The Struggle in the face of the Smothering

When they inevitably fall into the cracks

That litter the whole of the world

The lesser people will sit and fester

Like the infected open wounds that they are

While others will struggle tooth and nail

Clawing their ways to the top

Demanding to be heard

Demanding to be known

But in the end they still know

We are but the ashes

Of a dying stars whims.

Safari

As the girl composed herself
She tucked on the very end of her skirt
So that it covered that much more of her
And as she walked she felt it hiking up
To the point that she thought, though she wasn't, that she was exposing herself
The fabled contraptions about her spun
And men loomed out of coffee house windows
Money in hand, and a nice tailored suit
And though lonely, sat at tables set for two
She kept her eyes forward, books under one arm
And her other loose fingers,
Tugging at her skirt
On the side of the road they were driving on by
Bumper to bumper ignoring road signs
Deciphering her clothes, like they were a safe to be cracked
Materializing an x-ray of both her front and her back
The lights materialized green, and they did not go
The red of her dress urged them to move slow
But her fingers held firmly,
So that she felt fabric to skin
And she kept moving forward
As she rounded the corner the males were all feral
Naked and brutally beating each other
With their groins all exposed
And the hairs on their chest
Protruding from tightened muscles, that littered their physiques
They swarmed over each other,
Skin touching skin
To get as close as they could
To the girl in the midst of the copious amounts of others
Not unlike her who stripped of their clothes and rushed to them
Rubbing themselves against them
But the girl in the skirt, that may have been a little to small
She wanted nothing to do with it, nothing at all
And when she finally made it to the place of her learning
She laid down her books,
And kept her eyes forward
As the men all about her kept staring at her calves
Looking up her legs
Imagining what she had
They used absurd words,
Attempting to get a laugh
And she would smile slightly, but keep her eyes to the class
Her eyes were on the forward momentum
That her brain began to rush
And to her side she saw him,
In a slight peripheral
A man not gawking at her
But intent on his time
And she thought when this was all over
Maybe then, they'd have time.

Frost Bite

I do not fear the cold
For the cold always welcomes me
Embraces me for the sake of itself
Demanding that I listen to it
Reprimanding my needs for heat
Thinking it's all I need
While slowly slowing my heart beat
Creeping over my shoulders
And inbetween my toes
It knows the horrors I've seen
The cold,
It knows

What Is Left

About the time that I read the words I had already completed the picture
The cliche's were abound and the relentless hoardes had demanded blood
All I wanted them to do was embrace me in calming love
But they slaughtered me because of something a giant oaf had said
I pleaded and I showed that our interests were shared alone
But I fell under their blades as the oafish one laughed so strange
Contemplating my life I felt the cold rush of realization
That I should have been a little louder
And thrust my knife in to others backs
Because they of course were doing the same to me
and while I peer into my abyss
Drowning and feeling left abandoned
I take pride that I'm not broken
Just bruised as they send my lifeless body down the river styx.

A Reflection in a Pool of Glass

I am at a loss
Looking to find the way
Though the way is not clearly described
I can reach to feel
But I can seldom move to find
Trapped in my own guise
As a thoughtful type
Sliding single toes 
So that each digit can know the surface
Can find the pathway
That might set me loose
But I'm slipping
Falling into the facade of my fabrication
Deciphering simile's but never finding similarities
Contact is regarded with cautious mind
Knowing that fingertips leave residue
And that the night sky does too
I am at the brink
The ice is cracking
And I'm afraid I want to spill in
Tumble down the rabbit hole
Find the conflict where there never was
Making up rhymes
To pass the times
Letting my imagination go superfluous
Pondering the qualms the people have
Hoping for a happy ending to a hopeless situation
Because the light burned out
And I cannot be troubled to change the bulb
Though I like the dark
As I develop the questions
But not good for answers
Invisible in the red hue
I am seeking a decoder
A puzzle to limit this puzzle
The socializing remnants of a dormant life
Wrapped up in cryogenic slumber
A pod for feasting
When your mouth fails to work
And I know I'll sound crazy
As the whispers venture out of sealed lips
Like water leaking out of the spaces
So minute that one would seldom believe they are there
Save for those stains
That expand about darkening what was never before darkened
And letting the light shine in
I am reaching a conclusion
Even though I have not defined my thesis
Even though I have not declared my major
Except that I know it to be terminal
Definite,
Absolute
That is what I know
That is,
As they say
How it goes.

Between a Needle and a Hard Case

There's a pin prick at the back of my neck

Like a sword that couldn't go in

Waiting there on its tip

To destroy me

And spill my soul out onto the floor

I can feel it

But am unable to move

A stark drab and fortitude of bricks lay before me

Delaying my progress

And I unable to push away

Lest the sword pierce my skin

And like I said once before

My soul will spill out onto the floor

I'm contemplating life

As one usually does

Seeing the thousand figures passing by

Like slides of photographs

At the movie show

When put together make the illusion of movement

But I am very much standing still

Its a scary thing to be caught in a trap

Thinking on all the things and where there at

Debating the lasting impressions

That you placed on the last impersonal people you met

Or the ones who met the world to you

Feeling your feet getting sore on the ground

Imagining just stepping back

And watching it all spill out,

Your soul,

Onto the floor.

