I have played
the clown most of my adult life my humour concealed my pain though sometimes I would weep when laughter let me down I’ve been careful with my mask it’s been no mask at all I’ve been up I’ve been down my heart has done the rounds but I learned through indiscretion to never wear a frown I’m not a clever man but I do the best I can I’m told god grants fools wisdom when there’s no one else around
some things
cannot be gleaned from books some things are learned in blood anyway
the lights are going out now
and I’m pinioned to my cross sweet
mother of heaven hear me in my time
of need let me cast one last spell channel my pain into something beautiful
I’ve nursed
one disaster after another and there
are terrible confessions hidden behind my eyes coz I bent myself outta shape trying to satisfy the needs of
others now I require something for
myself don’t judge me I’m
not stoned I’m just tired fatigued by the extremities of being I
know I made a cunt of myself but I
didn’t mean to prick anyone else with this crown of thorns
they locked
me up for speaking my mind because truth is violence in their insane world I was drunk on freedom and the license it gave me but to think too deeply is to dig your own grave I was drunk on freedom but
I overreached now I’m the odd man
out in a party of strangers queer bedfellows both orphans and strays in this menagerie of singular outsiders I
found a voice to unlock their
secrets yes, I found a voice but it was not my own
I’m tired of
thinking no-one can think and fight
at the same time and I’m in a fight
here the fight of my life insanity and happiness are an unlikely
cocktail and they have labeled me
mad because I feel too much because I’m sad but my sanity is open to debate perhaps madness is a natural reaction to the real maybe
I am crazy maybe madness is a
failing but I ask you who can be sane in a world gone mad?
you have to be crazy to play by the rules to believe in a game that is rigged to make you the fool
lately, I’m not really there I’m not really anywhere sometimes I’m not myself I mutate into something else sometimes I’m formed in the shadows exposed under sodium light I can’t seem to shake the feeling that it all could happen again I’d be down on the killing floor dragging my ball and chain through hospital corridors desperate to escape finding no way home
paint a
picture of this emotionally squalid got the fear on now something chronic but I have music inside me so I’m not that far gone not
a damp eye in the house must be the
season of cynics I’m too tired to make
adjustments this late in the deal
lately, I’m riddled with doubt and what if it’s bad? but what if it’s good? but
what if it’s bad? and what if they
laugh? so what if they do? it’s
the bloody psychogenesis of crippling
inertia my head is black with
trouble and I’m weary of the conflict
I quit for the sake of my sanity but I soon found out you have to quit every day maybe I’ll quit quitting no, don’t tempt me don’t get me started once I get started I don’t know how to stop I’m not a temperate man I’m a greedy bastard who cannot get enough
It’s not easy
staying sober but it’s so much
harder staying drunk staying drunk takes dedication an appetite for destruction the
will to live as a fucking pariah, a leper and a bum no, I no longer have the strength to
deal with so much fun
a world
without madness would be a mediocrity but when I realised what a sick, awful joke
the world is I went stark raving
mad and madness begets madness so soon I was lost insanity
is no escape from reality it’s an
overdose of reality isolation, loneliness, desperation and
rage all of these are real the whole world is mad and in a world of madness perhaps only the crazy are truly sane
I have worn the cloak of madness madness that
wore me down it took over my
mind and co-opted every action my messianic highs, my diabolical
lows were as inclement as the weather
they guided my tongue and my actions they
damned me as they exalted me but I
glimpsed eternity and thrilled to uncover my great secret we are all as gods we are all of us insane only some of us know it only some bear the pain
don’t judge
that book by its cover that cunt
could get a piece at anybody’s door
he oozes a dark charisma
that’s how he gets things done
he’s packing dynamite and he’s
on a short fuse anything can
happen and very often does aye, he’s bad news his wiring is all wrong he don’t mean no harm but sometimes he can’t help himself
I’m just an ordinary sucker with extraordinary needs I have to stir the pot several times a week my appetites are excessive my appetites are raw for me sex is like a drug that leaves me wanting more
everything is about sex except sex sex is about power maybe that’s my problem maybe I lack power or perhaps I have too much all I know is when I make that
contact and the game is on I’m more than just promiscuous I’m mother nature’s son
Ain’t it hard
just to live? There’s no accounting for people or what passes for right and
wrong. I’d been shooting my mouth off. I was up to no good with nowhere to turn
but bad. I’d deviated from the norm. I’d
been scaring the neighbours. Somebody called the cops. Yeah, somebody called
the cops. But I know my rights.
