Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Sunday morning
• I awoke from heavy slumber to the sound of ravens swooping low thru the pines, clutching Mary Jane tightly in the morning dew…and the churchbells were ringing, I did not know the hour and on the street a blind old man was singing. I hummed along to the pipers tune and said goodbye to the waning moon disappearing to return so soon again.
Identity Crisis
Tyranny depends on separation in order to exist…it needs an “us” and a “them”. Religion, nationalism, racism, and class differences are illusions that foster the grand scheme of tyranny. We will never be free until we learn our true identities as parcels of the divine ONE instead of identifying ourselves as black, white, Christian, Muslim, rich, poor. When WE the People unite as ONE we will cease to be divided and conquered, herded and controlled by the principalities and dark forces of this world. When we separate ourselves from our own ego’s and collective ego’s instead of our brothers and sisters, when we erase the invisible lines and borders…only then can we see clearly. Our own ego’s are the fetters that they attach their chains of tyranny to…we will never be truly free until we are free of our own false identities and facist, patriotic illusions.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Order
Cosmos is a greek word that is translated as ‘Order’. It is used as a synomym for the universe. Nature is composed of perfect balance, a perfect circle…the cycles of seasons, equinoxes, the process of evaporation, pollenation… The balance of the food chain…the revolution of the planets around the sun and the moons around the planets…the tides, the magnetic poles … the gyration of the earth on it’s imaginary axis…Nature is Order.
‘Logos’ is a greek word that is translated as ‘Word’. Words are used to define the cosmos, an attempt to pin Nature into a corner and strip her down to her least common denominator. Logos was the fruit of the tree of the “Knowledge of Good and Evil” the seed of the Law, the illusion of separation, weapons used for the purpose of possession and control. Logos is man made law that sets it’s throne above the Cosmos and judges ‘good’ and ‘evil’, it is the essence of pride that created the illusion that man is separate from the Cosmos rather than a part of it . It is the lie that man was created to possess and control and rule over the Cosmos. It is a Demonic “Order” that is actually Chaos, the ani-thesis of Order, the enemy of Cosmos.
In Nature, power always moves outward and seeks to distribute itself evenly, while society centralizes power toward a single “scource” and sucks energy into itself. The Cosmos is the Sun while society is a black hole. Nature always seeks balance while the structures of society, by their very nature depend on imbalance. Nature perpetuates and nourishes Life while the Law is death.
Satan (Logos) was the first son of God (Cosmos). Law attempted to place his throne above Love and Lucifer created the first hierarchy posing as YHWY, the god of the Jews. He wrote the law in stone thru his minions that spoke Logos in his name claiming possession and control over the heavens and the earth building temples to this “god”, sacrificing to their deity that they claimes was the one true god. Their father was the devil. Their god was THE MAN (Logos, Law). The law was created by Satan to attempt to transcend the order of the Cosmos (a New World Order). Under the law, the jews were required to sacrifice a lamb to the deity a payment for their transgressions…now instead of blood we are required by the law to pay money for our salvation…our penence for our sins…for our dues for our right to exist we must pay them to eat, sleep, copulate and shit…we are forced to bow down to The Man and sacrifice our time and labor to build their empire…baking bricks in the sun. If we deviate from their imposed slavery we are forced to sacrifice more of our time and labor to pay their fines for our resistance to their “order” or are robbed of our freedom and imprisoned in government subsidized, corporate owned jails.
‘Logos’ is a greek word that is translated as ‘Word’. Words are used to define the cosmos, an attempt to pin Nature into a corner and strip her down to her least common denominator. Logos was the fruit of the tree of the “Knowledge of Good and Evil” the seed of the Law, the illusion of separation, weapons used for the purpose of possession and control. Logos is man made law that sets it’s throne above the Cosmos and judges ‘good’ and ‘evil’, it is the essence of pride that created the illusion that man is separate from the Cosmos rather than a part of it . It is the lie that man was created to possess and control and rule over the Cosmos. It is a Demonic “Order” that is actually Chaos, the ani-thesis of Order, the enemy of Cosmos.
In Nature, power always moves outward and seeks to distribute itself evenly, while society centralizes power toward a single “scource” and sucks energy into itself. The Cosmos is the Sun while society is a black hole. Nature always seeks balance while the structures of society, by their very nature depend on imbalance. Nature perpetuates and nourishes Life while the Law is death.
Satan (Logos) was the first son of God (Cosmos). Law attempted to place his throne above Love and Lucifer created the first hierarchy posing as YHWY, the god of the Jews. He wrote the law in stone thru his minions that spoke Logos in his name claiming possession and control over the heavens and the earth building temples to this “god”, sacrificing to their deity that they claimes was the one true god. Their father was the devil. Their god was THE MAN (Logos, Law). The law was created by Satan to attempt to transcend the order of the Cosmos (a New World Order). Under the law, the jews were required to sacrifice a lamb to the deity a payment for their transgressions…now instead of blood we are required by the law to pay money for our salvation…our penence for our sins…for our dues for our right to exist we must pay them to eat, sleep, copulate and shit…we are forced to bow down to The Man and sacrifice our time and labor to build their empire…baking bricks in the sun. If we deviate from their imposed slavery we are forced to sacrifice more of our time and labor to pay their fines for our resistance to their “order” or are robbed of our freedom and imprisoned in government subsidized, corporate owned jails.
Passion
Passion is the essence of life. Love exorts us to abandon self-control and surrender to Desire. Justice demands that we allow ourselves to be consumed by our anger. Passion is what makes us Human. We cannot know hate without first experiencing love, we cannot know sorrow without a knowledge of Joy…to be alive is to dance with the shadows. To feel is to be free. The enemy of Passion is fear. Religion is a construct of fear, an invention of men who are afraid of their own shadows, afraid of their own human nature and nature itself. Passion is salvation. The renunciation of Passion is a chilly icy death. The essence of God is Passion.
Extermination?
Is it right or wrong to exterminate varmints to protect your own interests? What do you do with the coyote in the chicken coup, the termites in your walls, the mole in the yard, the moths in your closet, the mice in the attic, the roaches under the sink? Extermination? Try to co-habitate with them? Shoo them away?
What about a varmit that claims jurisdiction over all of the land, property, possessions, and person…control over the animals, plants, even seeds…uprooting your crops and robbing you of your sacred herbs and sacraments, setting fire to fields and forests? What if they had taken over to the point where they left you homeless and penniless fleeing into the hills to escape them and they follow you into the hills continuing to impose their will on you?
What about a varmit that claims jurisdiction over all of the land, property, possessions, and person…control over the animals, plants, even seeds…uprooting your crops and robbing you of your sacred herbs and sacraments, setting fire to fields and forests? What if they had taken over to the point where they left you homeless and penniless fleeing into the hills to escape them and they follow you into the hills continuing to impose their will on you?
Civil War
The civil was was not about freedom of slaves, it was about power, control and possession. The industrial revolution was at it’s peak and the industrial north needed workers for their factories. The concept of self-sufficient plantations, privately owned by family’s that set their own prices for their crop was a thorn in the side of their capitalistic regime, a stumbling block to the doctrine of Manifest Destiny that would propel them to the top of the pyramid where they would sit on their throne above the Cosmos and rule over the nations with an iron rod. The north wasn’t interested in freeing southern slaves as much as it was interested in enslaving the south for it’s own purposes. The confederate states were invaded by the Union and rendered prisoners of war. The civil war wasn’t about freedom, it was about money and power and labor and taxes.The Civil War was an embaresment to the ideal of Liberty and Freedom that the United States of America was founded on. History reapeats it-self and today the new civil war is in it’s birth pains,emerging from a 40 year old struggle against the Liberty and Freedom our country supposedly represents, no longer North vs. South, this time the country will be divided from east to west and the cash crop is no longer cotton.
I want to fall in Love
I want to fall in Love…to escape the vortex of my self-imposed separation… spiraling downward past the underworlds…thru the never ending levels of hell…to break the fetters of apathy and fear…plunging with reckless abandon into the depths of the universal soul…knowing that even if I’m stabbed in the back or in the heart a million times it cannot compare with the numb pangs of my empty heart beating in my hollow chest echoing my desparate cries of isolation.
Capitalism and Christianity
· Capitalism and Christianity: It is easy to believe in the system of capitalism when you believe in a god that requires blood for the remission of sins and vice versa. The “gospel” of the Christian church can be broken down into capitalistic terms and often is. The idea that ‘freedom isn’t free’ and the idea that Love requires a sacrifice are products of the Judeo-christian mind-set. The idea of ‘Free Love’ is repulsive to the Christian because according to their parochial understanding, freedom and love are completely incompatible…they define love in terms of possession and control and freedom to them is liberation from their ‘sinful’ human nature which is where Passion resides and true Love is found.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
The Love of Blood
Christianity is based on the presupposition that "God requires Blood for the remission of sins." (Hebrews 9:22-28). Jesus is regarded as the "final sacrifice" to end the practice of slaughtering sheep and pouring their Blood over the alter in the most holy of holy places. He is the "Lamb of God" which taketh away the "sin" of the world (John 1:29). and if i don’t believe in "God’s only begotten son" i "stand condemned" (John 3:16-18) because his Blood washes away my "sins" and makes me white as snow...If i do not accept the Blood of Jesus, your theology says i will burn in hell for all eternity. Even Jesus himself is quoted as saying that "if you do not drink my Blood and eat my flesh you will have no part of my kingdom."(although i believe he was being ficicious and metaphorical here) My question is, (keeping in mind the biblical definition of Agape): If "God" is (Agape) Love, WHY did he require the shedding of innocent blood for the remission of "sins" in the first place (see Leviticus)? Does UNCONDITIONAL Love require a blood sacrifice for the remission of "sins"? Does SELF-LESS Love require a blood sacrifice for the remission of "sins"? If you love someone do you demand that they sacrifice something for you? Doesn’t the concept of demanding a sacrifice seem conditional and selfish to you? Why must you equate Love with sacrifice? If "God" is Love, WHY does he require blood for the remission of "sins"? and further more, If "God" is Love, WHY would he create a law that would condemn and judge people as sinners anyways? If you voluntarily, unconditionally and self-lessly Love someone do you hand them an impossible list of rules to follow and in addition expect them to sacrifice something they Love in order to atone for the rules they inevitably will break and threaten them with death, hell and damnation if they fail? If Yahway the god of the Torah was not the devil himself i don’t know who is. I believe that Jesus saw thru this bull-shit and offered himself as a scapegoat to free his people from an oppressive and usurious religion...and thru misinterpretation of his words combined with Pauls desperate and feeble attempts justify the law of the Torah with the revolutionary message of Love that Jesus proclaimed, Christians have created a new temple from the ruins of the old and turned the revolution that Jesus started into the new orthedoxy, once again making it all about BLOOD...i don’t think our Salvation depends on blood of Jesus any more than it depended on the blood of sheep and goats...I believe our salvation as humans depends on LOVE and nothing but...If we do not learn to LOVE unconditionally and self-lessly we will continue to persecute and kill each other in the name of "God".
Thursday, August 21, 2008
The Conspiracy of Society
Society is a vast conspiracy to control and possess that which is sacred. The original sin of humankind, pride, places it’s throne above “God” claiming dominion over all the earth and it’s inhabitants. It eats of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which is Law, and passes it’s fruits to our children and our children’s children, the fruits of judgement, condemnation, and guilt. It binds our minds and our hearts with precept upon precept. Society is a disease that feeds on what is alive and free and wild. It is the anti-thesis of life itself. It promises safety, security and comfort in return for painful toil but the wages of sin is death. The system of capitalism is a disease that perpetuates slavery, oppression, greed and violence, it is the anti-thesis of freedom, self-reliance and autonomy.
The Tyrant is a Slave
The spider is a slave to her web,The tyrant is a slave to his throne, the hand a slave to the stomach, they all end up dying alone…the fish is a slave to the ocean, the worm a slave to the soil, the farmer slaves in his garden with painful labor and toil. Love is the only redemption, the balance of darkness and light, death is the only forgiveness, the morning comes after the night.
Secret of Your Soul
When I look into your eyes so wild and free, mystical, angelic, I wonder what you see, come to me my angel share with me the secret of your soul. I want to know the secret, but I don’t want to break the seal, I’ll accept it as a gift but I won’t beg or steal, come to me my angel, share with me the secret of your soul.
Jenn
She’s got fire in her eyes and a monkey on her back, she’s walking thru the quarter looking for a sack, she say’s she’s leaving town and she ain’t never coming back, but I don’t think she’s going anywhere…Everywhere she goes everybody knows her name, she gets just what she wants she knows how to play the game, she says she’s tired of this town, everything’s the same, but I don’t think she’s going anywhere…she say’s working these streets is a tough row to hoe, even though she’s on paper she says she’s ready to go, she says she’s as free as a bird but I don’t know, I don’t think she’s going anywhere…we’re sitting at the moonwalk staring out at the river, she’s got a son on the west bank she knows he’ll forgive her, she said “I just gotta do me for awhile.” She looks me in the eye and she gives me a smile, and the wind ruffles her long brown hair, she says she’s wild and free and doesn’t have a care, but I don’t think she’s going anywhere
Fowl Society
They eat and fuck and clack and cluck and live inside their zones
They strut and fluff and act real tough, like dogs fighting over a bone
Like kittens and tits they fight for their bits like there’s not enough to share
And when it’s done you better run if the hand that feeds is bare
They’ll peck your fingers and your toes, that’s how the story always goes
Right or wrong, foul or fair the rooster always gets his share
Dependant on authority…lost their way, don’t know how to be free
So they’ll sharpen their beaks just to make you bleed
Cuz you’re the only one they see sitting on the throne.
They strut and fluff and act real tough, like dogs fighting over a bone
Like kittens and tits they fight for their bits like there’s not enough to share
And when it’s done you better run if the hand that feeds is bare
They’ll peck your fingers and your toes, that’s how the story always goes
Right or wrong, foul or fair the rooster always gets his share
Dependant on authority…lost their way, don’t know how to be free
So they’ll sharpen their beaks just to make you bleed
Cuz you’re the only one they see sitting on the throne.
