Ode To Self.

Self-destructive and self-involved.
Self-deceiving? That's partly true.
Self-indulged and self-obsessed;
self-deprecating, self-medicating, too.

Self-abased and self-abused,
self-adorned with tarnished gold.
To self-betray with self-defeat
is self-defence for self-controlled.

Self-preserved with self-disgust,
self-perfect your self-esteem.
Self-aware you're your own god
self-hypnotised into a dream.

With self-love you'll self-destroy,
self-evolve into a shell.
Self-pollute, self-saturate,
self-validate your own hell.

The Artist

Big dreams of a lighted stage,

a songbird in a rusted cage:

the blessed artist is turning the page

for the ink to spell out all of his rage.

The artist: a poet, a beggar, a whore,

perverted virgin who cuts it raw.

Clenching a cigarette sits on the floor,

dying to die a part of folklore.

Simple pleasures are far too complex,

the artist enjoys to live to perplex.

Carries his head to turn all the necks,

he finds sheer beauty in what others reject.

Offering truth is a job for the brave.

The artist awaits the cold calm of his grave.

Once a petulant child that refused to behave,

now - just another one passivist slave.

The artist paints a sordid picture,

berates and hates the rotten structure.

His fragile mind - a compound fracture -

is longing for a long due rapture.

The artist says he's biding time,

swiftly slipping from his prime.

But who will spare him a dime

when day will come when he can't rhyme?

Symphony In Gray Minor

I sit and paint a picture grim:
an ashtray filled up to the brim
of joys that came and stayed and passed.
Why did they go away so fast?

Why can't I read a stranger's glare
as they walk past but walk and stare?
Is there something they can see,
a something that's unknown to me?

Why can't I store the sunshine's kiss?
In winter's frost a thing I'll miss,
along with innocence of rain.
When will it speak to me again?

Why can't I write the future's lines
to promise dialogue divine?
To write myself into a dream
without the same old minor theme.

I sit and paint but colours fade
until they all resemble gray.
I know the canvas won't forgive
the brush, for spilling all its grief.

Trigger/Happy

I don't know who, but someone
shot me in the chest.
But I managed to get up,
now I walk around dead.

My essence has escaped me,
colours round me fade.
My attempts to look alive
are just a masquerade.

I drift through the crowds,
no one turns their head,
and the Sun won't shine on me -
you cannot warm the dead.

Reflection in the mirror
paints a stranger's face.
Not one sign of life remained,
not even a trace.

Tell me, please, who killed me?
I want to ask them: why?
Or did I do this to myself
because I couldn't touch the sky?

Dark Tunnels

Sitting on that chair with two arms

So prophetic through its palms

Supporting my body but not my mind

As it slips away into the unkind

Thoughts flavoured with agonising anguish

Innocent but apparently churlish

Concepts of gut-wrenching power

Ideas that take hope and devour

An empty room filled with people

A lone church with no steeple

One body fills not half the bed

No place of trust to rest my head

#2k13 (Hello, Johnny)

In an air-tight missile bunker he cowers in the corner
shaking like a leaf
good grief
no hand relief
auto-fellatio on auto-pilot
he can spark but he ain't no diamond
laid himself out in a trough to be consumed by the swine
they don't smell divine
but with the help of some wine
he'll be just fine.