Reside
The Full Weight of Failure
The full weight of failure
Is a lead coat I can't overthrow
Pockets full of phony coins
Wages of regret, you know
There once was sky
Hope was high
Now full weight
Is just heavy on the eyes
The full weight of failure
Is a millstone wrapped around my neck
Squandered time in unbelief
Consequences hard and set
Once misjudged
A place that I just can't regain
Broke some trust
In myself, but then there's the blame
There once was sky
Hope was high
Now full weight
Is just heavy on the eyes
What's success?
Not a grail or a nod from those
Meet thy test
Pass on principles alone
The full weight of failure
Is a lead coat I can't overthrow
Pockets full of phony coins
Wages of regretting grow
Night Train
Hail!
On time
11:59
Train of mine
Light is on the lines
Bag aside
Nothing left to mind
Words run high
Memento mori prime
Hail!
Rock bound duty of the son
To run the race and make
Race and racer one
Taut in flesh
And mettle of a kind
Stand at crest
Stamp it with a sigh
Once was hoped for
It's now too late
Once was worked for
It's now too late
Once was planned for
It's now too late
Once was planned for
It's now too late
Once was loved towards
It's now too late
Final surprise
It's never the wrong time
Hail!
On time
11:59
Train of mine
Light is on the iron
Squeeze
Life from life itself
Leave
Nothing but the shell
Cold Plate
I get impatient sometimes
with this penance of mine
Precision's a sin
When a memory's set in
Old brio is gone
The task just carries on
Do you remember we met?
A better man would forget
A few words were said
For effect and dissent
Now you're under my sign
I make stars align
And in the end if I'm late
It's 'cause I know how to wait
Whole geo is small
For hands that hold the ball
Old brio is gone
For work that carries on
You don't remember me, right?
I wait tables at night
I'm no engine of fate
Your dish is ready, sir
Here's your cold plate
Scarecrow
Here I am
Nothing but a scarecrow
Stuck in the ground
On a patch where nothing grows
Oh, what a fool I am
Stuffed to look like man
The come right to my hand
The very crows...
Thin and dry
I take in air of higher plains
Horizon's long
Or short, depending on the rain
Down below
The road that goes to town descends
But I can't go
I can hear those crows again
Oh, What a fool I am
Stuffed to look like a man
They come right to my hand
The very crows I'm to scare away
Folded grounded
Was where I once planted seed
Now dirt is hard
And cracked right in front of me
Domicile
Walls were just makeshift
No one stays
Once they recognize the rift
Oh, I freeze, then I burn
Abide a fear, to learn
If there's time to turn
Into the man I'd hazard be
Just me
Just be
Baby Sleeps Alone
She put herself in front of me
Then she caught my eye
She was an old fashioned girl
With modern complications
Ignition of a machine
My frame torqued up high
The movements never fatigued
In balances and gravitations
But now baby's sleeping alone
Made her dreaming her home
At first she just complained
But I could tell she liked the pain
The pull became a prank
And the leash became a chain
In time I noticed shadows
And things that were not there
Inventions of a prop
To hold the emptiness of air
Baby's sleeping alone
But now she wakes to bells
European airs
And pretensions to a crown
No promises, no charges
Then she quietly left town
The barren baroness
She gets the crown
The Guv'ner
The Guv'ner
Played with boys
In the sovereign state
Of Illinois
He greased the wheels
Cut the deals
But now the sheriff and the dogs
Are rounding up and nipping heels
I heard some mumbling
About a change
Then they say new blood
Is all too strange
The man in place
He's in the know
Besides we're waiting for some wires
Don't want to interrupt the flow
At noon I'll pick a place
Stand alone with Grace
Stare them in the face
Something must give
'Cause this is war
We've had enough
If you need more
This is the place where I live
This kind of man
That's vaunt and bought
Moves on the cash
Never the ought
He'll key the door
Open the store
If you'll just hand him a reason
I'm old enough
I've been around
Know how they run
This state and town
An honest day
Can't bear the cost
Republicratic swine
Are banging the shoulders at the trough
Our governor played with boys
The Rake of Autumn Light
The rake of autumn light
When it hits my eyes just right
Gives me transport, makes me kite
Back a decade and a life
To a time of storm and strife
To all that happened and all that might
The colors in the trees
Dying heat before the freeze
I walked the flagstones bright with flakes
And stopped before I reached
For the note I had to crease
Inside a book that named the place
Oh, life never prepared me for school
Nor for the way you taught me to
The building where you slept
And kept the letters that I send
Was built of tan rock, just like you said
The window on the left
Was where the signal was that meant
You'd give me all that , then leave me spent
But something changed your mind
Or made me seem a different kind
Kept me in darkness, eyes up that night
I moved away from light
Colors changed to black and white
Turned my back for a fear of fright
Oh, a vivid burst of hard insight
Turned and shook me to my knees and right
Toward a devil I could not sight
She got me on a ruse there
You got some kind of rule?