But you breathe, as I was trying

And you try to make it calm

You try to keep your chest from heaving

And your feet from shaking

And your standing from leaving

But you know that its not perfect

The pin prick isn't pleasant

And wetness trickles down the neckline of your shirt

You know its blood and you know its your own

And all this time you never asked who was holding the knife

Your shirt grows cold, as mine did

Damp and red - you imagine

Sending unwanted shivers up and down

Your ever so askew spine

There's so many questions to ask

So many answers to try to obtain

In a way though i won't get any

That's rather obvious I'd think

Somewhere along the way

As the movie shows play

I feel a glimpse of a solution

Like I know who and I know what

That I somehow deserve this

That I inserted the weapon in the fist

Still I languish my life

feeling anguish and strife

Feeling like its not going to end so well

But i never hurt a fly

Well I have, that's a lie

But in the grandest scheme of things 

I'm a giant not an ant

A gentle man in the guise of a brute

Against the subtle backdrop

Of heartache.

popo

Hide  your heart in the back of a moment
And let the past lay by
Aside from the pain that you are feeling now
You can rest assured that you are breathing
I am going to let you in on  a little secret
That no one can decipher alone
Let the last of the world pass you by
And let the memories fade away
Its good to feel flabergasted
As long as the night is the way

Word Play

It is not to be assumed that I cannot get through this day on my own.

  In the time it takes me to pick up the pieces I would have been half way around the world,

 but here I lay fractured and alone.

  Do not forget all of the trouble that it took to get here,

 because that would be a mistake.

  As they say its not the destination but the journey.

  Forget that though.

  If only I could fast forward through my mistakes that won't leave me alone though they do dwindle on the edge of my mind.

  Almost forgotten but never erased as things never can be.

  I attempt to decipher my own deceptions but that is futile enterprise.

  Give me sometime though and you will see what they've made of me.

 Do not think of me as one of those selfish people who blames my coming short on the bruises given by the others,

 I do have my own shortcomings that prevented from from stepping atop the precipice and I do understand my ladder is weary,

 but my feet are true.

  It may seem confusing,

 but its a mixture,

 a chemical forgery that dragged me through the muck and made me feel disgusted and faithless while all the others joined in raised hands to sing praises to the sky man.

   I'm not saying that I don't have faith,

 but when someone is stripped down to that inner nakedness its hard to find it in your absent pockets that which you believed.

   Sure pieces can be restored and storage spaces refilled but it is not at the present my present circumstance.  Please,

 don't end your gaze, i need your eyes to keep me full.

   Though I'm starved your sight gives me sustenance to make it through the doorway,

 and the door jam knows it. 

  Even in my current stay rays of sunshine will permeate the cloud if only you smile at me.

   And you have so that I may walk on passed the fire place that shoots out flames like bullets made out of clawing talons that seek out my heart and mind in order that it may rip them from their homes and destroy the roots therein.

  I'm not crazy, not now, never was.

   It is said that though I tripped up and broke the hearts of those who loved me most that I forged a path onward,

 not upward.

  To go up to the top of the mountain as I've already stated is something that I've only almost done.

   given that I'm not exactly sure how that could even be almost true,

 let us just dismiss that notion and return us to the task at hand. 

  I am moving onward,

 in a horizontal line that bares me forth into the arms of my aspirations and there is no room for warring hearts that seek to riddle me with rumor and gossip.

  I grow weary of fiscal responsibility but I clamor to the value of the dollar as dearly as some cling on to air.

  i need what I can get and nothing more,

 but the need will grow as i earn more.

   I'm lacking in my skills, sliding down the side of the cliff ready to be splattered up the floor as my brain already is scattered on the walls.

  In a very real sense I am mute. 

 Screaming though I may try I am seldom heard, but often hurt. 

 They think they do it for love but they do it for their inner most satisfactions and I do not blame them. 

 Let enterprising gentlemen solicit lovely ladies as long as they want it that way but don't let it be said i will pleased when a fistful of knuckles is struck upon her smile with the blow of a thousand lies.  

 When her blood bleeds sadness and the men pass on by her,

 i will wander by always on the outskirts of a desert devoid of spaces, 

praying though i don't believe, that she may see when once she was blind. 

 I'll attempt not to whisper too many words, 

but will speak volumes of praise and admiration and perchance she will hear me.  

But,

 who am I to joke on such things as Eagles do not see me only swallows and canaries.  

 There goes the blaming words,

 the slanted view of my slanted soul and I am but a lie.

   Not that I told but what the world labeled me, 

and even that too is a cheap ploy to garner sympathy. 

 Is it such a crime that I am lost in my own self-hatred,

 loathing and love.  

What i see reflected back in restroom mirrors is not the one that everyone sees, 

but how can this be,

 how is it they see anything but what I've seen? 

 I continue to doubt my appearance because how can they see this and think on high. 

  I'm no god, and they the angels I have sought.  

