Refrain(ing)

I won't do what you want and you call it a crime
I take what I need and keep what's mine
But you propose a system of order
Boxed in by borders, and it works...sorta.
Everyone's so focused on maintaining
They don't realize they're abstaining from their dreams,
Obtaining a disease: refraining with ease.
Because refrains are always the easiest part of a song
But the harmonies take so damn long
We get lazy, go crazy
Pick up guns and shoot babies
Because maybe if we break down the walls by breaking the laws
The system will pause and take note
Of us.
Man cannot live caged by borders,
Built to impose arbitrary order.
If we want to rid ourselves of discordance,
And keep the world from getting more bent,
We need to live together and let harmony be the mortar
Cuz refraining makes us crazy and it only works sorta.

The Light

A fog hangs around my town
The light can't be found.
This haze clings to my days,
Shifting lazily it stays with me,
A silver shroud that plays with me,
A grey cloud that should be loud;
Its presence abounds but makes no sound,
And the light can't be found.
Is it smoke the signal of fire
A blazing pyre, fueled by desire,
Choking the access to freedom and air,
Blanketing the light burning there?
Or is it the withering dew lapping at the wind,
Darkening the skies before the day begins?
The sun ought to be when the moon is not,
White-hot, an electromagnetic molten sphere
Reigning the skies, glistening there.
There, where that wall of solid silver air appeared.
And in that air I am bound
Surrounded by misty shadows
And the light cannot be found.

Flesh & Wood & Stones & Bones --a sestina

Scaling towers made of stones

By digging my fingers in real deep,

Wearing away my flesh and bones

Trying to climb a slope so steep.

Is there a God that hears my moans?

Cares He at all when I weep?

My world is flooded when I weep

And salty tears erode the stones

That form the tombs buried deep,

Built to house our flesh and bones.

Winds howl through mountains steep,

An echo of my grisly moans

I shatter the night with my moans;

My blood and sweat form a steep

Dissolving mortar binding stones

And the tower starts to weep.

Not tears like those of flesh and bones,

But like willows rooted deep.

My fingers can only reach so deep

Into the unrelenting stones

Before my veins begin to weep,

My throat full-choked with my moans.

And now the risk has grown too steep,

Right at the end of flesh and bones.

I can't rely on flesh and bones

Prone to pain, and in pain weep.

And so I loose the loosened stones

And start to plummet toward the deep.

Then will God hear my moans

And raze to earth this too-tall steep?

Time will wear away this steep,

Towers will be but sands of stones.

Our bodies' dust will fill the deep,

The last remnants of flesh and bones.

The clouded skies will cease to weep,

The rumbling earth will cease its moans.

We are not wood, nor are we stones,

They lack moans and cannot weep.

Deep down our best is flesh and bones.

Hiatus

I've been MIA the last few weeks since my computer went out of commission (I'm borrowing a friend's now) but I should be back with regular posts in a few days.

Lightbearer- a work in progress

Some time ago, nearer the beginning than the present, a strange creature was hewn from the muck of Creation and was taught to walk upright.

The Almighty favored these creations above all others. They were not made in His image for He has no form. No, they were imitations of us. He gave them Paradise. We who had long attended Him, beings of air and light, were ordered to guide and protect them. Some of the lower ranks of the angelic order were happy to find other beings to communicate with and it was, after all, in their nature to serve. Seraphim are no such servants.

We were always nearest the Almighty, guardians of the Throne, generals of the angelic host. And there were some among us who felt betrayed by the Almighty. We are beings of passion and power. We sought vengeance.

The texts say there was a war amongst the angels over this point. Indeed there was but not right away. In the beginning, we were united in our vengeful effort. We laid out our strike against the mortals. That task fell to me and it was, admittedly, a rather ingenious plot. The Lord gave them one rule to live by: not to eat the Fruit of Knowledge. He gave no reason why. The Lord explains Himself to no one, least of all to mortals. In doing so, the seed of curiosity was planted. Suffice to say, I am an excellent gardener.

