On the tip of a waking match

Was it a dream of a memory? I thought, but then again it changed.
The light shining from a separate side.
A conversation, from memory, about a dream.
A memory of a dream, we recalled.
Talking about our dreams, and the way the layers fall.
Everything so blurred around the edges now.
What once felt so urgent.
How they burn the corners of every thought to make it feel so immediate
Then in waking how it stretches long and thin from behind my tired eyelids
Trying to think of the word for which there is no sound
Or find meaning in a sense of aching loss
Like a friend I've been meaning to call
I scroll through the names and the letters won't add up right
The bitter gnaw of waking
And I've sweat through my sheets
And my sanity

Neon Phalanx

We’re grazing revolution with our brittle fingertips

And breathing heavy in the halls of counterfeit love

Digging ditches for the bricks of politics

And scratching sidewalk chalk on down the highways of our hope

My ambition is desperation

My religion is uncertainty

I will not worship distance and ambiguity and power 

But I will sing the praises of the heathens with heart beats and stomping feet

I will tithe before the poor who don’t start wars and don't eat meat

And I will bow to no one until my ankles are cut with ballots

Toxic Crop

when all the bullets have sewn their toxic crop 

when all the cannons have fired and the bombs all been dropped

tell me when this never-ending war will stop

will we take a break from taking lives when enough people die

gotta give peace it's time, but you gotta make your own mind up

i'm not asking for utopia 

i'm not begging just to differ

i've been tasked by my conscience 

to do more than keep an upper lip stiff or

drift from romance to romance

or play the prince's pauper dance

a paper trance we all fall down

listen and justice will call out

while real heroes die for the crime of speakin' truth

whistleblowers locked and lowered by the kings with guns and bombs and loot 

little secrets leaked by keepers, i hope they never get caught 

while the naked emperor lies like lies are all the sense that he's got

i'm not saying i got answers

but the questions need asking

what can be gained from mortal pain 

on this mortal plane we keep blasting 

hospitals and homes blown by drones flown

by the heroes countin' zeroes down from tuitions they owe

looking for an out through the orders they follow

flying flags over borders, more propaganda to swallow 

i'm feeling hollow hearing news that again we abuse these tools

tax dollar theft, can't catch our breath, too busy drowning in debt

another scandal I can't handle, tell me are we great again yet

Open Wound

Someday this laptop will die
And take the files with your smile
I probably should have erased
After such a long while

Someday I'll be someone else
I think I already am
I probably should just forget you
But I don't think I can

And I still dream
Of seeing you and it's alright
And I wake
To another cold and lonely night

You've cut me too deep
I'll be bleeding through
In my memory
You're still an open wound

This town is drowning with time
The suffocating past
You probably shouldn't be here
I'm probably talking too fast

And I still think
Just a moment of your time and some honesty
Could make this
Right again, somehow you'll see

You've cut me too deep
I'll be bleeding through
In my memory
You're still an open wound

Is it too much to ask
For a moment of truth
Just 'cause we didn't last
Doesn't mean I didn't want you

I want you
I still want you

Someday this laptop will die
Soon this message will end
I should be asking me why
I even want to press send

here's your tie, sir

here's your tie, sir, lookin' great, no why i would never lie, sir, please try sir, to stick to the script we inflict on the old do or die, sir

here’s your endless war like an open sore that keeps pussin while we’re fussin with our credit scores

here’s your executive call, here’s your border wall, here’s your plate stacked tall with all that falls on more than casinos and shopping malls 

here’s your best intentions, failed to mention monkey-wrenches in passive aggressive short quotable sentences

here’s your no nonsense, non-PC, not for nothing but nothing much ‘cause only this much nothing comes for free, so screw democracy, chew hypocrasy like scenery and win an oscar for your media monopoly, your national debt, your imminent threat, your business demeanor scheming to deport dreamers, scream so you loud you don’t have to mean it but don’t forget to place your bet, ‘cause we may be lucky enough to live just to live to regret, not so ready, not so set, but tell me are we great again yet

What Are You Waiting For?

We’re all stumbling around 

With fish hooks in our mouths 

And lines to the sky tangled up in the cloud 

We’re all looking away 

Perpetually longing for something just out of sight

We wait for and wonder what could, what should, what just might 

Happen...like something amazing I guess

It might happen...something amazing I guess

Calisthenics

Even my imaginary heroes have all died
Even my closest friends have all lied
While the world spins madly on without me
And yet I wonder if I've been left behind
Or simply spared?