A Paler Shade

Love Sucks

Ghosts of Montreal

Patience

Charmer Boys

Those unfortunate (bastard) wild boys,

trained too early

and too easily

that their goods were in demand

that they could barter through life

on looks and loving

 

Charm is their first line of defense

Permanently on offense

(still not in control)

taking from others

as was done to them

The original biological weapon.

  

This talent for assessing need

and weakness

This dark discernment

working towards neither's good,



A call to charms


Playing that designated role

imprinted too young

too mightily

Be what they need

Swallow yourself whole

Manipulation is power

or a passable facsimile thereof



You exert bravado

so we would never imagine

the rift within

The Path to Island Living (It's Cheaper Than You Think)

Friendship
was once plentiful
and capricious
and effortlessly-obtained.
More easily-maintained,
not readily-destroyed.
Sturdy and assumed,
monolithic in proportion,

Now disappeared.

How fickle we became,
somewhat automatically,
it would seem,
by age 30;
jaded,
old promises faded,
the delicate tickle
of time
now furiously gripping
and strangling.

Brutal recognition
demanded,
naivete stranded,
all the tiny things
become giant
in the land of
what-was-promised-to-be
older and wiser.

Perspective works in reverse
of what I'd imagined
(Why should that deceit
be any different 
from all other beliefs
turned on their ears?)

Awareness finds me
much too late;
the party is ended.
(but it will still serve
to find me home.)

It takes a season
(or three)
to respect your own
understanding,
to stop selling out
for a few laughs
and to fill your nights
with other-than-moderate
common bonds
(or, typically, none at all.)

To determine that duplicity shown
in front of you
can also be anticipated
once you depart, as well.

That gossip snakes around your name--
that those pangs in your back
are caused by more than exes' voodoo.

To no longer need
'somebody'
or
'any body'
to take you through
the night's isolation...
to make you feel complete,
belonged to,
part of,
acclaimed,
consistent,
valiant,
worthwhile,
important,
potent,
loveable,
desirable,
relevant.

Instead, to forge your own happiness,
and encourage your own brilliance;
no need for half-hearted
undercuts and overlooked slights,
bland tolerance, or hearty indifference.

Strive and perform and provide,
and the more you do,
it's expected of you;
not appreciated,
not accepted,
not approved,
not reciprocated,
not considered.
Merely bilked.

I reached a point
where my capacity
for bullshit
and my tolerance
for abuse
was all used up.
Something about 'looking
in all the wrong places.'

I needed more...
I found it.

Say My Name



(Slave Angel by Mariano7724)



I'm wishing there were

something more to see

cuz it seems

all inbred fucks

with no clue

and all luck,

and all the wrong people

are breeding

and all the wrong people

are dying


 
Nostalgia's a crying shame;

was it that good

or just a good game?

The skew of reflection

or the passage of time

Either way you slice it

it's all the same

Nothing left for me

in the here and now




I call my own name

No one else

does it quite the same

There's an onerous task

in going it alone

yet the alternative

cuts to the bone

When other folks try to

send me shame

I call my own name