Picture
“…and the word became flesh and dwelt among us.”-John chap.1
A painter can change a person’s life without uttering a single syllable. God, the master artist speaks to us each and every day. A man cannot fathom the infinite omnipresence of God until he stands on the shore and watches the sea pale in comparison. He cannot know the essence of humility until he lies beneath the stars and realizes how small and insignificant he is in the grand scheme of things. He will not know his creator until he bows down in humble adoration to that power that is bigger than himself and cries out “what is man that you are mindful of him?”
Nature is a fleeting shadow through the window of a man’s soul. Until he recognizes the form of whom that shadow belongs to and opens the door and allows him to illuminate the recesses of his soul he will forever be a stranger to his creator. A man is intimate with God when he can feel his caress in the breeze that ruffles his hair, and can see his face shine upon him as the sun rises above the horizon.
The most effective and impactful form of communication is not the use of words to express a thought or idea, but the use of words to paint a picture that illustrates that thought or idea. We that know the Truth have a responsibility to express it.
A painter can change a person’s life without uttering a single syllable. God, the master artist speaks to us each and every day. A man cannot fathom the infinite omnipresence of God until he stands on the shore and watches the sea pale in comparison. He cannot know the essence of humility until he lies beneath the stars and realizes how small and insignificant he is in the grand scheme of things. He will not know his creator until he bows down in humble adoration to that power that is bigger than himself and cries out “what is man that you are mindful of him?”
Nature is a fleeting shadow through the window of a man’s soul. Until he recognizes the form of whom that shadow belongs to and opens the door and allows him to illuminate the recesses of his soul he will forever be a stranger to his creator. A man is intimate with God when he can feel his caress in the breeze that ruffles his hair, and can see his face shine upon him as the sun rises above the horizon.
The most effective and impactful form of communication is not the use of words to express a thought or idea, but the use of words to paint a picture that illustrates that thought or idea. We that know the Truth have a responsibility to express it.
The god of Abel
Who is this “God” that demands the shedding of blood for the remission of sins? Creation was corrupted when plants, animals, and land became “crops”, “herds” and “property”. Abel was the first shepherd, the first one to break the will of wild sheep and possess and control them as his own as well as the land they grazed upon. Abel was the first man to shed innocent blood. The idea of “ownership” and “property” was the result of the domestication of plants and animals and is the cornerstone of civilization as we know it. Who is this “God” that looked in favor upon Abel’s’ sacrifice of bloodshed and rejected Cain’s sacrifice of the fruits of the earth?
Abel’s sacrifice was the first of many. The barbaric custom evolved into an annual massacre of the first born of the flock from every household of “God’s” “chosen people”, a requirement for the “remission of sins.” (If the household was not involved in the enterprise of domesticated sheep they could buy one at the temple; for a modest fee I’m sure.) As the lambs throat was slit and the blood drained into a basin and carried thru the temple and into the most holy of holy places behind a curtain that only the high priest could enter and not without a rope tied to his foot in case the “Lord” decided to smite him to death and poured the blood over the horns of the alter, the meat was cooked over an open fire and the priesthood indulged in the choice cuts of the meat according to their rank in the hierarchy and the wrath of the “Lord” was dissuaded because he was pleased with the aroma of the (barbeque) offering.
The domestication of sheep and man went hand in hand as the chosen people were branded and corralled according to their specific tribes to raise their flocks on their allotted territories and defend their folds against predators while eradicating “Gentiles” and nomadic-hunter-gatherer peoples that inhabited their “Promised Land.” the “Lord” had given them the land and as for the natives, he commanded that the Israelites kill them all (even women and children) and steal all of their stuff. (sound familiar?) If anyone had the testicular fortitude to speak out against the ways of the “Lord” he was commanded by the “Lord” to be stoned to death immediately by the closest person available for his blasphemy.
I don’t believe that “God” has a chosen people and I don’t think that the presence of the lord was ever concentrated enough to fit into a box or a temple for that matter. I have issues with the hierarchical priesthood concept and refuse to believe that “God” prescribed the slaughter of animals for the remission of sins, or the genocide of nomadic Muslim tribes such as the Amorites, Moabites, ect. I don’t think anyone had more issues against the religion of the Jews than Jesus Christ himself who gave his life as a ransom to set his people free from a usurious and oppressive religion.
The Jews were the first to unite commerce and religion, the business of sacrificing sheep was the cornerstone of the economy in the middle east where there wasn’t much else going on because they hadn’t discovered oil yet, so the machine ran on blood instead.
In the Jewish culture everything was commoditized from salvation to marriage, it was customary to pay the father of the bride so many head of livestock for the privilege of marrying his daughter. Girls started getting married when they were as young as 13 years old when they were considered a woman and often had very little say in who they married. (If that’s not child prostitution I don’t know what is.) The temple tithe required 10 percent of gross income, a practice that is still used by the Christians. The religion of capitalism started by the Jews still survives and has been preserved and embraced by the Christian church.
I respect Jesus and his teachings but I have come to the conclusion that the god of the Old Testament is something that was made up by a power hungry tyrant bent on controlling and possessing the world. ...the war that's going on now, another chapter of the crusades, is just a part of the script outlined in the bible...it is written, and we're acting it out like puppets with Bush and the rest of the infamadi (Zionistic fascists) pulling the strings. The earth is sacred, it is something that is not to be controlled and possessed, divided and fought over, you can't posses something that is sacred...The Man, in his sinful pride, has placed his throne above the Creator and commanded that we serve in his kingdom and bow down and worship him. If we keep feeding this satanic system with our labor, commerce, tithes and taxes and brainwashing our children to follow this "Holy" script it's gonna be a bad movie.
Generally speaking, one’s political views usually mirror their perception of God. I don’t see God as a hierarchical Deity who must be praised and obeyed to incur blessings and dissuade wrath…I believe that god is Love. Love does not lord above its beloved but exists in the midst and is one with all that is. The idea of a personified deity existing outside of his creation, an old white man with a long gray beard, sitting on a throne somewhere on a cloud in another realm, ruling over the nations with an iron scepter, is absurd to me and I don’t think “Thor” the Greek god of thunder is what Jesus was envisioning when we made references to his heavenly father.
Abel’s sacrifice was the first of many. The barbaric custom evolved into an annual massacre of the first born of the flock from every household of “God’s” “chosen people”, a requirement for the “remission of sins.” (If the household was not involved in the enterprise of domesticated sheep they could buy one at the temple; for a modest fee I’m sure.) As the lambs throat was slit and the blood drained into a basin and carried thru the temple and into the most holy of holy places behind a curtain that only the high priest could enter and not without a rope tied to his foot in case the “Lord” decided to smite him to death and poured the blood over the horns of the alter, the meat was cooked over an open fire and the priesthood indulged in the choice cuts of the meat according to their rank in the hierarchy and the wrath of the “Lord” was dissuaded because he was pleased with the aroma of the (barbeque) offering.
The domestication of sheep and man went hand in hand as the chosen people were branded and corralled according to their specific tribes to raise their flocks on their allotted territories and defend their folds against predators while eradicating “Gentiles” and nomadic-hunter-gatherer peoples that inhabited their “Promised Land.” the “Lord” had given them the land and as for the natives, he commanded that the Israelites kill them all (even women and children) and steal all of their stuff. (sound familiar?) If anyone had the testicular fortitude to speak out against the ways of the “Lord” he was commanded by the “Lord” to be stoned to death immediately by the closest person available for his blasphemy.
I don’t believe that “God” has a chosen people and I don’t think that the presence of the lord was ever concentrated enough to fit into a box or a temple for that matter. I have issues with the hierarchical priesthood concept and refuse to believe that “God” prescribed the slaughter of animals for the remission of sins, or the genocide of nomadic Muslim tribes such as the Amorites, Moabites, ect. I don’t think anyone had more issues against the religion of the Jews than Jesus Christ himself who gave his life as a ransom to set his people free from a usurious and oppressive religion.
The Jews were the first to unite commerce and religion, the business of sacrificing sheep was the cornerstone of the economy in the middle east where there wasn’t much else going on because they hadn’t discovered oil yet, so the machine ran on blood instead.
In the Jewish culture everything was commoditized from salvation to marriage, it was customary to pay the father of the bride so many head of livestock for the privilege of marrying his daughter. Girls started getting married when they were as young as 13 years old when they were considered a woman and often had very little say in who they married. (If that’s not child prostitution I don’t know what is.) The temple tithe required 10 percent of gross income, a practice that is still used by the Christians. The religion of capitalism started by the Jews still survives and has been preserved and embraced by the Christian church.
I respect Jesus and his teachings but I have come to the conclusion that the god of the Old Testament is something that was made up by a power hungry tyrant bent on controlling and possessing the world. ...the war that's going on now, another chapter of the crusades, is just a part of the script outlined in the bible...it is written, and we're acting it out like puppets with Bush and the rest of the infamadi (Zionistic fascists) pulling the strings. The earth is sacred, it is something that is not to be controlled and possessed, divided and fought over, you can't posses something that is sacred...The Man, in his sinful pride, has placed his throne above the Creator and commanded that we serve in his kingdom and bow down and worship him. If we keep feeding this satanic system with our labor, commerce, tithes and taxes and brainwashing our children to follow this "Holy" script it's gonna be a bad movie.
Generally speaking, one’s political views usually mirror their perception of God. I don’t see God as a hierarchical Deity who must be praised and obeyed to incur blessings and dissuade wrath…I believe that god is Love. Love does not lord above its beloved but exists in the midst and is one with all that is. The idea of a personified deity existing outside of his creation, an old white man with a long gray beard, sitting on a throne somewhere on a cloud in another realm, ruling over the nations with an iron scepter, is absurd to me and I don’t think “Thor” the Greek god of thunder is what Jesus was envisioning when we made references to his heavenly father.
Renunciation
A renunciation of codependent ties to religion, sex, drugs…an attempt to transcend the demonic possession of my ego and the collective ego of society…witches, bitches, ideas and identity…I’ve burned them all at the stake…forsaking the prison, the hell of my own self-imposed consciousness and the imposed morality of the masses…seeking only the light of creation and righteousness and Truth which burns eternally beyond the dancing flames of destruction, the annialation of all that is false and illusatory…binding my only begotten to the dead driftwood timbers of matter, space and time…ascending into the medulla of all that is and all that was and will be…the Alpha the Omega, the beginning and the end…Born again into the realm of consciousness…the awareness of unity with all that is… renouncing the false doctrine of separation, severing attachment to the body and mind…ascending into the purity of the Spirit…presenting myself a living sacrifice…dying to the luciferian concept of self…being born again a new creation…a parcel of the divine…taking on the essence of the whole.
Entering the Temple
She breathes life into my dusty bones clothed with cold flesh, once again I breathe. Awakened as from a dream I am reminded of who I am. Looking into her eyes she gives me power and permission to tap into a part of myself that I never knew existed. I feel. She is that missing piece; she fills the void that nothing else could fill. She completes me. Separation from her would be a chilly death. So I fight. Every obstacle that stands between us I demolish, she is the Holy Grail, she is salvation. I fight for her and surrender into her, I pledge my love to her and dedicate my life to her. In an act of celebration and consummation we become one flesh as I plunge into her with self-less abandon, dying to myself and being born again. Our bodies entwined together I enter reverently into her temple with all of my being parting the curtain of the holiest of holy places offering myself in covenant with her. with passionate intensity I lose myself in her dying and being born again as I spill my sacrifice on her alter uniting our bodies and souls with one final exertion and a peace pervades the silent night.
Sauna Detox
I sit in silence except for the steady drip of sweat cascading down my bowed head gathering speed as it rolls down the slope of my nose and for a brief moment of suspense, clinging to the end of my nose for dear life before it plummets into the shallow puddle at my feet. As I nod to the rhythm of the suicidal lemurs of perspiration, the steady 4/4 time increases tempo and switches to duple meter as the puddle gets deeper and expands, slowly oozing down the slight grade of the tile floor, flowing towards the grated drain, a trapdoor of escape from its dehydrating host. A thick slime covers my body and the putrid stench of heroin residue seeping out of my pores turns my stomach as I painfully relive coming down. The sweat stings my eyes and the river branches off into tributaries as the beat is interrupted by rouge droplets swan diving from my forehead.
Jimmy Weinmiller
He was the richest man in town (not to mention the most hated) in fact he owned over half of it. His dad was a big shot from Arkansas, one of Bill Clinton’s main moneymen, owned a big horse ranch, lots of land, and a huge mansion on a hill among other things. His business was drugs. Lots of drugs. Jimmy used to work for his old man’s cartel up until he did some time for getting caught with a semi-truck full of reefer coming across the border in El Paso. He spent five years in one of them fancy country club prisons till cousin Bill gave him a full pardon on his way out of the white house.
Everybody in the small town of Monterey L.A. knew his name. Jimmy Weinmiller. Nobody liked him much either. He rubbed people the wrong way. He rubbed people out of their land and caused all kinds of ruckus just because he could.
HE built his house, a massive two story mansion, right down the road on the bank of Black River Lake, a prized piece of land called Billy goat point with access to the hottest bass fishing spot around. It was called Billy goat point on account of a farmer who kept his goats there once upon a time, until they were eaten by alligators.
The son of a preacher, I lived in the parsonage beside the Eva Church of God, a little white country church surrounded by Pecan trees with a cemetery lined with ornamental pear trees. In all four directions of the two and a half acre lot was farmland. The acreage to the West was Wienmiller’s prized property. In the back forty was a slough that would flood in the winter months and become a winter bungalow for thousands of Mallards as well as wood ducks and about a dozen other species of duck. Oftentimes around dusk I would sneak back there with my twelve gauge and jump a few of them.
