Birdwatching

You should’ve been there to see how the lunatic hobo
From the dumpster behind the brewary jumped
When the kid handed him the monocular.

Well he starts quivering like a scared puppy and the young girl
Had to hug him and ruffle his greasy hair.
Useless cunt couldn’t even help her identify the bird.

Never saw him in our town before this year
But back when I was working at the railway station in the city I gave him some change once a while.

You’d find him going on about how to properly zero
An ACOG scope staring at a lizard; or mumbling,
‘Who were they?’ in his sleep.

A Day in the Life of You

Girl, you’ve got nowhere to run now,
It’s just a nightmare to the end.

Remember the sensation of hearing the deep hum
Of a snowstorm for the first time.
You thought it was a sleeping beast beckoning to you and out you went,
Shivering in a diaper, to the unheated corridor looking for it.
A door opened to the right and your father came in,
The white snow pouring in behind him along with the roaring hum.

Those days are gone now, all things make sense.
For everything, there’s a guy with a chalk in a T-shirt somewhere
Who’ll know more about it than you ever could.
So keep listening to those songs and keep thinking ’bout
All the people you’ll never meet, places you’ll never see.
And just pray I don’t make you have those terrible thoughts again.

As for that…

Didn’t you know that times have changed?
Now there’s a guy who’d even explain away your daydreams!
Yeah, be afraid girl, all they need to do is put you in a machine
And your mind will be sorted out just like the hum of the beast.

Didn’t you know it was all fake?
The pride you felt belonging to your country,
The stories of the fat wrestlers your drunk grandma told,
And all those passionate speeches from the pulpit?

Oh, and what about that desire to chase that scared stray dog
Around the park with all three of your cousins and the two kids
From the neighbourhood at the same time?
Two of ’em live half the world away and one’s homeless somewhere.

Now, if I’m starting to make you wanna cry,
Just remember what your shrink said:
Take a deep breath and count to ten,
And don’t forget the pills before bed!

A Wonderful Evening

A Wonderful Evening

I was drifting up above my mortal remains beneath a mango tree,
Surrounded by a promising void in an empty virtual reality.
Muffled voices laughed when I claimed to have figured it all,
Beholding the freak caught amongst the hypnotised lot at the mall;
Little knowing you had slipped me all the answers back in the hall.

My consciousness became conscious of its existence,
And decrying its having to reside inside the narrow fence
Of my stale imagination, it battered against the insides my skull,
Dreaming of the illusion that was the universe outside the wall.

Somewhere entwined among the tangled vibrations in the air:

A man audibly perturbed by her woman’s claim of knowing
What it was like to not be.

The abrupt cacophony of the muffled voices as I flew, flapping
The vaporous set of wings you had lent me.

The spuriously sensual beating of the clock, its slowed ticking
Signalling I was far removed from home, free.