change a thing
The locusts are coming with scorpion sting

A Man Like That?

     Does a man like that – a lying, vain, arrogant narcissist – a man with his history – of fraud, of racism and misogyny – want peace? Does a man like that really believe the things he says? Why should you believe the things he says? The president lies and repeats the lies of others. Who is the liar? Who is the dictator? He’s a fair bit of both.

    We are vulnerable all. Cutting down fires. Digging up cities. Plows and bulldozers moving the earth. Infected populations on the move. Virus vectors around the globe. One hundred and thirty degrees and rising higher. Reliably recorded and burst into flames. Too many tragedies coming too frequently. Seizing assets, appropriating income, usurping all. These are the criminal beginnings. Russia, Israel, Iran, the US of A, et al. deliberately bombing civilian structures – apartments, hospitals, churches too. Call it what it is: Genocide.

    Seal the book. Steal the book and go away. Closed up and sealed until the end of time. Sealed up and closed until the time of the end. But live by the Word and we could believe you. The words spoken by angels demand more than you have to offer. Preach the plain truth. Prove the message straight. It’s late, but we can begin again.

Draw Near and Listen

     Draw near and listen. Draw near to what is crucial.

    What is happening here? Cows and crops die. The corpse of the state lies in the street while, mile after mile, torching ten thousand buildings in the smoke-filled valley. Evil is come upon us – with thunder – with storm and tempest. A great noise, a flame of devouring fire.

    You can see it for yourself. You know the truth of it. You see the devouring flame written in the law. Written in the prophets and spray painted on the walls. You should burn them. Burn them or walk away. But you will do neither. Never. You cut your losses but it’s already too late.

    It is this: A Total Lack of Comprehension. 

    It is this: A Total Lack of Love.    

    Your grave is dug. For a million dollar weakness. For a twenty-five cent failure.

    Draw near and listen. Try to understand.

    Push the report. Put it all in writing. There are two ways to go here: Bombs or paper. Paper or bombs. It’s going to hurt either way. I promise you that much. It’s going to hurt, but you can live. This is the audacity of human survival. You can live...

    We are breaking. Lawlessness is upon us. But who and what will they believe? The lawbreakers in the White House? Remove their heart, they won’t believe the truth.

    I don’t have a guilty conscience. Not me. I’ve not cooperated with the FBI.

Evil Will not Prevail!

 

"God loves us, God loves you all, and evil will not prevail!" - Apostolic blessing Urbi et Orbi May 8,2025

Memento Mori on a National Scale

     No nation is forever. It would be good for us to remember this. Memento Mori on a national scale. The mighty have fallen. The mighty will fall and their weapons of war will perish with them. ­We are in a race with Russia, with China, with Israel, with Iran. We are racing toward fire and suffering. We are racing towards death and destruction. But gold will not decide the winner. Do not consult the four hundred Fox News prophets – they do not speak with the voice of God.

    So let the winds blow away the high stench of summer garbage. Let the winds blow away the sweat of our face and the dust of the ground. The grass withers and the flag will fade. Let us remember and in remembering live, and in living find God. Anything is possible after that.

The Thunder Outside

 The thunder outside. The lightning overhead. It rains and rains overnight.
Iran and Israel trading missile strikes. Iran attacking US Air bases.
Thunder and lightning. Crash and fire.
And tomorrow the heat returns.

“No warmongers here,” they say. “We have no warmongers here, but we will see the world crucified upon a cross of steel as we celebrate the gun, the warship, and the rocket. Blessed be the bomb.”

“No warmongers here,” they say. “We have no warmongers here, but history is clear that Israel will prevail. Those who oppose Israel are the enemies of God. On the wrong side of history, on the wrong side of God. We celebrate a president who understands the truth of God.”

Thunder and lightning. Crash and fire but God is silent as we are reduced to rubble. Let the lighting flash and the thunder boom. Let the rain fall. “The earth will rest, justice will prevail, the poor will rejoice and peace will return, once we no longer act as predators, but as pilgrims – no longer each of us for ourselves, but walking alongside one another.” Pope Leo XIV

Psalm 42 in 2025

 

If faith is a thirst I am a deer in the desert, desperate and dying
If faith is a thirst I am sunk into weight of heaviness
dreaming of their divorce as if it were mine all over again
crying for a rapidly spreading cancer
call it one year – maybe. Could be less.
When will I feel the face of God?
Deep calls to deep and waters rise
so sing the old songs and pray the old prayers
oh my soul, I’ve got nothing else.