 Me, 

an imp lesser than devils given to ghastly outburst of pity and remorse.  

 Let the wordless people know that the homeless people know than an empty heart will feed no families but a broken heart will feed two.

A Sort of Struggle

Little by little they siphon them away

taking what they can of the subconscious

Simply so they cannot dream

We damn them with their burdens

Their shoulder weighted down

Saying its time to knuckle down

Its time to live so give up now

But we fight on

With what little strength we have

For our doppelganger is ready

To punch the time clock

and get the mortgage through

With all the life force

The world has stole from you.

Procrastination for the Picky

If tomorrows selections are not to your liking you can restart at the beginning

But keep in mind that if you do you will have to rush forward in order to catch up

In this instance it is only wiser to keep on keeping on

To venture onward and upward into the swing of the club

Traveling on simply as you were though your tires at flat

But yes, yes of course you can go back to the start

Do not worry though if you are so far behind that you begin to rip out your hairs

There is no time to regret your mistake because regretting takes time and thought

When your thought needs to be where you are

Of course though, I'm just saying if you had remained where you were and struggled through

You could have stopped to smell the roses

Picking a part your disaster and turning it into less notable garbage but still not perfect

Perfection as you seek it in your singular time constraint cannot be accomplished

Should have thought of that before, just saying

In the meantime we will be over here reclining back in our comfy chairs

While you dreadfully scribble out lines just to make some headway

Your topics are half met though I know

But feel free to continue on that path,

Though your other choice is still here, though I know you are disgusted by your lack of interest

At least you would be finished on time

It is tomorrow and the selections are in but you are no where to be seen

And this grand raise my friend I'm afraid you can not show up late

Once the doors shut it is already over

But don't worry I'm sure nobody will love to see what you did.

Perpetrators of Tragedies

Oh, what do you achieve 

Oh great crusaders of misery and carnage

It is in this way that you either see nothing

Or the same walls and bars for the rest of your life

Notoriety is nothing

Even the evil organizations of criminal activity have had higher standards than you

You stand for nothing, make no statements

I would call you all illogical

But most of you are smart

In this drive of hatred and delight in causing suffering and pain

What is it you hope to achieve

An inner satisfaction to see what its like?

Is the experiment worth the risk

You only have a few sorry supporters

Only a few little boys who follow you around

Is it because of being pushed to far

Well sorry to tell you your still being pushed

By giving in to this sickness you let them win

Did romance never flock your way?

Well it'll never be so now

If you want to cause this pain and you want to end your own

There are plenty of evil men out there

Men with equally devious plans as your own

Or combat zones where the targets shoot back

Have your cake and be dead too

I guess I don't need to understand

I'm not you, you are not me

But you are not in a phase

You are not misunderstood

You are sick

Sick with morbid curiosity

Sick with the belief that you are important somehow

For what purpose

For what rhyme

Except to exercise your own sick urges

Its appalling, but that's what you want isn't it.

You want us all to acknowledge you

You want your picture posted on the papers,

To appear on all the newscasts

To become a legend of notoriety

Its probably our fault for letting this happen

Letting our media shine spotlights to understand your fucking sickness

There is no understanding it

There is no deeper meaning

Unless a tumor is eating your brain, 

Or pushing on places it shouldn't,

And you can't control the voices,

You never had to do this,

You never have to do this,

Its bullshit and you know it.

In the end you are a thief, 

A robber,

You had a high count of victims,

There is no bonus round

There is no parade,

In your own private places you will suffer alone,

And if the devil is there you'll suffer the worst,

If not,

Then what was the point,

Your mothers should have aborted you.

The Bastard's Feast

When they started their journey they had not wanted for anything

For years everything they had needed had been available

When they want arrived they simply called and they were waited on

hand and foot

But now as the summer season drew to a close there was nothing but to want

As provisions failed to meet demand

A supply line dried up like the desert after a momentary rain

So that they were not only thirsty but starving

And as they prayed to the stars for something to be done

It was ultimately their choice to start eating eachother

When once their clothes were neat and clean

They were now wrinkled, tattered and blood spattered

And only one man came out on top

He would stand their watching what was not edible

Fade into rot, as he carried it forth with the luggage

This sole survivor, oppresor, predator

Alive and smiling though he'd just devoured his kin

For the hearts of the basic man set him no room aside for feeling

His survival is the only excuse he needed to cause strife

To kill and torment those he swore to protect

For this man is a coward,

Hacking away at the defenseless

Knowing full well they were so

For he never showed them what to do

When love turned on the loved

When they came the hated

They were never taut to strike back at the hand that fed them

Not even when those hands fed him

Ratios

If by chance the rain does not fall
Then by chance your flowers will not grow
but if by chance the rain doth fall
Then by chance your flowers will still not grow
Meager people manage impossible missions
but beyond the hour they do not know if they will last
Maybe tomorrow many times over they will fail
And beyond their hours they will not know if they can last
Drifting by in dream ways
Floating on the thoughts of the sleep
Taking a way out that no one saw coming
Its the side exit back to their life
If by chance the snow comes too soon
Then by chance you should just give up the roses.

