I'm not Brian

June 1

I’m not Brian

I thought life was based on a system of ‘I will suffer and that will exempt you’.  Then I would be horrified when you suffered, after I had already done so ahead of you.  In an attempt to ease my dismay I would look to see who had broken the pact, you or me.  Had I not endured sufficiently to protect you?  Had you left the safety of the umbrella of sanctuary?  Panic gives birth to blame and blame of course births nasty biting things that run loose and bury in all the tender spots.  Now, the goals I tend are to end the breeding of those sharp and painful beasties, stop laying my neck upon the alter and start telling better jokes.

Scramble cracked perceptions

*

DANCE OF DEATH

Honeyed words pour from lips

Shades of doubt color my mind

Stained glass eyes look to blank walls

And picture the gallery of imagination

Attempting to sell it for hard currency

Sirens sing from the throats of mute men

The screams which rise in me fall on deaf ears

Paradox feeds controversy but it needn’t

Evolution from a cesspool is repugnant

Though process is steady made

Inertia is violent if that is from whence it came

Afterbirth is always bloody and humans not always nice

I must live and heal as others climb up and slide down

I must keep the beat and forget the dance of death.

Frozen Strawberries

May 30

FROZEN STRAWBERRIES

“I have them in the freezer,” I tell my sponsor.

“I’m sure you do.  When are you going to take them out and reenact spring?” her retort.

“I don’t want to take them out before I’m ready.  I don’t want them to go to waste.”

“Oh, the Excuse Maker, the Staller.  Are you going to drag all the old chestnuts out of the closet?  I thought you were going to defrost strawberries.”

“Fear, you’re saying fear of strawberries is not a sign of stability?"  I ask her.

“Eat the strawberries or not, but it seems to me you didn’t get sober to avoid the sweeter things in life, keeping all your goodness locked up in the deep freeze destined for frost bite.”

Let sunshine climb in your eyes and fall upon your heart.

*

I’m not Brian

I thought life was based on a system of

‘I will suffer and that will exempt you’.

Then I would be horrified when you suffered,

after I had already done so ahead of you.

In an attempt to ease my dismay I would look to see

who had broken the pact, you or me.

Had I not endured sufficiently to protect you?

Had you left the safety of the umbrella of sanctuary?

Panic gives birth to blame

and blame of course births nasty biting things

that run loose and bury in all the tender spots.

Now the goals I tend are to end the breeding

of those sharp and painful beasties,

stop laying my neck upon the alter

and start telling better jokes.