His mansion on Billy Goat point also served as a hunting lodge for novice duck hunters such as the likes of Bobby Hebert, Bill Clinton, and other athletes and celebrities. It was sometimes more of a party house than a hunting lodge; the noise would sometimes keep me awake at night. I would get up cursing under my breath as I shut the window otherwise left open to hear the chirping of the crickets, the mocking bird’s song, and the yapping of coyotes hunting along the southeastern tree line.
Unpopular though he was, I didn’t have anything against the man. Often times while I was out cutting the grass he would come tearing down the turning row in his four-wheel drive truck. I would lift my hand for the customary wave because that’s what you do in the country, you wave, at everybody. My wave would never be returned. The first few times I gave him the benefit of the doubt. “He didn’t see me.” I’d say to myself, or “He thought I was swatting a fly or reaching for the gearshift, stretching my fingers or something.” Then, after a few more times I was offended. Where I come from a non-wave is a sign of disrespect. Who does he think he is anyways?
He had a lot of farming equipment he would park wherever he pleased; whether it was on the church property or not. I would often have to go around it to mow and leave a big patch of tall grass and weeds. One time in particular he was picking up a tractor he had parked right where I was mowing, He came walking across the yard paying me no mind whatsoever, talking over the grind of the mower to the hand that had dropped him off. He stood along with the other guy, right in the path of where I was mowing. I held my ground as I came toward them, and blew grass cuttings all over them. I kept my gaze on Weinmiller as he looked down at his boots that I had just sprayed grass clipping all over. I watched him as he turned his shocked dumbfounded gaze from his boots to my unrelenting gaze as if noticing my existence for the first time, his surprise faded into an amused grin.
Time went by and his dog started coming around the house, getting into the trash, eating all of my dog’s (Sandy and Buck’s) food, and stirring up trouble with them. I run him off several times, threw rocks, shot at his paws with a twenty-two rifle, I even took him down to Paul’s Grocery once but momma made me go back and get it. So I caught the little bastard and loaded him up in the Nova and went a knocking on that big cypress door. When he came out I handed him the little terrier and said, “You gotta do something with this dog.” I explained the problems I was having with it and he offered to let me have it the second or third time I had to bring it up there. I turned it loose somewhere in Jonesville.
Harvest time came and he came by the house, I was out in the yard, he introduced me to his brother and offered me a job. It paid seven dollars an hour and provided lunch. I had spam and peanut butter sandwiches every day for the next three months. We worked from sun-up to sundown every day, and sometimes even after sundown we would work with floodlights. I had done some work for him before through his right hand man, Travis, loading hay and painting the backup lodge.
HE tried to jip me out of a lot of money. He was slow at paying anyway. Then one night on their way to take me home he said, “How does one-hundred dollars sound to you?” I wasn’t overly smart when it came to figuring but I wasn’t stupid either. I had gone near bout three weeks without pay and a hundred dollars sounded like a load of horseshit to me and I told him so. I told him by my figures he owed me about $700 dollars. He made up some lame excuse about taxes or what not but I knew he was paying under the table, so I held my ground and told him that I had agreed to work for seven dollars an hour and seven dollars an hour is what I was going to get. He counted out the money in hundreds and twenty’s cash in hand.
When I got back to the house I looked at my time card and got out my calculator and realized that I had over charged him by over two hundred dollars. So back I went to knocking on that big cypress door. Giving that money back blew him and his brother away. They had never seen anything like that. I walked home that night feeling awful good; I had refused the chance to cheat the cheater, though I could have with ease.
Everybody in the small town of Monterey L.A. knew his name. Jimmy Weinmiller. Nobody liked him much either. He rubbed people the wrong way. He rubbed people out of their land and caused all kinds of ruckus just because he could.
HE built his house, a massive two story mansion, right down the road on the bank of Black River Lake, a prized piece of land called Billy goat point with access to the hottest bass fishing spot around. It was called Billy goat point on account of a farmer who kept his goats there once upon a time, until they were eaten by alligators.
The son of a preacher, I lived in the parsonage beside the Eva Church of God, a little white country church surrounded by Pecan trees with a cemetery lined with ornamental pear trees. In all four directions of the two and a half acre lot was farmland. The acreage to the West was Wienmiller’s prized property. In the back forty was a slough that would flood in the winter months and become a winter bungalow for thousands of Mallards as well as wood ducks and about a dozen other species of duck. Oftentimes around dusk I would sneak back there with my twelve gauge and jump a few of them.
His mansion on Billy Goat point also served as a hunting lodge for novice duck hunters such as the likes of Bobby Hebert, Bill Clinton, and other athletes and celebrities. It was sometimes more of a party house than a hunting lodge; the noise would sometimes keep me awake at night. I would get up cursing under my breath as I shut the window otherwise left open to hear the chirping of the crickets, the mocking bird’s song, and the yapping of coyotes hunting along the southeastern tree line.
Unpopular though he was, I didn’t have anything against the man. Often times while I was out cutting the grass he would come tearing down the turning row in his four-wheel drive truck. I would lift my hand for the customary wave because that’s what you do in the country, you wave, at everybody. My wave would never be returned. The first few times I gave him the benefit of the doubt. “He didn’t see me.” I’d say to myself, or “He thought I was swatting a fly or reaching for the gearshift, stretching my fingers or something.” Then, after a few more times I was offended. Where I come from a non-wave is a sign of disrespect. Who does he think he is anyways?
He had a lot of farming equipment he would park wherever he pleased; whether it was on the church property or not. I would often have to go around it to mow and leave a big patch of tall grass and weeds. One time in particular he was picking up a tractor he had parked right where I was mowing, He came walking across the yard paying me no mind whatsoever, talking over the grind of the mower to the hand that had dropped him off. He stood along with the other guy, right in the path of where I was mowing. I held my ground as I came toward them, and blew grass cuttings all over them. I kept my gaze on Weinmiller as he looked down at his boots that I had just sprayed grass clipping all over. I watched him as he turned his shocked dumbfounded gaze from his boots to my unrelenting gaze as if noticing my existence for the first time, his surprise faded into an amused grin.
Time went by and his dog started coming around the house, getting into the trash, eating all of my dog’s (Sandy and Buck’s) food, and stirring up trouble with them. I run him off several times, threw rocks, shot at his paws with a twenty-two rifle, I even took him down to Paul’s Grocery once but momma made me go back and get it. So I caught the little bastard and loaded him up in the Nova and went a knocking on that big cypress door. When he came out I handed him the little terrier and said, “You gotta do something with this dog.” I explained the problems I was having with it and he offered to let me have it the second or third time I had to bring it up there. I turned it loose somewhere in Jonesville.
Harvest time came and he came by the house, I was out in the yard, he introduced me to his brother and offered me a job. It paid seven dollars an hour and provided lunch. I had spam and peanut butter sandwiches every day for the next three months. We worked from sun-up to sundown every day, and sometimes even after sundown we would work with floodlights. I had done some work for him before through his right hand man, Travis, loading hay and painting the backup lodge.
HE tried to jip me out of a lot of money. He was slow at paying anyway. Then one night on their way to take me home he said, “How does one-hundred dollars sound to you?” I wasn’t overly smart when it came to figuring but I wasn’t stupid either. I had gone near bout three weeks without pay and a hundred dollars sounded like a load of horseshit to me and I told him so. I told him by my figures he owed me about $700 dollars. He made up some lame excuse about taxes or what not but I knew he was paying under the table, so I held my ground and told him that I had agreed to work for seven dollars an hour and seven dollars an hour is what I was going to get. He counted out the money in hundreds and twenty’s cash in hand.
When I got back to the house I looked at my time card and got out my calculator and realized that I had over charged him by over two hundred dollars. So back I went to knocking on that big cypress door. Giving that money back blew him and his brother away. They had never seen anything like that. I walked home that night feeling awful good; I had refused the chance to cheat the cheater, though I could have with ease.
Kindergarden Bully
It was 1989 and I was having a rough time. Every day at recess I was chased down and beaten up by a bully named Duran Mclin and his gang of goons, and we had recess twice a day. I remember despondently complaining about my daily beatings to my parents over dinner and my dad looked at me and said “Son, next time he comes up to you, you tell him that your dad said to punch you in the nose.” And he held his fist up in front of his face and shook it. A wave of courage and delight swept over me. I couldn’t wait to go to school the next day. I had a brand new attitude. I had been given permission.
Sure enough, at first recess, I was surrounded by his goons. I didn’t run this time but stood my ground with fists clenched at my sides as Duran Mclin sauntered his way thru his gang and walked up to face me. I punched him in the nose as hard as I could. He limped away with blood running down his face, holding his nose, with a henchman on each side and the rest of the gang bringing up the rear as the procession made their way to the teachers to tattle-tale. I felt like a million bucks standing on the punish wall.
Sure enough, at first recess, I was surrounded by his goons. I didn’t run this time but stood my ground with fists clenched at my sides as Duran Mclin sauntered his way thru his gang and walked up to face me. I punched him in the nose as hard as I could. He limped away with blood running down his face, holding his nose, with a henchman on each side and the rest of the gang bringing up the rear as the procession made their way to the teachers to tattle-tale. I felt like a million bucks standing on the punish wall.
The Harlot's Supper: Burnt Bread and Bitter Wine
Introduction
The book of Hosea is a story about a struggle, a battle of wills. It graphically illustrates the war between love and lust, truth and lies, and redemption and judgment. It is a story about a husband and wife, a God and a country, sex and politics, love and money, wine and bread. It is poetry; emotional, gripping and raw. This is a theological essay on chapter seven of the book of Hosea. It seems strange to begin a chain of thoughts in the middle of a story instead of staring at the beginning, but this tale does not spin in a rigid, sequential fashion. It is a collection of poems that act as spokes in a wheel, the hub of which is the truth that the metaphor represents.
My purpose in writing this paper is not to dissect the narrative and theorize about historical details and trivial facts, or to overanalyze every metaphor, raping it of its powerful imagery, nor is it to merely recapitulate the story that has already been authored. My purpose is to paint a picture. My pen is a brush and my words are paint. It is up to you, the reader, to allow the ink inscribed in parallel lines to come alive and illustrate themselves onto the canvas of your imagination with vivid colors and strokes, creating a masterpiece worth a thousand of my feeble phrases, my awkward attempt to delineate the truth that has been revealed to me.
As I write, I sit before a mirror so that I may examine my subject closely. For this is, in fact, a self portrait. I pray for humility, that my brush strokes will be honest and not attempt to cover up my many blemishes and flaws. I also pray that you, the reader, will see your reflection clearly in this painting, for it is not only a self-portrayal but an illustration of humanity. We are all the unfaithful bride; whore’s saved by grace.
The harlot’s supper: Burnt Bread and Bitter Wine
She didn’t think anyone could see her when she fornicated on her bed, but he was there. As her body was being pillaged, a thief crept into her temple, under cover of the night and carved out her heart leaving behind an empty catacomb of nothingness, a shadow with no substance, an empty house with snakes wilting on the steps.
Those beautiful stained glass windows to her soul, once illuminated with love and truth are now vacant and cold. Her eyes aren’t as bright as they used to be, as they were in the days of her youth. Her innocence is gone. She has been defiled. She allowed a stranger to desecrate her temple. She lay with him in exchange for his bread and his wine. He entered into her, parted the curtain that separated the holy place from the most holy of holies and spilled his seed of deception on her alter, impregnating her with his lies causing her to birth illegitimate children. She is a whore.
Her husband is devastated. In his anger he stripped off her filthy rags of righteousness. She lied there naked on the marriage bed, her shame revealed, her sin as exposed as her bare breasts. He knew she had been with someone else. He was filled with anger and jealousy; he could feel the blood in his veins run hot. How could she? How could she do this after all he had been through for her? He longed to restore her to himself and to rescue her from her captivity, but her sin he could not ignore. It was right in front of his face, but he could not bear to turn his back on her. He would not.
She had sold herself back to the abusive master he had bought her from. The price had been paid in full, she was free, she didn’t have to wear that red dress anymore but still she turned away from him and subjected herself once again to the life of a prostitute, calling to her lovers as a dim-witted dove calls for a mate, soliciting cheap tricks on every corner, beneath every street light; sleeping in a den of thieves when what she really longed for was a home.
How could she forget him? How could she rip out his heart and cast aside the gifts he had lavished upon her? The covenant she had broken; the sacred document, their certificate of marriage, signed in blood, she had not remembered. The fiery coals of her passion had smoldered in her heart all night, and like kneaded dough that rises without having to be stirred, blazing into a fire at dawn and consumed her king.
He cried out in his anger, his face flushed with rage, he turned over the table, spilling her wages of harlotry on the floor and raised his hand to strike her…but he couldn’t. How could he? As he looked down at her, shivering and helpless, naked, wounded and broken, his heart was changed within him; all of his compassion was aroused and he remembered.
Every night he dreams of days gone by when she rested comfortably in his arms. She dwelt with him in his house, walking beside still waters and lying down in the greenest of pastures. He remembered her beautiful eyes gazing up into his, bright with love and devotion, fully trusting. He was desperate for her to respond that way to him again, the way she did in her youth. He missed her so much, he ached to hear once more, the song she used to sing to him, the one that made him cry. He wanted so badly to restore her to her home, to wrap her in his loving arms, to feel the warmth of her tears of joy when they shared their most intimate and passionate moments together. Every fiber of his being screamed out her name.
The candles were lit, a feast was prepared, but the place he had set at his table for her was empty. He longed to hear her knock on the door. He ached for her return. If only she would come to him. If only she would call out to him, he would restore her and bind up her wounds.
He pleads with her, his heart torn in two. The woman he adores has betrayed him. He pursues her, he fights for her, he woos her, but she does not respond. He whispered to her but she didn’t hear. He spoke to her but she ignored him. He shouted from the roof-tops, but she was oblivious. He sent her letters that remained unread and messengers unheeded and finally he was beaten, whipped and nailed to a tree on a hill for her to see, but she was blind.
