poem for the ghost of who i thought i was
a man of words found
hanging in the desert
a song, but not the one
you’re thinking of
not the one your lover
used to sing,
but it still sounds familiar
a smaller house in
another town, maybe?
the promise of happiness,
and then the
way it never arrives
age of electricity,
age of gold,
of unlimited desires,
call it what you want
we still have war,
still have hatred,
still have famine and genocide and
so maybe call it the age
of enlightenment?
maybe subscribe to the delusion that
acknowledging evil is enough,
that taking votes is the same as
taking action
and you have your words, yes,
and you have your silence
your list of suicides
of forgotten ex-lovers, and my name
has been written down on
one of those pages,
simply and without fanfare
my father’s name, spelled out
both backwards and forwards and a
smear of coke across the mirror
when i hold it up
a child on fire found
curled up in the middle of the street
a reason
seriously?
the age of disbelief is
a thing of the past
the cashier is shot for $20,
a six-pack,
a carton of cigarettes
for the hell of it
shit happens, and was that
aristotle or was it camus?
the honorable j. christ maybe,
right before that first spike
showed him all the possibilities of
suffering, and who the hell would
actually build their temple on
this s&m wet dream?
who would choose an instrument
of torture to be
the symbol of their faith?
fuck the future and
fuck the past
let the here and now be
what carries us through
let this moment be the
only one that defines us
i tell you i love you
and all time stops
all history is the history of failure
or christ arriving at the
golgotha hotel without a reservation,
without any luggage or message for the faithful,
and the cops have their orders
the blood flows like wine
there is never any better
time for fear than now