skip to the races

in a never-ceasing ever-blissing
always-kissing explosive-rundown-
popeyed-delicious twirl of being
perfectly and delectably
high

i journey onward sword in hand
and laugh and giggle because
the rain keeps hitting harder
and harder and the tears
dribblespilldeluge in thicker
pools of lost and wasted soul
lost and wasted
lost and straining
man outstretched taking the fall
for everyone here

and the rain shatters down around
his body and he crumbles into
nothing but his fiery veins
begging for his baby girl back
to a once warm home
with a poison throne
where ghosts cling hardfast
to the rising beast that
refuses to forget the now lifeless
fiber that used to be cells splitting
into other cells
but now everything
dark and hateful is
flashing in the rain
intermittently
because
my eyes want to see
no more torture
no more nothing
no more of
in out down
sound round
like to rhyme
never quite keeping
the metronome time
up
on the piano

and so i breathe in deeply
everything that ever had a
purpose or a scoff from the
heart of my scalding
bubbling underbelly
at these critics and skeptics
who do nothing but whine
and know absolutely nothing
and do not as of yet realize
how precious
this gift could be

and the smoke rises on this morning
after the brutal battle of the ever-scorched
tundra and the rumble rumble
chants under your feet
rumble rumble it blossoms up beneath you
like the upsurge of humanity finally
in its first bewildered coming and like
christmas we all gather around
the cross and take things
from under it
like bicycles
and tonka trucks
and blood-stained spears
and endless unconditional love
and the coldest limpest hand
of destiny on this coldest
deadest ground

and from a cottage down
the street they watch the
smoke rise and flutter away
but i inhale once more
that which leaves me
somehow brighter and
somehow further down
in my darkness
without a lamp
or a flicker
of a fire
here in this
hole and i
skip to the
races.

the burst

onwards
and upwards it goes
swelling to the edge of
the burst (i just hope it
can stand the heat) i
can already feel the fire
stirring within it
singing odes to my
broked-down nerves.

if i can’t open a heart (bleeding
or not here i come) i’d love to
open an eye at least just one
i’d like that balloon to pop
come to think of it and
(sputter sputter) spout
into raging fire a torrential
eruption for the sake of chancing
an atom or two’s courtship
clasping each other tight enough
to hold onto a simmering
fraction of heat and

maybe just maybe
one little ember will breathe
and the ash will fall onto the
life loving dirt cold and bland

and maybe just maybe
a speck of smoldering orange will glow
in the bottomless gray endless streets
moonlight delightfully absent in the
quaint reflections on street corners
and as the ember sinks
burning into dust
her lids might open
and a flicker of red
would alight
reminding her that it’s okay to dream
but it’s better to sleep.

here at the end of all things

you count the grains of sand on the beach
you say hey
come over here and count these grains
look real hard
and tell me if there are 728521 grains
or
728522 grains in this jar of sand
and i will look real hard and
study with my big fat brain
and finally
i will come to the conclusion
but you keep counting with
no conclusion in sight and
simply say
look
now that i
have done all this counting
(see what good counting
i have done) and
look
i have counted even more than
this simple jar of sand
but have counted the whole beach
from whence it came
and now i (truly!) know
that there are exactly
bighugelargenumber grains
of sand here
and i will say
wow
that is so interesting you now know
that the beach upon which we tread has exactly
bighugelargenumber grains of sand
on it
or
in it
or
whatever
and you thrust your hands upon your
hips and embolden your chest with this
mighty newfound knowledge welling up
in your big fat brain and say
look at everything we’ve accomplished
here at the end of all things
and i will say
wow
that is so interesting because
we now know this bighugelargenumber
but what does that mean
(what i mean to say is)
how does this help us
it is just another number
like two or five
and you say
well this means that
we know something
and i say
what do we know
we can no better explain ourselves
and have found no better scapegoat for our
actions and behavior and personality
(and the psychological quagmire
that we all bought stock in)
it just makes me sick with anger
that we can be butchered into little tests
and questions
and ass-tro-logical signs that say
hey this is how you are and
how you think
but you’re not really thinking
and
as i’m begging for
some
slight iota of
significance
from these
scientists
and
men of reason
all i hear is the sound of their
croaking honda civic engines
igniting gasoline
creating a spark
pumping pistons
all the way to the next beach
at the end of all things
where they’re getting out their
brand new shiny abacuses
and state-of-the-art magnifying glasses
as they begin their game again.