Everything that remains is silence.

The Backstory

    Someone knew something about the murder. Everyone knew so someone had to know – a man found dead in his home, a break in at the basement egress window. A man in a mask an a uniform, working the basement. Don’t bother with the cops – it was an inside job. Crimes and acts of corruption. Thefts, extortion, narcotics trafficking, personal drug use, murder. The details painstakingly researched. Clear-eyed and narrow. Someone had to know, and we were there to find out.

    What if a bad guy shows up while we’re looking? Tune him up? Work him over? We’re not that kind of investigators. What if a good guy shows up? Another cop… (a good guy with a gun?) an uncorrupted cop? Seems to be a rarity these days Forget about it, what are you going to say? It could have been you. It could have been me. This is for real. Bleeding, bally cops.

    “Childhood memories are like that,” G. said to me as we investigated the house looking for evidence, for clues. “Connected. Interconnected. One to the next. Every vacation. Every trip. And here we are for another murder.”

    “Yeah,” I said. “I remember those trips. I used to just stare out the back window of the family station wagon, looking at the reflection of the lights in the glass. I thought of them as my quiet friends. They were always there with me. And even if they never said anything, I knew their words.”

    “Look at what he wrote here in this notebook: ‘he has all the names of history, the changing time and seasons, this man of sin with seven ugly heads, a brutish, brutalist beast with a heartbeat of concrete…’ What does any of that mean? It’s nothing but coincidence, circumstance, hearsay!” G. said, huffing as he shoved a handful of spiral bound notebooks back onto the unlevel bookshelf. “That’s all we’ve got here. That’s all we’re going to find. Where’s the evidence? Where’s the eyewitness?”

    “Calm.” I said. “Quiet yourself.”

    Not the brightest, closest, largest, easiest, but it there. Somewhere. Hidden, maybe, but there. Waiting for us to find it. It’s there where they left it. No follow up. No return. But there for us to find. And we would find it if we looked. If we looked in the right place. Eventually, one day, the mystery would open. In the front end they sell the equipment. Legal. Clean. In the back and in the basement they sell the drugs and the drugs. That’s the way they do it. That’s the way they make their money. American money. Millions of dollars. You’ve heard this story before, every loaded anecdote of the American dream. Who is this beast that owns the cops? Should we check for outstanding warrants? It wouldn’t matter any way.

    “We believe in the future, yes?” I asked him.

    “But…”

    “But nothing. We believe in the future, yes?”

    “Yes,” G. said. “I suppose we do.”

    “Then there is nothing more to say.” And we return to our investigation.

This Fire Is Unsurprising

 

I Am

I am a faded cardboard sign – illegible in the rain.
I am a sailor lost at sea.
I am blue raspberry marketing – unreal.
I am a forgone conclusion,
    a smile in the dark, an unfinished melody.
I am the memory of a dying dog.
I am a hesitation mark.
I am standing in the rain again,
    the looming threat of war, mushrooms on a fallen log.
I am an unfamiliar dog in the neighbor’s yard.
I am an owl in the sanctuary.
I am unlike myself, as far as I can remember,
    but I am becoming true.
I am an abandoned car at the side of the road.
I am rabbit trail digressions into nonsense,
    an absurdist defeatism.
I am stomach pains and vertigo in an airport terminal.
I am a halfhearted Baphomet.
I am slowing down, full stop.
I am not especially well written,
    clumsy but earnest.
I am helpless and I don’t know what to do
    except to say that there’s nothing I can do.

Never Far Enough Away from This Word

     “Look into the courtyard. Down there. Just the other side of the magnolia tree. See him?"

    “Someone just left the room.”

    “I know. I’m pointing at him. That’s him, down there.”

    Drop this noise and the brighter lights and the darker shadows in the corner of the courtyard will stand out stronger. The setting sun casts strange and moving shadows across the concrete. Like a passage of blood through the arteries and veins of the body. Like a slow-moving train and a visible target. The shadows move and we observe. We write it all down in our official reports, filed upon our return to headquarters. Someone else will summarize and index our reports for the captain and the chief.    

“Stand by…”­

    This sort of thing goes on everyday­ in your mid to large size cities. New York and Chicago? Obviously. Des Moines? Occasionally. But in smaller towns and villages? Perhaps it happens, but no one notices. Or if they do, they will not report it. Midwestern nice is a thing. And civility is rarely pressed.