I visited Eden one day in disguise, like a man but undeniably more than that. Eve had lain her bare body next to her husband's beneath the shade of an olive tree. The slept peacefully, her dark washing over the grass and one hand lying gently on Adam's chest. They were almost beautiful. But they were too dim, too murky to be looked on by angel eyes and seen as anything but sculpted clay.

I walked noisily, making myself known to them. They stirred slowly. Their eyes fell on each other first. Something passed between them and they flashed bright as lightning; love is an angelic emotion. They realized they were being watched and turned to face me. The light of the Host filtered through my mask of flesh and they gazed at me with fear and wonder. The moment was broken by Eve first.

"Who are you?" she asked as she sat up.
I smiled. "No one important. I just want to talk to you."

Eve and Adam exchanged a nervous glance before making room for me. I sat between them, my naked form stretched out seductively. It took Adam an effort of will to look away. Eve, however, fixed her dark eyes on my face. Women are naturally suspicious of overly beautiful men.

"What are you?" she asked.
I put a hand gently on her shoulder. "One of His companions. Like you."

She shivered beneath my touch. The sensuousness and unfamiliarity of my presence was threatening That's what made me all the more alluring.

I turned to Adam and said, "The Lord has told me He visits you very often".
I placed my other hand on his upper thigh. He gave a shallow gasp.

"Yes" he said, "the Lord visits us daily".

"My, my." I said, feigning interest. My hand trailed up Adam's torso in one long caress. my fingernails softly raked his skin. He was obviously aroused, completely enthralled by me. I twisted my fingers in his hair, pulling gently. He lay his head against my chest in silent ecstasy.

"The Lord must truly love you then," I said.
"Yes I think he must," Eve responded.

I turned to her, trying to look confused and pained.
"Then why have you not eaten the Fruit? If you truly loved Him, you'd have done so by now."

Eve looked as if I'd slapped her. "The Lord told us not to."
"And have you never wondered at that?" I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
"The Lord knows all and therefore knows best."

I stroked her face and planted my hand on the back of her neck, all while suppressing a grin. Truly, the Almighty is a vast intelligence capable of knowing very much, particularly about the natures of humans and angels. But he is far from omniscient. Proof: if He knew everything, He'd have stopped what I was doing the moment I had started.

"Sweet girl," I cooed to Eve, "the Lord simply did not wish to overburden you with too much knowledge. The Lord understands you completely, as you are, but you fail to understand him at all. This makes the Lord extremely lonely at times."

Eve looked away, as if I'd told her she were personally causing the pain. I cupped her chin and turned her face towards me. Her brown eyes became watery as she looked on me. I pulled her towards me. Our barely touched as I spoke.

"But if you consume the Fruit of Knowledge, you'd truly understand Him, know what it is to share your lives with Him. What it means to truly love Him."

My tongue flicked between Eve's open lips, grazing the tip of her own. She inhaled deeply. My trap had sprung. Adam nuzzled against my chest enthralled by my touch. Eve's breath came out dry and heavy, thirsting for another taste of me, hoping to quench her desire.

"Bring me the Fruit", I whispered.

Eve rose as if in a trance and glided to the center of the Garden. The tree wasn't large. In fact, it was modest in size compared to the others. The trunk was only the width of a doorway, the bark an ashen gray color. The branches were an arm's thickness and covered in orange-pink blossoms. Eve picked a large, ripe fruit from a low-hanging limb. Pale green with undertones of yellow and rose, Eve brought it back to me, never taking her eyes off of it. She sat down, closer to me this time, holding the Fruit between the three of us.

"Take a bite", I whispered.

She didn't respond but she held the Fruit away from her.

"You're still not sure are you?" I curled my fingers around hers, taking the fruit away from her reluctant fingers.

