I Perished Beneath Progress

I suffocated beneath a billion plastic shopping bags each barely used but once

I failed to crawl my way out from under tons of rotten half-eaten convenience foods

I was found buried beneath an avalanche of good, reusable cardboard we had tossed aside

The mere idling of their many vehicles proved enough to totally blacken my lungs

I died from a million tiny cuts caused by all the perfectly good glass we had thrown away

I was carried off by the flood of petroleum, mindlessly burned for no real reason

Advertising jingles collided noisily in my head as I tried earnestly to pray for my soul

I was crushed beneath mountains of worthless and dead corporate factory fishery bycatch

I lay flattened and compressed under fresh concrete, right along with the dying soil

They gave myself and other dissidents free housing: next to their coal-fired power plants

I was borne off with rich sediment as the mountain glaciers melted into blowing dust

I drifted up with the smoke from the last firewood burned to boil their drinking water

They brought bad jobs and ruined our lives with their wasted dream vacation resorts

I was scalded horribly before drowning in the spreading floods of their black asphalt

I stood no chance as monstrous yellow machinery pierced and gouged my unprotected flesh

I perished from the shock of all the electricity that was simply being wasted

I was quietly covered by silt far below the surface at the base of their marvelous dams

I passed out, unaware of the hypoxically-poisonous nature of their slick propaganda

I was but one of uncounted millions who perished in the resource wars caused by overpopulation

Their high-speed tires spread me into a shiny stain on the smooth concrete pavement

I was buried with free-market lead in my brain and Clean Coal mercury in my tissues

I failed in my struggle to make it to the air above a sea of cast-off plastic containers

Nobody found my tiny newborn body inside a milk carton in a convenience store dumpster

I passed away beneath the excessive marching feet of the far beyond sustainable

I slowly decomposed along with vast forests of discarded paper we found no use for

Their screaming sonar destroyed my guidance system as we fled, full of industrial toxins

I drowned with a polar bear searching for ice floes long melted in this new warm age

I disappeared from migration routes traced through the web of life for a million years

Drying with the virgal rain, I never reached the parched earth, so very far below

I flowed lifeless along with dirty runoff into channelized rivers to help enlarge ocean dead spots

I withered beside the plants which could not migrate away from the increasing heat

I perished of amnesia after my identity was stolen by some worm-filled spam

Our imports fell apart quickly and lay in useless heaps by their abandoned strip malls

I was sent to Africa with the castoff Chinese clothing even thrift stores could not sell

I was body-bagged as the regrettably-unavoidable collateral damage of inevitable globalization

I thinned to the density of outer space with all the rest of their thoughts and beliefs 

Never Even Dreamed We Were So Clueless

How was I to foresee they would suddenly outsource my position to 4 third-worlders?

We could not have known that there was not enough water for us all, out here in Las Vegas

Never knew how fragile that Big Oil teat we all loved so dearly really was

Had no idea our homes would not be free ATMs for all the rest of everybody’s lives

Were so surprised that our financial industry created the credit mess that ruined us

Shocked that our special kids would not lead the world, much less find decent jobs

Could not imagine ourselves as profitable examples of energy usage and innovation

Did not realize the wasteful habits that I thought saved me time did not pay off at all, in the end

Ignored those irrelevant foreigners moving in other directions, leaving us far behind

Never even dreamed that retirement would become such a quaint and bygone concept

Consternated to find it so expensive to leave the big screen plugged in 24 hours every day

Surprised to be deciding between the mortgage, groceries, heating and health care

Could not possibly have grasped our utter dependence on Chinese goods for our very lives

Did not expect to see poor families living in giant SUVs that would never run again

Was stunned when a leader finally said we might need to do more while using less

Flabbergasted as the roads became impassible, dams broke and bridges were declared unsafe

How could I have foreseen myself unemployable, uninsured and without any savings at 50?

Why would I have ever worried about what they called this junk science of climate change?

Never even thought a negative savings rate might not be proper for His chosen people

Did not conceive that I’d ever see kids picking through dumps for what I had thrown away

Not even wackos mentioned we should treat domestic animals with the golden rule

Shocked to find there were no more jobs that I could not even afford to commute to

Certainly never thought My family had a hand in some vast, mass extinction of the seas

How were we supposed to know that such cheerful lawn products poisoned our drinking water?

Mighty surprised to learn how much oil all those disposable plastic bags had cost us

Could never have foreseen that my lifestyle would have caused me all these diseases

Did not think once that the boys really should have learned to read and to do the math

Why should I have worried about overpopulation when God had told us to just go on forth?

Never even dreamed I wouldn’t be laughing at them treehuggerss driving teeny cars

Got caught flatfooted when I couldn’t get another home equity loan to go on vacation again

I had never even considered I could not afford to dine out for lunch, 3 times a week

Always took it for granted that defense and healthcare would cost a lot more every year

Surely, I could not have predicted we would run out of credit and petroleum both at once

Never could have dreamed consumer spending would stop being the cure-all for all our economic ills

Didn’t cross my mind how much they planned to charge me for a simple death with dignity

How would I have known I was just hearing voices when I thought I was talking to my savior?

Take Your Conservative Values...With You

You can mount your fat and loud Harley while I slide on my sleekly whining rice burner

Go climb up in your 300 horsepower crossover while I slip into my hi-tech hybrid

Blare some Fox Republican Radio as I privately tune into NPR

Have yourself a double cheese burger and I’ll hit the Health Foods salad bar

Get into the institutional weekend football game as we watch MMA on weeknights

Fire up your brand new ATV and wail past our slow hiking into the wilderness

Turn up the satellite country music as we listen to new downloads in our earbuds

Suck down that read meat and potatoes while we prepare some spicy Thai food

Go chase some elk on your smoking snowmobiles as we listen for the cold silence

Pay lots to make your pickup a lot louder and roar on past me as I commute on my bicycle

Put your everlasting faith in the bible and I’ll support evolution until the evidence changes

Stand up against the environmental wackos while we quietly evolve our new lifestyle

Keep supporting unaffordable free-market medicine as we ask for universal healthcare

Just keep focusing only on the democrats as new, different parties emerge at last

Reiterate the importance of abortion and I’ll keep talking about climate change

Talk about the sanctity of marriage as I try and require an exam to have children

Knee-jerkingly approve defense increases as we join hands in search of peace

Adopt the arrogantly-smirking Texas lifestyle as we look to folks in Europe for consolation

Laugh about your extra pounds while joking sarcastically about us, as we are walking by

Put your money in clothes, cars and vacations and we’ll retire 15 years before you

Take your processed red meats and pass the un-drugged, free-range chicken, please

Dwell in the faux luxury of your McMansions as we downsize in comfort far away

Get hypnotized by corporate soundbites while we deep dive the details on the internet

