you looked real hard
You could find some open
Cracked slightly ajar
If you gave it a push
It went one of two ways
Wide open into nothing
Or slammed back in your face
I tried the nicest ones first
Yet those were shut tight
So I went to the common ones
The days turned to nights
Days into weeks, into months, into years
The open doors became
The ones I most feared
Resounding thuds
Pounding out in my brain
Accumulated rejections
Intensifying pain
So have you ever been there?
I think maybe, to some extent
But I never saw your footprints
On what was my side of the pavement
Matters not, however
On this plane I roam
You may call it your turf
But it’s not yours to own
Rather, this realm is for all
Here for us to use
It is here I find
Favorable options from which to choose
Much more to my liking
Much more to my style
And as I now find my freedom
You seem more in exile
So you can say what you want
And I’ve been there before
Just a ragged, lone man
Who found open doors
I have a hunch
And I have a suggestion
Maybe your ignorance
Stems from your lack of perception
Perhaps you’ll find freedom
Just release your lament
And make your own footprints
On my old side of the pavement.
Share the Moonlight With Me
Step forth into bright darkness
Share the moonlight with me
Bathe in it, lather your carcass
Let your flesh wash out to sea
Strange I still saw the event
After the cold steel burned a hole
Yet nothing I could do to prevent
His penchant for claiming your soul
Was I alive or was I dead?
It was all so clouded with dream
But now I know beyond doubt’s thread
All is real under the moon’s beam
Now here we lay, cold and stiffened
The tide washing over our skin
If I can find a way, I will get revenge
And get back what’s ours again
But for now, I beg you, please
Share the moonlight with me.
Ebb and Flow With the Lake of the Devil
Scars emblazoned on the chest of my soul
From the everyday battles in this life-long war
Each and every last mark bears my crest
Born of the Lake of the Devil, where all the imps nest.
I know I’m not evil, it’s merely a curse
For the flags on my castle keep me bred with the worst
Fight them I have for one thousand years
With no end in sight and no victor that’s clear.
If I could reach out beyond to make some new allies
The siege might be broken so morale can uprise
A victory for sure, in the imps’ defeat I would savor
Momentarily a core, then work to keep in my favor.
Regardless of such it’s a false sense of advantage
Matters not the strategy or how much I rampage
It’s gone a thousand years and will last a thousand more
The definition of winning is to survive in this war.
The Saddest Man in the World
(Part One)
Alone
I’ve been alone for so long
You’d think I’d be used to it by now
But no
I’m alone.
Friends are all gone now
They’ve had to move on
I’m left behind
I have some new friends
But they’re not my friends
My friends are gone now.
Family comes by from time to time
I try to let them know what’s going on
But too ashamed am I
I talk of it to only One
He can still learn from it.
My wife left a long time ago
She went with my friends
It’s good for her, though
She carried the burden of me and our children
Only to collapse
But she is with my friends now.
Again I tell you
I talk of it only to One
I tell him that continuing bad habits
Lead you to have no self respect
At this point, I’m not sure
That I ever had any.
Too late for me
Too late it is
So alone I go
To wait and to wallow
For this shame to end.
Well I am that One
And I admire that sad man
What he tells me are the pains
That he suffers in life
To put yourself through it
Day after day
Years upon years
And still go on
To me, he is the saddest man in the world.
Some Time to Myself
Walking through the meadow
Pines on all four sides
I think of all the things we know
Eying the raven as it glides.
Attention shifts to a noise in the woods
Snapped twig raises up my brow
A squirrel takes off with its mouthful of goods
Just the same you left me not long before now.
Into the woods I follow the path
Blanketed by needles and cones
The distance you made is worse than the wrath
Of the coyote who howls and moans.
Arriving at my cabin, I unlock the door
Rusty hinge shrieks make me wince
Battling the notion as my keys hit the floor
Feeling shame with her mention ever since.
So I sit in my chair, playing cards at my table
I recall the times we had when it was well
A drop rolls onto the bottle’s blue label
With a smile in my heart I’ll have stories to tell.
The Day Grief Died in the Sky
From a deck overlooking beyond
Reminiscing, some memories fond
The view is pleasing to my eyes
Lost in thought, my head towards the skies.
The mesh of blue and white in sight
I follow the clouds weightless in flight
Drifting as they do, she’s in my head
Every look, every touch, every word she said.
Those wisps alter shape so high in the air
One image to another with hardly a care
As I kiss softly her cold stone hand, I see
That just like the clouds, I’ve let change come to me.
Dreams
Dreams
Always tell me something
Puzzling, enchanting
Difficult to put my finger on.
Often times it’s utter confusion
And I’ll sit, half awake
Half asleep, in a coma
Drone to the world in my mind.
Dreams
It’s like a movie
Except it’s my stories, my ideas
I’m the star, the lead role.
Not someone else’s interpretation
Of the world at large, rather
My own thoughts I was unaware I had
Towards my realm, myself, and all things within.
Dreams
Mine come from the lost conscious
The one I can’t find while awake
It can speak to
me, yet I can’t talk to it.
Completely objective it is
In every obscure message it gives
Are the truths of myself I come to terms with.
Dreams
The greatest therapist in my life.
Forgotten Destination
By any means, by all means
It’s what it means
To be in this war.
To feel frigid ice water
Run through your veins
And the hot blood
Pouring on and on form our wounds.
Is it mine?
Is it hers?
Or was it his?
It’s all insignificant
In this ebb and flow
This teetering battle
Seemingly destined to remain balanced
Swaying on the edge
Of our species’ fate.
Was it not
The Origin of Species
Theorizing it all comes down
To survival of the fittest?
So daunting to ascertain
The final outcome
In this conflict of minds.
Momentum swings on a pendulum
From one side to next
As the average intellect lead engagements
Further continuing the perpetual repetition of history.
And if Darwin’s beliefs hold true
Another innocent, introverted, naïve genius
Will create the means
By any and all means
Of deceit and coercion
Via desperate hands on the puppet strings
That superior mind shall see the downfall
Of the post-mensa’s inferior ability to be wise.
And the fate of our species
Everyone involved and otherwise
Will bear witness to having swayed too far.
For modern times do allow the next Einstein
To provide the tools
That end us all in one swift blow
As we plummet off the edge
To our forgotten destination
Extinction.
The Saddest Man in the World
(Part Two)
Alone
You thought you were alone for so long
I bet it doesn’t seem that long after all
I know
You felt alone.
She was the world, your wife
Was everything good that is in it
You may not think I do
But I know
They are my only memories.
You had a lifetime of memories
Mine, less than a handful of years
Sometimes I still cry for her
I can only imagine what you went through.
I remember the day you talked to me
You told me that you had no self-respect
I felt so bad that my grandfather could feel this way
But I then realized
You were redeeming yourself by warning me.
You hung around for a long time
Long enough to know who really loved you
Your family, yes, we were there
Your daughter, son-in-law
They took great care.
The rest would stop by
Including myself
Just to show you we loved you
And there you were, though we never did say
Matters not, because actions speak louder than words.
The last time I saw you
You didn’t recognize me at first
Though you took my word for who I said I was
We joked, we laughed, promised we’d see each other again
I know you felt who I was before things turned for the worse.
Then I got the call, just three days later
You’d left that afternoon
Yet you waited for daughter and son
To see you off
Your wife waiting beyond the