    “Anything?”

    “Stand by…”

    My partner, G., and I were on a standard surveillance detail­. Observe and Report were our instructions. Just that and nothing more. Observe. Report. Crime doesn’t pay. We’ve seen it’s deficiencies and failures. And we were tasked to watch for it and to write it all down.

    “Do you see anything?”

    “I said stand by...”

    Lawsuits and shootings. A record of violence. Criminal, military records. But here we are, watching and waiting for something to happen. And when (or if) it happens, what will be required of us? We been instructed – unambiguously – to observe and to report. Nothing more. Nothing less. Lawyers come. Covert operatives go. Our man sits on a park bench in the courtyard eating a sandwich. Looks like pastrami and sauerkraut on rye, but I can’t be sure from this distance. I wrote it down in the ledger anyway. 

    While we were waiting, while we watched, G. put down the binoculars and turned to me. “What are you going to do when you’re thirty?”

    “Thirty?” I chuckled. “Thirty?”

    “All right, then. Fifty?” G. asked.

    “This,” I said pointing to the filthy apartment where we squatted “I’m fifty.”

    “Really?­ What’s it like?” he asked.

    “I don’t really know. I’ve never been fifty before. My knees are still okay. I’m healthy. Mostly.”

    “You know they just pushed the retirement age back again?”

    “Yeah. I saw that,” I said. “I’ve often said that I’ll get to retire when they drop me in the box.” G. laughed. “Yeah. Yeah.” I laughed too, but mirthlessly. “I’m tired.”

    Quoting scripture from memory isn’t enough. I’ve sat in the all night coffee shop on the corner with the street corner preachers strung out and ranting. One hundred thousand hours since 1925 and it’s still not enough. In Texas. In Oklahoma. In Minnesota, Iowa, and Illinois. Always in Zion, but never far enough away from this world.

    “Has he moved yet?” I asked.

    “Just a minute,” G. said as he replaced the binoculars. “Stand by…”

    I woke up the other morning – before my alarm, before dawn – and my first thought, even before I opened my eyes, was ‘It never ends.’ It never ends. Day after day, one more day and then another. It never ends. And now this. A phone call from my brother. A message from my mother and it feels like all my old failures returned and revisited. Like Nero Redivivus. The past isn’t dead. It isn’t even past. Just concealed and waiting and watching, biding its own time until it can return. My nightmares come back to haunt me. Death and divorce. Poor communication and spreading cancer in this ruined temple. Who am I? That’s still the central question, isn’t it? After all these years, it still comes back to this: Who am I?

    “He’s moving.” G. says abruptly. “He’s moving. He’s moving.”

    “Let’s roll,” I say as I grab my jacket and my camera.

There Should Be No Poor Among You

     If this is to be a Christian nation – founded on Judeo-Christian values – let this be the baseline standard: “There should be no poor among you.” Deuteronomy 15:4 We can argue over words and names and the interpretation of the law, all of our internal religious disputes. But let this be the minimal standard: “There should be no poor among you.”

    But there are billions in amusements and billions in military spending. Always billions more uncounted. And those budget cuts are never an option. There is always money for guns and butter. Let the poor starve. The free-market has spoken.

    “Do you have any better ideas, whiz kid? Smart alec. Jackass.”

    “Defund the military. Demilitarize the police. Feed the poor.”

    The cold air operators and cold war operatives recoil in horror. Taped phone conversations are tagged, flagged, and reviewed. Who is this criminal? Who is this asshole?

    “A sociopath, obviously.” This is their detailed analysis. “A commie libtard with a poor memory. We have all the evidence that we need: the phone calls are real. The photos are authentic.”    

    “Blessed are the poor and the hungry…”

    “...the poor in spirit! It says the poor in spirit, you illegal piece of shit. You’re not entitled to a damned thing except hostility and bodily harm.”

    Blood and hair. Bone and blood. Drag marks in the dirt. Hanging and beating in the public park with all the other liberal scum. Strung up and left bleeding. “This is the way. This is way things are. Who are you to object? Who are you to complain? We stomp commies like you.”

