flicker

 

I had a dream

was it just a dream?

I dreamed I was a boy

I had always been a boy

I woke up into darkness

something flickered in the void

it was me       that was my life

I blinked and it was gone

nowhere

 

my red flag challenges heaven      there is no power in this universe greater than entropy      our days are numbered      though we can’t believe it      but I needn’t go searching through my imagination     death has already found me        and I know the weight of it     the shape     the taste of it    it’s a canker burrowing inside      it’s a car crash    an overdose      a lonely suicide

maybe I’ll opt out early       negotiate a hollywood exit       no, scrub that thought       I won’t cheat in death        I’m in it for the struggle       I’ll stick to my original course       I’ll become a human being       and the path that I shall follow     I shall follow completely        even though I know that all paths lead nowhere

messiah

I’m once more in the wilderness    after forty days and nights of moral turpitude    have left me both directionless   and very far from home    this is a country with no name    where the ruler is despair   and mercy is unknown    

I want to write about it     though my thinking is as bent    as my twisted mind demands   so in the end I just let it rip   imperfect as it is   one word follows another  a train of laden mules    climbing a mountain slope   and failing at each step

there's a beast that feeds on thought    deep within my gut   his filthy menacing maw   lurks behind my grimaced smile   his powerful bulldog jaws     seize my puny words   to render them in fractured dismembered portions    completely devoid of meaning    and lacking taste or form   

my body aches in ways   that Torquemada would approve   my insides have been riven    into soiled and tattered rags    I’ve been scourged and bloodied   for a station on the cross     this is my Golgotha    my season of disgust

I seem to have contracted   a spiritual disease   and my head has been adorned    with a crooked crown of thorns   I’m broken pierced and pinioned   to a stinking mandrake root     I'm a voodoo doll   a pin cushion   the child of countless woes   

my agonies rage right through me   as clouds of poisoned gas    all hope of resurrection   has long since been abandoned   my thoughts are totally inchoate   lacking any rhyme or reason    and yet somehow I endure    for even though I’m naked     in the ravening of my soul    I am still a man     and I am not alone

tyrant

 

home

is where the

hurt is

and I got a surge on

sudden fury

blood in my eyes

blind with rage

but not struck dumb

I have words

killing words

dark

and corrosive

poisonous

and vile

curse your lips

you have a filthy mouth

you love me

you hate me

you love to hate me

but you need me

you know you need me

coz I’m your one and only

you belong to me

I might do you in one day

but I’ll never set you free

 

beggar

 

they beat me into submission        with subtle forms of violence      and the promise of jelly roll       they found out what I was made of      and made me pay for more      I struggled to repay my debts     my back was against the wall     I couldn’t catch a break     there was no relief at all     but I did not fade away      I hung on by a thread       while the ladies of the parish      furnished me with bread     their kindness and generosity     meant I did not freeze      coz there’s no justice in a system      that keeps a man on his knees     

obituary

 

I wonder what they will say about me when I am dead and gone      I imagine my obituary will be heavy     I’ve taken on mythological significance in certain quarters     because  I corrupted god’s will and made an abomination of my heart    the searing light of reality brings old lies and fractured truths into sharp relief    pitiless disclosure leaves no place to hide      I’m that terrible man     who feasted on people’s dreams      and then sold them down the Swanee      I’ve done some terrible things      but never by intention      things went wrong       things went horribly wrong     it’ll say so on my headstone

psycho ward

 I’m a seasoned performer   I’ve played this gig before    the mind jarring   hallucinations      the confusion of signs and significance    all new oblique angles and novel geometries      vast oceans of awkward instance    it’s a total mindfuck acid burn   but I’ll keep my head down     go by the numbers      ‘til I’m discharged and I can go home

going home?    I thought I was      they won’t let me leave     they say my blood is toxic and I’m in the danger zone     coz someone mixed my meds up and dealt me a lethal dose     now I’m scared like never before      it all seems real     of course it does     I suspect it is    but I won’t let on    I’ll just dummy up tight     least said, soonest mended    

they tubed me up   and leeched my blood    pending the obligatory psychiatric interrogation      when they issued me with papers    and stuck me here in the psycho ward    where they can better observe my exploits    my prognosis still looks scary    the devil is at the door    the main event this moment    is the battle for my soul     

pawned

I pawned my soul      to buy some drugs      I was stoned for a while      but it’s never enough      I left my best girl in the rain     so I could go get stoned again     I loved that girl      but I let her down       all for a little golden brown     a junkie’s life is filled with woe      they’ve got no friends      they’ve got no dough    and some of us are filled with shame       for lovers left out in the rain     

heave

 

step aside please    step aside     I got a load on      I’m gonna puke      coz my belly’s on fire       I’ve overdone      and it wasn’t accidental      I’m still too greedy to have any fun      extra medication is alright in theory     but I get the heave long before I get high    that’s one more development in my sobriety      I just cannot be arsed with fucking around       I want to be straight     that would be great       coz to tell you the truth       I’ve begun to stagnate      I’m sick and tired of living in a rut      but step aside please     while I puke up my guts