Roar across the waters drunk and shouting hoarsely as we quietly paddle and just observe

Listen as your media leaders pigeonhole us and ignore our independent consensus

Worship your rigged free markets and leave us to fair trade sustainability

Point to your golf course ponds and fight our suit to halt your wetland progress

Have some super-sweetened cereal and take your laxative instead of eating real fiber, stupid

Kill a tree for Christmas and get our re-gifted items in your own recycled wrapping paper

Adjust your thermostats for comfort in the fight against our foolish global warming hoax

Have illegales manicure your artificial lawns and laugh at our pitiable xeriscape

Leave all your electronics on all the time as we compete to use the fewest watts

Make your living fast-talk-pimping real estate while leaving the engineering to us

Destroy their future to get rich quick as we scramble to sustain ourselves in your dirty wake

Send your many discards to the landfills where we foresee your children subsisting

Take your sad and comical, old-timey heaven and leave us the certainty of the eternal void

I Streaked So Very Briefly

I grew as clean and polished as the perfect desert sandstone

I spun peacefully in an eddy though strong currents tossed all around me

I tumbled with the words from your lips as you mumbled a goodbye

I orbited the earth just fast enough to remain perpetually in the light of dawn

I was lofted somewhere far away, into the golden West upon the prevailing winds

I scattered with the leaves during a few crisp autumns long, long ago

I faded into one or more of those amazing painted sunsets

I was bent by gravity around celestial bodies along with other ancient photons

I rolled up on the beach with many a perfect swell

I twirled slowly to the ground with the fragile apple blossoms

I streaked briefly across the summer sky with a shooting star

I crashed through many canyons in roaring youthful streams

I refracted from the peak along with a billion ice crystals

I ground out the valley, nosed along by a patient glacier

I bathed the room with a streak of brief and pale moonlight

I rose in the air as a life-giving mist after plunging down the gaping cataract

I was taken up by the slanting sunshine and fell again as a gentle rain

I flourished in the ancient forests and then was compressed into a coal seam

I rained slowly down with other fine detritus from the far off surface of the sea

I fell with the million snowflakes as we silently covered the vast boreal forest

I welled up with vital nutrients in the icy water just off the pacific coast

I left questions carved in random patterns upon many jumbled boulders

I faded away in proportion to the increasing heat and the longer droughts

I played my subtle variations on a theme brought to life by a tiny creek

I streaked briefly full of avian color in the blue above a clearing rain forest canopy

I flashed a shining migrating side, momentarily breaking the surface of that great river

I helped form those fantastic images that filled the skies among the holy clouds

I went down in muddy sediment leaving behind baffling, petrified remains

I sighed with the wind in the big trees standing arms akimbo for a thousand years

I fused my atoms with all the others at the center of many suns

I formed mystic patterns of electromagnetic radiation they called the aurora borealis

I raced across the ocean with a pod of warm-blooded giant bluefin tuna

I bathed peacefully in the light of a billion healing springtimes

I disappeared across the event horizon of that black hole at the center of our Milky Way

I spun with the earth about the sun around the galaxy tracing far across but one universe

I left my carcass to the wolves and crows, and my soul to father sun

Lust For Life, American Style

They said to stop and smell the roses so we cut em all and then forgot them when we left

Knowing how short life is, I ran up my credit, declared bankruptcy and then walked away

I need to carpe every diem so joyously I graze myself further into obesity at every meal

As I realize that any day might be my last, I guzzle a couple extra beers every night

In an effort to meet my potential, I let my wastes fall wherever I produce them

To save a bit of precious time I toss aside the packaging as I quickly drive away

Wishing not to waste a single vital minute, she viciously cell-gossiped as she drove to work

Grabbing life by the horns, we took another vacation with our 2^nd home equity loan

I have set myself a goal of maintaining my instant gratification, over the long run

Determined not to be ensnared like ordinary people, we financed new ATVs and jet-skis

In my luxury performance sedan I truly feel in step with the grand march of life here on earth

Pondering my place in our wondrous panoply, I find the remote control once again

Striving to center, she purchased fine cosmetics, costly surgery and an unreal hair color

I financed a lifetime of stirring satisfaction identifying with my corporate home teams

Seeing that we might as well be comfortable, I bought another family land barge

In my moments of panic and confusion, jesus is there beside me, his hand upon my shoulder

Believing the thrifty died rich and the old died emptily, we resolved to spend it now

Why, with heaven assured for us, we can afford to let tomorrow take care of itself

Knowing I might not always be there for them, I grant my children’s every wish, immediately

Since you’re really never sure how long you’ve got, we’ll go ahead and get supersized once again

I seek a deeper, longer-lasting meaning as I drive blindly past the homeless every day

Knowing that you only go around one time, I grab passing pleasures by the armful

I pursue an unspoken long-term goal of simply enjoying each and every minute as it comes

Hearing of other’s suffering, we determined to grasp as much as we can just as fast as we can

In the light of world problems far beyond our control, we’ll just kick it back and relax

We took lessons from other’s early misfortunes and keep our savings to a minimum

Given the shortness of life, it seems right to get away from work as often as I can

I could never stand to be 40, so what’s the damn point learning this useless crap, anyhow?

We wanted it all, so we got a huge house, big-screen TV, ski boat and a giant RV

I always just had to smile when the Doc told me to start exercising and lose some weight

We’re going for the gusto and reaching out now for maximum enjoyment, in our great lust for life

We dine out finely in our new clothes and we usually make that minimum monthly CC payment

The world is going to shit so we might as well have a good time for just as long as we can

With those 2^nd mortgages, the house was way underwater so we rightly just walked away from it

I need to go for it while I can still enjoy it, not later on when I’m doddering and sick

Right now, my answer to the big questions is to just follow my desires, artificial or not

Lets Fight Them Terrists Here

I say “bring ‘em on’ over here so we can strip ‘em , whip ‘em and hang ‘em

We know what they look like and, buddy, it sure ain’t nethin like us

We’ll light ‘em up when they’re stooping down on top of them little towels

Why bother shipping all that stuff over there, just give us them weapons and ammunition

We can cut em down in the Wal*Mart parking lot and drag em over behind the church

I say let’s burn their fekin mosques when they go inside seekin’ santuary

We ain’t scared to fight ‘em here,, and besides we got no damn business over there

You don’t even have to pay us as long as there’s guns, refreshments and medics available

We’ll search them out like rats - with dogs and burn ‘em in bonfires for everyone to see

They can put it on TV and make a lot of money on ads and slick promotional shit

Hell, spend that money here and we can be happy killin and prosperin economically

Just let some fucking jihadis darken my door and then they’ll see what happens in a gotdam hurry