The Best We Can Say of The Man of Lawlessness

     He has the potential for life. He is potentially self-aware. That is the best we can say of him, this man of lawlessness. This son of perdition. Imposing laws. Changing times and laws to fit his own chaotic whims. There is no law in this. There is only chaos. Deceiving many – serial liar. The truth is not in him. His promises of peace are red flag warnings. The liar lies. It’s what he does. It’s what he is. Have nothing to do with his lies.

In Christ There Can Be No America First

 

    The National Guard and the Marines are called out to California. Making a problem where there wasn’t a problem. Inciting the very riots they claim to control. The President speaks: “Repulse the civilian attack with smoke and tear gas. Fall on them with flames and they will crumble beneath you in the flames of hell. When I damn, I damn them whole. Witches, heretics, libtards, and communist dupes. Perfidious, treacherous, treasonous, disloyal betrayal. The proud Pope presumes to speak of me, of open borders and the forgiveness of debts? Cut and stamped out! Burnt and trampled down! All Arab camel-drivers, terrorists, and drug cartels. True Americans – Real Americans – God Fearing Americans will not march with these.”

    “But all Americans are born heretics,” says a voice.

    “Kill that voice. Shut it down.”

    “The bitter east and the ironic west,” the voice says again and laughs a little.

    “I said kill it! Dead! And who will stand between their throats and our swords? Who will stand between their heads and our batons? Between their hearts and our bullets? Bring back the gallows and the gibbet and the bright burning stake. Flogging, drawing, quartering too. The wheel, the rack for the victim in his misery, in her degradation.”

    “Defund the military. Demilitarize the police,” comes that damned voice again. “Do not deploy the National Guard against freeborn American citizens. Four dead in Oho – how many this time? How many more? Cruelty is the point.”

    “I cannot bear to see my country defeated by cheap-ass foreigners, by traitor Americans, by liberal Nazi scum. The blood and the soil are ours.”

    “This much is true: There is a will to power in the world, and it belongs to you. It is the entrenchment of power. And the enrichment of the powerful.”

    “It is law and order.”

    “It is a calculated escalation. Stop talking of law and justice when you will enforce none but your own.”

    “It is the protection of our Judeo-Christian heritage.”

    “Invariably it is the Christian nationalist that wants something for nothing. Stop talking of God and of prayer when you know neither.”

    There is a blazing rage and a halting, dropping wind that blows across the land. Even the fat-headed fools feel it. The enemy at the gates is our own, is us. We destroy ourselves if we are given the chance. In love with war (of which we can never have enough) as we are... In love with religion (of which we have very little – true religion, pure and undefiled, is this: to care for widows and orphans in their distress) as we are… There is a great noise and big smoke as the national guardsmen storm the streets. More artillery and little art. No heart.

    “Nevermind the tears!” the President says in scorn. “Make for the flash and the gash. Make with the flash and the grenade.” He is as mannerless as dog of war and no joke. Neither angel nor soldier, the yet uncrowned king of America claiming the blood royal.

    “If you cannot rule yourself,” the tired voice speaks from the dark, “how will you rule the nation? Take the crown and the holy oil. Consider nothing and take everything else – but the Church Universal knows only one realm – the realm of Christ the king – and only one law – the law of love. In Christ there is no east, no west. In Christ there can be no America first.”

    “Fewer canons! More cannons! Fire the prelate! Fire the powder! Kill that voice”

    But the voice will not be silenced. “We have lived faith and died. Now we steal away to pray.”

Before We Get to the Upper Room

 

    What is it today? What is my heart doing and why? Heart and lung and unidentified pains. Heart and lung and sudden onset migraines. Dislocated hips. Hospital tests and procedures. I am frail and vulnerable, seeking care.

Unspoken silence.

    Years of pain, howling wind and a house a’ fire. The familiar rhythm of struggle. Something missing – a loss of spark. But the inevitable doubt is tinder for the fire.

Is this the restoration time?

    Yes, but not just yet. It is not for you to know. Between the was and the will be. Between dry bones and breathing wind. I’m on fire or soon will be. Head and heart. Flesh and bone. Spirit and soul all at once.

Unspoken silence.

    
    Come wind. Come fire. Burn, breathe, blow. Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Angry and Reckless – A Song for Trump

 

It's another backyard recording of a song I wrote - this one for President Trump. 

As angry and as reckless
as a toddler with a gun,
shooting off his vulgar mouth
and staring at the sun.

He’s a liar and a cheat
human nature misaligned
the harbinger of chaos
with death and hell close behind.

