Second Choice

To be a replacement
To be that Second choice
Just fitting the the bill
Just Good enough for now

Lifting it up
trying to convince it
as it looks the other way
as it finds more
in what is less

in what is repulsive

throwing my head down
hair in my eyes
on my knees

retching with that knowledge
helpless in the sickness





Tired of exhausting myself
Giving all to getting back half
Disregarded by the child

Daddy, take a bow




It kills and burns to have the weighted wisdom
You're only there because another wouldn't break free
It dries out the tears and fogs up the vision
You're second in line, quite possibly number three



I wish I had enough strength
Overstocked on pride
To face the world alone
I wish I could go forward
No one at the side

to be 
Happy enough on my own

Given An Inch

There’s a smile that makes me sick
a knowing grin worn on many faces I see

When does having money
make everything one does okay?

The filth, the acts, the things they do
I guess make them better than me

because there’s a bank account
that is bigger than mine today?

The Patience allotted
the sins forgotten
the gestures and looks left lying about

The acts forgiven
the lack of inhibition
is given inches of shadow of doubt

That’s taken for miles

and my head’s down
so far down my hair hangs at my side
and I don’t want to be along for this ride

Where entitlement and abuse is rewarded
and nightmares grown in the dark
Where gratification and intemperance
take priority over the just and the heart

because someone has a leg up
one way or another
I can’t look anymore, can’t breathe
I’m beginning to smother.
 





You can turn a key
pull an umbrella on the rain
touch glass with a hammer
it all turns out the same

dirty games with pain in mind
second guessing at the stains
don't have to look hard to find
nothing has capacity to change

you might lift some sunshine out
long enough to dull the pain
but please, withdraw all doubt
it will always come back to rain

it's that skip in the record
the fly in the vaseline
filthy anomaly in something beautiful
you always wake up from a dream

it will bend to remain
a system with a drain
same game, different name
not a fucking thing's changed

beautiful things turned into weapons without pity
by drooling, leering machines with one-track thinking
they are handed boarding passes and keys to the city
by wealth-impressed drones even as their ship is sinking

It's the same as it's ever been
advantage taken with entitlement's grin
smiling that filthy cheshire twisted beam
but death comes to every one

even slowly rusting machines

don't be surprise when violence comes
or retribution taps at your window and door
the price you pay when you walk without wisdom
making doormats of friends and acquaintances whores

even the slimiest practitioners
are given cart blanche
and I don't find anything funny
when a sentence is finished

with "Yeah, but they've got money" 

Tummy ache

Tides shift
sands twirl

feel the grit in the air

opinions grind
and machine parts whirr

feel the grit in my hair

from my hands twisting it
from my lack of not getting it

not understanding why I'm the way I am

there's question marks after lessons
there's no answers after sessions
of why do you think the way you do

and I'm the one being asked

Why does it bother me?

Well.....
Why doesn't it bother you?

Maybe I'm not angry
Maybe I'm not depressed

Maybe I'm just thinking today

Pardon me for being unsure
Sorry for not having the cure

for what's causing me to shake my head
as I'm walking away


I'm just who I am
my face holds answers, look and see
why does it bother you?

and why doesn't it bother me?

In the Background

In the electronic age
multiple programs, multi-tasking
terminology created

"in the background"

All those days of my life, I never stopped looking at the sky
Free cassette tape spinning in a primitive handheld device
deep voice that echoed my sentiment

Chase away the ghosts that haunt me now

22 years into the fray and the song never quite went away
it was in the background
like my looking for that answer
looking to the southern sky
and to the north if I were already there

My mind and heart "a constantly running program"
searching for that answer
with that old free song as a guide, a testament
that someone else knew what I was looking for

into the night skies

That tape never went away
always somewhere in the background of my possessions
like the search that never stopped
because it knew it couldn't, no matter what transpired

the song was of one who would chase away skeletons

one who "wouldn't mind"

I found her from 967
a break in the curtains that displayed heaven
ghosts and skeletons on the run
Now I'm in that southern sky, under her sun.

Handout

Photocopy gray
Staples in the corner
Third generation blur and fade
Some pages out of order

Pacing at the front of the room
Aisle after aisle
Handing out second rate textbooks
With a glued on fucking smile

That depressing mimeographed bundle
Imitation of life
Tossed on a desk with carvings and perversions
Stabbed in via jackknife

Same day. Same game, not a damn thing's changed
Not a teacher anymore, but a boss or
a friend
Throwing you a stack of half-hearted copycat
Lie after lie, means to an end

So I won't take this remnant of a tree
Folded in my hand, rolled up fakery
It can sit in front of my face making me sick
Clenching my fist, trying for bravery

1989-- Standing in the middle of Caligula (something with the horizontal)

Don't like to look in the mirror 

Or hear the voice that belongs to what I see 

 singing off key, 

looking like life warmed over 

 Staring and wondering 

speaking and questioning 

 Noah Drake asked, "Wondering what she don't see in me." 