Hopefully, they try to tell us to grow beards and kiss on some little carpet 5 times a day

just let them tell my wife once to cover up her damn face and they’ll find theyselfs in little pens

Don’t forget that Jesus is with us here and covers our butts as we stomp on their faces

If we fight them here we don’t waste our money there in that stinkin, fly-ridden dessert

Won’t none of their heathen innocent citizens get hurt if we cap the bad ones right here

We’ll pose for pictures atop heaps of their corpses stacked in the backs of our pickup trucks

Local TV can show drawings of suspects and we’ll cruise in our trucks and pick ‘em off

We can video their torture and post it on the internet as an invite for ther friends

Lets fight them here so we don’t have to go way over there and get all like bogged down & shit

Lets everybody start on their own street alookin for sign of they evil, antichrist horseshit

We’ll blow ‘em up together publicly with their own suicide cell phones and car bombs

The army can pay us as civilian contractors and private security forces right here at home

We can RFID all honest citizens and have open season on anyone who don’t scan

Which fekin chickenshit was it anyway said we’re afraid to have to fight ‘em here?

We’ll publicize their mass shallow graves and arrest them when they come down to mourn

Let’s put a bounty on their robed caliphate asses just like we did with them other varmints

Let’s fight them here so I can teach my boys how to get her done real young

It’d be a great economic stimulus cause we’d need lots of services and supplies

I say don’t let’s just Bring Em On, I’m sayin Bring Em On Over Here, with tattooed foreheads

We can start by setting them fuckheads down in Gitmo loose somewhere in Arkansas

Ain’t gonna be no liberal protests when we save their homes from bath-robed martyrs

Instead of gettin unemployment, the outsourced can join up with the local militia

We’ll fight our way out of this here recession locally, battling godless foreign heathen

Yep, we can restore our world image by bravely resistin invading terrarist killers, right here at home

No Longer The Man I Only Thought I Was

I’m not the man now I just used to think that I was before

Anymore, I’m not the man I only thought I was

I am no longer the man who once used to believe I was

I’m simply not the same man I really never was

It’s really just not like we only thought it was before

Things aren’t like we used to make them out to seem to be

Nowadays just aren’t the same as we used to have them feel

It’s different now than we simply believed it would be, before

Tomorrow isn’t even what we thought it was going to be

The future isn’t as bright as we could see it, way back then

Our kids real lives don’t match the fairytales we always told them

The future is simply not the same as how we held it up before us

I’m really not the man I believed I was always in the act of becoming

Yesterday just ain’t the same as we made it out to be back then

These days are different than that ancient history of ten long years ago

Pretty soon has been disconnected from the good times we were waiting for

Gas-Powered Wreckreation

I pull them 5 ATVs up the hill behind my big diesel just trying to relax on the weekend

We get tired of the same old places and go ahead pioneering different bandit trails

We stop for the snacks we brought along and just tuck the cans and wrappers behind a tree

Little Timmy loves to gun that 4 wheeler just like the little man I need him so much to be

We drag the jet skis 300 miles to the half-dried up reservoir way out in the empty desert

We got giant overstuffed coolers by the tables underneath a colorful plastic party gazebo

We roar around the lake making waves and yelling at each other at the tops of our voices

Drink a lot of beer and just piss and shit out in the water, whenever it strikes us

Tow my 40’ trailer out to Colorado ever august cause it’s too hot in our beloved Texas

We like to spend our days in the truck way up in the high country looking at the scenery

We run a generator for the microwave and blow dryer, the A/C and the DVD

This here is truly god’s country and we’re thinking of building us another second home

We drove 3000 miles to take pictures of ourselves taking pictures at the overlooks

Munched on overpriced, over-sweetened, over-salted, over-packaged treats along the way

Storing the digital memories of a lifetime standing beside lots of other real nice people

Staying safely in the same hotels all along the way and we keep our windows rolled up tight

Trailered up the snow machines and left stinking clouds of smoke pulling them up the pass

Pulled off all kinda like extreme moves as my savage 700 lb metal beastie roared

Tracked down and chased some elk and deer through the heavily drifted snow

Think I really felt I blew off some steam and, why, I didn’t bother nobuddy or hurt nothin

Got out on the water in my 20’ speedboat with those twin 250 horsepower Black Mercs

She’ll run 40 mph and has a 100 gallon gas tank that serves up the good times we love so much

We pull the kids around on water donuts and they lay there and laugh and scream

Why just alone the trailer for this baby is costin me like 13 grand…

Headed out west in our 65’ class C RV that we still owe a cool quarter of a mil on

It’s as big as a semi and protects our frail blue-haired bodies real well

Got a sporty paint job, a catchy name, a little hot tub and pulls our SUV right along behind

Gets 4 MPG and the mechanics charge $85/hr with a $100 minimum to change a bulb

Pulled on my $1500 leathers and strode out into the garage to mount my holy Harley

Had loud mufflers put on so I wear these earplugs but damn does it sound nice

I only ride it some weekends in the summer but it was just $30k from our home equity

Gonna take a freedom ride with the boys out west some day and reclaim my masculinity

Flew off to tony resorts fenced safely from the surrounding poor who despise us

Dropped into the 3^rd world searching for meaning and watched them grub their food

Feasted on dynamited fish and didn’t know or care where the water came from or the waste went

Assured ourselves that our vacationing presence brought a miracle of clean eco-tourism growth

But all these good times just blur together in the anticipation of our next wreckreational adventure

Now, Who Was I Really?

Can I finally risk a moment now to stop and ask, or am I still just in far too much of a hurry

What was my story again? just text me the take away

Did I ever even try to know? yeah, right…so why would anyone else even ask

Was I swimming hard but just holding my small place there, close to the bank

What were those unspecified goals towards which I moved with ever increasing speed

Did my influence end simply when I finally ceased spending more than I was earning

What slowly diminishing rippling effects spread out in that wake I long ago stopped making

Who is there to answer for me, if even I did not try and question it at all for myself

Who was I but some uncle who died long ago, barely known, leaving them nothing

And who were they, but minor characters, overlooked in my unscripted personal melodrama

Do I abide in a saccharine heavenly glory, or have I been sent to their tragicomic hell, or?

