I am pleased that the editors of Haggard and Halloo have published my poem *99. This write is a stepping stone to  the fringes of inner madness, releasing angst and revealing a path while relinquishing the same path.  I invite you to read this work on http://haggardandhalloo.com and feel free to provide your feedback.

Thanks to the editors of Haggard and Halloo!

Now I am off to free myself from this sensory overload of my human bodily existence.

john out.

Lay with me naked on the shore
Rolling into the bubbling suds salty slick like
reflecting off the oil in the water
Cyclops eyes stare
Stick a finger in POP
Folding into the pools
Where I buried your body in the sand
Marking your life grave with tiny flags
From the eastern shores of Hiroshima
Democracy disguised in western revelries
The one orange sun hangs low kissing the waves
& winks
This is kind of strange watching your skin pale yellow
Squinting my eyes trying to arrange
This strange covering of bones, maybe a mermaid metamorphosis,
Kiss me and breathe for me
Cause I lost my sense in the gasp while
Experiencing the fallout from the winds
That sting like acid from a dropper
Flushing my blotched skin
Into a full blush
Yer Nipples poke my chest that heaves
When you cleave my heart with your open pores
That are weeping for me to suckle
as if I am the last of humanity you are trying to feed
Save the masses cause the gases have escaped the history books
Cooking our brains with endorphin snails
Crawling away from the fires of the other lovers
On the beach
Ashes to dust handfuls of lust but its only your hair
Wrapped around my body tangled in the seaweed from the great big pond
That just wont stop
Coming and going
Bubbling gurgling cries of great white memories lies.

The Evolution will continue long after you finish reading this book, from the first page to the last you will wander with John; purposeful, carefully, recklessly, lovingly and dreamily. The dharma notes you will find linger on many of the stanzas; much like how the dharma lies 6 feet under the brambles, dig deep enough and you will find what you are seeking. When the wheels turn in the authors mind, the world stops just for a minute as he writes for the world; offering up a lesson, an idea, a spiritual message of awakening and a whisper to your soul. Listen carefully as your very own sage offers to you words that can bring forth a smile, a frown, a bellow and a gasp.

These precious bones clank
louder with the dawn

& I know that I feel this

The torch is burning–
lighting the night long and long

It has been done unto me
what has been done unto you

Undress your skin and leave it aside
begin to crawl inside

The nothing–
that surrounds how I feel this

Beg me for the freedom and I am running
running to the clearing

Opening my mouth stretching my hands to the sun,
my hands are bound

my hair’s down
& my eyes frown

& it’s a drawn out dream I breathe,
guessing that I am still alive

Fill me up with your hands–
like the blind who leads

Get the whipping stick
from your mother, she wants me to feel this

Feel your hands burn inside of me
& it’s a sweet sensation being a part of this nation

Do unto me
Undo the sun
Burn off the sky

& watch the horizon bleed
crashing on the sea riding the rafts of banality

my bones my bones

So precious bending to the pressure
of a thousand leagues beneath the core of the earth

Molten lava lips spit the sick bliss
crossing of the arms that shield a heart
from the shadow following behind me
whispering it’s empty promises for a better day

Lighting a cigarette, sucking on sticks
sticks and stones & missiles in toes

Blowing the petals of the rose to blanket my disparity
it’s a choice and I want to start this over
and I want
and I want
and I want…

left to smolder and putrefy the air, speeding on by people

take no heed of the dead standing on the painted line.

    Waving at the cars hidden behind fumed shrouds

years and years of pelting rain rusting wrought ironed fences

built to keep spirits encased, buried in the ground silently erased.

    Visitors come and go, cry and pray, adorning rocks &

fingering dates, missing the loved, hating the memories built alone.

    No one is there in those silent death lairs, no one at all, they

have left long ago towing their spirit along, listening to the cries

of those left behind, they have moved on to a better place and time.

    Millions and millions of stones, acres and acres of skeletal

ashes, miles and miles of carefully trimmed rows, all empty homes,

monuments to fear, reminders of time-carefully aligned.

    Churches and crosses, flowers in vases, homeless faces, cryptic doors,

    tattered tenements, and broken bottles, diapered babies and dirty needles,

    plastic bags, hand me down rags, missions spilling soup like sewers running

    over, smoking noxious clover, run them over, a dollar to spare, adorn

    my lair, crown me with flowers, justify my power, pick the dandelions

    and make a wish, bury the dead and make them weep.

Fuel the salaries of the funeral parlor, stoke the urns & feed the pyre, cut the trees and build

my casket, tuck inside the locket I wore, litter my face with pictures that will fade, cry over

the bed I’ve made, and teach me a lesson about lost love. Finger my gold rimmed glasses

and wipe the corner of your eye, cry and cry for your loss, make me bear the cost

for being free. This will happen to you and me, our bodies will molt and wither

away, yet today I breathe in this day & I will take my time to pray and pray,

opening my eyes with love and love, paying my dues & slipping in the groove.

What do you really have to prove, is there anything real to lose?

    Deal me a twenty-one blackbird sung, rolling the cubes on my bleeding tongue,

    speak with me on your knees, swing from the lonesome tree kicking aside blackbird

    crows, walk silent among the endless rows. Squawk and gawk on the side of the road

    & cover your ears to the sounds of sirens, turn a blind eye to the painted line and you

    just might bide some more time and time.

Time and time again I think of when and how, today I stand proud and write with voice loud.

Walking with head held high kicking stones, heading to the corner picking out my last home,

a simple word will do to remind you of me, I haven’t thought of the right one yet,

but you can bet that when the day comes I will know that it’s time to cut and run.

    Blackbird sung swinging from the trees, flapping in the breeze. Hitting my knees

    free of humanities disease.

Watching my past slip away    

Feeling the life beat out

    Dripping from my fingertips

Dropping dripping, clotty messin the floor

    Slippery slipping down

    Splayed round I look up high

Crying crying

    For the flow to recede

    And tow me back

    Onto the shore

    Of mystery and books

When I saw the last look in your eye

    Ducking the weight of your ego    

    Finding myself cynical

    This is not conceivable

Your lips spill through my soul

    Ripping apart all hope

    And reason

    A wild wild season

    Roars to life

A vow

A then wife

A knife

A constriction

Of my finger

    Swollen and rotted

    Twenty four carat casket

    Mottled by dreams

    Dotted by my tears

    Trying to rust right off

Spitting on holy cloth

That adorned my head

Consummating celestial beds

    Memory of reception    

    Fueling the deception

    Of man made union

And now I understand

That marriage is not breeding

Is not needing

Is not just love

    Making love is

    The union

    The binding tie

    The mystery

    The reality

    A life a real life

A coming storm

    That calms your soul

    Everytime you look

    Feel eyes

    Seeing a bonding

    That needs no signing

Only a graceful dance

In mindful stance

Brings alive romance

Feeding loving glances

Knowing nothing

Is made by chances.