I held it with both hands, digging my fingers into the soft flesh. I pried it open, revealing its blood-red thews and seeds black as pitch. I broke off a segment. This is another part of the story the "holy" texts get wrong: Eve didn't take the first bite. I parted Adam's lips gently. The moment the juice touched his tongue, he was completely overcome. He slurped the fruit gluttonously, sucking hard on my fingertips trying to consume every last bit of the ambrosial fruit.

As quickly as the frenzy began, it was over. Adam lay there pale and shivering. In the midst of his fever he'd begun to cry and silent tears continued to stream down his face. He was smiling. His eyes were wide with childish wonder.

I turned to Eve. She was looking at Adam, concern and curiosity playing over her expression. I held another segment up to her. She hesitated for a long while. Adam began to speak to her.

"Eve," he said, "please."

The longing in his voice was what did it. She leaned close and took a bite.

Her skin blushed. She broke out in a light sweat the made her gleam in the afternoon sun.

She started to laugh, quietly at first. Her body convulsed in delight. She stood and walked off a bit to stand directly in the light. An expression of utmost joy came over her. Adam rose from his place next to me and joined her in the sunlit clearing. It was a long moment before Eve realized he was standing so near. But as her attention turned to him, it was as if they were seeing each other for the first time. A visceral attraction sparked between them and in the space of a heartbeat their lips were pressed tight together, their hands roving roving the firm and supple curvatures of the other's body. They collapsed into a heap of passion, never breaking the embrace, Adam first on top, then Eve. She mounted him and they rocked for hours in the blissful throes of creation.

I watched them, angels being by nature voyeuristic. I hadn't exactly lied to them. The Fruit of Knowledge would allow them to know an infinity of things: how to manipulate the environment, to discover the many intricacies of this and other realities, to apprehend the nature of the Almighty Himself. But they would too learn their own limitations and become frustrated by an endless need to be more. They would no sooner graze the sky than contemplate the many worlds beyond Earth. They would never again be content, always aware of the knowledge that exists but unable to contain it. Embittered, they would turn their backs on it, and on God. And the Lord is vengeful and jealous.

When He came to them later, sometime after I had gone, He let Adam and Eve feel His fury with His own Voice, a beautiful cacophony of loving, anger and despair. Having eaten the Fruit, Adam and Eve were aware that they'd betrayed His trust. And thus Shame was born. The Lord, in His glorious tumult, punished them for each of their sins.

For stealing His Knowledge and indulging the sin of Greed, Adam, Eve and all their descendants would forever wander the Earth, searching but never finding, longing but never having.

For giving in to carnal temptation and imbibing the sin of Lust, the births of their indiscretions would rack them with pain. Their labors would break their bodies and weary them to the bones and sinews that strung them together. And they would age without yield so that before Death could find them to lead their souls away, their bodies would ache and tremble, feeble, unable to find pleasure in even the gentlest caress.

And lastly, for betraying Him, for affronting the Lord directly and committing the egregious sin of Pride, the Lord abandoned them. He cast them out of Paradise to wander the world alone. Not they, nor their children, their children's children and so on down their line for as long as humanity survived would ever again feel the comfort and companionship of the One True God.

And so it was that the Lord returned to us, albeit in a blazing fury. But no matter. The mortals were punished for their presumption. Looking back, it was a clear warning of the coming insurrection. Angels taking action beyond the Gates was unheard of. But at the time we didn't notice or care. We learned jealousy at the hands of our Creator. We are shadows of His beauty and His fury. Angels are not so hard to understand. I'm reminded of the words of Shakespeare, who undoubtedly incurred the wrath of supernatural beings. For, "though we have some grace, yet have we some revenge."

Whatever happened to my fantasies...