Claiming to be righteous
claiming to be wise
a heart full of impiety
and a mouth full of lies.

An abyss of willful ignorance
a vacancy of love
defaulting and defrauding
living push and shove.

The Emperor Nero fiddled
as Rome went up in flames
Trump goes to the golf course
leaving us the blame.

Ed Wood Stole Four Hundred Dollars from Me

     “Ed Wood stole four hundred dollars from me and I want it back.”

    This is how he comes to me, standing at my door at just after ten in the morning, his gray, felt suit faded, its collars and cuffs worn ragged. I haven’t seen or heard from good Doctor Tarrec for several years now. What is it? Count it back, it was just before my divorce … my first divorce, so what is that? A little more than four years ago? Has it been that long? He comes and goes. He does his thing. He does whatever it is that scientist, alchemist, philosopher, magician, mystics like him do.

    And here he was again, after four years, on my doorstep ranting about my favorite low budget filmmaker from the nineteen fifties. I had the day off – a relatively rare thing for me. I’d been up early – early-ish. It was my day off – to mow the yard – a necessary thing as it was starting to get out of control. I actually enjoy mowing my yard – it’s relaxing. Therapeutic, maybe. So I mowed the yard that was all I had to do for the day. I grabbed a beer from the fridge (can’t drink all day if you don’t start before noon…) and sat on the couch with a battered copy of George Bernard Shaw’s play, Saint Joan.

ROBERT: Do you know why they are called goddams?
JOAN: No. Everyone calls them goddams.
ROBERT: It is because they are always calling on their God to condemn their souls to perdition. That is what goddam means in their language…

    That’s when the good Doctor banged on my door and announced. “Ed Wood stole four hundred dollars from me and I want it back.”

    “Doctor… Doctor Tarrec? What are you doing here? Where have you been?” I opened the door and motioned for him to come inside. “Can I get you a beer?”

    “Do you have any Pliny the Elder?” I didn’t of course. It’s a great beer, but it’s only released twice a year and in limited quantities. I’ve only had it one time and that was years ago.

    “I knew him, you know?” Doctor Tarrec said.

    “Who? Ed Wood?”

    “Pliny. The elder one. His son too, but I never cared for him.”

    “What?” The conversation was already getting away from me. I showed him the couch and got him one of the discount IPAs I was drinking. “Where have you been, Doctor? I haven’t seen you for years.”

    “Nevermind that,” he waved off my question and sipped his beer. “Have you seen the movie Orgy of the Dead? It’s one of Ed Wood’s movies. And not one of his better ones.”

    This wasn’t saying much of course, but…

    “He stole it, and four hundred dollars from me,” Doctor Tarrec continued. And I’d never seen him so agitated. His face was red and his hair frizzled. He sipped his beer and wiped his lip. “I told him of the secret graveyard rituals, I told him of the moonlight emperor and the black ghoul. It was me who told him of the parade of dead souls. But he twisted it all up into that … into that burlesque travesty.”

    Chimes and discordant music rang out in the moonlight, strange music, and a crash of piano chords. A sudden gust of wind and the scent of night things. Dead things. Other, unpleasant things. Something in that cemetery was not yet dead. Call the psychic Lord of misrule and the dollar store Lady of goth. The prince of sots and princess of chaos. The scum of serpent and the poison of the basilisk. Spread the names of false messiah and the world suffers whole. The lover of flames. The Streetwalker, the Mummy, the Werewolf, and the whip-lashed Cat before dawn arrives. A sound from nowhere, the sound of nothing. Ever increasing. The sound of failure and solar disintegration.

    “You may have to let it go,” I said carefully. “Ed Wood died a long time ago. Back in the seventies, I think.” I looked it up later. He died in nineteen seventy-eight, when I was barely three years old.

    “It’s no matter,” Doctor Tarrec said as he stood and set down his beer. “I know where to find him.” Then he waved farewell and walked back out my front door. Perhaps I will see him again soon. Perhaps I won’t. I never know. 

I’ve Fallen Asleep in My Dreams

 

    I am a paradox version of myself – mournful and brokenhearted, anticipating and owning the heaven of perfect love. Slumbering and overcome by sleep and dreaming of something real. There is a danger, a great danger here – a subtle infiltration and, and, and a complete distortion of the facts. But nowhere regenerated. Nowhere. So I move. And move away.

