This sea of madness

Sunday, December 06, 2015

I always come back to this same place

Where the shores of oppression are awash

With the scattered empty shells of the sea’s most hapless,

Beings snatched up by the savage jaws

Of the ever-devouring winged beast that dominate the air,

Each justifying its existence in this strong over weak world

Where any thing can be rationalized as long as one side wins,

Right and wrong, good and bad, mere labels to post on flags

So that one might explain and moralize the slaughter

As something other than eat or be eaten,

When the weak are most often the least able to eat

And are most often eaten to bloat bellies and inflate egos

Of those powerful enough to do what they wish

Without consequence or conscience.

I have spent most of my life wrongfully enamored with this sea,

Seeing justice and fair play where there is only chaos and greed,

Once believing that everything evens out amid the ebb and flow of waves

When all we get are the washed up bodies of those unable to compete.

Power play

Saturday, December 05, 2015

They crave it like cocaine

Petty Napoleons plotting world conquest

On the backs of moist bar napkins and old pay stubs

Living in the shadow of their great fathers

Whose shoes they can barely fill,

Yet whose fortunes they squander

As if they earned it themselves

Feeding on some need even they do not even know,

Some unfulfilled ambition they see in other people

A fountain head of misguided logic

That paints them as a glorious prince

Hiding their lust behind masks of self-righteousness

They way Dorian Gray hid behind his portrait,

Too scared to ever show their real face

For the horror it would reveal about their dark soul

This craving, this ache for power, this need to be

Something other than merely petty.

Private Eye

Friday, December 04, 2015

They hate it when you give them

All the dirt they could ever possibly want

And they can’t use it,

Because they’re looking to fit you into a mold

But you’ve already made one for yourself,

Avoiding the typical white hat/black hat

Film Noir these guys like to create

In their attempt to create myths

They can sell to their clients,

When everybody should know

There is no distinction, just gray haze

Through which all people stroll,

Trying to avoid the pitfalls and the petty traps

Laid by vengeful, overly ambitious men

With Napoleon complexes

Who get frustrated and dangerous

When anyone gets in-between them

And their petty schemes,

Sending fedora-wearing detectives to stare

Out from the darkened doorways

Across the street, looking to find

The right kind of dirt for the right kind of trap

And all you give them is dirt to bury themselves with.

Puppeteer

Wednesday, December 02, 2015

He aches all over,

Back bent from leaning down

Inside his box,

The hidden little man

With gnarled fingers

Bleeding from where they
embrace the strings,

His voice fading into the non reality

Of puppet voices,

He must make up

Because puppets do not have voice

Of their own

Or brains,

And yet he so desperately needs them

To say things, he cannot say for himself,

A gnarled man inside and out

Full of illusions he creates

And then comes to believe as real,

Keeping things in motion his only goal

In a life where strings get tangled

And he is constantly struggling

To unravel them so that the fiction

Might go on,

His whole life lived here in this box,
where he can control every little thing

Except himself.

Horror movie

Wednesday, December 02, 2015

Eddy Murphy said it best;

When the ghosts says get out

GET OUT,

The monster never stops,

Its claws clutch even to the last,

Desperately clinging to last

Vestiges of power

Even when the end of near,

If you can ever get it

So near the end as that,

The monster never stops,

Ruthless in its ambitions,

Always sly,

Sneaking up in the dark,

And unlike the ghost

Eddy Murphy quotes

It never quite says

“Get out,”

until it has its fangs

in your throat,

by which time

it’s too late to do anything

but try and survive.

Rattle

Monday, November 23, 2015

The leaves rattle against the side of my car

As I sit here to wait out the first true chill of fall,

Each degree causing to shrink a little inside,

I want what I’ve always wanted, but can never have

On fair days with warm sun, I feel less its loss,

I am always losing something and finding something else

I’ve lost before when searching for what I’ve lost this time,
luck and ill luck tied together so I always get both,

I’m chained to the ground, a perpetual prisoner of my own life,

Condemned to the slow decay time brings, like an old leaf

Listening to the rattle of leaves already turned brown

Or lingering at the edges of limbs they are too weak to escape,

Moved, but unmoved by each gust of wind,

Lost when I finally break free to roll across leaf-strewn streets,

With no real purpose or direction, finding no company

In the piles of other leaves only indignity of rubbing shoulders

With strangers when all I ache for is to return to the tree

To turn green again, when all I can do is rattle.

This side of the Hudson

Sunday, November 15, 2015

I walk near the water

Chill air bellowing around me

As a chill stirs up inside

This budding exhaustion

Making my step drag

Even in places like this,

I always ache for water

When I feel this way

When the world seems

Madder than the average hatter

And the only answer to anything

Is more hate

The distant shooting reverberates

All these miles away

Recalling the smoke that once

Hung over this place

And if I stare hard enough

I can still see the smoldering

Of towers that now live

Inside my head

I ought to be home in bed

Curled up under a blanket

Seeking refuge in dreams

Where such things do not

Occur unless I let them,

And a backfire is just a backfire

Not the end of the world.

