America, I Weep for You

America, I weep for you
Born in splattered independence
In violence spread from sea to sea
A land bled dry for you and me
A nation lost within in a Dream
Conductor of mystified second-chance glances
Grand canyoned and chasmed in madness that dances
On great plains of rage roaring rich under fire
Where the faint glint of stars alabastered expire
Where the Babylon Mountains manifest destiny
Where a banner woven quilt of chaos
Paints a holy hymened canvass
No rhyme, no reason, just a game
To see who’s standing in the end

America, I weep for you
Jesus of suburbia
Satan of the city
You try so hard to stay unique
Made from multi-colored rag-coats
Splayed in shades of bigotry
And when it’s over
When the rod has recoiled and the medals dispensed
When the anthem played out and the tears wiped away...
But it’s never really "played out", is it?
Tears never really "wiped away", are they?
Not really...

There are some who believe we should cherish each other
To nurture and care for our sisters and brothers
If we want to achieve the beyond we believe in
But you know, America, there awaits no such reprieve
No saintly souls to be canonized
No sanctified codes reserved for sacred scribes
Only fiercely exhaled fumes from black-ironed nostrils
Expelled in the face of a weak human race
Gentrified in the fragments of sacramental minds
Loud and stubborn and unapologetic in our superhuman recourse
Where no mortal recusal can be forgiven, much less survive

Why do I weep for you?
America, I’ll tell ya:
I watched Waco burn in the span of a wasteland
With demented resentment for those basted, chaste lives
And while over their heads came the dread of a new day
We drank in their affliction under ashen-splashed skies
And the shots rung throughout the hollowed halls of Columbine
Hammered out a refrain we had not heard before
But sadly would again in time and with much more crescendo
I’ve witnessed your spirit respired from existence
When your wings tipped infinity then descended precipitously
And hard cities wrapped sick in some sleep deprivation
Were forced into a coma for generations on end
Preserving the Dream steadfast and unflinching
Built on the backs of those fleeced in the streets
Their willpower devoured by Holocaust zombies
Their faces affright in the dawn’s early light

America, I weep for you
Hundreds of millions of heartbroken tears
One fallen for each of your quixotic convicts
Who call on Christ to free a fetus
Who argue with a loaded gun
Who honestly believe they’re blessed beyond the suns of other nations
Who hold heads high in strapless fashion
Who make believe Jehovah cares
But not about the ones they bomb
Because their gods speak indistinctly
Who sleep awake while hypnotized
And feast on banquets dressed in excess
Who bear the weight the world can’t carry
Who circumvent their skeletons and float unfettered fat downstream
Who smile behind their silent scream

America, wake up and realize you can’t astride these wretched lies
When you become a peaceful population liberated from segregation
I’ll wipe my eyes of my frustration and look on you with adoration
Your torch once beckoned huddled masses seeking redemption
To storm your boundless, teeming shores
And when again you lift your lamp against the golden door
And the tempest-tossed who need protection
Hear your colossus roar restored
America, I’ll weep no more.

Hotel Babel

Checking in to Hotel Babel
Bellhop Jesus, take my baggage
Up to penthouse number nine
And show me where I need to sign

Climbing Jacob’s Ladder slowly
Passing prophet portraits peering
Back at me, but they can’t see
Into these lifeless eyes of mine

Tip the Savior with my soul
And open up to isolation
The curtains drawn, I don’t belong
Ring up a bottle of salvation

To drown my lack of satisfaction
To validate my mourning dove
Perched upon the cold stone of
My wayward spirit’s windowsill

Below, the streets of broken dreams
Carved out like cut glass shards of anguish
Misery in shades obscene
Misguided vines that guard the exits

Duvets are wooly sheets of lamb
To blanket the mistakes I’ve made
Fall face first into Mary’s pillows
Then fall away from everything

Eternal dawn, she wraps around me
Her warm, inviting smile affirms
I’ve made love to a vested virgin
Anointed in the bed we’ve made

