Water washes things away.
But at the end of the day,
what is a an ocean, river, or a lake
but just a really deep grave?
Leave your secrets to the deep,
the sun or the tide will bring them to light
and their secrets will be whispered alive
by the coroners who speak the language
of death and time
I was laughing in the car drunk,
and you were singing at the top of your lungs,
and I thought,
if there are gods, surely this moment was made by them
because this is heavenly
you stopped, looked over, and kissed me
There are ghosts inside of me
who I was at seven
and seventeen
parts of them cling to me like dust
but never quiet the same
six feet deep in this thing that used to be called trust
they tried hard to stay
but the days passed on, leaving them mangled and crushed
I tripped out
I tripped in
Fucked up
Fucked it
and when the world didn’t end with a bang or a whimper
I got into my car to wander in the desert
but there’s only so long you can go when you’ve got fifty cents
and day dreams and that’s not enough to outdrive the madness that keeps any peaceful, easy feelin’ from my mind
As the sun beats down on me
I pass an old hippy with lines on his shirt, braids in his hair, dancing aimlessly on the side of the road,
his paisley shirt faded,
and a necklace in his hand of broken prayer beads
I stop to ask him if there is a place to stay,
and he says, “There is a hotel up ahead. But it’s not meant for going or staying.”
I mutter a confused thanks and keep on walking
until I find a faded, neon dream of a sign
that says The Hotel California, flashing in retro pink and white
there are palm trees that line the drive
and from a single, open window, pink curtains blowing in the desert breeze, I hear, “….he was a monster, black dressed in leather, she was a Princess, Queen of the highway…”
and then in front of me, a little girl appears, and she says, “Best keep on moving. We have no vacancies here.”
The music fades, the window is abruptly slammed closed, and when I turn the girl is no longer there.
And my car returns, gas tank refilled, and I keep on the go, a song on the radio that tells me just to roll, baby roll
sometimes hell is hot and you gotta burn a little to survive,
so I just drive, ignoring the wars in my mind
All the pretty maidens lined up in a row
on the sea shore to watch their young men go
off to war for a king they’ll never see or know
one told her beau
kiss me I love you
another said kiss me quick
for we don’t know if there will ever be an end to all of this violence
and still a third
was at a loss for words
and had no kisses to give
only tears to leave on him.
and though it wasn’t much
the soldier still took them
The New Year smells like champagne
looks confetti and glitter on the ground
the sound of family and friends doing a count down
paper hats and crowns strewn all around
and as midnight comes in, it tastes like your mouth
I wrote you a love letter
a million years ago
you never saw it
and you’ll never know
how you once made my heart race
how I used to get so red in the face
and all that’s left of what might have been
is old notebook scraps I keep to remind myself
of the girl I used to be
when I looked at you with stars in my eyes
and I didn’t let rain clouds fill my mind
Do you remember
when Christmases
were like
fresh fallen snow
that glittered
and you’d wait for it to come all year round
but now you barely know when its passed by
and now its nothing but bits of ripped up
wrapping paper to be tossed out left over on the ground?
The snow will still be there
the magic dissipated
the river starting to melt, nothing left to skate away on
And the Beach Boys sweet, saccharine summer vibes
were the music that played in
Manson’s mind
as in a house in 10050 Cielo Drive
his victims died
and do you ever think
if we let the artist draw beautiful things
and the musicians create
and embraced softness as neither a masculine or feminine thing
but an acceptable human trait
instead of letting them get lost on the wheel
of corporate consumption and hate
and Hollywood’s masculine only take
that maybe there’d be less blood
and more paint?
There were four lads from Liverpool
who played music and sang to everyone
from the people in pubs to the Queen
and when they laughed, or talked or breathed
everyone watched and so did everyone change
they wrote songs about small people
dying all alone in a church with no name
and songs about big things
but when you talk about destruction
don’t you know you can count me out
and the simplest of these was a song
that said Love is all you need
and how cruel it is then
that one of the boys that sang such lovely things
and used his time to sit in beds and talk of peace
was shot down, dead, in the end.