This one’s for you

Friday, November 06, 2015

I live my life in myth

This sifting of sand

That blows through me

Like a sandstorm

I never have experienced

In real life,

Fogging up my eyes,

And clogging up

By lungs

So I can’t breathe,

Life is so complicated

I can’t describe it

Except in vague ways

As if each time I put

My pen to paper

The wind comes along

To blow the words away,

Making me think of that

Old song,

About dust or sand

Getting in your eyes,

But knowing that even

In the midst of all that,

Even when the wind blows hardest,

And the sand gets rough

This one is for you.

A drift at sea

Thursday, November 05, 2015

The water rises and falls

In this place with the moods of the moon,

Slapping at the shore of stones

With each passing cargo ship

I am lost in the tides like a small boy

Who has been cast out into the wide sea

Desperate to feel a bottom I know

I can never reach except by drowning,

And I am already way over my head

Each breath filling me up until I can no longer

breathe, or think – floating in this place

as helpless as drift wood as I cast my gaze

around for one desperate glimpse of land

knowing that if I can put my feed down

on something firm

I can survive.

Tough

Sunday, October 11, 2015

We bend our lives these days

Like strong men bending steel bars with teeth

Tough never tough enough

And your eyes like unguarded gates

To a tough soul so tender

If brings tear to my eyes to look at

No secret passages contained inside

Just a maze of curiosities,

The mysteries of the universe

That ache for something bigger than the turmoil

That engulfs the world

Tough but not tough

You filled with passion for something more

Something real or pure

Powerful in the way the ocean is

Drawn out when a summer squall takes shape

Each wave washing over the world

Reshaping it, while you almost seem

Unaware of your influence

The way the moon is unaware of hers over

These same seas

We sailors riding these passions

Until we either find land

Or sink deep into its perilous flow

Filling our lungs with something

So rich we cannot help but feel satisfied.

I wear you like silk

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

I pull you over me

Like a silk sheet

Cool skin growing

Warm with a touch

Soft on every part

As I move

This sleep we sleep

That is not sleep at all,

Shakes us at every turn,

We making and remaking

This bed we lay on

Finding excuses

To ruffle it,

I feel you around me,

Tight the way

A glove is tight

But it is not a finger

I press inside,

Easting in and out,

The ritual that wakes me

And also puts me

To sleep,

As potent as any drug,

We strolling leaf-strewn paths

In our own waking

And in our dreams,

Hear the hoot of trains

That have long ceased

To come this way,

Leaving only the soot

Of their passing

On dark tunnels below,

For us to explore,

And the soft touch

Of silk around our limbs

This pace we exist in,

Real and unreal

Made up each morning

By the made service

Of our rational minds

To become ruffled again

By passion that has

No reason,

Only ritual and release

Pink

I dream of flower petals

The soft stroke

Of tender fingers

Across my brow

Or cast across my path

Like pink snow

I ache for the just turned leaves

Autumn’s lips

Tips dipped in bits of red,

I ache to kiss

I live a Wizard of Oz life

The scared man behind the curtain,

The cowardly lion

Stumbling and bumbling

Through a landscape

Of Freudian slips

Over which I constantly trip,

Never able to say

What I need to say

When I need to say it

My head so full of haze

It might be cotton candy,

Or the faded pink

Of a faded movie,

With me

Always aching in mid step

To stop and dive deep

Into the midst of pink,

To spread it

and taste what

Lay beneath,

To kiss the red tips

And tender lips,

Each pedal a special gift

Too frail to touch too hard,

But I always do,

Me, lost in this maze

Of my own making,

A bumbling, tumbling

Head of straw

Knowing my brain

Can’t cure the pain

A metal man searching for a heart

That is already broken,

Each joint stiff

With the fall of rain,

And still the pain

Comes, the ache pounds

Inside me as if I am trapped

Inside my own chest

A phony wizard

Needing to drown myself

Once and for all

In pink.

End of summer rain

The water drips from your chin to chest

And I lick it up,

The rain drenching the world

With its cool touch,

And I need to taste

Where each drop goes

In order to know it,
I believe nothing I see

Needing to feel it,

Or taste it

Needing to take it inside

So that it blossoms in me,

Seeds carried at the core of it

The way rain drops

Carry specks of dust

Each bit a hint at a place

It has touched,

So I may touch it, too,

The taste of that place

Lingering on the tip of my tongue

Until I swallow,

All of it consuming me

This romance that devours us all,

One unable to consume

Without being consumed,

All this union, this push and pull

These drips of drops

We learn to know it all.