She says she has a mikvah dip
Appointment made for noon today
At the hotel salon aptly named
“Bathsheba’s Health and Wellness Spa”

And so I dress and head for breakfast
The dining room is scarcely filled
Chef Moses says the menu’s “plagued”
While Doorman Samson adjusts his toupée

Cut through the kitchen backdoor alley
Where John awaits on the fire escape
Says he knows a “little dive”
That serves the best communion ‘round

The city smells of kerosene
The Lake of Fire’s distinctive sea breeze
I know this place, I know it well
The hell townsfolk call Beggarsville

Streets confettied with love letters shorn into shreds
Nephews abused by long-suffering aunts
And sewer rats

Infested with larva of soul-eating moths
Humanitarians who have finished last
And the past

Ragged stares from dreamers who honestly cared
Once upon long ago
Before failure was known

The sting of sulfur blinds our eyes
We duck inside a crumbling building
Among the skid row bars and brothels
A hole called Café Rock of Ages

The owner’s name is Abraham
A boy named Isaac tends the bar
The wine tastes like the spit of swill
John says it’s here we’ll get our fill

We take our seats against the wall
The paper peeling worn and torn
Above our heads the clock unwound
A drunk named Judas buys a round

He pays with thirty silver coins
A seldom u-ndertaking for a
Man who toils a potter’s field
He hangs his hat and pours his meal

We order tempest tossed in loss
The cupboards bare – we eat the world
Piano Man Paul starts to play
The atmosphere begins to sway

We melt beneath the floorboards
Bidding fond adieu to all our woes
Promenade in fairground joy
In total bliss and happiness

Airing our feelings, grasping for reasoning
What is the meaning?
Am I only dreaming?

Chanting incantations, a lecherous celebration
Cursing segregation
Defeating subjugation

Bells are ringing, angels singing
Patrons smiling
Some are crying

Accept this pleasant, earnest present
Away with fists that don’t belong
Honest trust, how glorious!
The ivory keys tap freedom’s song

Farewell despair without a care
Far from the streets of sweeping sorrow
No room for shame, our lives in vain
A touch of grace, God, here I go

John says the anthem comes alive
In each gleam of a newborn’s eyes
And with Paul’s impassioned, vocal strains
Our broken dreams are euthanized

The soothing sound of freedom’s song
How I love it o’er and o’er
The cresting pulse of freedom’s song
Makes me wish for nothing more

But jubilation never stays
A pimp called Lot struts through the door
Presents his daughters, boasts they’ll fill
Any lust in Beggarsville

We thus retreat the downward spiral
Reminded life’s a mystery
The rich man mired in foolishness
The wise man sunk in poverty

So what entails a man to stay?
To forge a life in Beggarsville?
To take his bleak, vexatious veil
And shroud the light of his potential?

We head on back to Hotel Babel
Criss-cross the streets of broken dreams
Past shops called Enoch’s Bank and Trust
And Taxes Done by Zacchaeus

A star shines bright to guide us home
Quick stop downtown at Casino Levi
Lose gold and frankincense and myrrh
To three wise guys doing Magi tricks

The dust of dusk begins to descend
So majestic, such finesse
To cover every implication
With the prowess of indulgence

John says he’s had a revelation
Says we should pop down to the station
Hop a steel-wheeled riding rail
And take that scenic, westbound trail

He’s got an eye on setting suns
Wants to have a little fun
Wants to flee this sordid game
And taste the chaste of summer rain

Calls upon his guardian angel
A cherub-faced boy now appears
Presents himself as simply Michael
Who draws his sword when trouble nears

And so we journey through the city
When out of nowhere comes a mob
John asks them what they want from us
“Barabbas!” (i.e. none of your business)

They lunge, but Michael doles the lash
So swift he strikes with split precision
The mob disperses in a hurry
The details – still a little blurry