On the Other Side

She played in the flower garden
Where once she was forbid
But now observing eyes were averted
She pranced through pathways
And danced among the feverish lilies
That she did not care about the thorns
She felt the pains as she trampled the roses
Already scratches that emitted red
But she was too carefree to ponder then
What a few cuts could mean
She emerged eventually to the open grass
Feeling just fine and carefree
But the scratches told another story
Yet her eyes remained on the trees

passage across the styx

If but for a moment I felt the love of the spaces between my toes

Taking the minute to gaze and wonder about what isn't there anymore

A dying bed of grass upon a lawn of desert

And the feeble mind cannot comprehend

As sunshine burns more than it nourishes

As hearts fail to beat in rhythm

Each step off my a smallest of seconds

It is not enough that I have loved it all

It is not enough to try

One has to fall and fail in the most numerous of cases

Until the bottom most rung is reached

Where nooses and guitar strings waver

Dangling in mid-air in mid-sentence

As the baked out discussion are left unfinished

As the final nail is placed in the plastic coffin

Like leftovers that nobody ate

All those things left unsaid

All that feeling left faded in the back

Wasted

Half-eatin

Half-desired

and thus

Half-deserved.

The Cycle of our MisConduct

Human history
a convoluted contraption
perpetually pitied my contradictions
Misunderstandings of hubris
that pester grown men into throwing tantrums
beheading wives for the sake of ego
The mistakes of a few
paid by the mutiny of the masses
who can't tell one from two
nor know nothing else than prayers
Disputes based on crimes
disguised as social justices
as the misguided worship dismembers
all that the rest of them held dear
Families trying in vain to gain
their false footholds torn out of the walls
far before they could even begin to dream
All the while the handlers
let loose all of the wild cats
who seek out like carnivorous predators
all the deer and wild fowl that are too slow to move
And in this Darwinism we slumber
hoping that tomorrow our walls will still be around us
daring to build up new ones
As cannon fire rips and roars among us
tearing the paper thin security
sliding straight down the cerebral cortex
toppling governments and corporations
as we sit upon the cinders as the screams echo
closing our eyes,
taking a breath,
repeating our steps,
Until the fable years we were promised may perchance,
Just maybe,
Come like wide eyed children around the corner
Excited and innocent of the history
of the crimes we have committed.

Pious Pitiful Pissants

Preposterous musings that fickle the intellectual

As the sun drops for the moons rise

and the simpletons waltz through brooding streets

in search of a little sustenance

Claiming the faithful for a few extra quarters

And squandering the goals of the fierce

Depositing the corpses at the back of the line

Where the smell will be less foul

And in limited time the prophetic fiends

will frequent the places of worship

Granting ill will in prayers for the damned

Who drown with the sinking stones

but be it not for me to judge

those that drudge the bottom of the pond

in search of a few extra dollars

for the four horsemen

For they beset upon the few

Who control the buttons

that can obliterate the oblivious fools

Geniuses in turns 

Mostly in blows

With sharpened pencils not unlike daggers

firmly held and then firmly planted

Waiting for the midnight howl.

Some Sort of Epiphany

When the man came home his wife asked him what was wrong, and he only replied that he did not know.   It wasn't so long ago that he would have compiled a laundry list of grievances to thrust upon her question, but at that moment he was left speechless.  It was accentuated by the sound of the kitchen faucet - that the wife had running for her many dirty dishes.   The water ran into water, and he pictured in his minds eye the suds building into a small bubble bath for the various plates and drinking glasses inside.   The food would loosen and then with the help of a rag in the hand of his frail wife they would be wiped clean.  He thought of all this rather than his irritation that the dog had pissed on the throw rug again.  In truth he could see the stain still their behind his eyes, a wide round yellow stain on the off white shag of that carpet that lay in the center of the living room.  It was a definite eye sore, but he had no defining words to give his irritable feeling.   His mind was at a loss, even for the way his wife stopped shaving her legs one day.  He had felt them brush against his own and voiced that she mine as well have been a man.   The man had not truly meant it, he did not think that his wife's hairy legs made her less of a woman but her refusal to keep her role bothered something guttural in his beliefs. 

She then briefly removed herself from his view, and he rocked - as he had been - in his black chewed on leather chair and he stroked at the stubble on his chin.   When once he had been so angry at the incessant noise of the neighboring children he was now finding it peaceful their obnoxious laughing and screaming.  He stopped rocking and placed the soles of his feet flatly on the wooden floor and he kept his fingers on his stubble.  "What are you making for dinner?"  He hollered to the next room.  Perhaps this newfound respect for the things he found disrespectful could be quenched with a taste of a good home cooked meal.

"I ordered out, chinese.  Hope that's alright."  She responded, their was a simple fear in her voice.  That bothered him, but not in an angry way, it was that gut feeling again, that vomit inducing queasiness.  It was in fact okay that they eat take out, it was in fact not a problem.  But he heard in her voice a fear that it would be.  He was hurt.  Had he really been that petty, that picky, that grumpy?   So much so that his wife would be worried he'd retaliate in some way for her choices.  