 Rolling out of bed, rolling into the black again in the bathroom in front of the glass 

again disliking someone who's done nothing wrong

 There I am clinging to sainthood, 

shaking my head with a laugh at the lack of willpower that others show 

 willpower I feel I have no right but to display 

 I'm standing in the middle of Caligula

 the only one who sees anything wrong here 

 the only one who holds "steadfast" dear

 I know what's wrong with this picture 

 and it's damn sure more than the contrast

 a lot more than the brightness 

 something with the horizontal 

 because it's the same thing over and over again, 

out of control like the dreams where I'm spinning and I can't stop it. 

 and I'm the only one who cares and I'm going home alone.. 

 stone cold sober 

 stone cold pure 

 stone cold righteousness 

 stone cold flame 

 I'm standing in the middle of Caligula 

 watching others hurt and others getting hurt 

 and doing and letting it happen like the horizontal, over and over again 

 I see the wine and the touch and the intemperance 

 and I don't want any part of it 

 and I question those who do 

 and those who let those who do off the hook 

 No one ever learns 

No one ever yearns 

because it's handed to them like the horizontal 

over and over again 

 I'm standing in the middle of Caligula 

 covering my ears 

covering my eyes 

 pretending it doesn't happen 

 stone cold flame

Dialing

I have questions
I need to ask
I can look back, Dad
but they're not buried in the past

So I look up
and make a phone call
is there an operator
beyond the pearly gates and heaven's walls?

Because your questions to your father
fell on deaf ears
and I know mine would be answered
with a pat on the back and great cheer

but when my own son
won't listen to my knocks at the door
how much harder do I dial
before I can't do it any more?

3 degrees of seperation
different breaks in the same connection
Goddamn it, Dad, it's your help I now need
Which way one good father has to turn
to make his only son see?

The Indifference of "good" men....

I guess I never really had a problem with what I'll call mild vigilantism. In so many brightly lit areas of the world there is true darkness. People who have done awful things.

Terrible things.

It is bad they are still walking among us unpunished and unincarcerated for more than one reason.

The one that seems to bite the lesser of the two is that the victims are unvindicated from top to bottom. This is a no-brainer. The one that really hurts, really irks, and causes nausea at times, is that they walk around, grins firmly implanted on their face, believing they have done no wrong.

I have a problem with that.

Or worse, they know what they've done may not be exactly right, but it was okay that THEY did it.

Those brightly lit areas grow a little darker everyday for there are so many people scuttling about thinking they have committed the equivalent of some little white lie, when they have unequivocally partially ruined some pure soul's life....

I can't let that go....It keeps me awake at night sometimes.....Justice is too often a near miss....

Think

When you've accepted who you are today
and you've settled with how the shadows loom
you rise from your bed every day
hearing ghosts from the other room

When you realize you've reached your potential and it fell short of the goal you've set
smiles achieved by others beside you
sometimes throw balm on the burns you get

It is a fucking sad day
when you find out you have so much love to give
indeed a powerfully sad day
because, wasted, it leaked out like a sieve

register your smile with the kid
register your apathy with the wife
turn your head, ignore your reflections
for the rest of your goddamn life

There's a quiet place in my head
blackened reflections on shiny surfaces
voices of the dead, and shadows of dread
This walks the halls of my home.

Thin

Sometimes I feel things so sharply/ they bring a tear to my eye/ Every time someone says hello/ It means there will be a goodbye/ and it's no lie I have a tough time letting go/ and it's so fucking easy to cry/ the wrong things are the ones people know/ No one knew I was trying to die/ and I feel like there's an open wound somewhere/ under a rain of salt/ I can't seem to locate it anyplace or anywhere/ and that is no one's fault/ 30 years ago, I had my ass kicked/ and no tear has been falling/ but light melancholy or a harsh word/ can have me crawling/ My skins so thin, I bet you can see through it/ but someone now is trying to find a way/ I believe in her, she wants to do it/ I feel less burn, my flesh much less frayed/ Because I don't want the hurt anymore/ I no longer have the strength to carry it/ She wants to take it off, hand it to me/ and watch me as I bury it.....