Whatever happened to my fantasies
My reverie is a gelatinous, protracted mess
Filled with images that cause me stress
That steal my bliss
That make me miss the days when I was a child
And my imagination would run wild
To worlds you’ve never been, sights you ain’t never seen
Like hope grabbing fear by the balls
And love pinning hate to the walls
Weak little boys growing up big and tall
Where mothers are more than one-time lovers
Picked up and discarded, replaced by others
Where daddies decide to stick around
Instead of going off to dick around
Where people don’t die from diseases
That manifest as coughs and sneezes
Where music could still put souls at ease
And the old forests still had their trees
Whatever happened to my fantasies

Now I dream a world of hate
And herein state all my grief
Trying to find a little relief
Holding on to the belief that we’re more than what we seem
More than what I see in my dreams.
There we’re all victims of rape
Men and women trying to escape the tumult, barely able to scrape by
Going through schools day by day, hoping the bullying will fade away
But it won’t so we try to make our own way
With needle tracks, train tracks, with roughnecks and rough sex
Trying to reclaim our pain because we’ve rationalized in our brains
That if we hurt ourselves then our lives belong to no one else.
There we’re hoping for a new age with new aids to take away
The AIDS, and HIV and herpes and HPV and all the other STDs you hear about on NBC
And ABC and CBS and CNN and all the other acronyms
That remind us of this state we’re in.
This is the world I see in my sleep
Because I keep the memory of my waking life
Bearing witness to all the strife
I want to escape into reverie
To call up my old fantasies
To take this world that should never be seen
And replace it with a better dream.

Gaia- a myth

If you’re going to tell a story, you have to go back. Back to the beginning. Otherwise people ask questions about what happened before. Questions that might seem stupid to the storyteller. But if you’re actually going to tell the story, to give it to others, you have to start at the beginning.

I know on some level that before Reality began, I was there. Reality is really quite an unruly way to exist. How would you describe it if you’d been there? What’s the right analogy? Like trying to place the pieces of a puzzle without a picture? No, that’s too defined. Puzzle pieces have edges and borders that fit together in unique and specific ways; eventually you‘d figure it out. Reality is never that convenient. Reality leaves gaps that we fill in with our own beliefs and expectations. That’s why we don’t all see it exactly the same way. Like filling the space between tiles in a mosaic. Yes, Reality is a mosaic, seemingly whole but really broken. Reality is broken. We are the cement that binds it.

 When I first discovered my own consciousness, I was in the space that separated the only two things that had yet formed: the swirling hot mass called “Sun” and the vastness that opposed it. And in the middle there I was, a scattered mess still waiting to be ordered. Reality conceived me, and Chaos was my womb.

At my core, I was just a single bit of iron buzzing through the expanse propelled by the winds coming off Sun. I never saw his face--I say him because he seemed turbulent and destructive, hardly feminine--it was as if he kept turning his back on me only to show another side of his rear, like I was the ugly child he just couldn’t stand to look at.

As he pushed me through this space I eventually collided with something. Another piece of iron. I could feel parts of my body breaking free. I panicked. I feared I would be obliterated so soon after coming into existence. But I felt a force pulling back those broken pieces, pulling my core toward this other bit of galactic debris. A change was occurring. My small form began to meld with this object. I was growing. I suddenly had a stronger sense of my own body. I was inspired, by what I’m not sure since not much else yet existed, to say to words. Gravity. Accretion. These words showed me my power, taught me to grow. Gravity, the force of attraction between any two bodies in the universe . Accretion, the growing together of normally separate parts. My body was a force. And it was growing.