"That is fine."  He said.

Queen of the Movement

I blanket your shit with a stiff upper lip
Let's get one thing clear
You are not queen of the movement
You repeat offending joys
Surrounding yourself with smoking toys
And denying that you aren't just sitting on your ass
Only rising up to sit your ass over there
And to play with your smoking toys
To offer up your offending joys
Oh, Queen of the movement
Let me pardon myself from your view
Let me take the back stairs out
Lest I run into you
So harsh, ruthless, blind
You know you need a cause but take no time to really ponder
Attack and defense,
When there's only the holding of the gun
Empty and not cocked
Not aimed,
Just looked at, spun around and turned
Pondering, thinking
But you only see the steel
The weapon, useless without its bits
Without its multitude of pieces
And you spring into action
Knock away the useless thing
And pound the face of the wielder
Who may be an asshole
But who only repeated what he grew up knowing
Its the same,
Raised a specific way to the innocent people you claim to protect
Spiteful and stupid,
All of you, oh queen, yes all includes you
Grow up and stop being a fucking idiot.

Thorough Excuse - a short story

I am contractually obligated to give you the whole truth.   Not just the small tidbits one might expect from a story of this magnitude but the whole truth and nothing but it.   It's not that I think there is enough to warrant such a magnitude to what I need to say but the fine print above the dotted line I signed says the exact opposite.  It says that no matter what it was that I did wrong, I must be willing to explain myself in gory detail.  So here it is, the whole truth as I can surmise is necessary.
If I am going to deliver an accurate account of what went wrong I must first start at the beginning.   And by the beginning I do not mean my birth.  That would be far too much detail, no I will simply start at the start of that particular day - which was a Monday.    As everyone knows the start of the week is the worst day of the week.  There's no escaping this.  Garfield knew it.  It is an astrological exactness to everything that is wrong in the universe.  And my ill fated day was of astrological wrongs.  First my alarm was not set.   By not set I don't mean that the proper time was not entered, because it was, it was just that I didn't flick the little on switch to signal to my digital alarm clock that when the red numbers flash six'o'clock it is to be accompanied by an arrant and disturbing warning sound which really should be reserved for many natural disasters.  That's a ridiculous thought, as the horns they use now to warn of tornadoes and the like are much better than alarm clock alarms, but for the sake of full disclosure that was the type of thought that was going through my mind.   So I wake up about five minutes late, which means I'm pissed off.   When I open my eyes to see what ungodly hour my brain has decided to wake me at and I five minutes after the intended time on my clock I am naturally pissed.  This is an outrage, this is a break in the routine, this is a disaster.   I should not be waking up now, because now everything will be five minutes behind if I stick with my typical schedule, and since that can't happen I have to shorten some parts of my normal routine.   So either I lather up less in the shower, or I forego the toasting of my morning bread or I don't shave - which can't happen - or I will be late for work.   Decisions, already, at this time in the morning.   Like I said astrological disasters.  End of days shit.
I prefer to be perfectly clean so lathering less is out of the question so I stick to my normality in that regard.  I soap up my hair with this fruity clarifying shampoo that in fact smells like strawberries - like exactly like them.  Its fantastic, I can feel a layer of suds forming on my head and I figure I have an Afro foaming up there, and the hot water is spraying against my naked shoulders running down my body and I'm thinking I'm definitely wasting too much water.   That's a terrible thought.  A really tragic thought.  People are going without water, because of drought, or contaminates and crap like that and here I am loading my hair with seven dollar strawberry smelling shampoo and I don't care that water is passing by my toes by the gallons every minute.   I give the thought a think only for about two more seconds then I tip my head back and let the water rinse away the soapy goodness.  When I'm sure my hair is free I grap a bar of soap and get where I can get.   But there is always that space between my shoulders and the center of my back that tends to get neglected and i don't have a  brush to get to it anymore ever since the ex took it awhile back.  But screw it, I need to do what I can.   The water will probably make some soap land there anyways.
When I'm all finished with that and I dry off my face, my arms, my body, my legs, my balls, and my ass - in that order - I toss my towel in the hamper as though I'm a pro B-ball player.   But I miss and it drapes slightly on the corner and slides off onto the floor.  I pick it up on my way to the door and throw it in a tad annoyed like.   I tried to keep my mind off the fact that I'm still five minutes behind of my typical schedule.    Even as I slide one leg in after another into my boxer briefs, and then my work khaki's and my blue polo I can't allow myself to worry about the time.  
It's the toast I skip.  I grab and apple out of the fridge - the last one - and I pour myself a glass of orange juice.   I don't need the carbs, I have the fruits, the vitamin c, and the fiber, and I figure that'll be enough.   I scroll through recent news articles on my phone, well, actually I'm just looking at the newsfeed of facebook, seeing if there's any new developments in the lives of people that I went to school with who mine as well be strangers.   But I don't care.  There's something interesting about how other peoples lives are going, what they find worth posting about, what they are into.  Its interesting knowing where everyone is in their lives, even if you didn't care about them back in high school, but thats so long ago and you know you are not half the person you were back then, so how can you assume anyone else is.    That's what I do and then I click off after the the last vague post about someone vaguely complaining that their husband/wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/dog/cat/world/society doesn't understand or listen to them.   How everything is royally screwed.   I could care less, but I'm just a spy, I don't let anyone know I'm present and taking interest.  
I check the time on my phone and I've shaved off a few minutes, now I'm only running a couple minutes late.  I step swiftly from my table to the front door and slide on my shoes.  Retrieving my keys from the rack I open the door - making sure its locked behind me - and I make my way to my overpriced gas guzzling SUV that my ex made me buy because she convinced me that if we ever had a family we'd need something better than my old Dodge Neon.   Now I'm stuck paying for the extra gas while she gallivants with coke fiends and hippie dippy bullshitters.   That's neither here or there, I digress.  I mean why should I care what she does.  We're not together anymore, I don't care, but I know what you'll say well he must care if he's going to waste the time to write in his mandatory explanation, but the answer is I don't care.  That's what I'm thinking on my way to work.  I'm still a couple minutes behind, so I accelerate a bit more and my engine goes from a purr to a roar as it accelerates from forty-five to eighty.   I can almost see the numbers being shaved off, its almost like my own little time travel machine.
That's when the blue and red lights flash behind me.  I'm so screwed that I don't know what to think.  The idea of possibly driving on and leaving an officer of the law in my dust only enters my mind for about ten seconds.  Who am I kidding, for one it wouldn't be worth it, and for the other I'm just not that kind of asshole.   So I wait.  And wait.  And wait, and then wait some more.  I know he's running my plates.  I know he's trying to discern my identity - less I be some homicidal maniac with a penchant for murdering cops.  He has to be cautious, I get that.  I'm also late for work.   More so now.  I didn't even eat my damned toast this morning.  That was supposed to be my saving grace.
So that's why I'm late.   I hope I have supplied enough detail in my story to warrant a good enough excuse.  I'm glad this company gives so many shits about me.  It really makes me happy to know.