 

another armageddon

 

another armageddon rains down on my head     it’s the end of the fucking world       as far as I can tell      I want to scream      but I’m stifled by the shock of it     my agony is muted    and I can hardly breathe       the past lives on in my head      there is grief etched into my bones        I can’t take any more of this     I feel I’m near the end

this is no mere nightmare    this is reality   a whole body experience    an integral human event of apocalyptic  proportions      I’m trying       you can believe that     I’m trying      but it’s hard to live and love       while you’re bracing yourself for impact       this strange new disease has me on my knees      post-traumatic stress will be the death of me     

carnival

 

there are no free rides        in this shit show    but it’s the only game in town      they promised us a carnival       but this life is an atrocity      it’s one filthy chore after another       you couldn’t sell tickets for this      it has to be meted out    blow by bloody blow

alcohol

 

I got the thirst something chronic      but that’s just the symptom       it’s not the disease      booze loves me       it loosens the bindings     that conceal my pain       it soothes my soul      while it numbs my brain        I’m reaching for oblivion      so let me breathe fire       I need to imbibe something impure      I need a drink     like I need a friend     yeah, I need a drink    like a hole in the head…

seconds out...

 

all these fights are rigged       a man don’t stand a chance        he’s got to punch above his weight      from the very start     I was once pretty agile     but now I’m trading blows     the knockout punch was landed     and I don’t feel a thing       coz I’m numb from the neck up       and piteously exposed     one too many poundings      has left me on the ropes      I ought to throw in the towel      like so many suckers before me      but I’m in it for the fight      I don’t know what else to do

salvage

 

don’t you miss it?      the speedballs and reefer?    the fantastic highs?     the tragic lows?     no, I managed to keep  my shape     but it was an accident    I came out whole   as something less than holy    I defied the world and it crushed me      I’m stuck in my shotgun shack    my bindings are undone      I’m hardly worth the salvage    from the scrapyard of my mind

lunatic soul

 

I flashback on a doomed trajectory     having survived alone    in the kingdom of ghouls     my bad blood had caused a derangement     I thought I had died and gone to hell       I found myself in unfamiliar surroundings      harvesting dreams that tasted of tears     I was trapped in a hospital that felt like a prison     praying that someone would answer my prayers      I made it home but the margins were slender     I’m still in the thrall of that living nightmare     my mask has slipped to reveal my defects      I look like I'm healed    but I'm not really there

naked and alone

 

sleep will not touch me now     neither will I dream     it’s not my conscience again      it’s not what it might seem         they say there are no bad men      only bad situations          and I’ve lived through situations     maybe I brought them on myself     tell me, what difference does it make?      we suffer just the same    from things we haven’t done      everybody’s innocent     according to their tales     we are all just victims of circumstance    wrestling ghostly shadows     naked and alone

 

lice

 

same old     same old     here I am,  back in the dock again      I guess it’s too late now to plead insanity         so what’s my excuse?     I’m picking at old wounds     might even tear me a few new ones      but I can’t help myself      some memories have sharp edges      and weigh heavy on the heart    there’s pain at the core of everything      sometimes I can’t see it        but it’s always there         like worms gnawing on my bones     or lice crawling through my hair  

bullet to the soul

 

we are creatures of light and shade    but most of us are dead inside       victims of spiritual suicide      the abyss of our pain      swallows all ambition    and our darkest monuments      cast heavy shadows across our empty lives     I’m having a human experience here      typical to my generation     I took a bullet to the soul      I’m bleeding out again     but I no longer seem to care

inertia

 

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

frenzied

I could torch this world of contradictions     everything is turned on its head        good is evil     and evil is good      and no-one really cares      I get the rage       it’s more than simple savagery       it runs rational and lethal         it’s integral to my energy

I embrace my anger as something splendid     something glorious       a denial of restraint       but never of reason       I’m talking something pure       free of horror or pity       action beyond mere frenzy       the ripened grapes of wrath

I’m a singular entity    I keep my own counsel     the panicked herd does not sway me      I damn them all to perdition        I’m ruthless and perfected        in my wayward geometry       I’ll see them burn      in the hell they made for me