Rime or reason?

Sunday, August 16, 2015

I don’t know who you are

Lingering on the edges of my world

A strained violin note

Stretched out inside my head

Until I can’t think

Or breathe

Feeling its vibrations

Pounding up from the core of me

A stranger’s song

Reverberating

Until it becomes

An earthquake

I can’t escape,

A melody

With no rime or reason

I can’t stop

Humming

Sense of sense

(date unknown)

I weave my finger through you hair

It feels like water and I wonder

Why my fingers are not wet

This touch, a rush inside me

I cannot fully explain,

This need to feel it

Whenever I look at you

To taste it and to know

All there is to know

I kiss your lips and lick

It with the tip of my tongue

Tasting all there is too taste,

Needing to feel deep inside

So as to know exactly what

You really feel like,

Knowing that I can never

Really know you until I

Know you from the inside out

I lay beside you in the heat

The sweat dribbling from us both

As we breathe deep

I can see nothing in the dark

But I still feel you

And I still taste you

As we breathe deeply together

This sense of sense

Not at all lost in the dark

Though with my eyes closed

I still ache for more

I float

Saturday, August 08, 2015 (written earlier)

I float,

Lungs filled with air

I dare not let out

Filled with your air

But also empty

I cannot breathe

Deeply enough

To fill the cavity

Inside my chest,

A cough brings up,

Each memory

The lingering touch

I am desperate

To feel again,

The kiss I miss

Yet so filled with bliss

It keeps me float,

Like a life preserver,

On this insane sea

We all must float upon

And flounder in,

Each soul bobbing

Between the ripples

Of waves,

I float with you

Inside of me

With a memory of me

Being inside of you,

I wear you around me

Until you become me,

Or I become you,

Even when you are gone

Surviving each storm

By merely staying afloat

My lungs filled with air

I stole from you

With each desperate kiss,

Knowing then

As I know now

That I might never

Get another chance

To breathe you in.

I float,

Feeling every inch

Of what I felt then

Every curve, every valley,

The friction and head

We drew each time

We made contact,

Electric, atomic,

The scene of it

Lingering in my nostrils

So that I can breathe

Little else,

Part of this endless sea

I float in

And which over time

Will finally consume me

As I once consumed you,

I float,

But not alone.

You move; I move

(date unknown)

You move and I move

Like sheets of Teflon

That creates heat

Without friction,

This heat boiling up

From inside

To burst out

And subside,

Our lives bent around

These volcanic eruptions

Needing the feel of it

As we stir up the lava,

And the bliss of it

When it all breaks free

Each phase

A perilous adventure

We might not survive,

The climb to the top

The sacrificial plunge,

The lost moments

When we cease being

Who we are

For whom we become,

Broken on the sharp

Shards of loved and lust,

Then reborn,

Like a phoenix

We rise from our own ashes

To repeat it again

And again,

The insanity of pending death,

Defying feat we need

To perform in order

To feel as if we are alive

You move, then I move

Then we both move

Together,

Somehow managing

To find moments when

We can feel inside

And outside

As we stoke up

A fire neither of us

Can control,

Or would want to,

Learning that the best part

Is when we have

No control at all

Getting a grip

Wednesday, July 22, 2015

I sweat just to think about it

This climb up and down

With nothing more than

Fingers and toes to grip with,

The lip of it hanging over me

Like a cliff that might tumble

Down at any time,

This life of risk,
this grip on the tip of it,

Both hands too moist

At the palms to keep me

From slipping
and still I climb,

Pushing myself up

And into each crevice

Feeling the fabric against me

As I move one precious inch

After another,

Aching over progress made

Fearing a back fall so I cling

The sweat dribbling down

From brows to eyes to mouth

So I taste the salt of it,

Get drunk on it,

And the pursuit of it,

The ache to over come

And keep climbing,

Often with no other purpose

Than to see what lies
over the other side,

To see if I can reach it,

Knowing that there will always be

More of it to climb

And stare over

When I finally manage it.

Mummy

Mystery wraps around her

A mummy with only the glint of her eyes

In this dark placed filled with phantoms

I cannot make out,

Her shape the brightest

As if death’s second life

Has already consumed her

And we live with the blaze

Of her existence

Feeling it scorch our bones

We, the unnamed masses, who

Get buried in the glorious tomb

As tribute to who she was

And who she will become,

Our lust for her life meaningless

Against the praise we must cast upon her,

And do so out of some deeper

Compulsion we cannot resist,

We consumed by her flames

Slave to her life

Chained to her fate

Stumbling into our own doom

Just to heap praise on her,

We foolishly believing

We have wills of our own

And might – if we wanted – do

Something other than what she demands

The whole time feeling her flames

Engulf us.