Quit

Take out your blade

Let the blood drip to the ground

In that loving awful manner

Don't stain the floors

Catch the droplets in your palm

Breathe lightly

You've done this before

It's all so familiar

And now you are at peace

and I am happy

I am dead

and you are free

That's how it should have been

You blamed me for drowning you

But you chained us together

I gave you the key 

But you threw it away

I never applied the cement

That was all your doing

So don't pretend I buried you

When your shoes are the ones that are dirty

Hide and Hide

It's not fair to assume that I knew what would happen had I not done what it was that I did.   Not to say that I thought everything would go on as it should but only that it would be altered in some other minor way.   That is a long way of saying I didn't know what the hell was going to happen to any degree.   We seldom expect the extremes.   We don't often believe in the extreme danger or the extreme peace.   That sort of peace where the crickets chirp and you sigh softly rather than that extreme danger where you are gasping for air and drowning in your own self-fulfilling self-loathing prophecy.  It tends to we worse when you end up in the middle of those extremes.  When you are neither gasping nor sighing but struggling not to hyperventilate.   That irregular heartbeat that comes with not knowing what extreme you are closest to.  Not expecting death but pain not expecting harmony but dissonance.  Its like that violin string that reverberates to an infinity chord.   That sort of piercing pitch that escalates to the point that you want to rip your hair out.  That's what I got.  That middle ground.  Then again I'd never hurt anyone like I had that night.
When I was sitting at home pondering on life's questions my wife asked me a simple question, probably something about dinner being later, or that my brother had called.    She didn't notice the beads of sweat, that thick coat of perspiration that forbid me hearing the outside world.   There was a film over the noises outside my ear.  Not physically, I have no such ailments, but something otherworldly.   Something more psychological to be honest.  She must have asked me several times because she stepped over and shook my shoulder and asked me if I was okay.   I lied to her, nodding a little too much and she gave me knowing stare which I returned and she knew then not to press the matter.
We could speak to each other through our eyes.   Have conversations with vague smiles, our lips really seldom move except when they connected.  It wasn't that we lacked common grounds to converse over it was that we both had a mutual respect for silence and subtleties.  I had always been a subtle man.   Been being the appropriate word.
I of course watch her night gown reveal images of the pink panties she's wearing as she takes cartoon leaps back to the bedroom but I don't find myself aroused.   I find myself missing that idea of sensual tension.   I find myself nervous that it'll be lost forever.  I check the clock that hangs on the wall over my left shoulder and its very nearly nine at night and I stand up.   I turn my attention to the direction my wife had just vanished around, and I want to follow.  I want to believe that its okay, that if I go with her I'll be safe.  That my lips will touch hers, and her hands would undress me while mine caressed her.    And we would fall like feathers into our sheets and explore the vast universe that is only us.   And stars would twinkle through our eyes, and choirs of angels would accompany a trio of doves as the heavenly harps played over sticky sweet chords of our love making.  Then it would be silent, then it would be our breathing.  Then would be our slumber.
But I can't.
I pick up my truck keys and do my best to be quick to the door.   The less she has to see me the easier it'll be to think of myself as something else.  I'm not a man right now.  I am the meta tron, I am the voice of god now.    Doing the work, good or ill that is required of me by my lord and master.   It may be a bit extreme but that's what it feels like.  I'm some pawn in a mythical game of chess controlled by divine overlords.   I'm a means to an end.   A piece more likely to be sacrificed than to succeed.  
The drive is quiet.  I don't turn on the radio.   I don't want to hear music or talk radio.  There's something sickening about not contemplating your current path.   To so easily distract yourself with pop songs and political ramblings.    Letting yourself forget where your headed so you can sing the lyrics to a tune about thug life or heartache.   I fool with the idea though.  The buttons are ever present as the digital display reads in green numbers that its nearly quarter to ten.   I'm very nearly there, as mysterious headlights illuminate my face.  I'm sure one of the beings out beyond my truck knows me, knows my mind, can see it in the high beams.
