A violent mass propelled by a current
too lawless to reason, 
too rapid to stop.
The gross swell of chaos has no deterrent - 
not the pleas of the crippled, 
not the calls from atop.
It surges distortion, heaving disorder, 
distract from reality,
from the wrong in itself.
And all that is left once the discord takes over, 
are the bones of the fallen, 
bracing depravity’s wealth. 

Good evening my friend
drop your coat, lose the purse,
sit down where you’re standing
for better and worse.
Open your mind
then shut both your eyes
look into the present
of doubt, rage, and lies.
Now save that for later,
you might need a snack,
for our voyage is lengthy
so keep cool and sit back:

Remember the summers
when we’d crave and find
the cold touch of swings
under our behinds?
We’d wake up to play
not to work or to study,
we’d snowboard on grass
keeping jeans green and muddy.
We’d make our own language
and speak it word for word.
Our secrets were sacred,
our whispers unheard.
Cartoons came with ice-cream
while sleep came with tears;
and our parents were heroes
of a thousand years.
We’d spin with the Earth
and laugh just to laugh,
no deadlines, no business,
no cold facts and graphs.
No stress drowned by pills,
no rush for the end
the world was our playground
what happened, my friend?

 Where your honor belongs to your father
and faith, she belongs to your nurse.
Where your thoughts and beliefs have no matter,
the cut of your sword is your worth.
So swing metal swing till it shatters,
and crumbles as you to the earth.

Will ye not spit upon my grave, like every other passing lad?
Will ye not curse my name in rage, uttering God must have been mad?
Will ye not damn my soul to depths, when soiling paper with yer quill?
Aye, ye will.
 
But do remember as ye weep for men, nay, boys that wielded under my command,
ye weep for me.
To each of them I lent my heart through sweat and blood upon that sea.
For every knuckle, I spared two;
for every cry, I howled anew;
each face of grit and boldness bore my eye,
and as we pegged that deadly shore, I spoke my own goodbyes.  
 
My boys,
they marched on sinking land to their own ends,
their mount infused the rhythm of my pounding chest.
Each soul forsaken for a deity to loot,
I fought my hardest to refute.
And as their weary bodies for always lain to dream,
it took the whole of all my courage not to scream.   
 
And though I tell ye of my boys, and how my heart has ceased with theirs, how after dark I gape the sea and chase my whisky down with tears,
will ye condemn me for their innocence, and wish upon my worn bones ill?
Aye, ye will.  

You used to cry a lot.
You used to write a lot of poetry.
You used to wake up for the seconds of relief
before your mind and heart remembered grief, which
well,
which hadn’t really come to be when was expected, had it?
No. But still, you wept
until your thoughts rose, rather than attacking, to defend the flesh within the goose.
And still. You wept and wrote for worse instead of better, because that is when your voice felt strong
with every liberated letter; because reality stood clear amidst your self-induced insanity. 
Yet how abstruse you tried to be… you were? Who knows?
But now you’re tired.
But now you brush away the hope that used to fall so easily upon your lashes.
But now the only weight that falls is ash from burning shags, which only serves to quicken days and darken lungs. The words found shelter on your tongue,
and there’s no drive for them to leave.
And yet, just as a habit keeps its wheel smooth,
the hope that claimed to die with youth, although so brief,
persists and echos through an old motif:
perhaps there’s still more room for grief. 

One step behind
with no wings nor a motor,
one second too slow
to taste the drop left of the water.
No time to look up
as the backs of their shoes
raise the dirt spawned by past
in a mind-fogging ruse.
And the single last choice,
although fruitless and deadly,
is to run for the life that
is hopelessly empty.