section eight

I don’t make the rules    I don’t even follow them   perhaps that’s where I went wrong  some have called me crazy   but that’s open to debate   when they opened up my head   to take a peek inside    they found I was haunted   by a demon of conscience   and was inked bloody with the stains  of unforgiveable depravities    but you never know what secrets lurk   beneath the surface of a man’s alleged insanity    believe me when I tell you   everybody is crazy   but most just don’t realise it  

I slay the beast every morning   and every fucking night    but they don’t give me medals    they just give me pills    and send me on my way     it’s a wild and torrid wind    that blows through my skull    and on any given day    of wonder and of peril   there will be a fearful storm    I’ve had a lifetime of bastard storms   and I demand a reprieve   and maybe stronger pills    from the very top shelf please   I have forsaken a peaceful mind    to make war with the beast  

thinking of the life I’ve led   the desolation I’ve endured   and the meagre mercy I’ve received   I feel weary   I feel heavy in my bones    when I brood on all of that    and the way I sought nourishment    with casual lovers and liquid fire  and then those sorry times  I was more beast than man    when the madness   the sheer fucking frenzy   fuelled by my boiling blood     raging with pathos and fury   would shame me to the core

 I am truly tired   of the burden I must bear   I could weep    and sometimes do    when my heart simply cracks    and my brain implodes   and I am the most pathetic excuse for a man   to ever shed his load   but the sickness which afflicts my life     does not define my soul    or rob me of my humanity    would you dismiss me as a crazy man     don’t you ever feel the same    have you never felt alone

the infinite and radiant IS

the infinite and radiant IS   bestowed upon me a kiss   and she whispered in my ear    that she’d always held me dear     she banished all the shadows   that once played upon my heart     she said that though I’d felt alone     we’d never been apart   she knew that I had suffered   the countenance of men     but I would never lose her love     or lose my way again   

she said that I now owned the world   and everything therein    and nothing that I would ever do   could ever be a sin   and it filled my heart with joy      to know I was her favourite boy    how do I explain?   I was reborn again

she told me she was everywhere   and she was everything      from the fish deep in the ocean    to the birds out on the wing   she said that none of this is real  but thinking makes it so   this world is an illusion   that we must one day let go   

she is the love supernal   and her light shines eternal    she has been my lover   since the dawn of time   she’s my sister and my mother   there’s never been another    she's a lifetime confidante    and the dearest friend of mine    I know her most intimately   so I can assure you of this   everything that ever was   and everything that is   has always been the property of    the infinite and radiant IS

 

the villain

I hear that you never tire     of spreading the bad news       and I’ll happily play your villain     on any day you choose       I heard what you’ve been saying      and some of it is true    but I never put down anyone     in the cowardly way you do    

I’ve nearly always done     just what I wanted to      while you’ve relied on others     to tell you what to do      of course I have regrets     but they are so very few    I’ve lived to be free     that was never true of you

you are so deeply pious      but you haven’t got a clue     and I refuse to be consigned     to live the way you do     we were once good friends      but you possessed a jealous heart     you wanted what I had     and that’s why we had to part

you’ve been casting stones      but always from afar      you know deep in your bones       that’s the kind of man you are      you talk behind my back    but never to my face      is it courage that you lack?      or just any sense of grace?    

leaden

 

the margins are minuscule    in this cruel season       it’s hard enough to raise a buck    never mind a smile     I sing with the crows     and bathe in the dark     cold fibre is scant reward     for all the bareback adventures     and romantic misdemeanours     that blot my copy book     (kudos to the phallus imperator)

my chapped lips      and  caffeine smile     reveal there’s fear in my monkey     his silver tongue and leaden heels      have me hobbled in the blocks    those softer metals conduct static       directly to the brain pan      and my blood’s impurities      leave a tell-tale stain on the inside  but there’s no point in concealment     no-one gives a fuck what’s written there anyway

infinite space

when I’m dead and gone     don’t you cry for me      and I’m simply moving on    and I hope you’ll come to see     that no-one ever really dies    for each of us lives on in immortality

none of this is real      but thinking makes it so      this world is an illusion      that one day we’ll  let go     I tried to live this life      without a single care    I never made a penny       but I’ve been everywhere       