Where are those missing final statements from the boring ledger of my passing life

Who was I really, if I myself could not be bothered to take the time to stop and ask

Was I that gray and sick old man they turned from, who could not even sit up in bed

Maybe the smiling, hurried so-called professional who could not stay too long

Then again, there was that dripping boy who so reminded them of his grandfather

Who was that guy I looked at in the pictures someone else took when I happened to be there

What were those things that I found so important back then that they kept me so long in a blur

Was I the one always laughing too loudly, way too often, at the expense of others

Did I really spend a third of my life in bed and fully another fifth in front of a TV

Why cant I find all that stuff I held as the very dearest to life, not really too long ago

Where are those little darlings that made even all that work seem so worthwhile

Where has that woman gone I loved so much that it could make me cry

Is it true there really is no way, looking back from now, to find out who I was then

Why does the value of my pleasures seem to have drained through my hands like so much water

How come I don’t remember all the holidays I spent so much time looking forward to

How can I fail to be able to reckon up the present value of my lifelong reckless habits

Who was I and did that answer already disappear many years ago, somewhere in my clueless past

Does it all really dribble out to nothing at an empty dead end, just past nowhere

Then again, there certainly were moments, though I have sewn no meaningful tapestry

Can’t I reach back now to enjoy the worth of all the things I always did - for the future

Now can I ask for some of that that time I was always working so hard to try and save

Leading The Undeveloping World

Lighting this new and self-inflicted Dark Age with our blindingly intolerant religions

Scoffing at any scientists whose work contradicts our faith - Or that of our donors

Denying millions to what we trumpet as the world’s finest health care system

Increasing illiteracy rates with every graduating class of our overweight and spoiled children

Devolving freedom of the press into cheerfully-empty, commercially-safe soundbites

Encouraging the ignorant poor to breed freely as the educated opt out of parenthood

Arming ourselves with god’s blessing for any neo-crusade our leaders see fit to pursue

Letting our infrastructure crumble around us but automatically raising cost-plus military spending

Rejecting investment in actual business for artificial speculation in phony financial innovations

Refusing to set any example on emissions and energy use for developing countries

Encouraging our own Balkanization through expensive multi-lingual governance

Rewarding phony, closeted leaders for exporting research, engineering, production and support

Building up vast stores of usable materials in our dumps for future hand-gathering by our descendants

Leading the world in time spent at war, anorexia, tv-watching, debt and obesity

Being the most aware of the importance of reality shows and entertainment news

Far ahead at portraying environmental issues as wacko threats to family and economy

Twisting the pursuit of happiness into a god-given right to shortsighted, selfish greed

Granting ever more control to the rich while patronizingly-fleecing the shrinking middle class

Measuring the success of political candidates through their fundraising results

Exporting our pollution to third world industry then scolding them on human rights

Being governed by multi-generational, aristocratically-inbred, star-power families

Rigging voting districts upon our election to ensure a continuing stream of victories

Requiring illegal workers since we made the jobs, conditions and pay so very poor we wont do them

Institutionalizing a paralyzed two-party system as if it were mandated by our sacred constitution

Profiting handsomely by encouraging polarization through destructive and divisive opinionating

Encouraging a faux economic growth through the promotion of negative savings rates

Performing phony political litmus tests like gun control, abortion, flag burning and gay marriage

Increasing our infant mortality and bringing back vitamin deficiency, TB and malnutrition

Smugly relying on disappearing non-renewables for all our inefficient daily activities

Cynically rejecting sustainability as an expensive hoax spun by elitist liberal conspirators

Keeping the military in check by granting it a hefty budget increase every single year

Speaking with a country twang to mask your elitist background and ownership by the corporations

Stalling progress by staying on expensively-crafted but childishly-simple message in virtuoso fashion

Scoffing with a god-granted exceptionist superiority at global opinion, morality and lifestyle

So-called 3^rd world Costa Rica has a higher literacy rate than the undeveloping United States

Fumbling Along, Accidentally Shattering

Honestly, all I did was pick it up for the first time and it just fell apart in my hands

It was not our objective to turn rivers into filthy, stinking, channelized dead zones

I tripped over it and then watched as it split into a million razor-pointed shards

Our plan did not specify that we would convert life-giving rain into poisonous runoff

I never saw that other car approaching as I texted while turning left, reaching for my coffee

We did not mean to gash the landscape and ruin the air to provide power for happy families

I forced its mechanism until something snapped and then I slowly picked up the instruction sheet

Their collateral suffering was not detailed in our larger strategy for their democratic liberation

With a choice of assembling it one way of 2 ways, as always I did it incorrectly the first 2 times

Our efforts to grow our food were not meant to unwind the surrounding ecosystem

I don’t remember what I was grasping for when I spilled the coffee that ruined the rug

It was never intended that our war for their freedom would fracture their society

Afterwards it was easy to see how stupid it was to leave it sitting there, right in the way

Trying to foster economic growth we unwittingly destroyed the natural systems that supported it

I bet on a long shot without thinking much and quickly lost far more than I could afford

When the logging and mining was done there were suddenly neither jobs nor tourists

I was backing out when I felt a muffled crunch and heard a splitting sound behind me

We assumed a trillion independent selfish decisions would blindly optimize our futures

I reached out for something else and this fell, broken into a thousand pieces, on the floor

We never realized how really cheap oil was until we were suddenly paralyzed by its price

I was just trying to keep us happy but our family emissions helped end a biological era

We never thought real estate would tumble as we packaged up all those bad loans

It accidentally shattered as we turned the corner and struck it against the wall

We never intended to create this endless sterile, unimaginative and alienating environment

Trying to steady the nail with one hand, I beat my finger black and blue with the hammer

Well, obviously we could not have foreseen a climate change induced agricultural collapse

In my hurry I tried to carry too much at once and then cleaned up for many hours afterwards

The objectives of our corporate hog farms did not include poisoning human drinking water

Standing up, I lacerated my forehead one more time on that darn overhanging shelf

We could not foresee their local development decisions that fostered regional ecological collapse

The wrench slipped again and I gashed my knuckle which then filled with filthy grease

The roads we built to speed up traffic quickly cloned into snarled and decaying suburbs

Walking in the dark, I broke my wrist before I even knew I had slipped on unseen black ice

Pesticides saved the crops but got into the water and poisoned our mothers and children

I did not realize you stood behind us as I joked loudly about your many shortcomings

We never meant to ruin the economy by destroying the only environment that made it possible, at all

Mindless Consumer Magic

Anytime it gets kinda hot, I just twist a thermostat and some good old cool air begins to flow

The CO2 from that coal-fired power plant plays no role in our Traditional Family Values©

I slide my credit card at the pump and drive away alone in my 9 passenger vehicle

We’re conveniently supporting terrorists with every tankful so that we can fight them there

The rain splashes off all that nice smooth concrete into little rivulets as we drive

The oily residues which taint the feeder creeks are absolutely no concern of ours

Our shiny trash cans are overstuffed with recyclable materials that we call our garbage

Hey, let the wackos sort that shit out after we roll our kids futures to the curb

With a simple twist of my wrist, fresh clean hot and cold water flows from the tap

I don’t know where it comes from or care where the shit I put on my green lawn goes