But John’s been wounded and it’s bad
We need to get him help and fast
Michael says that Doctor Luke
Can fix him good as new again

For Pete’s sake then, put down the sword
And help me get John on this board
We’ll carry him to Luke’s E.R.
And hope it doesn’t leave a scar

Rush through the doors where scores and scores
Await afflicted with disease
Leprosy, possession, those seen clinging to a crutch
All in need of a healing touch

Curse the sound of freedom’s song!
Oh woeful words that maim, not heal!
Newborn dance fawn prancing ground
Means nothing to me anymore

We should have stayed at Hotel Babel
Then John would not be in this state
And Mary, oh my undercover lover
How she’d placate my intentions to escape

Doc Luke attempts a risky operation
Never done before nor will again
But in the end it’s either this or lose our friend
And me and Mike can’t let that happen

So begins the Lazarus Procedure
Ever-eager Mike begins to pray
Says it helps to keep the pain at bay
But I don’t see it quite that way

Luke thrusts the spear into John’s side
The blood spews forth in flashflood waves
Nurse Ruth attempts to stitch a fissure wide
The Balm of Gilead is then applied

John’s last words urge us all to keep believing
Rolls back his eyes then wades across the sea
Eternity? Could be. But me? I highly doubt it
The scrub tech, Thomas, heartily agrees

So I set off once again for Hotel Babel
Funny how things seem to end that way
You search for faith only to find
The abscess of a sacrilegious mind.

Montage – The Last Call

I cannot stand my father’s hand
Who wields a violent, tyrant’s glove
Sour bearer weakened and feeble
In the order of law I will no longer tolerate
Be still!
Beckoned and bruised
Full hatred, full of despise
Anarchy to which I worship, subscribe
While lanterns burn brightly in the corridors of my mind

Within an age when all things fair
I went too far!
I left the earth searching, pondering, praying
Aimless in my conquest
Never having been a saintly figure of the church
My martyrdom is inexplicable
I need not explain! I need exoneration!
Reverence for weirdness, vindication for oddity
Ptolemy reasoning and platonic figuring
A beast with severed Bristol ties
The master laughs when servants cry
Under the influence of insanity

And to my mother dressed in armor
Now murdered on the battlefront
I show thee no pity
Affectionless her body lay infested with her swollen anger
Her last words rang, “Scoundrel! Blasphemous borne child! Oh, how I loathe thee!”

Now a lecture for the worms … and worms have no ears
I scorn relatives with menopausal awareness
Shuffling halfheartedly toward the Golden Years of nothingness
My God, what am I doing here?
In a haze surrounded by speculation
Makes me strive for segregation
Triumph in the town of plenty
Redemption for a sparrow’s crown

Take from my bosom apologetic voices
Begging forgiveness for attending this menace
Pretend no more I’m a believer; infected with cursed heathen fever
Catching glimpses of amity from the corner of my eye
A million thoughts race through my head
Is true love real? Or truly stable?
Would true love flee if it were able?
Lovely little parody that here I sit among the ashes
Caressed by the sense of me sitting on a fence
Which way should I fall – to the bad or the good?
Why try? On which side will you die?

My fondness for people resembles a piccolo placed in the back row
Never been known, never was shown
False freelance no pay headwash mind games
Reserves me and my lonesome at no extra cost
My torturer, my devil, my nemesis, friend
A soft, quiet friend with a momentous impact
This is my montage – the last call

What manner lie you wake at night to sense a presence in the room?
A shadow’s breath on top of you emerging forth and spreading sickness
Confess, you wicked silhouette! ‘Twas you who hid within my room!
Watching me slumber with eyes tightly fused
Pray tell, what was I supposed to do?
Love you all as best I could?
I’ve already tried to entwine my benevolence
But to those who have misunderstood
I’m just a lost cause ‘twas meant for dogs whose dice roll just crapped out again

