Tangled Lines

Drift away with me
On a cloud of quiet shape
We will float away
Till we're forever lost in haze

Yeah, till time no longer has a face

Drift away with me
Like ripples on the sand
You can count on me
All your secrets will be safe

Yeah, cause I've no longer things to say

Oh, and in the morning
When they come out from the rocks
Search the mountain scapes
Find our ship has run aground

Yeah, but we're nowhere to be found

Drift away with me
And I'll drift away with you

Bristols At Dawn

I want to feel dark
With a cloud or two overhung
No little whispers
Of spring
Sprang
Sprung
I want to feel dark
When the lights are still on.

I want the thunder in my head
Crashing around my mind
No little peaks
Of sun
Shown
Shine
I want the thunder in my head
While it's raining inside.

Tempest and the Night Owls

Shudder stricken
Quiet nights of momentary lapse
The girl on the page burns
Dancing flame against the sky
Violent and murderous rage
Dawning in the painted frames
Of a fairy tale glass.
Etched by the broken heat
In her nightmarish place
She clings dear to anything
Cause there's nothing left to hold onto anymore
Least of all him

Picture Show

Turn out the light
My heart shines too brightly
And everywhere I go
I'm like a walking picture glowing

Turn out the light
My heart burns too brightly and
I'm afraid that you will know
When I'm a walking picture now showing
You

Wave

Five years to the day I woke up crying
Not really understanding why I was
I found out when the night fell
When the quiet broke my heart

It really should have been raining
But it never works out that way
When you're standing, left empty
By the phone call come and went

I dreamed last night that you were back
Like you'd gone away on a trip
I went to get you a book
One that we'd discussed
Then I remembered that you were gone
But the dream it didn't end
We all went on as we had before
Except that no one paid you any note
We left you just sitting there
A fading light in the corner of my room

Sunrise

Time so vast discouraging
Like the thrashing of the sea
Misting grey and crashing blue
Letting waves roll over you

What has lasted wasn't right
Like the holes torn into night
Park light trying to consume
Empty benches nature's pews

And I stand by
Waiting for the sunrise
And I stand by
Waiting for my sunrise

Just one last chance to see the colors shift and change
Before the emptiness of night has fully been washed away

In The Out Door

Caught in a familiar place

Our hero dances resolute

somewhere between kitchen accessories

and the freshly butchered steaks

the voices sounding overhead

singing one come one all

but our hero isn't listening 

He just stands in the aisle and says

Every underdog is a heretic

Flying in the face

Of convention and establishment

demanding he come in last place

there's no time for course correction

when you're slamming into the shores
Breaking down your own beliefs
Waltzing in the out door

A Little Nonsense

It was quiet over the city, which didn’t matter to me in the least as I was in the suburbs. Rain battered the outside of buildings, somewhere, but I was inside looking out at the warm winter night.

Maybe it was my sentimental heart, or maybe it was the tequila… Either way I had just one thing on my mind. Trouble is, I couldn’t think of what it was. Also I didn’t have tequila in the house so what I had drunk was a mystery to all.

Beside me the exercise bike had seen better days. Not many, mind you, but beggars can’t be choosers; sometimes. It seemed to be a metaphor for my life, always in motion but never going anywhere. Deciding this was too deep a thought, I quickly threw it out the window into the grass. It laid there looking back at me, hurt. I tried to tell it that I might one day have time for it, but not at the moment.

I was busy you see.

Off in the distance a bird was calling. Another bird answered, but the call was collect so it declined it. Ah, to be young and a blue jay.

Suddenly I remembered what it was that I’d forgotten; the thing I’d been trying to remember all along. Quickly I hobo’d my way onto the train of thought which was just leaving the station. As I sat in the car watching the progression of mind meeting relevance, I was startled to see that everything connects one day to the next. It was a humbling realization.

One that I wanted no part of.

An instant I jumped from the moving train, remembering just in time to tuck and roll, and came up safe in the place between thoughts. It was all at once empty and full. I tried to think of something. Anything. Alas, in such a place no thought exists. Madness descending, I quickly leaped out of the way, landing back in my flat beside the exercise bike.