“You have the
right to obey. Compliance is mandatory. There is only one rule: obey all the
rules.”
They held me
on trumped-up charges of lewd behaviour and vagrancy. They confiscated my shoelaces. They
confiscated my humanity. They took me to a doctor who said,
“What’s wrong
with his head is anybody’s guess. He needs to be disinfected. He’s channelling
subversive vibrations. We’d better lock
him up; I think that’s for the best.”
They put me
in the quiet room, where I’d plan for my escape. I’d tiptoe right out of
there. I’ve learned to play their game.
I level up
heavy again and again. But I don’t complain. That’s just my lot; it’s always been
this way. Mania is a gift from the cosmos.
The truth don’t stop. It’s rolling on hard, like the driven rain. I have a face
for every season. They can’t take that from me.
I was not easy to help but I was helped for some my illness was seen a a failure or even a betrayal but my world was broken and I reached out for a new one no one would condemn a cancer victim saying ‘he brought it on himself’ but my friends diminished in number those are the perverse mathematics of life I don’t mind being ghosted I live for myself to hell with everyone else I’ve forgiven those erstwhile friends who could only see the surface of things I don’t require validation I made it on my own I’m an individual now a man of some distinction
we were a pack
and we made meat but we had to
be ruthless with those who could
not we would dance in the sacred
manner horizontally with the shades down private individuals living in a private world
I got the blame when it all fell apart and maybe I deserved it paint
me wicked everyone does it’s easier that way there are too many pigments in the other picture I grieved for that cabal of erstwhile friends and lovers when
they fell on me like wolves to tear
the world apart
the years
take
I’m docile
now
polished
smooth
I wouldn’t
leave a ripple
if you
dropped me in the ocean
I could be
making waves
but I’m
coasting from here on in
I’ve made my
choices
what is a life
but a series
of choices?
I live
according to my nature
it’s too
late now
for anything
else
people can fuck you up
tell me if you’ve heard this one before
I didn’t know her face
but her moves were familiar she
said she needed to be loved but she wasn’t
ready to bleed for it I understood
that I’d done my share of bleeding I’ve drowned in my own tears
I don’t let that shit in my house this poor boy don’t believe in romance but I’ll adhere to anything that makes me feel real life gives me all I need and I don’t ask for much I’m just looking for a friend not a nursemaid or a crutch
back to my
cubicle
curtained in
(do not disturb)
locked out
tubed up
and glued
down
the shadow
of a man
the simulacrum
of a corpse
I couldn’t
even scream
‘do you remember your name?’
‘do you know
where you are?’
‘do you
recognise me?’
don’t ask me
questions
I know
nothing
je suis un
zombie
the man
death left behind
I have
tasted her deadly promise
and it festers
in my mind
I walked into a door
or the door walked into me I got
the usual cuts and bruises nothing
to scratch home about I’ve taken
some beatings and maybe I’m better
for them but I think I’ve learned my
lesson I think I got things
straight I’m not the man I was and that’s cause to celebrate
as the world spins on its axis and the sun sinks slowly in the west another tsunami load of recycled shit
hits the fan there’s always fresh meat for the
grinder there will always be war and rumours of war there will always be blood on our
hands because we’re all in the shit
together it’s always been this
way you can tell me there’s love in the
human heart and that love is the
universal law but I have to laugh when presented with the
irony otherwise I’d be screaming all the way to hell
I’m totally spaced out
blitzed out of existence so catastrophically
high I cannot see the ground they dropped the fucking bomb on me and hit me where it hurts hell flickered for a second then the lights went out now I’m
locked out of the world with nowhere
else to go my imminent re-entry will have to be postponed though I’m bitterly disappointed I’ll still make it on my own coz I’m the killer cosmonaut I’m
not afraid to be alone