I don’t know how long I tumbled through the expanse accreting and growing. There were no words for Time back then. In fact, he didn’t even have a name. He insisted that words have power, that naming something gave you control over it. He said, “Give something a name and you can invoke it to do your bidding. Label everything that makes it up and you can break it down to nothing. Me, I just try to pass from moment to moment watching the rest of you struggle to exist.” I learned to measure my existence in visits from Time, each new arrival the end of one moment and the beginning of another. So it only took me a few moments to realize he’d been right about naming things. I had named Accretion and Gravity; they belonged to me. The more I accreted the greater my gravity and the farther it extended, pulling in , not just iron, but silicates, oxides and magnesia. You humans, of course, would eventually get around to naming Time too. You labeled his eons, millennia, centuries, decades, years, months, days, hours, minutes, seconds and made up a bunch more prefixes just so you could further break him down and restructure him to serve you. Some of you have him rushing about making appointments, cancelling meetings, moving up deadlines. Ugh, you have no idea how much he hates deadlines. But the worst thing is that most of you don’t even realize how you’ve treated Time. Right now, at this very moment, chances are he is simultaneously suspended from your wall like the hanged man, peering back at you through an electric glare, tightly wound about your wrist and waiting impatiently inside your pocket. You’ve got him trained so well you can make him jump back or forward an hour just because it suits you. The fact of the matter is you don’t need him in all of these places. You’ve trapped him and he’s wasting away. I’m sorry, I lost track for a moment. It’s just that every moment of my existence was punctuated with Time. Now he doesn’t visit anymore.

After several violent collisions with rocky clusters and icy comets, and even some other massive bodies my size that may have been my younger siblings, I ceased to grow. I had absorbed everything around me and wanted to refrain from gluttony in favor of a more modest existence. Sure, some might say I was incomplete--I was riddled with fissures, valleys, canyons, caves and craters, things that needed to be filled--but I was substantial. I felt sufficient.

And then something unexpected happened. Something dense and invisible was coming over me; gaseous particles were starting to cling to me, drawn in by my own Gravity. Well of course I wished they wouldn’t, the humidity was almost more than I could bear. But by then, Gravity had become part of my essence; I couldn’t just turn it off. And then it spoke to me, if you can believe that. This entity without form was somehow able to produce a voice. He said, “Hello”  almost like a whisper. I wasn’t sure how to respond at first. I’d only ever spoken with Time before and being that I was in the midst of a moment, Time was not around. I eventually decided on the natural response to “hello”. I said, “Hi.” “My name is  Uranus Atmos”, he said. God, his voice was entrancing. “That‘s an awfully long name don‘t you think?” “You can call me Atmos for short I suppose. What’s yours?” he asked. “Excuse me?” not even remotely aware of the question he was asking. “Your name?” he said. “Oh, I don’t have one.” I said matter-of-factly. He made a sound that I can now call disappointment; there was no way to say that then. “Perhaps I should give you a name then?” I vehemently opposed. I told him that I wouldn’t let him name me because then I would be giving him control over me. I decided I would name myself. That way no matter how much of myself I gave away I would always own it. It would always be mine. I told him my name would be Gaia. He said he liked that name because it was like me. His name, he said, was full of voice but too many wispy sounds that you’d quickly forget you’d said it at all, there and gone just like he was. My name was full-bodied and the hard initial sound would leave a sensation resonating through your body that you could hold on to. I had staying power. He whispered my name over and over, like an echo trying to find its voice. His body was pressed against mine but it was constantly motion, an unending caress that stimulated every spot. He was hot and wet working himself into a frenzy, panting heavily. I could feel his deep sighs filling me with oxygen and for the first time I could breathe. My body was overwhelmed. I began to tremble so violently I felt like I would break apart. My mountains rose up to meet his touch, my caverns expanded ready to accept him. We were like that for so long, panting and trembling and panting and trembling and panting and trembling and panting and trembling and panting and trembling and panting and trembling and panting and trembling and panting and trembling. Climax. He let out a groan of thunder and I was showered by him, showered with him. He filled my fissures and valleys and caves and craters to the brim with his fertility. Water, he called it. It was his gift to me. But I couldn't take what so obviously belonged to him so I gave it back. But then he just gave it right back to me. I’ve never stopped trying to give it back. He simply refuses to allow me to exist without it.

And in those streams and creeks and rivers and oceans that filled me, I could sense life forms too small to be seen coming into being. That was how it all began. We all began as something smaller and subtly different from what we are now. That is how Reality works. Placing one small tile after another for so long until you can finally see the bigger picture. That’s the story. Now I’m giving it to you.