Church Of The Paradigm Saints

Put on your best and head

To the new church

Of the Paradigm Saints

Embrace this pain

Because the truth it hurts

And may God bless the T.V.

How ever would we see what was happening,

if we didn’t get it intravenously?

But we can only do so much vicariously

Feel the pulse of the streets

A disease spreading

Something darker

More consuming

Than even poverty

Of more value

Than mere wage slavery

Come off your knees

Survey the scene

Before it’s too late

There’s miracles to consummate

Forget the new speech of old newspeak

Hope and change that no one believes

Rigor mortis of humanity is setting

Take time out to look in

Went from night to day to memory

And every bloody Sunday

To a ghost haunting in small doses

An hour here

A summer there

Been no bed of roses

Drawing dreams like a last breath

Sewing torn seams

Is all we got

Happy Single Mothers Day!

We know who you are out there struggling.

We saw your front teeth get kicked in, your swollen jaw, your blackened eyes. We watched you get drug across a street by your hair. We know how embarrassed you feel every time you hold up a checkout counter because the cashier has to check your WIC card or your EBT card will not swipe. We hear the snide remarks from the line behind you. We know it’s difficult to find the right guy, when most the “right” guys won’t date a girl with kids. We know how rare it is to find a job that’ll work with your schedule. We know how hard you worked and hustled to make sure we had something nice for Christmas.

We were there.

We went through it all with you.

And who are we?

We are the children of the forgotten families of America.

And when we get our turn at power, we will not forget a thing of that.

We love and appreciate you all so much.

Happy Mothers Day!

Land Of The Wandering Jews

For if I change,who here will change their opinion of me?

A changing state’s most difficult aspect.
An aspect sitting heavily upon my chest.
Forcing the shallowest breaths.
Weighing down every decision.

Cut to bone with surgical precision.
The further this blade continues to sink,
to ease the pain I like to think,
it can never measure against the sadness, the broken promises amid the madness,
I spread through my bruised world.

The guilt from which leaves one unfurled.

One way or another, before we’re through;

WE ALL WITH BLOOD PAY OUR DUES.

Wouldn’t You?

She doesn’t even think of me

Yet, she still steals the themes of dreams

She said that my hand on her face

Was like an axe buried in flesh

So I suppose that makes us square

Because these memories of you

Constantly cleave my heart in two

Self-inflicted; slow/sharp razors

Deep enough to forever know

Never to regain beautiful

Innocent child withers inside

Why not give beauty one more try?

Not much time before life is through

& if I did why would not you?

Fletcher Don’t Cook Fryz for Jaffe No More

One day…

Clive Barker will arrive at the restaurant I am working at. He will step out of a limousine, throw open the front door to the dive, and walk right up to the front counter.

Does Carl Paul Henneman still cook here? If so, could I have a moment with him? Clive will ask the counter girl.

A server will come back to the kitchen, armed with a snotty attitude.

There’s some weird guy here for your weird ass, she’ll say in her condescending way.

I’ll step out of the inferno with my head down and hair covering my eyes. I’ll look up and instantly recognize my childhood hero.

Carl? Carl Henneman? Man, are you a hard guy to track down, Clive will say.

Wh..?! What the hell are you doing here EvilC? I’ll ask.

Looking for you! Paramount is finally greenlighting a film adaptation of the GREAT AND SECRET SHOW! I need you to pound out the screenplay. I ran across your book on Amazon and you are the only one that can pull something this epic off. Can you get out of here?

Hell yeah, give me a second, I’ll respond.

Then, I will walk right past a crowd of snickering servers, for none of those morons would know a great man such as the one that was just before me. I’ll return to the pit of hell from whence I came. I’ll turn all the fryers, stoves, grills, and ovens to their maximum degree before I throw my apron in the industrial oven. When I walk out the kitchen for my triumphant exit, fires will be raging and smoke will be billowing out from behind me. The manager will be screaming. I’ll have a huge smile on my face. The girl who always gave me a hard time will be standing there with her mouth agape. I’ll walk right up to her and lay a greasy kiss on her perfectly lipstick/d lips.

I always hated you, I’ll say as I walk off in the sunset, talking shop with Mr. Clive Barker.

Suddenly, I am ripped from my reverie.

Hey, retard! They wanted that burger medium, not well done, a server shouts.

Oh well, there is always tomorrow, I think to myself.

I throw another burger on the grill.

A Promised Land

Gasping, wincing; clutched chests
In a bathtub coffin
Laid to rest
White as porcelain
Pharmacopia-synagouge
Prayers unanswered
By disguised corporate gods
Down here
All are quiet
Down here
We await sentence
Trying
To give back the silver
Crying
While repeating repentance
Over and over
Crimson and clover
My brother
To think of you now
Consumed in the dirt
The clay of the earth
Supporting desecrated ground
Body burnt
Ashes scattered
A channel with no sound
Sparks for our pyre
Temper skill
In the funeral fire
Sacred magic of forgotten tomes
The snakes handled
To empty a tomb
For a new one to fill
We all participate
In the soft kill
Slumber in reverie
But the levee breaks soon
Whatever you heard
This is no return
Going quietly with the slow burn
Back from the dead
But not to save them
Here to save you
Collecting truth
Waiting for a turn
To unleash these lies learned
Esoteric verses gather us
Resurrect us like Lazarus
20:22 Leviticus
We’re here for the land promised us
Someone forgot to mention this
While there’s still time
Erase lines devised
To conquer and divide
Guess who’s picking the sides
An operation no longer clandestine
Taking
Everything
Changing
Memory
Remember me; remember you
Before our hands had been tied
For how we’ll be remembered
Will be how we chose to die
Promises masking lies
Never materialize
Mesmerized as if hypnotized
Staring at our scars
One day they’ll realize
These tracks will trace
Our path to the stars
Before we’re done
How amazing
The novelty honesty has become

Medicine That Kills

Whenever someone tells you something, polarize the concept, step to the opposite end, and look back.

 

I had this nightmare the other night.

The sun was setting.

I was running down a street

Thousands of angry actors were chasing me.

Dressed like doctors,

lawyers,

judges,

doctors,

correction officers,

probation officers,

public defenders,

bill collectors,

social workers,

drug counselors,

politicians.

Some rattled sabers.

Some threw rocks.

Some shouted,

stop running idiot, we’re trying to help you!

I had to keep running.

But I was unable to catch my breath.

I was suffocating.

I fell to the ground,

out of air.

I curled into a ball.

I could hear them running past me,

all around me.

I knew at any moment they would look down and find me.

Wake up.

Wake up.

 

I woke up.