Forget I said a single word
What’s best unsaid is what I think
To you, to all, to worldly stays
‘Cause what I say turns blue skies grey
Pledged to oaths I can’t reveal
I’ll never heal and cannot translate
Those who go to bed with bloated bellies
Scrounging round for one last supper
Retire now!
Wash away covetous ways like disposing of bowel waste in an outhouse reserve

I refer to happiness in meager tones
For we have not yet been properly introduced
And if I told you of everything so vivid to me
A parade of raindrops that fall in the smash suddenness of silent contempt
My expressive salute to a parental cluster of amethyst that seems to shine upon my loose footing
Would you take back what you said to me?
Could you bring back the laughter escaping my lungs?
I’m on the run, you wanna come?

Hallelujah, what’s it to ya?
Seems to me much more than that
If Kipling wrote on shattered speeches
I know where the pieces went
And they’re for rent

Alas, the fall of twilight’s play
As black cloth falls, I’ll dim the lights
Although I love all when the dawn breaks
I am trapped in secret night
The last contender for the fight
It’s all right; I’ll be alright
It serves me right
Goodnight.

Off The Chest

Snuff the candle in your head; I think you’ve had enough to say
You want my damned soul stretched and ploughed
Cursing the plan that you really can’t stand
The thought of us going through life hand in hand

Took the occasion to sort out our trouble
Decided to chance it and made it out double
An affair of despair left our love levee breaking
Slaves in the making, our hearts torn and aching

My mind split wide open; brains spilt on the floor
You vanish from view, my lost angel whore
Release tired efforts and the shadows of trust
Segregate/Separate affection – a must

A farewell celebration, invite all our pain
We’ll howl at the moon in the night’s pouring rain
Below empty streetlights so hollow they shine
As the sorrow frosts over our window of time

In the overwhelmed solace, earth covered in white
Then the snows of our yesteryears melt from our sight
And become what was once such a cryptic disguise
Mask the seasick endeavor, the corrupt enterprise

‘Twas all lies – the charade, the insane games we played
The art beyond bondage and the chains that we made
The curse that we now know we’ll never be free
The loss of commitment that leaves us bereaved

Belief in faith fails me; forsaken my hope
At the end of my rope, but I’m trying to cope
Intrigued by delusion, persecution inquires
What cures this misfortune and lifts mere men higher?

City Of Broken Dreams

Consumed by stuttered drabbbness
In the city of broken dreams
Merge with the utter hapless
Become unravelled at the seams

In stride with worn and pitiful
Fictitious pairs of shoes
Holes swallow my indifference
Tattoo inks me “Born to Lose”

I wander in the humdrum
Contemplating city schemes
It’s a wrongful plague on pilgrims
This damn state of broken dreams

City says that it’s seen plenty
I would say I’m barely seen
As the crow flies four and twenty
I walk the streets of broken dreams

Christ can’t save this wretched Sodom
Christ can’t hear in-sin-seared pleas
Christ can’t win ‘cause in the end
We’d all just kill the man again

The city sun has burned to blackout
I burn candles in my head
This city leaves no room for doubting
That true love is truly dead

Street signs suggest subtle suicide
Alleyways form hostile spaces
Misplaced names and withdrawn faces
End of ropes and no more aces

Apathetic streetlights mock me
Illuminate my story well
Spawned from Angel and his Mentor
Just before the angel fell

City splendor fades so quickly
Once my future, now my past
Dreams that promise dreams can come true
Turn to dreams that never last

Beneath the broken neon moonlight
Scream the silent walking dead
Harken cries of desperation
Harken hopelessness ahead

Stumble down the rain soaked cobble
In the city of broken dreams
Vanish all of my tomorrows
Vanish all the pretty things.