It’s magic how the bulldozers turn non-productive wetlands into family neighborhoods

There’s no way these blessed suburbs represent brutally efficient habitat destruction

If I get hungry while I’m upon my busy way, I idle on in thru a fast food drive thru lane

Later on I do my part and stuff all of that packaging waste into some convenient dumpster

We proudly support our troops with plastic decals affixed to our imported cars

They’re made in fume-filled sweatshops overseas by ignorant peasant wage slaves

Our unearned home equity was an amazing source of funds for vacations and toys

Now our interest rate is too high, we owe more than it’s worth, so we deserve a bailout

My son was uniquely gifted and showed great potential at an extremely early age

The doctors have ascribed his lack of success and bad attitude to ADHD and poor schools

It’s magic how the stores brim with things I just saw on TV and simply have to have

Mom and Dad always buy for me so that I will remain their friend and still talk to them

Simply pushing buttons on the remote from the couch brings up 150 big screen channels

There’s not too much on that we really watch, but that monster sucks down the juice 24x7x365

I joyfully immerse myself in the spectacle of commercial sports at any opportunity

I love watching overpaid black criminals brutally bash each other, clad in shiny, tight spandex

I love the freedom of the open road and the wind in my hair on my Harley-Davidson

It sits for months depreciating in the way in the garage while I miss a few more payments

There’s nothing quite so relaxing as quietly sitting and fishing on a peaceful lake

We rip across the water on 200 dirty horsepower which exhausts straight down into the water

The freedom of the open road beckons us from the comfort of our mobile home

7 miles a gallon, tons of CO2 and a noisy generator so we can watch our DVDs in AC’d comfort

It’s magic how the meat we love appears wrapped in plastic so very clean and safe

We don’t see or want to know about the filthy feedlots and those bloody slaughterhouses

We see a future filled with more bright consumption and happy indulgence for the kids

It’s a wonderful and magic world made simply for our pleasure, convenience and comfort

Time Could Not Heal

Time did not heal the wounds he wore as he attended his own solemn burial

The passing of so many hurried years did not make them any wiser

Their broadcasted fantasies were not meant to have prepared the populace

Endless dull repetition did not bring her to some flashpoint of enlightenment

Sadly, the fear and worry that always drove them never lead to that happily ever after

All the time that convenience saved them was not stockpiled for their later enjoyment

Their passing would not heal the awful recognitions they suffered during their last days

There was no happy guided segue from this laying tubed up in a paralyzed desperation

That ever-pending eternity would disperse their strong feelings but never change them

Forever could not make up for any of their suffering, despite other’s pious assurances

For time could heal them no more once they had gone off and left us for good

The light-hearted empty lives of some, ironically enough, proved as useful as any pious brooding

Time neither erased his sins nor granted him the forgiveness his victims finally learned

Distance did not separate them from the memories they would always carry inside

No matter who those sad women slept with, they always awoke with themselves

The many long years did not help him to accept his own hideous apparition

She always carried that pain in a place that was walled off, but not inaccessible

They always sought something indefinable, though there was nothing left to tempt them

Time would certainly not heal the loneliness of her isolation during those final years

His healthy lifestyle was of no use forever once all his cells had ceased activity

They even dreamed it was not time that they needed, but devices that might save it for them

As he slowly faded, his only wish was that he could simply resume his empty, hectic life

The eternity that awaited her was oblivious to her many selfless sacrifices

His passing did not bring him the long-awaited pleasure of seeing his many enemies in Hell

Sadly, their quiet acceptance of lifelong suffering did not grant them an eternity with god

Time did not even try to heal their pain as their spreading wakes never quite faded to nothing

There would be no paradoxical heaven which included both the wise hermit and the great leader

Time could not halt the dispersion of any molecules that made up their hypothetical eternal souls

Allahu Akbar

God is the greatest <whichever one you choose>

God is Great, or so we shout, leaping righteously at each other’s unbelieving throats

And why not, for has He not revealed only to us, His chosen people, His living word

He grants us access to an inner strength that our fearful minds are otherwise denied

He relieves us of the monstrous uncertainty that envelops us in this frightening universe

Of course! We must raise arms to defend His loving message against the teeming infidels

Quite naturally our God is male and no foolish mother nature or some sexless spirit

We can go forth sealed in the ironclad certitude arising out of our mindless prayers

Allahu Akbar and He seriously does say to cover women’s faces and to grow out your beards

Faith and prayer will be answered, if not in this world, then, in the paradise to come

God remains great even if others twist and pervert His word to their selfish and greedy ends

Yes, He commends you to martyr your hopeless life while spokesmen make His videos

Obviously, He is taking an active interest in your stand on the sanctity of marriage

All our seemingly pointless hate and death and war really are His Divine Will being done

We greet each other, my unsmiling brothers, with the phony shibboleth of an Allahu Akbar

He grants us dispensation to quote Him freely out of context as meets our selfish needs

Our Lord Shiva adorns our missiles and His fellows sanctify our sick but cozy caste system

Private internal dialogs with our Personal Saviors yield irrevocable and guilt-free decisions

He gave us the Inquisition, the Taleban, Al-Qaeda and the New World Holocaust

Acting in His name they pimp various paradises which require only a simple but total faith

Twisting the fiction of His word, they channel our trusting belief towards their need to power

Yes, God is still great and the truth He revealed is absolutely no invention of man

We can stone disobedient women and burn the heretical at the stake in His name

Given their active imaginations, there is nothing in their commands that our faith cannot justify

Yes, we know evil when it raises its head and we recognize that the Great Satan is among us

He watches over us all tallying our sins and working in mysterious ways to test our faith

He knows all beforehand, sees everything, yet still awaits our decision to accept Him

And if you pray for a dogmatic guidance long enough, He’ll probably speak with you, as well

What a burden of anxiety lifted and awful guilt over our actions re-forged into pride

You can safely let go your fate into His hands reciting Allahu Akbar until you pass away

But, you must listen when others tell of His commands that the enemy be destroyed

For this is a non-negotiable package deal from which you must accept all or burn in Hell

Oh yes, and don’t forget that you’ll also receive a personal relationship with your Savior

So if you play by their rules you can live happily and get to dwell in Heaven forever

Right, and they’ll throw in assorted ancient dusty prophets, mysteries and miracles

You can lose your fear of death and accept all their horrors as simply part of God’s will

God is great and He can ease your fears if you just blindly grant Him, and us, your fictional soul

My Spoon-Fed Denials

I let them deny others the health care that might have threatened their fat bonuses

I integrated that unmerciful Social Darwinism right into my canned Traditional Family Values®

I merrily defaulted on my overdrawn home loan right alongside all the other negative savers