Though she slay him, he paid the price for her, a ransom to set her free. He gave everything he had. Her insults were thorns in his brow. Her lies were nails in his hands. Her adultery a spear in his side. But, still he loved her and offered himself to her; bread of life, broken for her iniquity; new wine, poured from his veins that were pierced for her transgressions. But she did not accept his sacrifice. She turned away from him and called upon her lovers-her captors. In her hunger she wailed on her bed and slashed her wrists to receive a harlot’s supper: burnt bread and bitter wine.
The book of Hosea is a story about a struggle, a battle of wills. It graphically illustrates the war between love and lust, truth and lies, and redemption and judgment. It is a story about a husband and wife, a God and a country, sex and politics, love and money, wine and bread. It is poetry; emotional, gripping and raw. This is a theological essay on chapter seven of the book of Hosea. It seems strange to begin a chain of thoughts in the middle of a story instead of staring at the beginning, but this tale does not spin in a rigid, sequential fashion. It is a collection of poems that act as spokes in a wheel, the hub of which is the truth that the metaphor represents.
My purpose in writing this paper is not to dissect the narrative and theorize about historical details and trivial facts, or to overanalyze every metaphor, raping it of its powerful imagery, nor is it to merely recapitulate the story that has already been authored. My purpose is to paint a picture. My pen is a brush and my words are paint. It is up to you, the reader, to allow the ink inscribed in parallel lines to come alive and illustrate themselves onto the canvas of your imagination with vivid colors and strokes, creating a masterpiece worth a thousand of my feeble phrases, my awkward attempt to delineate the truth that has been revealed to me.
As I write, I sit before a mirror so that I may examine my subject closely. For this is, in fact, a self portrait. I pray for humility, that my brush strokes will be honest and not attempt to cover up my many blemishes and flaws. I also pray that you, the reader, will see your reflection clearly in this painting, for it is not only a self-portrayal but an illustration of humanity. We are all the unfaithful bride; whore’s saved by grace.
The harlot’s supper: Burnt Bread and Bitter Wine
She didn’t think anyone could see her when she fornicated on her bed, but he was there. As her body was being pillaged, a thief crept into her temple, under cover of the night and carved out her heart leaving behind an empty catacomb of nothingness, a shadow with no substance, an empty house with snakes wilting on the steps.
Those beautiful stained glass windows to her soul, once illuminated with love and truth are now vacant and cold. Her eyes aren’t as bright as they used to be, as they were in the days of her youth. Her innocence is gone. She has been defiled. She allowed a stranger to desecrate her temple. She lay with him in exchange for his bread and his wine. He entered into her, parted the curtain that separated the holy place from the most holy of holies and spilled his seed of deception on her alter, impregnating her with his lies causing her to birth illegitimate children. She is a whore.
Her husband is devastated. In his anger he stripped off her filthy rags of righteousness. She lied there naked on the marriage bed, her shame revealed, her sin as exposed as her bare breasts. He knew she had been with someone else. He was filled with anger and jealousy; he could feel the blood in his veins run hot. How could she? How could she do this after all he had been through for her? He longed to restore her to himself and to rescue her from her captivity, but her sin he could not ignore. It was right in front of his face, but he could not bear to turn his back on her. He would not.
She had sold herself back to the abusive master he had bought her from. The price had been paid in full, she was free, she didn’t have to wear that red dress anymore but still she turned away from him and subjected herself once again to the life of a prostitute, calling to her lovers as a dim-witted dove calls for a mate, soliciting cheap tricks on every corner, beneath every street light; sleeping in a den of thieves when what she really longed for was a home.
How could she forget him? How could she rip out his heart and cast aside the gifts he had lavished upon her? The covenant she had broken; the sacred document, their certificate of marriage, signed in blood, she had not remembered. The fiery coals of her passion had smoldered in her heart all night, and like kneaded dough that rises without having to be stirred, blazing into a fire at dawn and consumed her king.
He cried out in his anger, his face flushed with rage, he turned over the table, spilling her wages of harlotry on the floor and raised his hand to strike her…but he couldn’t. How could he? As he looked down at her, shivering and helpless, naked, wounded and broken, his heart was changed within him; all of his compassion was aroused and he remembered.
Every night he dreams of days gone by when she rested comfortably in his arms. She dwelt with him in his house, walking beside still waters and lying down in the greenest of pastures. He remembered her beautiful eyes gazing up into his, bright with love and devotion, fully trusting. He was desperate for her to respond that way to him again, the way she did in her youth. He missed her so much, he ached to hear once more, the song she used to sing to him, the one that made him cry. He wanted so badly to restore her to her home, to wrap her in his loving arms, to feel the warmth of her tears of joy when they shared their most intimate and passionate moments together. Every fiber of his being screamed out her name.
The candles were lit, a feast was prepared, but the place he had set at his table for her was empty. He longed to hear her knock on the door. He ached for her return. If only she would come to him. If only she would call out to him, he would restore her and bind up her wounds.
He pleads with her, his heart torn in two. The woman he adores has betrayed him. He pursues her, he fights for her, he woos her, but she does not respond. He whispered to her but she didn’t hear. He spoke to her but she ignored him. He shouted from the roof-tops, but she was oblivious. He sent her letters that remained unread and messengers unheeded and finally he was beaten, whipped and nailed to a tree on a hill for her to see, but she was blind.
Though she slay him, he paid the price for her, a ransom to set her free. He gave everything he had. Her insults were thorns in his brow. Her lies were nails in his hands. Her adultery a spear in his side. But, still he loved her and offered himself to her; bread of life, broken for her iniquity; new wine, poured from his veins that were pierced for her transgressions. But she did not accept his sacrifice. She turned away from him and called upon her lovers-her captors. In her hunger she wailed on her bed and slashed her wrists to receive a harlot’s supper: burnt bread and bitter wine.
Monday, July 21, 2008
One night at Nighthawks...
Pour me another cup of coffee Bob. I ordered in a tired voice as I slid my mug across the bar. It was late in downtown Chicago. The city slept except for this cozy little coffee shop on Fairbanks. I shifted on my stool and smiled placidly as I watched the steam spiral upward from the cup placed in front of me. Soft violins and flutes accompanied by a silky female voice flowed from the jukebox in the corner. Though I couldn’t understand the Italian lyrics, the music soothed my aching mind and relaxed the tense muscles in my body. As the song slowly faded to silence the man across the bar sauntered over to the jukebox (boots echoing softly on the wood-grain floor) and placed another dime into the slot like he had done several times before. I thought that if I heard the song just once more I could sing along with it, note for note, even though the Italian lyrics were completely foreign to me.
As the man’s back was turned to me and the lady that was with him stared wistfully at a spot on the table as she cradled her chamomile tea, I glanced down at my notepad resting on my knee under the table at the small handful of words and phrases that I had managed to record from his conversation with the lady. The man’s name was Capone, Al Capone. I am a private eye that freelances for the Chicago Police force. As a private eye I usually get paid to investigate people, but this time I’m not on assignment. Capone is a personal project I’m working on. I’m on my own time. I won’t be able to rest easy until he is behind bars.
Capone is defiantly an elusive opponent. He has the whole city of Chicago in his pocket, from the Mayor to the Chief of Police. His hired guns almost outnumber the police force. He has been charged with racketeering several times but nothing ever sticks to him. He always swaggers out of the courtroom with a smug grin on his face, eyes full of gleeful defiance. It has become my mission in life to wipe that grin off of his face and to see the look of defeat in his eyes through iron bars.
As he turned form the jukebox to walk back to his seat, the light glimmered as it caught the scar across the left side of his face. It started above his cheek and slanted down to the bottom of his jaw. The scar bent into a crescent as his lips curled in a sinister smile. I had seen that same smile many times before as I watched in anger from behind the masses of reporters as he descended the steps of the courthouse. Capone doesn’t realize how far he and I go back.
On a foggy winter night back in 45 i was awakened by gunshots. I ran into the den to see my father riddled with bullets. A dark figure in a trenchcoat was standing over his body with a smoking tommy gun. I caught a glimpse of his face in the moonlight as he escaped out of an open window into the night air, but not before I slashed his cheek with a bowie knife my father kept on his study table.
My father was the cheif of police in chicago at the time and had apparently refused to cover up a smuggling ring ran by Capone. That night, over the corpse of my father, I swore that I would avenge his death.
As the man’s back was turned to me and the lady that was with him stared wistfully at a spot on the table as she cradled her chamomile tea, I glanced down at my notepad resting on my knee under the table at the small handful of words and phrases that I had managed to record from his conversation with the lady. The man’s name was Capone, Al Capone. I am a private eye that freelances for the Chicago Police force. As a private eye I usually get paid to investigate people, but this time I’m not on assignment. Capone is a personal project I’m working on. I’m on my own time. I won’t be able to rest easy until he is behind bars.
Capone is defiantly an elusive opponent. He has the whole city of Chicago in his pocket, from the Mayor to the Chief of Police. His hired guns almost outnumber the police force. He has been charged with racketeering several times but nothing ever sticks to him. He always swaggers out of the courtroom with a smug grin on his face, eyes full of gleeful defiance. It has become my mission in life to wipe that grin off of his face and to see the look of defeat in his eyes through iron bars.
As he turned form the jukebox to walk back to his seat, the light glimmered as it caught the scar across the left side of his face. It started above his cheek and slanted down to the bottom of his jaw. The scar bent into a crescent as his lips curled in a sinister smile. I had seen that same smile many times before as I watched in anger from behind the masses of reporters as he descended the steps of the courthouse. Capone doesn’t realize how far he and I go back.
On a foggy winter night back in 45 i was awakened by gunshots. I ran into the den to see my father riddled with bullets. A dark figure in a trenchcoat was standing over his body with a smoking tommy gun. I caught a glimpse of his face in the moonlight as he escaped out of an open window into the night air, but not before I slashed his cheek with a bowie knife my father kept on his study table.
My father was the cheif of police in chicago at the time and had apparently refused to cover up a smuggling ring ran by Capone. That night, over the corpse of my father, I swore that I would avenge his death.
Tower of Babel
Wandering through this maze of broken down buildings, cracking asphalt and cement, stepping over people lying in the street, smelling the ashes of the burning remains of a once prosperous society, I rounded a corner and there it stood. The Ivory Tower, so beautiful and majestic, reaching up through the clouds, so tall the top is barely visible. I had heard it was the place to be. Many a man had spent his entire lifetime laying the foundation and stones for this tower and never got to see the top. Many a pilgrim had traveled to his holy hill in search of this tower and here I stood now at its base. What lies before me is stairs, lots of stairs. They wind upwards in a spiral to the top. Me, being a man that always reaches for what is beyond his grasp began to climb. I climbed and climbed stopping to catch my breath from time to time, highly anticipating what awaited me at the top. Finally, weeks later, I am hungry tired and thirsty, I reach the top floor. As I step off the last stair, a hallway lies before me with a huge chandelier hanging from the ceiling. I walk down the hall and open a door. I walk into the room, dimly lit, a ray of light pouring in from a window. I walk to the window and as I look down at the ghetto I had left and realized that it wasn’t all that far down. Here I was looming high above it all. It looked different but somehow the same.
I turned my head just in time to see a cork flying past me, attached to a line with a lead and a hook baited with a plump night-crawler, squirming in the air. I looked to see where the line came from. Then I noticed I was standing in a bathroom with an old man sitting on the commode fishing out of the bathtub. He stared blankly ahead, mouth slightly ajar. I walked over to the bathtub, full of water with nothing but a few bubbles and a rubber ducky floating around aimlessly; the worm squirms and writhes on the end of the hook, its body secreting an oily residue into the water. I turn my gaze to the old man and ask, “What are you doing?” He seemed puzzled by the question and turned his gaze toward me for just a moment. “I’m fishing.” He said with a shrug and continued to stare ahead blankly.
I turned my head just in time to see a cork flying past me, attached to a line with a lead and a hook baited with a plump night-crawler, squirming in the air. I looked to see where the line came from. Then I noticed I was standing in a bathroom with an old man sitting on the commode fishing out of the bathtub. He stared blankly ahead, mouth slightly ajar. I walked over to the bathtub, full of water with nothing but a few bubbles and a rubber ducky floating around aimlessly; the worm squirms and writhes on the end of the hook, its body secreting an oily residue into the water. I turn my gaze to the old man and ask, “What are you doing?” He seemed puzzled by the question and turned his gaze toward me for just a moment. “I’m fishing.” He said with a shrug and continued to stare ahead blankly.
Grandma Smith
I was twelve and I hated penny loafers and I hated church. I don’t know what I hated more; church itself or the fact that my mom made me wear those stupid penny loafers when I went. I hated sitting there for hours on a wooden pew, listening to my dad behind the pulpit talk about things that didn’t make any sense to me. I hated the solemn hymns, the organ accompaniment, the constant business of standing up and sitting down and bowing my head, the long pious prayers, the superficial conversations before and after the service, the impossible expectations of perfection imposed upon me by my parents and the church people, (and God himself apparently), the stigma I lived with at school, and the fact that I was not allowed to go places and do things that other kids my age participated in, but I especially hated the penny-loafers.
She was ninety-two when I first met her. My dad was the new pastor at wood-haven church of god in Hammond, Louisiana and I was the new student in her Sunday school class. I’ll never forget opening the door and walking into her classroom for the first time, and seeing her sitting there, ancient and mystical, glowing from the inside out accentuated by the rays of morning sunshine through the golden, stained glass panes of the window behind her. It was as if I’d walked through an invisible doorway into another dimension. She sat regally behind the table like an angelic mother hen with a cluster of my peers around her with a warm, calm, peaceful smile permanently etched on her countenance. I left my bitterness and pride at the door and reverently took a seat at the table with the other kids. After the introductions and some small talk, a hush fell over the room as she removed a small cylindrical package from her oversized black purse, we all paused in meditation as she one, by one rolled a spearmint cert across the table to each of us with her wrinkled arthritis ridden hands, a weekly communion we observed religiously before she opened the class with a prayer.
She always said that all prayer was, is talking to God, and that’s exactly what she did. She didn’t quote scripture or speak in old English; she simply talked to Jesus as if he was right there. In fact… I think he was. I remember that first Sunday, I looked behind me as she was praying half expecting to see him walking thru the door and pulling up a chair at the table waiting anxiously for his cert. I sensed the presence of God like I had never felt before, like a welcome and honored guest that had come from afar.