As things had turned out the way they had I decided there was only one thing left to do. So, taking hold of the stationary bike, I rode off into the night.

A Murder

Last letter on the left,
Typed in a time of silence
His thoughts cold to the page
"My life needs an evacuation plan"
Voices echo dimly
In the sunlit halls of a child's memory
Where building blocks
Abc'd their way into being more than a foundation
While the man sits with coffee
Cigarettes and lighter for companionship
Lights up and mouths quietly
"All my life I've wanted to go home"
But no one listens to the words
Of children and old men
Except for the birds
That circle above.

Gloria

Sudden overwhelming feeling and collapse
Like another Sunday crossword covered nap
The swirling hue in the cupboards
Beckoning me onward
Still I can't quite seem to fathom what I've grasped

It's just a trick of the light
I'm told
There's nothing there that wasn't where it was;
Or where I left it
Just another thing that comes with getting old

Sepia painted twilights in repose
Unanswered letters spoken is softened prose
The world keeps dimmer
Despite the brilliant glimmer
That hung upon the garden where she rose.

Dark and 20'd

Sure he hears her heading up the stairs
But there's nothing really left to say
Anyway
Might as well go ahead and stay

Floorboards creak as she makes her way
Through a bedroom darkly she creeps
All alone, she wants to scream
So it seems
She might as well just go to sleep

On the back roads of the world
We always seem to make our homes
Trying hard to keep ourselves apart
Turns out
It's just another way to break your heart

Soliloquy

So maybe today I sing out of tune
But one day I'm going to hit every note
One day I'll never run out of air
My lungs will never give out
Soon I'll sing and shout
And feel a hundred years in my throat
A blast out in the heavenly choir
Putting all the angels to shame
So maybe today I can't write the music
I hear when I'm alone
One day my heart will shed this body
And I'll travel the speed of light
My song will rise from deep within
And be written into the night
And I will finally become
The song I've always wanted to write

Lit

I'm falling in love
With a girl I don't know
Haven't seen her
Haven't heard her
But I know she's there
She's just out of reach
A whispered verse
For a shadow...

Light lines brightly
The dim night finding her out
Time tries
But I can't help thinking about
The girl in her shadow

That One

Twenty-seven
Nothing makes sense
Nothing's made sense
Since I was nine years old and slitting my wrists
Twenty-seven
Nothing makes sense
Nothing's Made sense
Since I was seventeen and wished the world would end.

It's just the game of life my friend
Could we go back and start all over again?

No wait...

Please hang up and try your party again
The disconnect is bringing back the end
Or so you say
So long, the end.

Twenty-seven
Nothing makes sense
Nothing's made sense
Since I was twenty-two and swallowing pills
Twenty-seven
Nothing makes sense
Nothing's made sense
Since I was twenty reaffirming my vows

Is the struggle worth the pain?
Is there nothing left to say?

No wait...

Please hang up and try your party again
Dial the number but it's all in vain
You're gone away
Until the end...

Hurricane

I hear you can't go home again
If you had one to begin...
Another start of another end
Living on the rend

They say the storms on Venus
Are not something to be missed
The lightning shines the brightest in
The darkest grasp of space

And so I sing a soft goodbye
To familiar satellites
That hung around my neck so long
The view eclipsed my sight

Said, you're right
And there's nothing like
Flying
Into the face of a storm
Flying
And not coming home

13

When I look into her eyes
It rains

Sometimes I just don't want to be
Sometimes I see
Something out of nothing

Never before have the stars

Been quite so bitter to me
Never has the moon
Shone so hatefully

Soft and gentle piano
Follows
Where ever I go
As if every player on earth
Seems to know

When I look into her eyes
I wonder where she is

Beautiful and gentle
Is this night
Soft as silk
Floating on the air

When I look into her eyes
I know there's nothing there

Only rain

Mirrors

Everyone that I fall for reminds me of you
That's why I stopped falling in love
It's just not worth it if you're not falling too