I blotted out their suffering in a haze of preoccupation with my artificial stress and worry

I realized that gutted landscapes and dirty air were but a small price to pay for our progress

I said I did not mean to smash the doors of their teeny cars climbing down from my truck

I saw that we could not retain all our wondrous choices without market-based medicine

I ignored so-called scientific experts at the well-rehearsed urging of politicos in corporate ads

I adopted respected business leaders lack of interest in the mistreatment of illegales

I went right along in denial of any fiscal holocaust brought on by chronic overspending

I knew that health statistics were twisted by those seeking to socialize our healthcare

I saw there was simply too much uncertainty to risk taking any expensive climate action

I spurned the defeatists unspoken contention that we should fight them here not there

I never even considered the gaming and credit industries as foolish wasteful scams

I let them put off our infrastructure needs as I made my own minimum monthly payments

I learned not to be so affronted by their disgusting political presence in leadership positions

I denied my guilt and looked forward, without any comment, to clearing my good name

I laughed scornfully when they said we were all robbers ransacking other’s futures

I did not notice the lack of prevention for diseases insurers strove not to pay to treat

I realized that Europeans denied our god-granted exceptionist role at their own risk

I let them subsidize their corporate owners ethanol boondoggles to try and crush solar power

I lived in denial thinking that people, the government and my wife could all change

I chose to ignore that we could no longer swim in or eat the fish from our lakes

I did not check their sources and later backed them in compounding their mistakes

I missed the poverty increasing, the middle class disappearing and the rich getting richer

I evinced not the slightest hesitation in continuing to spiral our defense spending

I let outsiders bulldoze the farms, meadows, forests and wetlands for quick, one-time profits

I lay sweating in fear that the socialists would not allow me to choose my own doctor

I learned to overlook the ignorant, noisy and wasteful wreckreation that they so enjoyed

I never even mentioned our own overpopulation being the root of most of our problems

I calmly accepted that we must always spend more to prepare for our certain next war

I never believed things would just collapse due to our refusal to fund national infrastructure

I scoffed with everyone else at the foolish antics of the environmental wackos

I accepted without real thought that it might require a lawyer to get to see a doctor

I calmly awaited the new and better jobs they had promised me as I was being outsourced

I denied other’s true convictions and proclaimed ours alone as the only real true Word of God

Waking Dreams

These dreams woke up at last and now they can never seem to rest again

They toss and they mumble fitfully, throughout my long and mindless working hours

I see them fumbling in their pockets for loose change in long gray lines

The alien light of our world creating the strange discolorations of their faces

You get used to not looking right at them or else they will quickly fade away

Their faulty assumptions collapsing beneath the fairy tale castles of their logic

These dreams awaken, stubbled and grimy, having voluntarily left their kingdom

They fill me briefly with their uneasiness as they are passing right on through me

They walk the land alone dissolving soundlessly without leaving any footprints

I watch them fade like old prayer flags just after they emerge fully-formed, upon my way

They leave no trace except the faint and dissolving memories of their passing

Some are so sublime as to be nearly undetectable by the busy conscious mind

Sometimes I pray to mistake gruesome reality for their phantasmal influences

Given off as I walk, they disperse in an illogical ever-thinning aerosol

Waking dreams, trying to tell me how much I need some simple restful sleep

Their seamless reality at least as attractive as our collective conscious hypnosis

There must be more to them than what so simply just fades from my grasp

Experienced as reality, dismissed as foolishness, yet somehow deeply symbolic

Tossed into pens and forced to struggle against each other for supremacy

They woke me up again in uncertainty merely with their deep and utter nonsense

These awaking dreams have not yet reached a full consciousness, nonetheless

These cast out and wandering souls sometimes awaken me in rich tears

We do not speak to each other but I wonder if they observe me as I do them

Sometimes when I come to, I’m laughing, with echoes of their beautiful music still in my mind

Often do I wish to experience their version of reality as more than a mere spectator

Waking dreams, trying to shake and rouse themselves from the depths of the everyday

Began to cry as one of them impinged upon the terrible vacuum of my empty life

Just had to reply as they masqueraded as those I had known and loved so long ago

Their parallel universe inextricably bound to our collective stream of unconsciousness

I could not elude them or escape them, for they awoke with me, as I fled before them

I might still be thinking, even as I talk to them, over their music, all in living color

Happily, as I grow older it becomes less clear when they have overtaken me once again

We’re Not Like That Anymore, Right?

I got this angry need to waste, destroy and kill that flares up in a frickin heartbeat

I have an innate predilection for loud noises, smoke, shouting and doing injury

I want red meat with every meal, alcohol every night and lots of sudden violence

I’ve got a right to any woman that I might catch out somewheres alone on a road

I work well within the sound of screaming, struggling real close to naked flames

It’s a relief to stop my thinking and just follow the gritty violence in my gut

Kill their kids and rape their women and leave them alive with our bastard seed

Raise our voices in hoarse gap-toothed shouts and wave our fists in triumph

I’ll go off and die young and maybe leave some snarling orphans to take my place

Kill and blacken the meat that sustains us and leave the plants to the girls

Defile the gods of our enemy with our excrement and laugh harshly as we march away

Adapt the stallions that the women tamed to help us to make a more awful war

Leave deep thinking to the geeks but laugh and bellow and drink way too much

Slap your kid around until he accepts the wide mean streak that’s already there

Pretend faith and allegiance to gods and politicians you don’t try to understand

Obey as long as they trump up enemies and provide food and drink and weapons

I don’t go off searching for my soul but I sure like to suit up to go out to fight

I find my life’s deepest meaning staring at the mutilated body of another brother

There’s got to be more to life than talking and reading for those such as me

I’m not saving up or putting down roots cause tomorrow we go off to kill and die again

Give me meat and beer and tobacco and whores to rape and kick around

Let me burn their houses and whip them raw from the backs of giant horses

Beat me down with harsh discipline or I will bite savagely the hand that nears me

Give me a simple faith and just confidently assure me that we do not die in vain

I happily burn fields and butcher animals and leave families shivering and dirty in the rain

We don’t ask much, just arms and your blessing, when you turn us loose again

I am quick to anger, hold a grudge and fight with my own in times of peace

Give us meat to kill so we can throw its bones to savage dogs beside a roaring fire

I did not need to learn to read to march in step or to use my beloved weapons

The best is when it comes to fists and grappling, knives and knees and elbows

I seek no salvation or revelation but total immersion in no-holds barred deadly violence

I will waste away quickly should I become too old to march with my companions

I need to fuck up something or somebody just to quell this eternal inner need

I will work for any scheming prince, greedy priest or profiteering politician

Equip us, bless us and set us upon some enemy or we will surely come for you

My Search Results Are Ready

I ran for the canyons but they was dammed, flooded and already way silted up

I made for the mountains but them empty second homes kept me fenced way outside

I went out to float the rivers but the drought had turned them into dirty little dribbles