Almost two years later I stood by her death-bed, listening to her pray, this time in a language that I did not understand. She lie there flat on her back, unblinking eyes fixated as if staring intently at a spot on the ceiling, mumbling unintelligibly pausing to inhale slowly. She seemed oblivious to my presence as I stood there silently thinking about certs rolling across the table, the smell of the old spice cologne she always wore, and her big tattered bible she always carried, loose pages stained with age, with passages underlined and notes scrawled in the margins. She paused momentarily and after a brief silence, without detouring her heavenward gaze, she whispered my name. “Yes, Grandma Smith?” I answered. “I’ll see you in heaven.” She finally spoke before returning to her prayer. “I’ll be there, Grandma Smith. I’ll be there.” I said. The next morning she went home to be with Jesus.
She was ninety-two when I first met her. My dad was the new pastor at wood-haven church of god in Hammond, Louisiana and I was the new student in her Sunday school class. I’ll never forget opening the door and walking into her classroom for the first time, and seeing her sitting there, ancient and mystical, glowing from the inside out accentuated by the rays of morning sunshine through the golden, stained glass panes of the window behind her. It was as if I’d walked through an invisible doorway into another dimension. She sat regally behind the table like an angelic mother hen with a cluster of my peers around her with a warm, calm, peaceful smile permanently etched on her countenance. I left my bitterness and pride at the door and reverently took a seat at the table with the other kids. After the introductions and some small talk, a hush fell over the room as she removed a small cylindrical package from her oversized black purse, we all paused in meditation as she one, by one rolled a spearmint cert across the table to each of us with her wrinkled arthritis ridden hands, a weekly communion we observed religiously before she opened the class with a prayer.
She always said that all prayer was, is talking to God, and that’s exactly what she did. She didn’t quote scripture or speak in old English; she simply talked to Jesus as if he was right there. In fact… I think he was. I remember that first Sunday, I looked behind me as she was praying half expecting to see him walking thru the door and pulling up a chair at the table waiting anxiously for his cert. I sensed the presence of God like I had never felt before, like a welcome and honored guest that had come from afar.
Almost two years later I stood by her death-bed, listening to her pray, this time in a language that I did not understand. She lie there flat on her back, unblinking eyes fixated as if staring intently at a spot on the ceiling, mumbling unintelligibly pausing to inhale slowly. She seemed oblivious to my presence as I stood there silently thinking about certs rolling across the table, the smell of the old spice cologne she always wore, and her big tattered bible she always carried, loose pages stained with age, with passages underlined and notes scrawled in the margins. She paused momentarily and after a brief silence, without detouring her heavenward gaze, she whispered my name. “Yes, Grandma Smith?” I answered. “I’ll see you in heaven.” She finally spoke before returning to her prayer. “I’ll be there, Grandma Smith. I’ll be there.” I said. The next morning she went home to be with Jesus.
Wilderness Sactuary
With reverent awe I pull back the curtains and slip into this sacred sanctuary. I soak in the beauty that surrounds me and a great wave of peace washes over me as the curtains close behind me shutting out the world. I am finally home, in the presence of my heavenly father, I remove my shoes for I stand on holy ground and proceed into this vast holy sanctuary via a trail in the pine straw and oak leaf blanketed forest floor that I have traversed many times before. The sun shines thru the branches illuminating my path. I pause for a moment to soak in its warmth and then proceed in silence for a word spoke in my tongue would be a foreign language. The terrain is rugged, wild and beautiful, the forest a virgin, unscathed by the hands of sinful man, it is pure and un-violated. It speaks in a language I have forgotten. The language of my heart. I lose myself in the thickness of the forest in which the four walls of my chambers could not even attempt to hint at the measure of blissful solitude the shade of the oaks provide for me. And as the sun sets I watch the accent of the moon as I lie on the ground next to my crackling fire, shifting my gaze from its dancing flames to the flickering stars above me, winking at the man in the moon watching over me as my fleeting thoughts ebb away into the night air, dispersed into nothingness like a plume of smoke from my fire.
The other side of the fence
The grass really does look greener on the other side of the fence, they say it’s really not but at least there’s a lot more of it. I gaze across the vast plains thru strands of barbed wire at the huge fireball in the sky; I watch it as it slowly disappears behind the horizon. I wonder where it goes. How I long to gallop across this lush green sea of grass, how I long to see where the sun beds down for the night. But here I am trapped inside this fence. Sometimes I dream of getting a running start and jumping over the western fence and galloping into the sunset, but I always stutter step just short of jumping. What if I trip? Besides I have grass to eat here and an old bathtub full of water to drink, and an old Guernsey named Betsey to keep me company and every Friday Farmer Joe dumps a bale of hay over the fence with the forks on his tractor for me and Betsey. I have everything I need here and I am comfortable. Oops I stepped in Betsey’s’ crap again.
Good-Bye
I said good-bye to my sorrows, I said good-bye to my fears, nothing but a song bouncing round between my ears. I said good-bye to my worries, I said good-bye to my pain, I said good-bye to you girl cuz you were driving me insane. But I want you to know I’ll always love you so, but a traveler always knows when it’s time to go. I got no money in my pockets nothing but time on my hands…don’t owe nobody nothing and I ain’t making no demands, I got the sun on my shoulders, my guitar on my back. And everything I own fits into my backpack…you say time is money but I think it’s so much more…my bag is always packed and never too far from the door…my yoke is easy and my burden is light I’ve got one life to live and I’m gonna live it right. I’ve got nothing but love and I’m gonna give it all away. I’m not counting on tomorrow, I’m just living for today.
From the Temple to the Vine.
It is interesting how the mode of worship goes from stationary and vertical to fluid and horizontal between the Old Testament and the new. The Jewish patriarchal hierarchy, the religio-political system of the Old Testament, with its priests, temples, rituals and laws was considered by Paul and the New Testament believers as a tutor and model for the coming messiah, Jesus. The law was not the end but a speedily exhaustible means to an end. The sacrifice of Christ redeemed the Jews from their oppressive and legalistic religion that required blood for the remission of sins. He became the final sacrifice. He was the final sacrifice, the fulfillment of the law. He allowed himself to be swallowed by the religious machine and crushed in the teeth of the gears in order to stop the wheels from turning. He destroyed the temple, ripped the curtain in two and put the priest-hood out of work, and established a new kingdom…a kingdom not of this world.
The “kingdom” of heaven is quite different from our worldly concept of kings and kingdoms. Jesus’ thoughts on leadership include statements such as “whoever wishes to be first among you must become the least.” “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.” He turned the paradigm of hierarchy upside down with visions such as: “the lion (lion of Judah) shall lie down with the lamb and a little child shall lead them.” In fact being born again and becoming like a little child was a pre-requisite for being a part of his heavenly kingdom. “Let the little children come unto me and forbid them not for such is the kingdom of heaven.” “If you do not become as a little child you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” In the parable of the rich young man he spoke of the renunciation of material possessions and even said that it was easier for a camel to go through the “eye of a needle” than a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. He made a clear distinction in Matthew chapter 6 between the kingdom of the world and the kingdom of heaven “you cannot serve two masters…you cannot serve both God and Money.” He commanded his disciples to not carry extra clothes, or staff (used as a weapon against thieves), or Money when he sent them out in two’s to spread the gospel of the kingdom of heaven.
In any kingdom of man, laws are instituted to protect persons and their property from the hands of selfish and greedy people; mechanical mechanisms to discourage crime. A hierarchy must be established to enforce these laws. Jesus’ remedy to this dilemma was simple: “Do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth where moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal…” “Observe the birds of the air, they neither sow or reap or gather into barns, but your heavenly father feeds them.”
To the converts from Judaism, the coming of the Messiah marked the end of God’s vertical, hierarchical, second hand relationship with his people and the beginning of an intimate, personal, first-hand relationship. “The time has come and now is when the true worshippers shall worship God in Spirit and in Truth. He was the fulfillment of the prophesies of Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Hosea… Jesus brought God to the people by calling him Father rather than Lord. He included humanity in the Godhead when he said I am the vine and you are the branches… He put himself on an equal plane with his followers when he said “who is my mother and brother and sister? Those who do the will of my Father.” The apostle Paul said: “We are the body of Christ…”“we are no longer slaves but friends.” All of the revolutionaries in the history of Judaism spoke of someone coming after them that was greater, from Moses to John the Baptist who said, ‘ I am not even worthy to unloose his sandal straps.’ Jesus as well prophesied off the coming of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost was a step closer to people experiencing God on a horizontal plane and resulted in the egalitarian model of the first church before it’s corruption in the book of Acts.
God is Spirit. The idea of a stationary God in another realm is a conceptual misnomer. The idea of Omni-presence implied in the bible suggests that God is everywhere at once, thru all and in all, that he inhabits and yet transcends his creation. The personification of God is merely a metaphor. The feeling of the absence of God’s presence is nothing more than a lack of perception and the overwhelming experience of ecstatic and intrancsive worship is a revelation, a heightened sense of awareness of the presence of God.
Temples don’t grow and evolve but bodies and vines never stop. A tree will never grow to the capacity it was designed to reach if it is transplanted and confined to a pot. Its roots will either break thru the structure that contains it or its growth will be stunted and it will eventually shrivel and die. God is alive and cannot be contained. He cannot inhabit man-made structures without ripping the curtain in two and demolishing it completely not leaving one stone on top of another. King Solomon said, “The heavens, even the highest heavens cannot contain you oh, lord how much less this temple I have built with my own hands.” Just as the tree cannot be contained in the pot, or God in the Temple, or Christ in the Tomb; neither can the Church (The Body of Christ) be contained within a religeo-political hierarchical structure. Truth is alive. It transcends scientific and mathematical formulas. It is not known by him who claims to have found the end…it is known by him who wonders…and wanders, perusing it to the end…of himself.
The “kingdom” of heaven is quite different from our worldly concept of kings and kingdoms. Jesus’ thoughts on leadership include statements such as “whoever wishes to be first among you must become the least.” “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.” He turned the paradigm of hierarchy upside down with visions such as: “the lion (lion of Judah) shall lie down with the lamb and a little child shall lead them.” In fact being born again and becoming like a little child was a pre-requisite for being a part of his heavenly kingdom. “Let the little children come unto me and forbid them not for such is the kingdom of heaven.” “If you do not become as a little child you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” In the parable of the rich young man he spoke of the renunciation of material possessions and even said that it was easier for a camel to go through the “eye of a needle” than a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. He made a clear distinction in Matthew chapter 6 between the kingdom of the world and the kingdom of heaven “you cannot serve two masters…you cannot serve both God and Money.” He commanded his disciples to not carry extra clothes, or staff (used as a weapon against thieves), or Money when he sent them out in two’s to spread the gospel of the kingdom of heaven.
In any kingdom of man, laws are instituted to protect persons and their property from the hands of selfish and greedy people; mechanical mechanisms to discourage crime. A hierarchy must be established to enforce these laws. Jesus’ remedy to this dilemma was simple: “Do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth where moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal…” “Observe the birds of the air, they neither sow or reap or gather into barns, but your heavenly father feeds them.”
To the converts from Judaism, the coming of the Messiah marked the end of God’s vertical, hierarchical, second hand relationship with his people and the beginning of an intimate, personal, first-hand relationship. “The time has come and now is when the true worshippers shall worship God in Spirit and in Truth. He was the fulfillment of the prophesies of Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Hosea… Jesus brought God to the people by calling him Father rather than Lord. He included humanity in the Godhead when he said I am the vine and you are the branches… He put himself on an equal plane with his followers when he said “who is my mother and brother and sister? Those who do the will of my Father.” The apostle Paul said: “We are the body of Christ…”“we are no longer slaves but friends.” All of the revolutionaries in the history of Judaism spoke of someone coming after them that was greater, from Moses to John the Baptist who said, ‘ I am not even worthy to unloose his sandal straps.’ Jesus as well prophesied off the coming of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost was a step closer to people experiencing God on a horizontal plane and resulted in the egalitarian model of the first church before it’s corruption in the book of Acts.
God is Spirit. The idea of a stationary God in another realm is a conceptual misnomer. The idea of Omni-presence implied in the bible suggests that God is everywhere at once, thru all and in all, that he inhabits and yet transcends his creation. The personification of God is merely a metaphor. The feeling of the absence of God’s presence is nothing more than a lack of perception and the overwhelming experience of ecstatic and intrancsive worship is a revelation, a heightened sense of awareness of the presence of God.
Temples don’t grow and evolve but bodies and vines never stop. A tree will never grow to the capacity it was designed to reach if it is transplanted and confined to a pot. Its roots will either break thru the structure that contains it or its growth will be stunted and it will eventually shrivel and die. God is alive and cannot be contained. He cannot inhabit man-made structures without ripping the curtain in two and demolishing it completely not leaving one stone on top of another. King Solomon said, “The heavens, even the highest heavens cannot contain you oh, lord how much less this temple I have built with my own hands.” Just as the tree cannot be contained in the pot, or God in the Temple, or Christ in the Tomb; neither can the Church (The Body of Christ) be contained within a religeo-political hierarchical structure. Truth is alive. It transcends scientific and mathematical formulas. It is not known by him who claims to have found the end…it is known by him who wonders…and wanders, perusing it to the end…of himself.
Born Again
In the deepest recesses of my being I am faintly aware of an ephemeral essence that transcends form and substance. In fleeting moments of enlightenment the rays of divinity shine through the windows of my soul and casts a shadow of the unseen upon the walls of my mind betraying everything visible and material as illusatory and transient... Nature. Beauty. Love. Character...awaken me as from a dream, stirring me from my vain occupations, leading me out of my withering abode into the truth, into the reality of the moment...Suspended outside of my body above the axis of space and time I am transported into the heavens, birthed into a world that i long dreamed existed but had faded to a distant memory, buried beneath the sands of time... Once again naked and helpless, breathing for the first time, i am born again. Consciousness dawning, realization of being a parcel of that divine, indefinable Spirit that is All in All, the Beginning and the End. The One. It cannot be possessed or contained but i long with every fiber of my being to be completely consumed by it.