I’m an immortal soul    and I’ll still be about    long after the sun has died    and the stars have all burned out    when everything we’ve known     has  disappeared without a trace     my journey shall continue       somewhere in infinite space

oxydation

countless measures of synthetic junk      have arranged my psyche as euphorically drunk    I experiment with words and their rhythmic possibility      and I’m all wired up with a new found mobility    I take inspiration from needle and spoon      to dance with the devil and howl at the moon

I found my ease in an exotic narcotic    a new alchemy that’s darkly  hypnotic      I mix my medicine with booze and snake oil     and then cook it all up in aluminium foil      I study my dreaming at my own leisure   with a bitter concoction that I’ve learned to treasure     and I savour its taste as the ultimate pleasure  

but my little boat is slowly submerging     as the beast from the deep  is likewise emerging      I need his poison the way I need air    but he promises bounty that just isn’t there     he dangles his riches  just beyond reach     and holds fast to my flesh     like a blood engorged leech

big dog

 he looked like a big dog

he barked like a big dog

I was suitably unimpressed

I’d forgotten to be afraid

 

somewhere along the line

I had shed that fear

and the air of casual violence

that once served to mask it

 

strange how we forget our chains

only to recall their chaffing

in the occasional moment

of ritual confrontation

 

how could I ever have dismissed

the memory of bondage

and a lifetime of enslavement

to my petty tyranny?

universal dogma

the universal dogma     is a liturgy of fictions     the fable of creation     is an article of faith      that binds the entire race    in a suicidal compact   of ignorance and hate    there are existential dilemmas     that will not be resolved   through  ritual supplication   to a non-existent god      we are slaves to an orthodoxy      that has us blinded and divided    if we eliminated those illusions     we’d see that supernatural forces    are products of the imagination    the key to our destiny     lies in our own hands

raven

 

death is the bird      perched on your shoulder        who counts your days    and marks out your time         that song is mine      and never grows older      so show me good grace    for I am your master      this world belongs to my children and I

I live alfresco    don’t need television     I gather my news    straight from the vine    we’re crashing out    to another dimension       these shoes were meant    for sunnier climes     pour us some sense    from an unopened bottle      and drink of a truth     that won’t be denied

there’s nothing to fear    so don’t get excited     it’s so hard to live      but it’s easy to die       you’ll hear music wrapped up in thunder    you’ll feel the essence of something divine     I am the raven that carries you over    and paints you immortal    if you’re so inclined  

 

the rainmakers

 

we scored a thousand trips         the wonder kid and I     we weren’t in it for the money     we were in it for the high    they  were consciousness expanding    and we thought them heaven sent    I can’t remember where we got them     but I can tell you where they went

love was everything     and everyone was high     and we were messianic    the wonder kid and I        we distributed our treasure    with evangelical zeal       and bestowed upon our punters      a once in a lifetime deal

we told them it was manna      that had fallen from the sky      we told them it was powerful    which no-one could deny    we sold a benediction     to liberate the mind      a journey they’d remember      until the end of time

grave expectations

 

I should develop myself a positive hustle     forge some new gimmick     and take it a million miles away from confinement and isolation    yeah    I’m shaking off the leg irons that shape my footprints into the too familiar patterns of helplessness and despair

fetch me a doctor to inoculate my spirit    I’m crashing out of this jail    before new variants of old killers nail my lid shut    I’ve seen those monsters     they were six miles high     and loaded with terminal velocity    they have my name and post code etched in memory     there’s no negotiating with their dark intentions    they’ll seize my lungs and pump me dry    it’s a matter of time    and time is limited by nature  I want to live    if only for the moment    I want to live like I’ll never die

 

 

stones

 now is the time for gathering stones     slay a tyrant or two in the name of freedom      cracked skulls and broken bones   are the price we pay    for disobedience     but in this black economy     only troubles are free

my heart is emptied out      my hands are loaded with bricks      there’s  riot going on inside my head     a revolution on my doorstep      someone fetch a doctor     I’m haemorrhaging violent potential

maybe I’m sick from being locked in       or crazy resentful of being shut out     I need a lover to paint my garlands blue    this ring of roses is slowly choking me      so come share my cup     it could be our last     we’ll dance together one more time    and draw lots for the first stone cast