The Recipe

Start with a stance, passionate but unbalanced.

Throw in dashes of Dickinson—if she hadn't had talent—

and cut into sections with rhymed ends that slant.

Into some, the essence of nineties decant.

With the essance of aughts, be a little more stingy.

Let the thing stew in a brain-bucket dingy,

Then knead it in an uneven rhythm that skips.

Alliterate lightly to cover the blips.

Mix metaphors up like a suicide soda,

and finish it off with an unrhyming coda.

Oops.

Eh, nevermind.

My Personal World, Part 22: Baggage/Around the World in 8 Tracks

If I am ever really known, then I am known to travel light.

I lost most of my memories along the road one night.

The bumps were bruising, the memories too heavy for my mind.

I think those twist and turns were also too much for my fright.

I last saw my shame on the way down a pass on I-90.

It couldn't keep up with so many bad decisions at high speed.

I might've left my marbles just east of the Mississippi.

They didn't weigh me down; I just didn't want 'em with me.

I'm not an accountant, but still, I don't fight

The influence of tastes past on my future, my life.

If I did, I'd need insurance no agent provides

For the times high-flying, erratic-steering memory collides

With the steady, ceaseless, high-speed driving of a beat,

From my most recent metal, and back to oldies.

I'm not really known for traveling heavy.

Nevertheless, I carry most of the music with me.

Alliterative, Literate, Literary, Lawless

In reading and writing, regarding the radical
I've been too focused, fixated, fanatical
On being fantastic, first rate, foremost and formidable
To find favor with the finical, fussy, fastidious,
But not once have I wondered "well, what have I missed?"

Crisis of Belief

The blunt end of Revelation grows in heaven, from a seed.

Its branches underlie us, too monumental to be seen

By the legions, billions, ignorant—a number once including me.

Until one day, down the middle, my skull was rudely pierced

By a sculptor's knife, an existential ax-blade—a mere leaf.

As ignorant as I'd been, I swore ne'er again I'd be,

But had I known the fight I'd have to make the world believe

Or even just acknowledge, to this task would I've agreed?

I lived before I knew. That knowing now comes naturally.

Knowing what I know, can I go back, forget, retreat?

It's too tiring to believe in the Truth, the kind with a capital T.

The Beautiful Terrorists

They vivisect with just their eyes,

Their talons, too, pierce many pies

All those within their reach or grasp.

They even bite the hands they clasp.

Few, lucky, leave while still intact

Their grounds ruled by unspoken pact,

Where rule's enforced by brutal words

Far too feared to be ignored.

Where Roads Diverge, Pt. 2

I know not what I wish for when I wish that I could change.

I'd do as well to trade retreating hairline for a case of mange.

To adopt the common value's to believe the TV's lies

That having more will make me happy—to hoard, and be dissatisfied.

Perhaps I ought to be creative rather than pay convenience fees,

But the bills bear someone else's face. My time is marked for me,

and while supervision rankles, it straight repels to be adored.

I hate the wrong decisions, but hate the right ones even more.

Where Roads Diverge, Pt. 1

Hard rock begat pop-metal, and pop-metal, glam.

I've evolved just enough to dislike who I am.

Sometimes I should put “long-term” before “now.”

I hate that I ask—and don't figure out—how.

I hate that others must mind when I shirk

'Cause I'd empty my Netflix queue in lieu of work.

I know I should mind earthly matters, rewards,

and respect that other folks collect them, if not hoard,

So that my debts and my enemies don't endlessly climb

I hate making the wrong decision all the time.