Like a Daycare on Fire

 It was crowded and noisy inside my mind today, like a daycare on fire. It wasn’t a stream of consciousness; it was a gush, a mudslide, a broken sewer line of consciousness. No symmetry. No reason. Only nonsense nursery rhymes. Two radios played simultaneously. The first played “Stacy’s mom has got it going on” on repeat. Not the whole song, just “Stacy’s mom has got it going on. Stacy’s mom has got it going on. Stacy’s mom has got it going on…” the other played Melissa Etheridge - first “come to my window,” then “I’m the only who’ll walk across the fire for you” back and forth. Sometimes together. I tried to focus. Stacy’s mom. I tried to breathe. Stacy’s mom. I tried to find the mystic selah at the center of the sacred om. But Stacy’s mom has got it going on. - Peel the chicken. Lick the chicken. Peel the chicken. What does that even mean? I don’t know but it wouldn’t stop. Look at me in my old man sweater. Walk across the fire with Stacy’s mom. Are you buying or selling t used cocaine oil? What? Discarded shoes and gloves found after the snows have melted. Come to my window. Eternity is the flame after the candle has been blown out. Who said that? 

The noise in my head settled to levels slightly louder than normal around noon. It was almost tolerable. Stacy’s mom had got it going on. Actually - Stacy’s mom is probably age appropriate for me. Is she still available? 

Dreaming with a Red Hat

 I’m out on the streets 

while the shadows are still long 

trying to recapture thoughts and dreams 

that disappeared before the dawn.

There was a hallway that went nowhere

and I was never there. 

There was the smell of urine 

lingering in the air 

while liberals, Catholics, Freemasons, and Jews

were rewriting the dictionaries

that you disdain to use. 

Someone somewhere

had barricaded the church-house doors. 

Was this dream mine, or is it yours?

All these codes and signs 

read more like yours than mine. 

A thousands words of poison and deceit. 

A thousand words of fraud and treachery. 

And so it seems

I will be stuck,

At least for a time,

with all your distressing dreams. 

Stop Cutting

Stop cutting - you're hurting yourself
but not only anyone and everyone
all of us
all of this must change
all the satanic lies 
from unstable spirits 
and brainwashed devotees 
at the heart of an insecure nation

Is it working? I cannot tell
what is it you think you're accomplishing?
No one's ever so cruel 
as the one planning a population reduction
accelerating the work and danger

The Sin of Empathy - America's Song

 

We are great and we are bold
we will pound you into sand
our legs our iron, our head is gold
the world is ours to command

We won't take no for an answer
we demand and we extort
and what they won't give to us
we'll just have to take by force

So it's down with mercy and out with love
stuff your feelings, we don't care
we're in charge now, that's how it is
you can complain but you won't dare

We are vain and we are blind 
God help us, but we are cruel
we've forgotten our fist love 
and rejected the golden rule

So it's down with mercy and out with love
kindness and compassion are for fools
in the empire of scorn we're building 
spite and pride are the guiding rules

Between a cliff and a burning fire
where the mob calls out for blood
when we call it the sin of empathy
you can't be surprised that we have none. 

Once I Opened My Mouth

 

“I am not worthy; I cannot answer you anything, so I will put my hand over my mouth. I spoke one time, but I will not answer again; I even spoke two times, but I will say nothing more.” Job 40:4-5

She

She seized and cut my still beating heart, left me exsanguinating into the resurrection machine. She was the voice of all the repeated, reheated, recycled, rehydrated whispers in the heavy, heaving air. 

She disappeared into the light and shadow, disappeared into the distant police sirens. All of this was her loathing pretense of a loving embrace. 

She exploded on the threshold. She was beyond the door, behind the walls. She was beyond all the crowded machinery, going through other doors to other places.