When I finally park I am taken aback by the stillness.   When I switch off the engine my trunk goes quiet.   A small hiss is all that existed but it slowly evaporates its sound to the open air.   I'm alone now.   Just me and that hideous quiet that sends shivers down spines, and back up to the neck again.   I even twitch a little.  For me this isn't just a figment this is something deep inside.   A demonic pull under my skin.  That feeling that if you were to open up my shirt a hand would be trying to escape as if from a plastic bag.  That feeling that with just enough force it would succeed.   I'm bringing something hellish onto this plain, and I've never thought it possible.
The headlights pass over me, and my company has arrived.   Not sure how long I waited, my heart is beating faster than a bullet, so much so that I'm not even sure that its beating.  My heart is that violin string, that held note, that monster tone.   My heart is in my throat my mind is pouring out of my ears.   My bowels nearly vacated all over my leather seats.   The seats that stick to my t-shirt as my nervous sweat coats my clothes.   I open the door and step out.   I fucked up, and I know it.   That's the worst part.
It can never be that easy.   You can never steal from villains and expect a slap on the wrist.  That's just what the heroes do.   That peaceful extreme, that placid ideal is not available.   The devils cleaned it out, threw it on clearance and disposed of the signage.   There's nothing left.   Death is possible, but not likely.  They'll hurt me first.   To what extent, I'm not sure.   Probably to the point that I wish I'll be dead.   That deadly extreme, its too good for me, to calming to know that its done.   This isn't done, this is prolonged suffering, this is torture.
I was the one who came up with the plan to take the money from the people that you don't take from.  But the man whose underneath the barrel of the gun that I'm holding, he's the one they believed did it.  Because I said it was so.  Because I turned on my tears and said it was so.   I was only following his lead, I was only too dumb to know better.   So they make me do it.   They make me hold that cold steel to his forehead and they make me stare into his eyes, that already are swollen and bloodied with little rivers of red tainting the whole.   I played the fool and they bought it and now here I am about to murder.   This is the extreme for him, but somewhere in the middle for me, and when I pull the trigger his troubles are over.   As the sand beneath our feet darkens with moisture I can't help but tear up.  After all he was my friend.  
I am his extreme.  I stare down at the gun in my hand and I look around at the devil faces around me.  The minions of hell smile on at me.   They claim that my balls are massive steel contraptions that no man could squash.  That I'm a man.   But I know like them I am but a machination.  A device, a tool.   A wind up automaton marching to the tune of my inner parts.  To the infinity chord.  That screaming baby.
Everyone goes silent when I look down the barrel of the piece.   There's a whole vision in there, as a tremble under the weight.   Not of the gun but of the consequences.   I see my wife, I see her eyes, I see those knowing conversations from lip teeth and eyes.  Those facial twitches that are impossible to hide.  I see those disapproving looks, those knowing frowns.   She's miserable in my visions, because I cannot hide my rusted parts.  I see my wife in the metals, and then I see no more.

A Criminal

A man stood alone
pondering.
He looked on pensively.
Content to stare.
Not at one thing in particular.
Only at the open air.
Some place right before him.
A spot set in front of his eyes.
Where speckles of dust floated violently.
In small movements.
And into oblivion.
A man stood alone
pondering.

Misplaced Confidence

The conception of solace is a foreign concept

As each new nights brings with it new vices

And with those comes the voices

Tearing at the inner workings of my inner ear

It is a long lost notion that this nation suffer through its regurgitation

Deliberately falling to be picked up by gorgeous angels

To falter just to be carried by lustful mermaids

In the midst of catastrophe they leave the video playing

While they go fornicate with woodland fairies

It isn't planned to be this way

It isn't envisioned to be chaos

It isn't hoped for catastrophe

But it is openly negligent

The caps are left off the pens

Loose wiring is attached to shattered bulbs

The super is out on a date

Not with a partner

But with himself

Obsessed with his own selfish self worth

Constipated with ideas

That he kept backed up so that he didn't sound too smart

Stepping in line till his ideas are in line

Lost are the original thoughts

The world saving plans

Overflowing into the overflow

Like so much rain water

Sucked down the gutter

Forgotten and smelling like raw sewage

Don't judge me if I can't sleep

Don't stare at me with seedy eyes

Just because my mind wanders

A excess boils over

And we are fed the burned up leftovers

As cataclysm feeds cataclysm

Just because a game of texas hold-em

Was more important than nuclear launch codes

Committed to a hospital for mild irritation

Right under the sensitive spot

Right behind the groin

Where they were swiftly kicked

When they tried to make a positive impact

Now satisfied with making any impact

As long as it gets them on the talking video box

Solace isn't here

Solace went away

Solace is,

 well, 

astray.