    Move away to nowhere. Somewhere I can be heard. But beware. Beware. I do not trust the willfully blind to lead me, to keep me to secure. I am falling back – no more forces. I am falling back - no more focus. The future is uncertain, but some men and angels predestined. Like the pythonic spirit of prophecy, a slave able to predict the future and to make great prophet for my masters. The rest shall keep as they are. Helpless to believe. Helpless but to be. Like the rest of us. I open my mouth, but there’s nothing there. I’ve fallen asleep.

    The whole thing makes me ill. It hurts. I know it hurts. Severely beaten and imprisoned, yet singing psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs. It hurts to have a spirit, a soul in this world of physical pain. A disillusioned failure in the middle of a psalm. To have feelings in a world of frailty.

    I may not know what it is that you are facing, but I've had plenty of low days of my own. One thing (maybe the only thing) I know is that tomorrow will be another day. For good or for ill, tomorrow is another chance. 

    The future uncertain within the storm, singing in the dark deeper than fear. Defenses fall, fail future attack. But believe even more. Strength in mystery and the mystery of the faith. I am a future version of myself or soon will be. If not now, then.

Selah (Psalms Unnumbered)

 This is a quick, lofi recording of a song I wrote on my way home from church this morning. 

Selah (Psalms Unnumbered)

Now the chaos and the clutter
too much noise, too little me
overwhelmed and underfunded
haunted by anxiety

Selah. Selah.

Sleeping in a bed of fire
laying on the spinning floor
I am weary with my groaning
my spine is cracked, my feet are sore

Selah. Selah

Speaking words without meaning
live a life of uncertainty
I will pray with psalms unnumbered
let the Lord deliver me

"Selah" is a liturgical direction used in the Hebrew psalms of uncertain meaning - perhaps "pause" or "reflection" 

Life and Death or Something Close

 

Swift motion and cold night air. I am awake and dark
sleep forward now and live hard. Speak soft and sober.
It’s almost a dream, a recovered memory. I was here and gone.
Lost again and the devil is at his prayers. The black dog slipped away.

A rush of tumbling people, slipping down the way
into the mist, into the fog, into the dark.
Chart the place, but lose the line. I’ve burnt my eyes
But now to health. And now to Luck. Confess for blood.

Talk as you please – there is no safety anywhere these days
There’s no use for questions. Don’t bother to ask.
We’ve said too much or not enough already.
Either way, we want no explanation of words.

Life and death or something close, and I’m tired of both.
Make the matter dark with silent weaponry. By the Powers!

By the orders, executive orders. Fake news and the irrational arguments of the masses.
We are sick hearts drying in the sun.

It is becoming harder to live, harder to laugh, harder to love.

No Wings

More pain first, more joy later
tied down to earth
worn out in search
beat my forehead and clasp my knees
with no wings to fly

The Terrible Silence of God Is Coming

     This is a true story. Nothing has been invented. Nothing has been changed. Not even the names have
been changed to protect the innocent. The author leaves it to you to determine the reasonableness of the views expressed. If we have established the statutory requirements, we will be well pleased.

    I was on a stakeout with my partner, G., in a car – a standard midtown sedan, gray. Standard police issue – but she was never in my car. Nevermind the lurid hush-hush tales you hear on on the nets. Bring me documentary evidence. Bring me oral histories or verbal reports. She’d just flown back into town a few days ago. Always needed a fix – but she wouldn’t talk about it. And anyway, I never met her outside of the office, outside of business hours.

    These are the questions that needed answers: Who was here when she was here? Who was paying for it all? Her attorneys were asking the same questions – but with their budget, I’d bet that they were getting better answers than we were. Who’s being unfair here? It’s a hell-storm, shit-show of our own creation, duly authorized and fully approved by officials of the highest caliber. Receipts showed three hundred and fifty thousand in this year alone.

    So we waited and we watched. We would find an answer. G. cleaned and oiled his gun while I sipped old coffee from a paper cup and worried the crossword puzzle in the paper. Code No. 0075 from Room 40 stumped me. I couldn’t work a miracle. Filings and collations on all the intercepts – rows and columns of numbers and letters. 9000 range in the last group, last row. This kind of thing was usually reserved for double encoded names. I thought I might be on to something here.