All Purpose-Super Jesus!
Learn to use your omnipotent super Jesus powers today! The startup package includes this bright flashy book by Bill Johnson for only 29.99 plus tax. Limited supply and there selling like hot cakes! Stop by the bookstore in the lobby and pick up your copy today! Our mega-church is open from 8 am to 2:30 pm every Sunday offering a variety of Sunday school classes and services to suit your needs and desires. There is no need to stop for coffee on the way to church; we now have a Starbucks in the foyer (right across from the book store) for your convenience! (Please give a little extra to the offering so we can pay the salary of the money changers! And by the way, the standard Tithe has been raised from ten percent of your gross income to fifteen percent; please make a note of that. Tithe envelopes are provided in the back of your pews, remember your tithe is tax deductable!) Our Traditional service starts at nine am for you early risers that prefer the classic old-school style Jesus and features Old Testament readings, congregational hymns written during the Crusades, long pious congregational prayers with plenty of thee’s and thou’s, a weekly quote by our sponsor George W. Bush, and old timey hell fire and brimstone preaching by our Senior Pastor Rev. Gilly Brahm who just turned 95 last week (Happy Birthday!) Our Contemporary service begins immediately following at approximately 10:30 and features a more hip, up to date, westernized Jesus. Come and worship Jesus in style as our house band plays Christian parodies to Boston and Foreigner as well as heartfelt love songs from the 80’s in which the word “Baby” is replaced with “Jesus.” Enjoy the light show and smoke machine! This service comes with the extra option to raise your hands in the air, clap to the beat (on 2 and 4 please) and speak in your prayer language! (If you do not have one, one will be provided for you by one of our lovely tongue coaches.) We do allow dancing, however, no booty shaking or other vulgar expressions please, but feel free to convulse on the floor moaning and groaning as the spirit gives you utterance. See you Sunday!
Visions
Visions are shadows from behind the curtain that separates the ephemeral from the temporal, the holy place from the most holy place. They are mediators between conscious and unconscious, soul and mind. They are metaphors illustrating deeper truths. Nature itself is a vision, a puppet show, a reflection as in a mirror, an image thru a stained glass…”Now I see but a poor reflection…then I shall see face to face, now I know in part, then I shall know fully even as I am fully known.”-Apostle Paul
Dear Uncle Sam,
I Traveler demand redemption from the captivity your kingdom has imposed upon me. I hate the tyranny of capitalism and resent the expectations imposed on us to serve its arbitrary ends. I refuse to expend my limited energy resources to the pursuit of your barbaric monetary deity. I will not bow to your god or lend my hands to his service. I am content to live off of the discarded crumbs of your subjects and the gratuity of sympathetic strangers for my labors of love, but I would prefer above all to completely sever my ties to your kingdom and live in harmony with Mother Earth, enjoying her gracious and generous bounty, but you in your greed and insatiable hunger for power continue to rape and pillage her, claiming possession of her and utilizing her rescourses to build your evil empire. I will not allow my identity to be defined by a label, title, or class that you assign to me. I do not give you permission to name me. I am not your property and I will not lend my time and energy to serve your arbitrary cause. I wish only to be a part of something organic and real, to work for a cause that I believe in and can see that my labor is not in vain. I will work to provide sustenance, safety, and comfort for those that I consider my family. I do not care about your kingdom and it’s mechanical pursuits and will not lend my limbs to be used as your tools, or my back for your yoke. Though you do not recognize my rights I will not be powerless, though you exile me I will not be dispossessed. I will wander into the land of Nod with the mark of Cain on my back and no hand shall smite me and my foot will not be dashed upon a stone.
Summer of Love?
The "hippie" movement was much more than mere rebellion, it was a desperate search for meaning, a groping in the dark, a switch from auto-pilot to overdrive, an awakening, a consciousness, a new awareness. A misguided search, but a search nonetheless. Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll were not hailed as an end themselves but a means to an end...a part of the journey. Acid trips and meditative trances gave way to prophetic visions and chemical induced illusions. We were lost children of the Fall, searching for a path back to the Garden, groping in the darkness, dreaming of the Promised Land. Doubts lingering in the back of our minds...the question everyone was afraid to ask..."Is God dead?" Are we all alone? isolated by the prisons of our own minds, bastard children of our own demise, we were vulnerable, rebellious, and pliable. Searching for meaning and True Love we started "Being" and practicing "Free Love." We joined communes and formed organizations with egalitarian and utopian ideals, protested and demonstrated in the streets, longing for a place and time where everyone was equal to his brothers and sisters in every way. As time went on, our baby boomer cries of defiant rebellion became spoiled tantrums of "gimmie, gimmie, gimmie" as the struggle for liberty and justice for all evolved from an equality to an entitlement mentality rendering us a welfare state, more dependent than ever on our beloved Daddy Sam. The pendulum has swung from one extreme to the other in the 40 years we have wandered in the desert since the "Summer of Love” in 67' and we are by no means anywhere near the Promised Land. The Revolution has made a full circle and become the new orthodoxy. Here we are over three decades past the bicentennial year and we're in the same place we were in over 230 years ago. Tyranny. The time has come once again for the people to unite and list their grievances against the axis of power, the rulers and principalities of this dark world, and declare their independence, breaking all ties of co-dependency and loyalty to Babylon. Instead of resisting, co-existing with nature and our fellow man in harmonious communities of likeminded souls governed by a circle of agreement with a powerful nucleus of Love rather than a hierarchical pyramid of control perpetuated by an oppressive Omni-present Tyrant.
Green Band-Aid
The problem with our country is the fact that we throw money at all of our problems. It is like a mother bandaging her child’s skinned knee with a dollar bill. Sure, it might stick to the kid’s knee for a while but in the end it will make matters worse rather than better. Capitol hill has become the scene of utmost greed and disillusionment, like bourbon street during Mardi Gras, the populace has become patrons in a parade where Uncle Sam throws dollar-bills instead of beads and wears a smiling mask of democracy while individuals, families, organizations, and “underprivileged” citizens scramble and fight over the loot. The madness leads me to believe that we should change our nation’s motto from “In God we trust” to “Throw me something mister!” The Fema Fiasco after Hurricane Katrina is just one example of what will take place when Uncle Sam runs out of dough to throw.
The U.S. government has created its own monster. It has spawned an entire generation that depends on them to finance their retirement, feed them, and pay for their doctor bills, abortions, contraception, education plus exporting large amounts of money to other parts of the world. Maybe the more appropriate term for the government should be “Daddy Sam” rather than “Uncle Sam”. They have created a government-sufficient, welfare state. They have hand-fed the elephant at the zoo peanuts until it is nice and fat and spoiled and they haven’t bothered to ask themselves what will happen when they run out of peanuts.
I believe it is time for another revolution. A return to the roots of what our country was founded on. I believe we should begin to exercise our rights given to us by our forefathers. As citizens of this great country, I think it is time that we the people took our lives into our own hands. I think it is time we started building our own homes, raising our own families, and putting food on our own tables. Our government by the people for the people has become nothing more than a socialistic institution, a sinking ship drowning in debt, steadily dolling out money it does not have to a greedy, mutinous crew.
The U.S. government has created its own monster. It has spawned an entire generation that depends on them to finance their retirement, feed them, and pay for their doctor bills, abortions, contraception, education plus exporting large amounts of money to other parts of the world. Maybe the more appropriate term for the government should be “Daddy Sam” rather than “Uncle Sam”. They have created a government-sufficient, welfare state. They have hand-fed the elephant at the zoo peanuts until it is nice and fat and spoiled and they haven’t bothered to ask themselves what will happen when they run out of peanuts.
I believe it is time for another revolution. A return to the roots of what our country was founded on. I believe we should begin to exercise our rights given to us by our forefathers. As citizens of this great country, I think it is time that we the people took our lives into our own hands. I think it is time we started building our own homes, raising our own families, and putting food on our own tables. Our government by the people for the people has become nothing more than a socialistic institution, a sinking ship drowning in debt, steadily dolling out money it does not have to a greedy, mutinous crew.
Sinful Nature
It is the sinful nature of man to deify his own will and appoint himself the ambassador of his self-made law, imposing his opinions on his brethren, endeavoring to spite and shame those who don’t adhere to his sentiments, passing his judgments from atop his lonely throne of superiority and foolish pride. He robs himself of peace the moment that his affections and preferences become absolute and mechanical, when he fancies his natural propensity as law.
The Game
The game has one rule: supply (-cost) + demand = profit. The object of the game is to maximize profit by increasing supply and demand and minimizing cost as much as possible by cutting out middlemen and keeping labor expenses down. Capitalist like to make money but they don’t like people making money off of them.
Why would corporate America use its own natural resources, supply, when it could get them overseas for cheaper? The U.S. uses over 50% of the worlds goods so naturally goods are more in demand over here and therefore more expensive. That’s why we are dependent on foreign oil, and setting up ‘democracies’ in other people’s countries.
Why would Corporate America pay American employees min. wage or higher and deal with unions and lawsuits and child labor laws when they can pay foreign workers pennies on the dollar without having to compete with wages and benefits of other companies? That’s why ‘3rd’ world countries are filled with sweat-shops with overworked children stitching our soccer balls and tennis shoes so they can buy a coca-cola at the end of the day.
Why would corporate America use its own natural resources, supply, when it could get them overseas for cheaper? The U.S. uses over 50% of the worlds goods so naturally goods are more in demand over here and therefore more expensive. That’s why we are dependent on foreign oil, and setting up ‘democracies’ in other people’s countries.
Why would Corporate America pay American employees min. wage or higher and deal with unions and lawsuits and child labor laws when they can pay foreign workers pennies on the dollar without having to compete with wages and benefits of other companies? That’s why ‘3rd’ world countries are filled with sweat-shops with overworked children stitching our soccer balls and tennis shoes so they can buy a coca-cola at the end of the day.
The Circle of Life and Death
Corporations are giant death machines that depend on the remnants of organic life to turn “raw natural product” into packaged commodity. Nature is being crushed in the gears of the machine and turned into a lifeless caricature filled with preservatives and chemicals consumed and wasted by once living creatures that have long ago been digested by the very same machine. The only thing that separated us from machine is our free will. A machine can do everything except make a conscious free choice. It can exhibit all of the qualities of a living body but it is soul-less and can only be controlled by an outside mind. As William Burroughs said; “…once capable on independent life it has fallen to a state between life and death, it can only exhibit living qualities in a host, it has fallen to a state of mechanical, inorganic matter that can only exhibit living qualities in a host…it is the antithesis of life itself. A virus. It can be programmed to discriminate when given options but not to exercise will. Humanity is quickly being programmed, we are being given options and allowed to make certain choices within those selected options, but our freewill, is bit by bit being taken away from us. Machines always need the remnants of organic life to subsist and exhibit living qualities. Machines themselves are composed of remnants of organic life. We are quickly going the way of the dinosaur (who, by the way used to be in charge of this planet). Now the black sludge from their decomposed bones is being refined and running our cars and boats and planes and trucks shipping our goods, Modern Tyrants are fighting wars over the decomposed sludge from the extinct rulers of the pre-historic world I guess shit really does come back around.
Americanization, Globalization, Urbanization...
It’s all the same thing. Their goal is control, money, power and fame. The globe has been turned into a giant game of risk where governments representing corporate interests are competing for control of the world. The United States is nothing more than a corporate owned franchise spreading its empire all over the globe. Every nation in the world is infested with our Embassies, Military bases, and Nike sweat shops, as well as McDonalds and Starbucks. America has become the center of a black hole of greed, and power imposing its force on the rest of the world turning other countries into subsidiaries to serve it’s arbitrary ends as it sucks the earth’s natural resources into itself consuming over half of the worlds goods and enslaving a large percentage of the world’s population.
It’s the same old story…we learned all about globalization from our mother country, Great Britain. Power hungry tyrants have been playing this game for centuries before America even existed. British colonization in India and Africa, Napoleon Bonaparte was intent on taking over as much of the world as he could get his hands on. But this time it is different, it is not territories and boundary lines we are fighting over anymore, those are quickly becoming obsolete. This control goes deeper.
It’s the same old story…we learned all about globalization from our mother country, Great Britain. Power hungry tyrants have been playing this game for centuries before America even existed. British colonization in India and Africa, Napoleon Bonaparte was intent on taking over as much of the world as he could get his hands on. But this time it is different, it is not territories and boundary lines we are fighting over anymore, those are quickly becoming obsolete. This control goes deeper.
Black Sheep
There will always be hierarchy…as long as there are people who are willing to control and manipulated other people and people who are willing to surrender their liberty for the acceptance and protection of the flock…however there will always exist within the fold, black sheep who do not forsake the community but do question the ideologies and demands perpetuated by the hierarchical structure and are not afraid to offer their own alternative views, thoughts, opinions, and theories to the community. These anomalies act as a natural checks and balances for the Sheppard’s. And are necessary in every community to prevent total tyranny.
Politics and Religion
Although, out of all the Religions, I can identify with the terminology and explanations of the eastern religions the most, I do not subscribe. I find Buddhism to be empty, and nihilistic, but emptiness and nihilism beat the hell out of dogma and pretention in my book. I believe strongly in the teachings of Jesus Christ, he is by far my favorite eastern mystic, but I don’t call myself a Christian and I don’t believe Jesus would either. I do believe he was the Jewish Messiah, although the Jew’s denied several messiahs’s before him…a rather stiff necked and obstinate people…but I’m not an Anti-Semite. I am an anti-racist. I believe that racism is a lie of fear, hate, and pride passed down from generation to generation… which is why I’m not a Muslim.