An Apology Rested

An apology rested there

Un-seasoned

Bare and simple

Just waiting

But no one picked it up

Un-handled

Un-wanted

Despite its silent pleas

No one cared

It was resting in plain sight

Forgotten

But within their vision

Such a simple solution

Long neglected

Long defective

Passing it's expiration date

On the loop around

Un-salted

Un-satiable

Decieving all that they cared

Though none pocketed the thing

An apology wasted

A long term band-aid

Left to rest beside an open wound

Just a minor cut

Left to fester

Left to tear

Becoming a hated thing

That burned with every touch

Still, a solution lay there

An apology resting.

A reminder of a sin

But not a solution for forgivness

In their eyes of course

Eyes long blurred

Long over due for prescription

Glasses

Tastelessly left out in the sun

Staring at storm clouds

Because they couldn't turn their heads

To stare at calmness

Focusing on calamity

But with no focus

Everything was calamity

But before

An apology sat there

Ready

Waiting

Un-neccesary

Un-advised

Even by the brightest

Such a simple solution

Such a quick way to fix it

But we left it like shards of glass

Right there

On the floor

Repeatedly stepped on

Repeatedly trampled

Condoned to the crunch under foot

Under toe

Wishing inside to fix it

Wishing inside there was a solution

Now overwhelmed with the pieces

Un-satisfied

Un-convinced

That there would ever be a way

There still is

But beneath the grains of sand

For thats what the glass became

Was hopelessness

They gave up

We gave up

The pieces are all there

There's just so many

It can always be fixed

But its difficult

And the apology waits

Still waiting

An apology always rests.

The Trouble as it Started

There were half a million reasons to depart
Though, I found it hard to choose
It would have been fonder to have it be less
Maybe just less than zero
Or decided for me
In essence I'm weak
And the weekend is arriving
Tasking me to rest
While the workers get done
While the fates dawdle along
Convicted of meandering
Deemed unfit to task anything at all
There were all those reasons and then some
But I wanted to retire
Slink back into my skin
Hide behind my pale flesh
That hadn't seen the sun for as long as the sand upon the beach
For as long as winter beat us through and through
Out and out I failed
Wishing just to sit,
Maybe sleep,
Maybe fade away,
Not having to think a thousand thoughts
For all the million choices
Subtracting the limited limitless of my pondering
Convincing myself to twist into pretzel like tangles
Falling apart at the seams
Wishing it was all an uncanny dream
For all of those million decisions
For one simple puzzle
It wasn't fair to buzz me wrong
When I'd still hadn't thought of an answer.

Growing Up Sketchy

I am a shadow of my former self
I person I do not admire
Nor one that I detest
Just a shadow
A smudge on the wall
That I notice but never clean
A fly that sits in the corner of the window
Never buzzing
Never bothering
A ice sculpture on the front lawn
A transparent figure
Not unlike a ghost
But cold, and melting
Losing space
Losing existence
But willing to come back with the seasons
Existing to observe
Never to act
To listen but not speak
I am a shadow of my former self
The parts are all there
But they are robotic
I an automaton
I a machine that moves from one place to the next
Twitching my fingers on a keyboard
Moving my wrists to fold mundane causes
Blanking on the answers
While speaking freely toward the questions
Like a paper bag unused below the register
Observant of the plastic
Useless beneath the metal
Used by those who think more
Who aged more
Lost in my icy metallic exterior
I am a shadow of my former self
A self who died at twenty-something
Completely content with being not content
Conceding to simplicity
Falling on to knees to beg for silence
Because the noise is negative
Not wanting death
Just wanting patience
I am a shadow of a self
Not former or otherwise
An illusion I concocted
While listening to the radio
Contemplating the state of the world
Blissfully listing listless trivia
Going from door to door
Car to work
Home to a place that used to be it
Sipping on water cups
Drinking when its hopeless
Feeling lost
But healthy
I am but a shadow of some other person
Who I was
Was lost in the street.

Catastrophe in Philosophical Problems Guised as Wisdom

If the cold strikes your heart
and you can no longer feel
Don't fear the distance
That the chilling feel reels
in the midst of the freezing
You can be sure itll hurt
But better to be cold
Then to meet flames to be burnt
Go on then
Argue semantics
Give into your institutions
And give me your merits
The world is cold
The sun is hot
And though these are truths
You're still taught their lies
The patience you feel
As the mosqutoes bite
Is as weak as the meek who will inherit the dump
Lest they stand up
Back to their knees
For they no longer have feet
Because to grow them
That's a lizard like feat.