Suburban Religion

from venice to chichen itza
you entertain us
look at us asleep in your footprint
(and here is a toe
and a heel
the vibrance and life
of the dirt)
turned around
It glowed so bright but wouldn't
shine outward
it stole the gods from sanskrit
india's peace
it cut them up and boiled them into soup
healed up
the wound from where beliefs were torn
reopened. Bled.
scalpels constructed with a westerner's fortune
chopra's diamonds.
diminished a people so marginalized.
ashes to dust.
these killers of god are growing
taking what little is left,
a bigger existence,
hatred is easily marketed
you don't ask questions, you don't answer them.
Sheep shearing sheep,
the wool piled in banks, cascading.
turned around
from vegas to paris
we like to entertain ourselves.

Falling Leaves

I'm sure it comes as no surprise,
someone would write to you.
It's definitely controversial,
and just as much taboo.
But I love you.

I heard you when you sang "forgive me"
or when you scared the crowds in Illinois,
by proclaiming what everybody there had had in mind.
But you sang those ancient songs, with such
conviction.
I could have sworn you told the truth.

As hard as you said relating was,
friend, you were there.
to share.
but time is full of new,
those who think they can escape
need only look at you.
To see the truth.

If it's discretion that you seek,
to understand hypocrisy.
I'm afraid I can't help you.
I don't see too much of me.
As I faintly disappear,
between the sins, the love and fear.

You can say I'm a shit talker.
I would probably agree.
But I've never sang those hymns off key
dishonestly.
I'm on an airplane headed south,
with a guitar and a running mouth.
I don't really listen,
except when I can tell, right then,
that I'll benefit from it.

I've never felt like I'm losing a friend,
whose not even dead.
But the longer I lay here,
the weaker I feel.
I know I can't stop what time has planned.
the way we progress,
or misunderstand.
But, if you want,
I'm here to talk,
or maybe start a band.

MCMLXXXIX

Moving
Closer
Masks
Longing
X
X
X
I ((((don't))))
eXist.

Every Bird for Himself.

Look at all this food,
oh boy don't it look good.
A silent bite of bread to take
my mind off of this long flight.
And seconds from the feast,
I hear their cavalry arrive.
A thunderous army of black feathers
The dark cloud begins its dive.
But here's my own batallion.
The gulls from distant shore.
Swoop down for my defense
But they'e never looked that way before.
Eyes green,
fixed.
On what there is so little.
How can we share.
Not half a loaf of bread,
we're thousands of beaks
who need to eat.
Not enough is there.
And as the black clouds struck the white,
I heard the same cawing, clawing fight.
Nature's heart exposed in war,
my comrades fierce,
the blood the gore.
Spiling on the pavement, and puddling beneath
the bread.
The white and black are now met with
robin's red and the jay's blue.
The sky, the sidewalk are equally pallettes of
a violent incarnated hue.
I make a move but see his eyes.
a crow with purple chest,
his beak, his teeth, his build his size.
Am I to risk my life, my death.
for this tiny piece of bread.
It looks so good and such a ruse,
maybe that purple is a bruise.
And the light is playing tricks
on my laterally faced eyes.
But to my surprise he claimed the bread
and I felt claws press into my head.
I'm looking to the side
the pavement lays beside.
My bleeding feathered body.
My selfish raptors death.

Indendence suspends it.

As an unimportant fly,
dipped down from the sky.
And it made it's new place,
just above my knee
(just beneath my thigh).
My primary thought
concerned an expeditive swat.
My inconveniences held a mile high
above this pests fragile life.
But not even a square inch,
of my vacant skin.
Before used for nothing,
but now it was a home to him.
Who am I, then, to believe
my shallow comfort more importantly.
Than the air and the spirit
of a single breath,
no tragedy in this minuscule death.

Brother sister, forever may we be.
Open to even the smallest of pleas.
From a bird or a fly,
or the people we see.
Lest we deny the glory and light,
of living in celebration of life.
For if every tongue was created to sing,
and even flies have tongues (I think).
If placing my own pique a grave above,
another's voice created to love.
It must mean there's something wrong
with everything we've learned.
That maybe we aren't all where we deserve
(and we have, we haven't earned).
But there's people on the streets,
who live much longer than a fly.
And many swatted by,
our grotesque new way of life.
Exoskeletons collide
in the gutters where they die.
And something is wrong.
Something is terribly
terribly
terribly wrong.

The Solution.

The fear, terror, hatred.
That sang us to sleep,
as beneath our bedroom windows,
sirens ring out on the streets.
These parodies of wars, that are knocking at our doors
or teaching us to sing a song, a lullaby,
That keeps us painfully asleep.
Wake up oh, sleeper and rise from the dead.
Could we die and be less dead?
Can our comfort and softened flesh,
once again be beaten fresh.
And our clothing, hair and nails,
be torn, burnt and broken
beneath the glory, while we take sail.
On borrowed wings, on stolen time.
beneath our refusing soliloquy.
Let our dissonance define us, and our arms in defiance crossed.
Between the gears of what we've known, let us be tossed.
Lest we forget that it created the void,
that fills our hearts with greed.
Lest we forget this machine that was built,
was built to create a perpetual need.
Our hearts are stronger,
our minds are wiser
our bodies, now beaten to strength.
What else is there to give,
what other reasons, now to live.
Than to be changed to insurrection,
to aid passion's resurrection.
Beneath a sky lit,
by satellites, cities and patriot.
But the city will shine
with fire and light,
while we dance in our chains,
in shackles, delight.
Let us be made acquainted with the cold cement,
of alleys and jail cells, and tenements.
Let our days be made battle
until the nights that we see.
The end of this stolen, controlling
grasp on humanity.
Let us give our four seasons, our life and death.
To seeing this tyranny end.
To sleep without song and light.
To see this lullaby die,
and to awaken a century's death.

The Biz.

Daughter how fast you,
my daughter how fast have you.
Picked up yourself by your own strings.
And given yourself to the loud things.
The voices that tell you they love,
when you listen to it long enough.
And turns you over to the statues outside,
that violate your body, your heart, your insides.
If this voice whispers louder than wind.
To tell you that love is one more step again.
But such misery,
waves louder than the sea.
And the voice that calmed,
the blood-crusted palms.
Whispered inaudible peace.
If anger and hatred may turn back to passion.
And justice replace, this fixation on fashion.
It seems like breaking the skin, and then reaching in.
But the humblest seed breaks through the proud mountain.
And if you still remember the face,
and the mouth that whispered peace,
is now whispering grace.
It will come down to shower
with the scent of a flower.
And wipe these years of rust off your face.