I guess it’s safe to say that I do believe in Freedom, Peace, and Love. I believe in community, family, and equality. I don’t believe in oppression, tyranny, or the centralization of power, so by definition, I guess that makes me an anarchist. Generally speaking, one’s political views usually mirror their perception of God. I don’t see God as a hierarchical Deity who must be praised and obeyed to incur blessings and dissuade wrath…I believe that god is Love. Love does not lord above its beloved but exists in the midst and is one with all that is. The idea of a personified deity existing outside of his creation, an old white man with a long gray beard, sitting on a throne somewhere on a cloud in another realm, ruling over the nations with an iron scepter, is absurd to me and I don’t think “Thor” the Greek god of thunder is what Jesus was envisioning when we made references to his heavenly father. But, that’s just me…I could be completely wrong.
I guess it’s safe to say that I do believe in Freedom, Peace, and Love. I believe in community, family, and equality. I don’t believe in oppression, tyranny, or the centralization of power, so by definition, I guess that makes me an anarchist. Generally speaking, one’s political views usually mirror their perception of God. I don’t see God as a hierarchical Deity who must be praised and obeyed to incur blessings and dissuade wrath…I believe that god is Love. Love does not lord above its beloved but exists in the midst and is one with all that is. The idea of a personified deity existing outside of his creation, an old white man with a long gray beard, sitting on a throne somewhere on a cloud in another realm, ruling over the nations with an iron scepter, is absurd to me and I don’t think “Thor” the Greek god of thunder is what Jesus was envisioning when we made references to his heavenly father. But, that’s just me…I could be completely wrong.
We are what we eat
“We are what we eat.” Senseless and pacified herds of livestock injected with hormones, drugged, castrated, de-horned, fed nutrition-less mass produced bull-shit, and bred to be tranquilized, slaughtered, ground into hamburger meat, smashed into patties, packaged, labeled and sold in mass.
College
College: been there done that, didn’t care enough to buy the T-shirt and your tax dollars paid my way. Pell grants and other Federal and state financial assistance give young people all over America an opportunity and excuse to binge drink, have casual and meaningless sex, and experiment with drugs, run up credit card bills and other wise post-pone real life for an extra four or more years after high-school. All of this on Uncle Sam’s' bill I might add. As for the studious and enlightened ones that actually were sober enough to graduate, just go to Starbucks or Blockbuster and you will find them behind the counter in a uniform complete with a plastic corporate smile and nametag. Upon asking them how college prepared them for the real world, they will gleefully tell you about their degree that is framed and hanging above their bed in their parents house; Please rewind, it’s due back Monday before 10pm. Enjoy! As the tuition rises more and more each year the value of a degree decreases don’t buy the lie; a college degree is not a penance for salvation, or a ticket to the job of your dreams….why is it the government bends over backwards to emphasize the importance of college and to provide every means necessary to ensure the educations of America’s youth? Because a mind is a terrible thing to waste, knowledge is power, and federal and state funded institutions are the only place besides the media that the young, pliable, half-stoned minds of America’s future can be filled with ultra-left wing liberal socialistic propaganda. Not that I ‘m completely undermining the college experience, I do realize that it is often worth the years of debt and financial struggle that usually succeed it. However, there are other ways to obtain knowledge and to develop relationships rather than climb the ivory tower. For example, we live in the information age. If you want to know something about anything there is an immeasurable amount of info available on the internet. Granted you will have to wade thru some bull-shit to learn anything worth-while but then again college is not bull-shit free by any means either. Better yet read a book. As far as social life goes, there are other ways to meet people besides paying thousands of dollars of tuition fees for the college community life, join a cult. They are a hell of a lot more accepting than a fraternity or sorority would be and the initiation process promises to be a lot less weird and humiliating. Or, if the cult thing is not for you, try a motorcycle gang, bridge club, internet dating service, become a barfly at a local dive, or get a job. The best professor is life and the best education is experience; live. If you want to learn about aboriginals in Australia, get out of the classroom and fly there and develop a taste for kangaroo burgers I guarantee you will learn much more for a much cheaper price.
The Root of All Evil
The State creates currency and exists solely to regulate, and perpetuate its use. It monopolizes Trade and Commerce demanding a usurious interest percentage for the right to buy and sell. However many hands property goes thru the debt remains just for the right to Trade. And then they have the testicular fortitude to use the term “Free Enterprise.”
Corporations are money machines that generate tax revenue and interest rates for the State. Taxes, customer’s sales taxes, and taxes on labor wages is the states cut for supporting their interests. And corporate interests dictate laws and regulations that are designed to keep citizens dependant on them for commodities and employment, eliminate competition (mom’s and pop’s companies, small businesses.), require certain services (insurance, notaries,) and levee taxes. As corporations are becoming more and more powerful, self-sustaining, and independent; individual citizens are becoming more and more dependent on them as the State narrows their options to create their own alternatives to being exhumed by the corporate machine by: heavy taxation, the demand for permit’s, strict regulations by State administrations, and laws.
Corporations are money machines that generate tax revenue and interest rates for the State. Taxes, customer’s sales taxes, and taxes on labor wages is the states cut for supporting their interests. And corporate interests dictate laws and regulations that are designed to keep citizens dependant on them for commodities and employment, eliminate competition (mom’s and pop’s companies, small businesses.), require certain services (insurance, notaries,) and levee taxes. As corporations are becoming more and more powerful, self-sustaining, and independent; individual citizens are becoming more and more dependent on them as the State narrows their options to create their own alternatives to being exhumed by the corporate machine by: heavy taxation, the demand for permit’s, strict regulations by State administrations, and laws.
Televised "Revolution".
Flower power didn’t work because rebellion usurped community. The revolution became the new orthodoxy as ‘Hippie’ became a fashion statement rather than viable option. It was ‘hip’ to be against the establishment. The reason the movement failed was that a majority of the people didn’t really believe in the ideals they were preaching, they were more concerned with trying to be cool and capitalizing on the fad selling concert tickets, records, tie dyed T-shirts, bell-bottoms, drugs and paraphernalia, and books. The revolution was not only televised, it was commoditized, genre-sized, religionized, politicized, and therefore never realized.
what happened?
After the Second World War, husbands and wives were now in the work force serving side by side as cogs in the wheels of the gears of the machine while their children were left to be raised by the state rather than the village. The organic family structure was replaced by a mechanical system and children were taught at a very young age that they: “…must lead their own independent lives outside of the old bonds of family, tribe, religion, order and class, and you must do this within the new guidelines of rules which the state, the job market and the bureaucracy lay down.”-Ulrich Beck. Market values trumped family values and community responsibility was usurped by allegiance to Big Brother. We were subversively and cohearsivley forced into being loyal subjects to a regime dedicated to corporate hegemony and control of world trade, sucked into a vortex of power and greed, a black hole spinning out of control around the bowl and down the hole, spiraling ever closer to the depths of tyranny. The baby boomer generation was the beginning of the new mechanical consciousness, fulfillment of the prophesy of the coming anti-christ alluded to in the Bible, Plato’s Republic, and George Orwell’s 1984. As the baby boomers plugged into the machine, generation x plugged in the television set and digested lethal doses of poison for the minds of the masses as we, the second generation of orphans indoctrinated by Father Sam in his religion of mass consumerism, and maniacal individuality, sacrifice our children on the altar of convenience in the name of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness (safety, comfort, and security). We’ve neglected generation X; we’re aborting generation Y, what is to become of generation Z?
Squares, Lines, Boxes and Boobs
The problem with our society is fact that it is the wrong shape. Nature is composed of circles and spheres, everything in Nature operates in cycles, every motion and wave of energy is at its root centrifugal and centripetal. Columbus found that the world is round, and ever since, the human race has been overwhelmed with the task of making it flat again. We just couldn’t handle the circularity and spherishness of it so we divided the north and south with a fictitious line separating it into hemi-spheres and then quartered it separating the east from the west, then we rolled it out flat and drew lines of longitude and latitude, created national border lines, state and province lines and county and parish lines. We made them all as square as we could, considering we were inconvenienced by rivers and peninsulas and such. As if all of that wasn’t enough we built cities, grids of roads and numbered square city blocks lined with square houses, and square office buildings sectioned into square floors of square cubicles. Society is a square conspiracy to square everyone away in their own individualized little squares like caged animals at the zoo so we can be monitored and controlled. We live in on blocks, work in cubes, are entertained by boob tubes in square boxes, we eat our cereal out of boxes, store our food in ice boxes, and we’re buried in a pine box. We’ve divided time into lines, years and months and weeks and days and hours and minutes; boxes within boxes within boxes within boxes…We’ve reduced music into lines and measures. Some have even attempted to put God in a box and enclose him behind a curtain within the square walls of a temple and use their self proclaimed anointing to control the masses lined in rows and aisles…we have even started to dissect the human brain, separating it into lobes and hemispheres and the main occupation of the powers that be is to enforce the mass lobotomy of the population to keep them in line…Boobs.
Me and the Road and Mary-Jane
I’m hitching out of this town tomorrow, today I’m gonna get stoned in the sun, and drink the last ounce of my sorrow cuz I’m a lonely gypsy on the run. You know I can’t stay here with you girl. The highways and the by-ways call my name, won’t you come with me tomorrow, join me and the road and Mary-Jane. I can promise you the world girl, but the road ain’t no magic carpet ride, the time we have is borrowed and baby I want you by my side. I don’t know where I’m headed, I’m searching for a long lost paradise and I see the road to heaven everytime I look into your eyes. I’ve been searching high and low girl, from the carolina’s to the Frisco Bay, looking for that garden that somehow somewhere was lost along the way. Girl won’t you come with me tomorrow, I’m traveling towards the promised land, I’m leaving Babalon far across this desert sand. I can promise you a home girl, in my arms underneath the stars. They say there’s mansions up in glory but I don’t think that heaven’s very far. I’ve been traveling round in circles, and the highway always leads me back to you.
Listen to me closely, you know who I am. I’m an endless river that can never be damned.
Listen to me closely, and you’ll find the truth, your soul is the ocean, your eyes the windows I’m looking thru. Listen to me closely, your body’s the shore and I am the river won’t you open the door. Listen to me closely, I’ll always be true, Listen to me closely, can you hear the high-way calling you.
Listen to me closely, you know who I am. I’m an endless river that can never be damned.
Listen to me closely, and you’ll find the truth, your soul is the ocean, your eyes the windows I’m looking thru. Listen to me closely, your body’s the shore and I am the river won’t you open the door. Listen to me closely, I’ll always be true, Listen to me closely, can you hear the high-way calling you.
Traveler's Battle-Cry
Craving inspiration I return home…looking, longing for something real to hold on to…I return to the never-ending black snake that climbs the hills and descends into the valleys forever chasing the edge of the world…and I find abundant empty traces, signs that show the way…those places in between…eternal hope’s bright ray…that cuts thru the pines and lights my path back home, but my home is where my heart is so forever I will roam…but I’m not empty any longer I was lost but now I’m found, and I’m calling for the gathering of the remnant with the sound of a magic conch shell come on people gather round…Come you scattered people prepare yourselves for war, beat your plowshares into swords and be oppressed and scorned no more. We are the people and we’ve got to fight our cause because the devils on the loose and he’s sharpening his claws. You can call him YHWY, you can call him Uncle Sam, You can call him Lucifer but I call him The Man. He likes to play monopoly and he forces all to play, and he cheats us and he beats us and there’s nothing we can say, but somebody’s got to say it and we’ve got to find a door that leads us to redemption our freedom to restore. Pyramids and towers reaching to the sun…tears falling from the sky land on everyone. Can you feel the rain…can you feel the pain of the lost tribe of Cain?
Ant Farm
The ants go marching down singing soulless songs about being lost and being found as they build their empire of mud and spit the king of the dunghill sits atop the kingdom of shit under the omni-present eye of pyramids by and by telling fables of golden streets and mansions in the sky…
Enchanted Forest
The sun sets and soon the moonbeams fall thru the pines, shadowed by the smoke of a newborn fire as the days labor is reflected in the embers and consumed in joyful celebration soon to be a distant memory overshadowed by dreams in which the morning rays alight… a perpetual cycle devoid of the illusion of time…welcome to the enchanted forest, where the dew-drops on the leaves glisten in the morning sun and acend into the sky transforming into a tapestry of stars under which we lie…consciously dreaming, into the mist we fly…rising with the smoke above the pines.
Moonbeams
I chase the setting sun I am moonbeams on the run a reflection of the sun shining down on me. As the moon pulls in the tide we’re all going for a ride cuz we’re all just a floating in the same blue sea. I pull seeds out of their deaths, babies from their wombs, proclaim an end to rest, butterflies rise from their tombs, moonbeams I am you and you are me. I love the sunshine too but I’m lost without the moon. I need it’s light to lead the way for me.
Buddah, Jesus, and the Devil and Me
Buddah, Jesus and the Devil and Me were sitting round the table sipping ashwaganda tea when in walked Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu...and then Harry Chrisna and Allah joined in and they were talking bout what constitues as a sin and i said if killin's on the list then why do you wage war? Buddah, Jesus and the Devil and me we got so high that we could not see, and they say the sheep hear the shepard’s voice but by god I heard three.