falling off the wall

it’s falling off the wall
or it’s ragged effortful wheezing
or it’s breaking into pieces
too small for fingers to pluck
or it’s good children laughing
at a bad god
or it’s the disappointing end
of the road it seems

but
in time
the paths are made straight
the wrongs held accountable
as we rally around
yetanothermother miscarrying
yetanotherchild
oblivious and indignant
of what splendorous luck
she has stumbled upon on this
most facetious of stages

crying out
a sick and succinct soliloquy
to love the earth if for nothing
other than the fact that
she cannot stay.

what makes us human, i suppose

something more than mere obligation
a prose sweeter than sick bed nursing
back to health don’t you die on me
i need your strength or who knows
something more than reminiscing
a night of laughter and the strange
air somehow void of the sincerity
we once seemingly bought into no
waitress don’t take that away too

yes let’s just keep it here
i can barely keep it from
sifting through my
fingers but keeping something
even something lost
is better than keeping nothing

if so wickedly forced to choose
which, sadly, we are.

skyscrapers

the colossal lack of motivation
is what we’re here to discuss with

you. you have skyscrapers inside
you. inside your head. there is no

limit to the things you can accomplish.
and as bright as you are i don’t see

how you can refrain from creating
anything and everything spectacular.

the saddest part is you know it.
you tip a hat to the barely tapped

sagacity exuding from your limbs de-
rationalizing this twisted heartless world

into dumb luck. drooling that it’s arbitrary.

and that it’s all very sad. sad, and there’s
trumpets. alas, you scoff from your perch

that the rest of the world just needs
to slurp down another dairy queen

beverage. because who knows
how much longer any of us is here.

oh but i had so briefly held the light

say i
to god
at the assuaging demise
or at least to what i picture
god to be
in this
most likely of scenarios.

buzz

what’s with all the wreckage
THIS IS THE RECKONING
do you reckon
YES I RECKON SO
but what does wrecking have
to do with the reckoning
TASTE THIS
IT IS ANYTHING WITH FAT
AND SUGAR AND GREASE
but why do i want that
answer my question
IT TASTES GOOD
well sure but
IT DISTRACTS YOU FROM
THE TRUTH
JUICY HAMBURGERS MAKE YOU
FEEL SPECIAL AND WARM INSIDE
my sense of personal life sanctity
is reinforced by my appreciative and
functional appetite
YES IF THE BEES WANT TO LIVE
THEN THE HIVE KEEPS BUZZING
ah i see movers to move and ars gratia
blah blah artis bullshit you still didn’t
answer my question
WHAT QUESTION
the wrecking
WRECKING MOVING
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE
moving is something with gainful intent
i would think
COLLATERAL DAMAGE
IS AN UNFAMILIAR CONCEPT
TO YOU THEN
it’s not unfamiliar but
i just can’t accept it
WELL THEN
LET’S SEE YOUR GENES PASSED ON
i’ll pass them right across your eyes
you give me a couple minutes.

slug life

“take your epiphanies seriously,”
says the slug to the wall.

this is the reckoning

so
the time of reckoning
is at hand

WHAT CONTRIBUTIONS
TO HUMANITY
DID YOU (fucking
junkie) OFFER
US?

well okay so
maybe i didn’t
paint a dali
or do some
scientific science
business with the
makesyourbreakfastforyou
genius calculators

but
WHAT?
but i finally found
a way to go to sleep
and i guess you could
say it was painful
but that’s only when
you think of pain
in terms of the
failure to fulfill
an enchanting potpourri
of arbitrary values
clogging the minds
of so many potentially
genuine individuals

WHAT?
YOU ARE MAKING
ME ANGRY well
i guess i should stop
OF COURSE YOU SHOULD
THIS IS THE RECKONING
zipped lips (chief)
hit it and quit it
go for the gold
rock on baby

QUIET DOWN
ANY LAST WORDS?
ahem ahem
good to be here
ladies and gentlemen
i mean this (with all the
sincerity i can scrounge up)
nummmmbero uno: i never
imbibed “too much” cannabis
never ever ever
even when your ears start ringing
and they definitely shouldn’t be
(you remember that day)

nummmmbero dos equis:
i never had a lot of luck
with chicks who were
taller than me (and
fuck that shit)

but then (in these strange, dark times)
we must remember that
this is nothing.

taking umbrage

it is appropriate
to be asked of thunder
its purpose

aside from the
obvious ominous
clatter of fearful

feet running
from rain ‘round
the corner

sinking through
titan spires of
lightning

at the whim of
the atmosphere,
oblivious.

the rising itself

aren’t i supposed to be
“the future”
(something other than
just growing up into you)
or so i heard
but just like the easter bunny
that’s slipping away too
just another
illusion
haha you got me
not to sound cliché
but i don’t see this place
being saved despite
such species self-interest
seems all right to me
anyway
oh hey man
i appreciate it but
you packed it
you get greens.