Took off for the woods but they had burned down and dried to blackened ashes

Left on a road trip for safe family adventure and found a string of filthy restrooms

Went fishing with the kids but had to tell them that we couldn’t eat our poisoned catch

Fought traffic down to the ocean to watch as strange and dangerous objects washed ashore

The Doc cured my lifestyle-induced disease just in time to make his golf game

Headed for the wilderness but my GPS wasn’t working so I went on over to the mall

Took the speedboat down to the reservoir but there was no water left for to ride on

Got up real early to enjoy the quiet and heard brave construction workers roaring by

Said I’d rather fight them here than there and was labeled as a cowardly cut-and-runner

Got all ready for the winter but every day stayed real warm and it was way too dry

Called for action on climate change so they set the clocks back a whole week later, in the fall

Went searching for the great West from one chain restaurant and hotel to another

I journeyed to our great outdoors and found the discarded toxic remnants of a meth lab

Climbed a rocky mountain and was passed by the many hurried hi-tech peak baggers

I went to hike the mystic arroyos but they were clean choked up with exotic species

I sought the ancient wisdom of the Indians, and so I journeyed to their new casinos

I watched the electrically sprinkled fossil water simply evaporate, shining in the wind

Talked to the wise men in their giant pickups and they told me that they’d just tell me what

Listened, mesmerized by the agents looks and voice, as she pitched the mountain sunsets

Learned to help clamor for the always more, the ever bigger and the even cheaper

Worked to realize our manifest destiny by plopping strip malls from coast to coast

Sought out that shady grove I had heard about but got turned around on the interstate

Rode out of the valley and gazed back upon the ozone layer that covered up our town

Loved that down home country music as it brayed down to my pickup via satellite radio

I searched for the wisdom of the elderly and they told me I just best not get too old

Quietly paddled our canoe through the wakes of pleasure trawlers and jet ski madness

Meditated to the blessed randomly and sporadic high-decibel outbursts of our progress

I enjoyed the financed memories of a lifetime at handicap accessible vista overlook points

Heard god’s amplified word at our friendly megachurch and then stopped down to Wal*Mart

I went to seek the wisdom of the retired CEOs but their compounds were walled and locked

I sought the peace of the starry desert but found it full of wackos, bristling with guns

Put great faith in freedom of the press then saw that it depended solely on selling advertising

I went back to eat at Grandma’s house once more but Dad had sold it off way, way long ago

Quest For Inner Peace V2.0

I simply could not just ignore my body odor in the search for inner peace

Got flipped off while talking to Sally on my cell driving to my yoga class

Well, actually I go a couple times a week and it’s only $35 a month

I think I really noticed something after only a couple of classes

The other day I almost touched my toes for the first time since I cant remember when

I was really getting out there as we lay in the corpse position, then I fell asleep

It felt sorta like I saw myself take off silently in one of those rescue helicopters

Why, the traffic didn’t even bother me as I drove alone all the way back home

I think I scratched the side of a hybrid floating out of my SUV in their parking lot

Shutting down my comm device, I was shedding my earthly concerns before the class

I knew I needed another measured portion of the infinite, really soon

I was still a pilgrim despite the deeply worn tracks I followed thru our rodent warrens

I dropped my thoughts of dinner and even forgot all about my office foes for just a moment

I sought to see myself on a lovely beach in a rainbow sunset framed by reflecting clouds

I was only dimly aware of a woman’s gas in front of me as we assumed the next position

I repeated the computer-generated nonsense syllable that was my unique personal mantra

I pursued this inner quest as vigorously as I had pushed to get the kids thru school

My husband said he had learned to meditate as well and he practiced on the couch at night

Visions of the eternal void maybe just came to me in short bursts, as I exhaled

I took to going barefoot in loose clothes at times, in the privacy of my own home

My cooking shaded away from meat and towards instant packaged Asian main courses

Sometimes I felt a twinge of guilt sipping on a Latte instead of bathing in the Indus

After a long internet search I found a guided Indian Enlightenment tour with a real guru

I began to see a bit of God in all the plants and insects as I sprayed and weeded my garden

Passionate conservatism began to make a lot more sense as my eyes slowly opened

I peeled off layers of consciousness with the onions, searching thru my life’s mandala

Many weekends I applied but a half coat of makeup and wore my hair quite simply

There was so much more to me than these well-tended suburbs could ever reveal

The occasional housekeeping haiku began appearing in my personal diary

I wrote down the dreams that awakened me and tried to fathom them as I blew dry

Sometimes the New Age music cable channel brought quiet, purging tears to my eyes

I spent 20 minutes in the park listening for songbirds on my way to grocery shop

Changed my ring tone to a soothing melody and tried to let up on the car horn

Began to sense the triviality in the banal and un-insightful existence of others

Adopted a Tibetan orphan overseas on the internet and walked dogs at the shelter

Took comfort in knowing that I was following the ancient path of enlightenment

Yo, Conservatives: Do You Really?

Do you really ignore their careless toxic dust way up your nose and far down your lungs

Are you good with harshly ignorant laborers throwing up cheap shit all in your face

Is their flimsy pre-fab on flattened and devastated earth a relief to your tired eyes

Does that smoggy orange haze that you drive through soften your haunted outlook

Do you really fulfill your spirit from some musty old book supposedly written by a god

Can you actually enjoy that giant, poorly-engineered, way-overpriced gas guzzler

Do you think the lame media in which you immerse yourself helps you to grope your way thru

Are you still so sure you won’t live long enough to need any Medicare or Social Security

Do you really think energy efficiency spells the end of what you mistake for comfort

Do you perhaps take a vicarious pride in our cowboy diplomacy and wars of liberation

Are you gathering cosmic truth in your cycle of meaningless work and mindless recreation

Has living for today and grabbing all that you can not even worn you just a little bit thin

Does it grow difficult to lose yourself in prescribed meds, alcohol, religion or media rapture

Can you truly believe that our blind and greedy rush can continue even another 100 years

Have you actually considered the size and permanence of your stumbling daily footprint

Did you ever answer if you’re better off in today’s version of Morning In America

Do you really think if you just keep the family safe and happy everything will simply work out OK

Does the blasting noise of all the cars and harleys and trucks somehow blend to soothe you

Can you find safe and quiet refuge in the crumbling home that’s worth less than you owe

Is yours a parallel worklife with the next piece of veal in one more prairie dog cubicle farm

Do you really think that polarized 2 party gridlock inevitably gropes us forward

Must you judge all your actions with regard to convenience and time savings

Are you ok with those who fed chalky poison to babies helping provide food for your children