    On the street, in the cold, war and diplomacy, drug deals and stock exchanges. Take me through from A to B to C. The police will come and consequences follow – at least that’s how it’s supposed to operate. Marijuana. Heroin. Codeine. Hide the circumstances. These back room, street corner deals are usually conducted in secret. But, no sir. Not here. Not in America. Twelve thousand of General Pershing’s troops in Mexico would beg to disagree.

    The call came over the radio: “Calling all groups: Pry meaning from action and locate the missing explosive materials. Photos to follow.”

    “So we wait.” G. said and I agreed. “We wait and watch. Nothing’s changed. Not deadly peril. Not possible miracle.”

    We had the telegram. We had the purloined snapshot showing the suspect on vacation with two buxom beauties (neither his wife). We had pages and pages of decoded documents from the state department. But over all of this we still had questions: Why?

    The call came again: “You have one minute to make up your mind. Move now or suffer.” The bosses had enough – they thought – to demand immediate action, but we were not convinced. The liar lies. It’s what he is. It’s what he does.

    “Should we go?” G. asked me, his voice already fading into the cold.

    “The Terrible Silence of God is coming,” I answered. “And we will, come what may, do what we must.”

Misquoting It - And Badly

     “I know the truth of it. I know what is real and what is required,” she said to me in the hall where it smelled of sweat, and stale cigarette smoke, and boiled cabbage. She cornered me, trapped me in the hall and insisted that I listen to her as she told me a series of stories of divorce heard second hand and strange tales of invisible, two-headed children at play. “You’ve heard the stories,” she asserted. “You’ve heard the reports of sinners, and satanists, and sexual deviants.”

    I nodded, not knowing what to say.

    She began again, stepping closer. I could smell her sour breath. “We live in an assassination culture…”

    “Cut it out, Hazel. I’ve warned you about this.” The booming voice of the landlord echoed through the hall. “Leave that man be.”

    Hazel turned away from me toward the unseen voice. “But…”

    “Now I’m not gonna' tell you again. This is your final notice.”

    “But…”

    “Your final notice, Hazel. Your identity – your finances will all be transferred.”

    This whole conversation was making me uncomfortable. I just wanted to deliver the mail and be on my way. I had a route to finish and a supervisor monitoring my time. “I think I may have compromised…” I started to say.

    “Compromised,” The landlord repeated. “Yes. That’s the word. The true word.”

    I nodded, not knowing what to say.

    “She’s alive, right?” the landlord sneered.

    “Well, I don’t know…”

    “Alive, but genetically modified. I mean, look at her.” He grabbed her chin and turned her face toward me so I could see her. Take a better look. “Look at her. That building, that body’s been vacant for months.”

    “And you’re still charging her rent?” I demanded.

    “You know what they say,” he sneered. “The sorrow of the world is death. The sorrow of the world is death.”

    “I know the reference,” I told him. “And I know that you’re misquoting it. And badly.”

    I looked at her again and she smiled at me. “We see your open and palpitating heart. My ears and my heart.” She laughed. “These,” she said pointing to the landlord, “are the manifestations not of doubt, but of deliberate, willful disbelief. This is the sixth hour darkness of hardhearted, soft-headed politicians.”

    “Hey, hey, hey,” objected the landlord. “I don’t wanna’ hear no more of that. I’m warnin' you.” But he turned and left without a word or action more. Hazel returned to her apartment. And I continued along my route.

Faithless, Hopeless

Another day of sweaty desperation
and psychotic spirals
twelve miles more and I’ll be done
till tomorrow when it begins again.

But what about now?
a faithless, hopeless future
only love remains.
Maybe that will be enough.

Suffer Till Someone Else Takes Over

 

Now we find ourselves living in a state of death
in this mere mortal homicide homeland
we are isolated in an endless universe
and gravitational collapse seems imminent
the emergency preparedness test sirens
blare through our hymns and prayers.

Why all the lies? Despair is an insult to God
but give me the benefit of the doubt
I’m broken. Try me. I’m still somewhat functional
let me suffer. suffer. suffer
till someone else takes over
there’s nothing left to plunder.

6:30 Mindful of Time and Late

     6:30 mindful of time and late – as if we were the last, lost souls beneath the throne of glory – in a small diner where a woman was killed. Call it a misunderstanding over a cup of coffee. Was it murder? Assault? An accident? The question is still lingering.