As far as I can see none, but you
The rake of autumn light
When I fix my eyes just right
It narrows blindness, I narrows sight
Back decades from a life
From the times of storm and strife
From all that's happened and not what might
If memory were a sieve
And all I've done has been outlived
I could actually drop pace with time
But light I can't forget
Lets meknow it's over, yet
You're still in place, and still in mind
Headbang
Head bang
In the borderlands
Face down
In a pit of sand
Dipatched
By young and calloused hands
Last stop
The hippy caravan
Back home
It's called a tragedy
Talk of
His sensitivities
How does
A mother come to grief
But joy sparks
From my disbelief
And oh, shaking it off's slow
I can't let it go
Wing named
In memoriam
Tribute
To a seeking son
Here rests
In the pantheon
For all time
Or till the money's gone
Oh, shaking it off's slow
Can't let it go
A feeling so low
Just one bully down
Many to go
Better I see
The harder I cry
She adds up the years
Still too close in the mind
But the never I see
Clears a blot from the eyes
And he can never be tragic
It's useless to try
Head bang
In the borderlands
Dispatch
By young and calloused hands
Name chipped
Into stone of stand
A white boy
In some Afghanistan
Oh, shakin' it off's slow
Can't let it go
Wheel's come 'round
And I'm not feeling low
But he'll never know
The never I see
Clears a blot from my eyes
He'll never be tragic
It's useless to try
The better I see
The harder I cry
Mom says
Gift of Sight
Rock steady
I stood ready
But now is not my time
Not hedging
Not pledging
Words that were never mine
Kept pressing
Despite lessons
Had me turning 'round
Finish line
Hold the rhyme
But on one heard the sound
Gift of sight
Set things right
Mod dancing
Still dancing
For something new in cans
Newer tribes
That take their bribes
Using a different hand
Rock steady
I stand ready
It's never not my time
Gift of sight
Set me right
Feels just like I'm flying
This black night I see
It's all too plain to me
The of all belief
My heart is 19th c.
Haz-Mat
Haz-mat tingles
The tips of the skin
Filling it up
Filling it in
Rays from box
They entered the skull
Tantalize
Never too dull
Images draw sweat
From the glands
Magazine ink
Smears in the hand
Drip-feed titillation
Into the vein
Keeping 'em hard
and wet when it rains
Then at night
They fornicate
Morning sheets
Unfold on the train
Turn from the glass
Stare at the page
None too subtle
Maintaining a thrall
Roundtrip ticket
Repeating it all
Review of a Billboard
A familiar score
No one is sure
They haven't seen it before
Soundtrack makes
Crowds blubber again
Same as before
Sentiments from sediment
Haz-mat tingles
The tips of the skin
Filling it up
Filling it in
Cross words, someone's
Always ready to fight
Puzzling screamers
From the left and the right
Graphs and tables
Stories of crime
Worries of swindles
And tricks down the line
Box score speculators
Players with stats
They're just dopers with bats
Imagine that
Spectacles by the day and night
Haz-mat pulsing blood of life
Hit the lights