I was hearing voices couldn’t tell which was which and they were talking bout the difference between a woman and a bitch or maybe that was just me I don’t know. Something about sheep and goats, I had my pen and pad handy and at least that’s what I wrote, maybe that was just me I don’t know. It’s all open to interpretation religion, politics, and the state of the nation, or maybe that was just me I don’t know. Jesus and the devil were arguing about the fall and I was reading the handwriting on the wall and just then I heard a whipporwhill call and I answered back in a mockingbirds tune and the door opened to a rising moon and I paused from my meticulous reading as Venus joined our safety meeting and I was tracing the devils outline on the floor...and he was reminissing bout the garden of eden and one wild night he had in sweden, and me, well I was looking for the door. Me, I was thinking bout a woman I know we were headed two ways and she had to go, I was thinking bout…sitting on the roof of the pirate house staring at the moon, mid-night snacks in bed, ice-cream and a spoon, and I was thinking bout freckles on your back look like Orion I smile everytime I see it and I ain’t lying, it makes me think of you. Making out on the swing by the lake popping each others pimples nothing but your glasses on, your dark chocolate addiction and the candy bars I stole and your bike you like to ride, fly blackbird fly… And the conversation that transpired lasted all night around the fire, I’ve never felt quite so inspired, watched the sun rise and never got tired just buddah, Jesus, and the Devil and Me…
I was hearing voices couldn’t tell which was which and they were talking bout the difference between a woman and a bitch or maybe that was just me I don’t know. Something about sheep and goats, I had my pen and pad handy and at least that’s what I wrote, maybe that was just me I don’t know. It’s all open to interpretation religion, politics, and the state of the nation, or maybe that was just me I don’t know. Jesus and the devil were arguing about the fall and I was reading the handwriting on the wall and just then I heard a whipporwhill call and I answered back in a mockingbirds tune and the door opened to a rising moon and I paused from my meticulous reading as Venus joined our safety meeting and I was tracing the devils outline on the floor...and he was reminissing bout the garden of eden and one wild night he had in sweden, and me, well I was looking for the door. Me, I was thinking bout a woman I know we were headed two ways and she had to go, I was thinking bout…sitting on the roof of the pirate house staring at the moon, mid-night snacks in bed, ice-cream and a spoon, and I was thinking bout freckles on your back look like Orion I smile everytime I see it and I ain’t lying, it makes me think of you. Making out on the swing by the lake popping each others pimples nothing but your glasses on, your dark chocolate addiction and the candy bars I stole and your bike you like to ride, fly blackbird fly… And the conversation that transpired lasted all night around the fire, I’ve never felt quite so inspired, watched the sun rise and never got tired just buddah, Jesus, and the Devil and Me…
Tyrranny
They say have no other gods before me don’t take my name in vain, if you step outside their lines they’ll label you insane, they’ll lock you up or take you out they’ll screw you either way, if you’re gonna fight for freedom you’re gonna have to pay.
Be careful what you say, be careful what you do cuz the all-seeing eye has got it’s sights on you. Be careful what you do, be careful what you say, look what they did to Jesus, John Lennon and JFK.
You better go to work to support the economy, pay all your taxes you can’t live here for free, pledge your allegiance to the red white and blue, if you don’t fall in line they’ll point the cannon right at you.
Chorus.
Keep marching to their beat don’t get out of line, if they think you’re one of them you’ll be doing time, they’ll shoot you in the head or nail you to a cross, they’ll cut off all your toes if you run away from the boss, they’ll chop off your head and put it on a plate, they’ll throw you in the furnace if you don’t bow to the state.
Chorus.
They’ll call you a terrorist if you don’t support their cause, they’ll invade your country and impose on you their laws, they’ll drop bombs on your village if you don’t bow to your knees, they’ll pave over your fields to build their factories. They call it democracy, but behind the veil it’s tyranny.
Be careful what you say, be careful what you do cuz the all-seeing eye has got it’s sights on you. Be careful what you do, be careful what you say, look what they did to Jesus, John Lennon and JFK.
You better go to work to support the economy, pay all your taxes you can’t live here for free, pledge your allegiance to the red white and blue, if you don’t fall in line they’ll point the cannon right at you.
Chorus.
Keep marching to their beat don’t get out of line, if they think you’re one of them you’ll be doing time, they’ll shoot you in the head or nail you to a cross, they’ll cut off all your toes if you run away from the boss, they’ll chop off your head and put it on a plate, they’ll throw you in the furnace if you don’t bow to the state.
Chorus.
They’ll call you a terrorist if you don’t support their cause, they’ll invade your country and impose on you their laws, they’ll drop bombs on your village if you don’t bow to your knees, they’ll pave over your fields to build their factories. They call it democracy, but behind the veil it’s tyranny.
Trapped in Disneyland
Grazing sun-burnt sheep feeding aimlessly on the spoils of war, 6 dollar cones and chicken wings without bones and I’m looking for the door, and the pirates are raiding out in the street, they pillage and plunder for something to eat, they’ll sing you a song as you walk along and they’ll sing all night for a few hits of your bong but what they crave is so much more. Help I’m trapped in Disneyland can you help me find the key, I need a magic mushroom or a hit of LSD, I need some tea to ease my mind, a rabbit whole a new world to find sweet Alice won’t you take me home to you.
Hide-Away
It takes a million stars to make the world go round, Jupiter and mars created by the sound of ten thousand waves crashing on the shore, the moon pulls in the tide I couldn’t ask for more, it gives and then it fades when there’s nothing left to say, we bleed we heal we grow and we give it all away, so let’s forget the world and let the time fly and let’s get lost in the sweet by and by, mount up on wings and soar into the sky, you are my hide-away. We’ve all been here before, don’t ask what it’s all for, it’s different but the same, we all live to play this game, it pulses in our chest just like all the rest, it’s not a test it’s just a game, no reason or ryme to blame.
Uncontrolled Substance
you pull back the curtains and slip inside your mind, you search and you search but the Truth you cannot find. stumbling through this maze you can't see from all the smoke, blinded by the haze as you take another toke. Smoke and mirrors shots and lines death's shadow on the wall, your perception of reality shatters and you fall, endless tunnels leading nowhere bodies strung along the way, hungry souls just like you searching for the light of day. the air is stale and filled with stench as you struggle for your breath, you count your enemies as friends barbiturates and crystal meth, side by side and hand in hand with loneliness your guide, you walk into a gray cloud, into nothingness abide. out of body out of mind, you’re high above it all. but what goes up must come down when you're high you trip and fall. you come crashing down to where you where before, reality kicks your ass as you lie there on the floor
The Wound
my prayers are bouncing off the ceiling again, suffocating loneliness these walls my only friend, festering wounds never had a chance to heal, i've kept them buried deep within but now my skin begins to peel. the sedative wears off, the numbness fades away, this hurts too much to feel but this pain is here to stay. broken and bleeding i fall down on my face, trembling and heaving i go back to that place, voices from the past i can't forget though i've tried, though i run so hard and fast from this pain i can't hide. i go back to that place that shaped who i became, the day my heart died the day my soul was slain. my knees getting weak, my heart full of fright, a helpless little boy but a man i will fight. fight to win back what is rightfully mine, a fight to the death my heart is on the line. i cry out to God "i know i'm supposed to be a man. but daddy i'm scared will you please hold my hand." A great wave of strength filled my from above. i swung my sword fearlessly and won back my heart of love
Sidewalk Painter
It’s a labor of love but mostly for the sake of my own sanity. the picture starts in my head, though sometimes i have to try to make it out when it's done...i'm dreaming of butterflies and screaming in pain, painting a blue sky in the pouring rain, can i talk to you? Will you stop and listen to me? i'm not done yet... i love you. do you want to know my name? i know you would love me if you could see beyond my frame. please don't walk on by, give me just a moment of your time. can you hear me over the ticking of the clock? can you see your reflection in the the canvas? try to make it out through the shadows... the picture starts in your head. it's mostly for the sake of your own sanity... it's a labor of love...and it's not done yet.
The City
the city looks different from 19 floors up but the sky seems even further away, cars so surreal like matchboxes with wheels shine with the glint of midday, she sidewalks are full of hustle and bustle, mass confusion to and fro, like rats in a maze they walk in a daze, there's always some place to go. No time to think, to stop is to sink for money is the essence of time. Here in the city it doesn't pay to be witty, just do what you're told for a dime.
Into the Sun.
Take a walk with me through my corridors of reason... i'll share with you the secrets of my soul... Beneath the shadows of the arches in the tunnels of my mind you'll find a raging fire an eternal burning coal...Would you follow me into the sun? would you would you? would you follow me into the sun? Behind beneath between the lines can you see the colors underneath my rhymes the pictures you pretend you never see? Dreams you never dreamed to dream, impossible or so they seem, tainted by a distant memory. would you follow me into the sun? would you would you? would you follow me into the sun?
Mechanical Pharoah
We have deified the man and hailed him as our king. But this thing we call 'The Man' is actually machine. With the gears and bells and whistles, no organs, flesh or skin. Hollow bones with no marrow, no shining light within...We're trapped in the belly of the beast machine of war, searching for redemption, looking for a door. It’s we that built the beast. For its ends we slave and toil, we offer up our sacrifice, it thirsts for blood and oil. We built it from the ruins of the temple of old, appointed a high priest, our allegiance we then sold. We built our pyramids, our towers to the sky, and when a prophet shows another way, him we crucify. We nail him to a cross. Treason is his crime. He’s suspended on the axis that marks the space and time. We rebuild the temple, sew the curtain that was torn and slaughter all the children from the revolution born... (Pharaoh): "We must keep the secret safe, the illusion he revealed. The truth he told is dangerous it must be concealed. To keep it under wraps we must censor everyone, and keep them busy with our work baking bricks under the sun. Who will build our pyramids if they escape across the sea? This job is for the serfs and peasants not for kings like me. We must rig the game to ensure that they stay poor, but if they don't cooperate we'll just have to import more."
LIFE
Spontaneous combustion...a thunderstorm in august...icy drops of ecstasy stinging your face...LIFE...your black and white world dissipates into a kaleidoscope of vivid color slung against the blank, gray canvas of your cerebrum by the ecstatic reverie of a tripping Picasso...LIFE...like bird shit hitting the windshield of your speeding car, like the kitchen wall after a toddlers suppertime tantrum, like the trail of bright red splotches on a Nashville sidewalk before the rain comes to wash away the violent, untold story...This is LIFE...Chaotic symmetry, vicious and sublime. Cycles and seasons, reasons and rhyme. Shapes shifting, faces smeared, what was is gone reality disappeared. Pyramids inverted, circles around squares, walls caving in exposing demons lairs. Captives set free of chains forged by fears, illusions of power melted by tears... of broken, leaking vessels of light... The eastern sky splits and the day destroys the night. He who has ears let him hear, the illusion of darkness will soon disappear. The sun sets in the western sky; before morning comes pharaohs first born will die. A sign from heaven shines from the east, the first shall be last, the greatest the least. Rise up my people the kingdom is here. Lift your eyes to Zion and forsake all your fear. You are the Remnant and your time is now. Confess allegiance to Freedom, to no other king bow.
Inez
i met her in a park i was passing through, she asked me to stop and play her a tune. (That always happens when i carry my guitar around) So i played a couple and she sang along, she told me her story and she sang me a song, sipping vodka on a blanket in the grass...she's a Cherokee Indian and a little bit white, smokes allot of rock and she likes to fight, been to prison 5 times met her first cousin in the pen. And that's as close to her family as she's ever been. She met Jesus at a tent revival when she was 15, got baptized in a river in the hills of Suwannee. says she's got a lot of forgiveness to ask for, she can't hear his voice anymore...She used to ride horses and hunt rattlesnakes, swim in the rivers and fish in the lakes, now she makes her living walking the street and she believes very strongly that you are what you eat, she says she's half rattlesnake and quarter-pounder with cheese among other things if you know what i mean... she said life's so different from back on the farm...i told her God still loves her and she said "i don't know...i think i'm too far gone." then she said she had to go. she was headed to work out on Murfreesboro road, "if i don't get a hit i think i'm gonna explode." she says she can't hear his voice anymore, she thinks forgiveness is too much to ask for... she thinks she's too far gone...
I Am The Rain
Metamorphosis in the street, longing to be complete, raging against complacency, rebelling against the cold blue steel of numbness, the prison of my burning insatiable hunger, the whirlwind of energy carries me precariously to the edge of apathy and throws me over the precipice so that i can rise over the paradigms on the wings of eagles, angels of the sky, translated into nothingness and everything simultaneously. A new birth, becoming once again a parcel of the universe, returning to God as a vapor rising to the heavens and back again to wet the tongues of the damned, the withering lilies of the field. Evaporation is completeness; stagnation is the stench of hell. Mid-day sun i rise to you so i can fall again, so i can fly again, so i can die again. Rise...Fall...Fly...Die...Rise...Fall...Fly...Die...Drink you withered lilies. Drink your fill. I Am The Rain.
Flow
Lose your illusions, find yourself, peel back the layers and put your dreams on a shelf. Lose your life to save it, if you save your life you'll die. Let go of your ego, you've got to fall to fly. Fall in Love, deny yourself control, reckless abandon, set free your captive soul. Let the river flow, let it flow to the sea, don't let your soul be damned break the walls and live free. Free to love, free to dance, freedom to just be.
Ain't Selling Nothing
They call me a loser but that’s an odd thing to state, how can I lose if I refuse to participate? I don’t play for money, power or fame; I turned in my jersey this ain’t my kind of game. I’m not on the field and i ain’t sitting the bench, I’m clothed in righteousness not Abercrombie and Fitch. The more that I lose the less that I lack, the yoke is as light as the shirt on my back. I ain’t selling nothing I’m here to give it away; the gift that I give can’t be exchanged for pay. I extend my love freely with my arms open wide with holes in my hands and a scar in my side. He who loses his life will find it in me. Come find what you’re looking for come find and be free.
Down in the Swamp
Sometimes it gets a little dark down in the swamp
The people are shady and the mud is thick, there’s a storm a brewing out in the sticks
Sometimes it gets a little dark down in the swamp
There’s a voodoo woman on the south side of town and the church is built on a burial ground
You hear screams and shouts and gunshots at night, the cops say it’s nothing just a family fight.
The people are shady and the mud is thick, there’s a storm a brewing out in the sticks
Sometimes it gets a little dark down in the swamp
There’s a voodoo woman on the south side of town and the church is built on a burial ground
You hear screams and shouts and gunshots at night, the cops say it’s nothing just a family fight.
Feigning Deaf
I was twenty miles west of Davenport and I had whiskey on my breath, got pulled over by the police and I pretended I was deaf. He asked me for my license and I feigned I didn’t hear. I threw my jacket on the floorboard to hide those empty cans of beer. I attempted some sign language and he repeated himself slow, I squinted real hard to read his lips, I put on quite a show. After several failed attempts he went back to his car, as he drove off in disgust I headed back to the bar.
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