    Why, just yesterday they were driving combat vehicles through these streets to crush “the threat of civilization,” they said. A global war of destiny sparked and fueled by their own unstable emotional impulses, led by the noise and blinded by the sun, the sun, the blinding sun. There were fascist actions in Oklahoma City. Fascist actions in Des Moines. All the fanatical, fundamentalist righteousness of people devoid of empathy. We fall apart and burn in a hell of our own making.

    Please. I can’t stand to be alone. And I can’t stand alone. We are in this together. My agnostic friend is desperate enough to talk to God, if you would believe it. I do. I’ve been there myself. I’ve not always believed, so I understand. And I tell him so, but he doesn’t believe me.

    This malnutrition. Apathy. Atrophy. Beaten and sore abused. Burned with cigarettes. Like a battered car. Broken down and crippled under the archway in a puddle of urine. Now which is worse – you tell me – if the urine is mine? Or if the urine belongs to someone else?

    This is the fifth chapter. Apologies. This is the fifth mystery – divided – where the music (and the world?) ends abruptly. But how did it begin, you ask. How did it begin? It began with the Why. Not how are you? But Why are you? It began with the word and the word was Why​?

Confess!

I am naught but dust and ash, smoke and small engine noise, subject to the cruelty and violence of the masters and their sons, all the scions of grasping little men. They caught me and drugged me and drug me behind the car for half a block before dropping me into this cell where I am now. 

All this happens. They ask me many questions. 

“What is this God?

And you, who are you?

What comes first? What came next?

Who is responsible for seizing and staring into the darkness and silence? Recall!”

The room has one small window, high on the wall and barred. I do not know how long I have been here. I do not know how long I will stay. 

“We want the things held in your memory, all the false arguments and false objections. Ready for proper classification of impressions - hard or soft, cold or hot, outside or inside. Open up your memory, the treasure house, that great harbor of secrets, brought back and reproduced on command.”

They want me to confess my secret exhaultations. They want me to confess my trembling. They want me to confess my secret sorrow into the ears of unbelieving men.

All this happens and again. 

“Do this! Not that! Only this, never that! Speak not to yourself, but to us. Speak to these things uncontained. Answer all types of questions. What grammar? Does the thing exist? What is it and what kind?”

“If you make a sound it will not go unreported, unrecorded. Cease and sink. Slip away. But there is nowhere else to go. Name the numbers and number the names for our official reports.”

I will remember to forget and will forget to remember. This is how I will live. All this happens and repeat. 

I remember a woman with a light. Beautiful and well praised by her neighbors. I remember the darkness when she was discovered… how could we have known? I remember many accusations, those accusations looked for and found, all those lost experiences - repressed, oppressed, suppressed. But when the memory loses itself… try to recollect and it is something other. Rejected, unrecognized, unremembered. 

“We demand a restoration!”

I am naught but dust and ash, smoke and small engine noise. I do not know what has been said or what will be declared. Till then I will try to remain content in the hope of happiness.

“Late it was and later now. Within and without, we are here. Shattered deaf, flashed and shone, scattered blind, breathing, panting, hungry, thirsty, burned for peace, but still you cling to sorrow. You are a burden to yourself. We should find joy, on which side stands victory. We should find pity and mercy - but you are sad and full of wounds. Is not the life of a man upon the earth all trial? But there will be no trial for you. No due process, no bill of rights with all its protections. No.”

All my hope is nowhere. All my hope is now here. Ever burning, never extinguished. Set me on fire. 

“You are a problem, an infirmity, a groaning, glowing ember dimmed with age. A base and disgraceful thing with contempt. But this is another day in which we will repair our previous losses. Confess to our brotherly and devout ears. We have your clothes and your shoes. We have the photographs of your adult children.”

All this happens. Repeat. 

“Listen to yourself. What pleasure would there be for us in your mangled corpse? None. But what horror? Also none. There is no need to go to the lengths of producing further examples. Confess!”

In this space, folded upon space, I will not be discovered. There is no secure space for my soul. Scattered. Brought together. Held fast before open doors and sweet delights. Held back again, weighed down. Miserable. 

“We will be loved and we will be feared. Without interruption. Without intermission.  We will command your mind with a single observation. Who would rescue you? The help of angels? What prayer? What sacrament? The pope is dead. Now strange visions and delusions. The prince of the air is our fellow conspirator.”

All this happens and again. 

“Here you are free among the dead - Confess!

Here you are victim and victor - Confess!

Here you should despair - Confess!

Many and great are your infirmities - Confess!

Terrified by the mass and weight of misery - Confess!”