The Impossible Light of Death

Open this particular wrath 

And open this particular hell

With each proximate breath 

We delay the arrival 

Of the impossible light of death 

Not a sudden destruction 

Maybe not in darkness 

Maybe not today

But unexpected and unannounced 

Even as they are still rejoicing 

Peace and safety and all the good that will follow

Peace and safety and all the good that they promise 

You know enough to know that they lie and they lie 

And will never uphold the law

Peace and safety but they shall not escape

You Called Me Up (a song for Jess)

 Yesterday while I was out delivering the mail, I wrote a song for the second of my ex wives. It’s a country song, apparently. 

The Moon of Endless Failure

 It was a world of competing interests and the ever increasing influence of performative ignorance. This was nothing new. Nothing had changed. Nothing ever did. A world of pretense toward morality and meaning. A world of secret contracts and contracted disease. A world of decaying infrastructure. 

And he hated it. He hated all the strenuous effort required to maintain a measure of daily calm in a world so riven by low men and their rivalries. 

He was tired of public officials and the official public rhetoric. He was tired of their much lauded but never demonstrated love. He was so tired.

As the moon of endless failure rose into the evening sky he knew that they would, given the chance, throw us all into the fires of the furnace for a dollar. 

Epiphany In Uncertain Times

Come now, visit and bless

this house, this home

with a gladness and glory unknown

in dark and desperate days

Show us how to rise up in splendor 

when darkness covers the earth

when thick clouds of satanic deception 

have taken control  and taken the soul 

of people I know and love

Come to make all things plain 

Come to make all things clear

here where our hearts throb and overflow 

with grotesque exaggerations 

and slow suffocation 

The global injustice

and domestic terror

the home grown police violence

of shadow puppets 

and selfish prophets

have obscured the stars of hope

Even so, the grace given to me 

is still a mystery

the light has dawned and the glory come

like justice a flower

Bless all who live here 

with the gift of your love

seeing and being seen

knowing and being known 

20+C+M+B+25

You Cut Me (The Knife Don't Know)

The other day I had the nonsense phrase "The knife doesn't know you cut me," stuck on repeat in my mind. It sounded to me like the refrain of a black comedy country song - and that's what it became. I hope you like it. 

Inanimate objects don't know the things we know
the rocks and stones can't feel when the winter storms do blow
I don't blame the knife you carried; it was completely unaware
The knife don't know you cut me, but you don't care. 

I ain't sayin' I was easy, only that you were unkind
you never let me hear the music playin' in your mind
or was it that you had no songs, no melody of your own 
and that's why you would cut me to the bone? 

You, you cut me, cut me to watch me bleed
You, you cut me, I'd show you the scars but there's no need
Maybe you won't hear it but darlin' I gotta' share: 
The knife don't you you cut me, it's you that doesn't care. 

Your lips were hard as iron, your kisses cold and sharp
you never let me hear the beating of your heart
Every act of kindness, every loving touch I gave
you returned to me like a slash from your blade. 

You, you cut me, cut me to watch me bleed
You, you cut me, I'd show you the scars but there's no need
Maybe you won't hear it but darlin' I gotta' share: 
The knife don't you you cut me, it's you that doesn't care. 

Half Deaf and Unsure

 

Now half deaf and unsure 

if the silence 

or the roaring voice is real 

A thunderous, bottomless noise 

in the freezing cold  

of a windowless room 

The lights gone out 

crushed skulls thrown forward 

knocked out, dead 

oh God, oh God 

Ghostly floating silver 

obsidian sparkle 

lights extinguished by pain 

Blind danger, gasping in surprise 

for all the fumbling frustrations 

all the blood from the mouth, the head 

Oh God, oh blind God 

not this, or anything else 

God, not this

The Shadows of the Dead

It’s time now for stepping out for the shadows of the dead. 

Make a close examination of the brain and of the head. 

Close up the face, close and blind your eyes. 

We’re staring at the stars without looking at the skies. 

The world of the living dead is every day reborn. 

With each resuscitation comes renewed hate and scorn. 

Time passes quickly here, even faster than we know. 

Repeated and recycled, the chaos only grows. 

Do not think about the void, ignore the alarms. 

Let the darkness of the night fill you with its charms. 

There’s life and death in blood and paychecks every week. 

But there’s no light in the counterfeit life you seek.