19.12.28

Imperative ride on the wings of extinction
Ostensibly laughing hunched over in fear
Anxious yet patiently waiting out my turn
To share my mulled masterpiece broad with the world

Falling face forward with hands tied behind me
Letting the claws of fate fully wrap round me
Spreading dark wings soaring passed past compunction
Trampling regret with a newborn’s first steps

Tearing down walls found upholding reluctance
Though I sometimes get lost among qualms I run from
How will I know when I’ve reached satisfaction?
When will I feel the sealed kiss of redemption?

Standing surefooted preparing for Eden
Steady myself in forgivable sin
Invisible demons with faces unthinkable
Slink toward my door though I shan’t let them in

So teach me to learn, to stretch taut my affections
To burn with desire that is cool to the touch
Make a fist and release and watch cosmos expire
I don’t get enough sleep and I dream far too much.

Credendum

Felled plumes of youth tread light to spite sequestered serving spoons that bear
The watermarks once silvered shining,
Once dried & polished, now dulled & tarnished
Reclined in coffin-trays of age, last breath expels in Delphi whisper
Reminders offer up redemption - memento mori – calm & for the few who’ve stayed
A toast that you’ll fall fast asleep within the lap of modest gods
Who’ve yet to wield their powers claimed but stroke your forehead just the same
Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt?

Lost wishes dance beyond vast heaven’s burning light of satellites
Shined brightly down upon tomorrow (as for today, we shan’t believe)
We’ll not conceal our efforts though betrayed
W/ blinded eyes & raspy voices carried far & vanished all
Through billowed clouds of smoke the declaration - per aspera ad astra!
Laid glories paid to ashes straggle late, in fact they come but only once upon
A long awaited, antiquated jewel of sparkling alteration set in suspect demarcation
Celari vult sua furta Venus

Corruption of the best is worst, far worse than better laughing laws of added insult
Injured by inventing customs mocked & morbid, teased & sordid
No creature dies a virgin - this existence bends & screws us all
On blankets made from ferns of dust by unapologetic apparitions floating free &
Unforgiven - sic transit gloria mundi – headless vespers starkly bowed & flourishing
Like April’s sighing daffodils come springing forth through dark-infested, soil-digested
Tablets dunked in Dramamine soliloquies of ghosts heard singing languidly
“Nemo liber est qui corpori servit”

Cadavers slowly grow & quickly die, the clocks unwind their blood-stained hands
While friends who knew dread time draws nigh have long departed, broken-hearted
Finding troubles multiplied as sure as sun meets tempest sky in revealed caveats
Spoken by dear Daedalus who can’t deter bold Icarus from soaring ever higher
Toward the fire - adversus solem ne loquitor – a late appeal from fabled lips
The flame attracts the moth’s wings laced w/ wax while Mona Lisa’s missing eyebrows
Raise: ‘tis better to be hated for yourself than loved for who you’re not
Ars est celare artem

An empty cask is simply rolled down labored mountains giving birth
For centuries the mouse lies breached until w/in the caverned-womb recedes
The condemnation of misunderstanding, the fear that molds numbed ignorance doled
Out to hungry witnesses who can’t compare to one lone conscience pricked & prodded
For veracity, indeed - veritas vos liberabit – impunity shall not provoke though truth
Be found in vats of wine, to quarrel with a drunkard is to wrong a man who is not there
His vacant stare transfixed upon the grapevine’s luring flattery, the smutty jest molesting
Quod me nutrit me destruit

Fate stalks in stealth & sets its trap with tears, with vile sacraments of coy persuasion
Forced upon a host who has not learned to die nor translate mandates
Penned in chalk by papered fools who use the wall’s deceptive template
For their forged negotiations, creating bogus lamentations thus diverting tiny minds
Abjection of the self-made kind must be surmounted - vincit qui se vincit – as all things
Change so change we w/ them, tortured by the arrogance of horrid wars & barmy lovers
Cradled in the thorny eye where argyle webs catch origami silhouettes of days gone bye
Dolor hic tibi proderit olim