Same eyes but a different look
Same lips but a different kiss
Same fingers but a different touch

And there's a pretty girl sitting across the room
Mouthing words I could have written
Should have written
Words I just can't say
To your mirror

Knotawordle

Little sister
My little Sister
Big little sister
I can still see you
In the back of the room

We used to play such childish games
Race after rainbows, through the falling rain
The inside jokes have started to fade
Like dust settling over words on a page
We wrote, we sang, we laughed
But time just moved too fast

Little sister
My little sister
Big little sister
Time just slips away
Till only thoughts remain

Lives Before

Sometimes I still feel it should be possible.

15 years old and completely lost to a summer that quickly flew by. My time had revolved around Lake Ontario that year. I loved to swim. Loved to crash around through the waves; feel the water flow through me. I swam there with my nephews when they visited, and when they left, I swam alone. But as much as I loved swimming, it was the fall I waited for.

There's a little dock that juts out from a quiet inlet. It's in a whispery town with large farms and fewer people. The dock is formed of pressed gravel and concrete. It should have been ugly -was ugly. But that's what made it so beautiful. Man made peninsula that was completely alien to the surroundings.

I liked to sit there and watch the lake. The rhythmic flow of the waves nimbly dancing across the shore line or crashing against the rocks when the wind picked up. My head's always been a mess but sitting there I seemed able to blank out my thoughts and just be still. It's been a long time since I've had that luxury.

Out a short distance from my gravel perch, in the shallows, was a grouping of concrete blocks. They had dumped large slabs of concrete all along the edge, most likely to prevent people from going to far out. It seemed likely that a few blocks had just got away. It was random but in my mind I built order from the chaos. To me the blocks formed the shape of a giant.

I came to refer to my favorite spot as 'the stone giant's bed.' I even wrote a poem about the giant that lay in the water, waves lapping over him; moss growing on the sides. It was a Christian allegory. That's just the kind of kid I was. I was raised a Christian by my mom but from a young age I had begun reading the bible on my own. More so I believed it without being told.

Years later my experiences with various churches and different ministers who obviously didn't read the book their faith was based on, would contribute to my backsliding. It was only temporary though as I never stopped believing in God. My continued existence seemed founded in a miracle. Eventually I was able to move past my problems with individuals.

Still, sitting on a pier at that time, I knew nothing of those issues. I knew I loved the bite of the autumn air, mingled with the misting of the spray. The flecks of white churning in the dark swell. The water was cold, you could tell without touch, but there was something pure about it.

One cold and overcast day, I happened to be on the dock as a storm moved in. At first the rain was light. As the clouds rolled over the lake, pushed by heavy winds, the rain began to beat down. It was ice cold and each drop felt like a needle against my face. Yet I stood there watching. Looking out at the waves bowling along. Little blue hills on a lake, gathered up and flung violently against the shore.

I could feel the power from above and below. The air was electric and alive. I felt raw and tempestuous. As I stared out into the lake it seemed like I should be able to dive into the water; my atoms diffusing with waves, changing me till I myself became a wave, flowing in and flowing out.

I knew of course this wasn't possible.

I left a few minutes later completely soaked to the bone. Somehow I managed to avoid coming down with a cold. I went on as usual, completely unchanged by the experience. There were no profound revelations that I can share with you. Well, other than that it's nice to have somewhere warm to change out of wet clothes.

Some things, like thoughts of transformations are better left to the realm of fantasy. Still, every now and then, when I happen to pass a lake and catch the sunlight reflecting just right off the tips of the waves; sometimes, just sometimes, it still seems like I should be able.

Cutting

I don't wonder anymore
'Where's my flying car?'
I'd be content just to hit the open road

I don't need another lesson
In the things I can't attain
I've reached the age of settling for 'ok'

Still I tell myself
I'll find myself
To the mirror every morning
What's a little lie caught between friends?
I couldn't take much more
Aching for
The things I can't achieve
Looking in my eyes I can truly see
With a friend like this who needs an enemy?