Abandoned hope for rope to suture up shorn burlap sacks of burdens tied around swelled
Heads & left for dead with all but fa®ce to save men, save them from depravity &
Wrinkles etched in wickedness that feign what’s left of shameful sin enshrouded in
Enduring dimpled malice cast to sow the crops of gardened excess graft to masks that
Bury winter’s sly insurgency – mundus vult decipi – for summer will not always be
As everything that shines like gold is not as posh as it may seem sat dangling from
Hoodwinked earrings shaped to fit the feel of evolution’s hollow earlobe strained to hear
Parva leves capiunt animas

Reverberation tweaks the brain producing rain like blowhole Moby edifice
Torn down deluxe scab train electric swank eccentric vertigo abstraction quicksand
Sink in elephant parades which pave the way for maiden voyage Starship Compromise &
Bend dreamed knees to sacred Dahlia Terror bum hum round the barrel’s blazing spire
Scorching scandalous skirts afire - suum cuique pulchrum est - round zoftig hip of
Backdoor sun splash spread as grass sharks scan the seedy scene in shades of green
Embracing each lost chance begotten, clever slip & tiptoe round the hippo dipped
Brevior saltare cum deformibus mulieribus est

Dismembered limb of peg-legged poet flail vis-à-vis pure dumbsaint great wild teahead
Compositions mixing w/ the maddened visions crawling out of inhibitions exhibiting
The past & present future of said discontent while rapt in frantic fog fantastic swirling in
A language sea of energy, the knowledge of no hope can bring the courage to move ever
Onward, rest peacefully fair Marian - eheu fugaces labuntur anni – such holy contours of
The Earth can disappear without a warning, in truth to find another form emblazoned
On the chest of independence from your captive skin & curl up at the feet of fine infinity
Ad limina apostolorum

Accepted loss can reconstruct the aqueducts that flow so deeply in the mind of
Solemn ages stilled in streams where bathe the sages searching in the pooled
Reflections plunging deep for sunken passions, fractions of a misspent youth is proof
The seed falls further from the tree than what initially believed so does authority have its
Place but beware casting pearls to swine – quis custodiet ipsos custodes? – accountability
Is a necessity if we are to agree democracy is key when dealing with our convoluted
Views on human sovereignty & world responsibility - is it too late to save the queen?
Astra inclinant, non necessitant

As glass doth shatter when it gleams the brightest so do fortunes splinter sending shards
Into the mystic mist of everlasting bliss & comfortable forgetfulness, the patient watered
Spots of teardrops excavate the hardened stone, not done with force but falling often
Fingers pricked on rapture’s rose, high places sought by narrow roads, make me chaste
But yet not so - forsan et haec olim meminisse iuvabit - those who are allowed to sin
Sin less, experience lends best to them that teach on what they learn for learned men
Find wealth w/in the history of their error’d ways which teach them best how to behave
Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum

Led hand in hand to comprehend the whole of beauty turning inward, laughter sung by
Foreign children following the path of seldom, seeking trails w/ unknown outcomes
Trusting instinct won’t relent – be not confused nor circumvent, this life is an
Experiment, insist upon yourself & listen closely to the whisper you alone can hear
W/in the temple’d walls of unique celebration - nosce te ipsum – then fall behind
So you may finally find the finest traits locked deep inside, trapped in the genius of
The mind can one discover thoughts discarded - winds that blow the sails departed
Alterius non sit qui suus esse potest

Unite w/ fond fidelities in lieu of fretting futilely in towers made from shiftless
Interests fixed to castles built on distress, instead decant a firm foundation boasting
Groomed humility, become the artificer of a calculated destiny & if there be failed
Faults to find abandon them & start again amending flaws as best you can while still
Asserting soft submission - dum vivimus servimus – like rivers nourish ocean tides
So must creation learn to lap upon the sands of distant shores & drown its weakness
Evermore: man’s nature can be modified but not the nature of mankind
Consummatum est.