Do you really feel that things will just work out and we’ll muddle through like always

Do you really think it’s progress to channelize the rivers and fill in all the wetlands

Are you maybe only accelerating blindly toward some as yet unspecified objectives

Will you really reflect back in satisfied wisdom as you are fed and excrete thru medical tubes

Does their sporadic and uncontrolled noise really not rattle your uninsured teeth

Do you really not notice the billion wasteful and paranoid lights blotting out all the stars

Is adjusting the thermostat to your comfort really your only solution to climate change

Have you truly found peace of mind in a round of golf or an expensive pedicure

Do you not weary of making this or that hole a little bit bigger while moving it elsewhere

Do you really ignore the endless tolling of extinction, heat, drought and pollution

Aren’t you often looking forward for weeks to vacations that you do not even remember later

Can you actually believe that unencumbered greed is, in reality, sacred enlightened self-interest

Do you really sleep soundly thru the night, wake up refreshed - just to do it all once again

Get A Squishy Grip

How can you try to preserve these stupid trees when loggers really need those temp jobs?

Where’s the sense in expensive conservation when things cost so much already?

Forget the animals, get a tree-hugging grip and start taking care of our dear families

What’s a few degrees warmer and, anyway, what’s a polar bear ever done for me?

Get out of the way Spongy Bob, there’s manlier issues than this candy-assed sustainability

How dare you tell the urban poor they should not slash-burn and then farm their rain forest?

On what moral authority do you decide who can have how many blessed children?

Why should our nice lawns dry up just to preserve some inedible little desert fish?

We’re not giving up our comfort or our safety to drive some teeny-weeny shoeboxes

We’ll stay with the cheaper imports even if they break before they ever work

It’s not our problem if them squints like working 14 hour days and sleepin 20 to a room

No environmental wacko is going to force their lame agenda on our traditional family lifestyle

Why should we pay more for electricity just to give a coupla salmon a chance to breed?

Don’t talk to me about some web of life until all god’s children have enough to eat

We just import their stuff, it’s their own decision to abort their female children

You can’t tax that acid rain with good people already paying too much for their A/C

These draft rules are unfounded speculation that will cost us all jobs and money

There’s not a word in our sacred constitution about this fool habitat preservation

Buck ain’t giving up his SUV until Fakkim stops burning coal to cook his gruel

Look, this climate change hysteria could threaten the economy and our families

Now, I’m not sure about evolution but our God surely did say only the fittest will survive

We vetoed child health care but we must pass this arms spending bill with no strings attached

How dare you to say local control means outside developers get everything they want?

Don’t try to mess with our god-given right to thrilling petroleum-based wreckreation

Of course we must channelize that river to protect surrounding homes and towns

If you don’t like our mining, why you’re just welcome to go off and freeze in the dark

God said to be a good steward so I make sure and have only the best chemicals applied to my lawn

The welfare of our people simply must come before this environmental nonsense

Yes, the convenience of fast food packaging makes it indispensable to our consumer lifestyle

It’s just simple common sense that recycling is for the boy scouts until you get paid to do it

Cleaning up diesel fuel will only make imported consumer goods more expensive to deliver

Removing mercury from power plant emissions will hurt small business owners

Spreading scientific doubt on climate change bought us time against the crackpots

Jesus, research studies have shown small cars to be dangerous, especially to kids

By all means, we must permit mountaintop removal to keep our coal inexpensive

Of course, endless pointless environmental reviews impede our economic progress

So, get your squishy grip off of the freedom loving lifestyle we intend to keep on enjoying, forever

They Could Not Hear It

They could not hear the music which always flowed so smoothly from inside my head

I still could not understand them even when they stooped and shouted right in my ear

They did not feel the sad melodies with which I themed all of their activities

I understood every word they said but in the end I could not grasp their true message

Their motions became quite graceful when put to the rhythms that only I could hear

I shuffled about to those crazy tunes to which they never even knew that I was listening

Since they could not hear it, they determined there must be something wrong with me

But I politely rebuffed their earnest efforts at helping me along my way

My internal occupations made me seem quite inattentive and forgetful to them

I always wandered off course immediately without the strictest guidance

But they could stand me in a corner and I might remain still for hours on end

And how often I was startled by their gentle tapping upon my shoulder

So many times I would finally notice someone had been calling my name

I would smile in red-faced amazement and then simply shrug

Staring straight forward I never even saw the back of her embarrassed head

I waltzed alone to an orchestra that helped me soar and made them chuckle

I thought I sang harmoniously with my music but, to them, it just sounded very much off-key

There was no way I could share with them all of the beauty that I witnessed inside

They laughed and shook their heads as I swayed alone to those inner melodies

I had to turn it up so loud that I was deafened to many important commercial messages

They could not hear and I would not listen and so did my years dance right on by

The Lights Are Going Out All Over

The lights are slowly going out all over

All around our engines are starting to shut down

No longer does the blue entertainment light dance out of every living room

More bridges are simply too unsafe to even try and cross

The stores are closing up, all across the little towns

Barbecues are flickering out all across this land that god had blessed

Monstrous RVs sit empty for lack of good cheap fuel

Bluehairs wait in vain for their outsourced contract foreign servants

Billboards are becoming illegible due to wind and rain and sun

The water taps only flow a trickle of dark and smelly brine

The roads seem to be growing ever harder to negotiate

Halted trains are blocking intersections in a mostly haphazard fashion

Can’t pick up no more early morning traffic scans or upbeat weather reports

Tightfaced mommies ferrying soccer broods are growing ever scarcer

Vacuous mall tweenies indolently draining daddy’s cash are disappearing daily

Our power just shuts off randomly for hours each and every day

MickieD even runs out of burgers with increasing regularity

Been standin on line for day-old factory white bread for hours, all the time

Bulldozers are sitting idle and power tools lay listless with no energy to drive them

Middle Management’s micro death march projects just aren’t moving us anymore

Toilets aren’t flushing so there’s clumps and tissue everywhere in the bushes

The president assures us that our ingenious people can meet all of these challenges and more

Suburban survivalists have taken over all the forest campgrounds

Wal*Marts are closing up all over cause China’s cut them off

Credit markets are frozen up again but there’s no bailout on the way this time

Military convoys are halted as the soldiers go on patrol to look for gasoline

The garbage trucks don’t come too much and the stuff has piled up real high

They say the fundamentals are still solid but it just doesn’t matter anymore

My downloads don’t hardly ever finish cause so many servers are simply gone

Monday night football even got called off last week cause the stadium lights were out

Formerly swaggering apartment cowboys cant find beer at their favorite stores

The cops are always hurrying off somewhere but never seem to stop

Saw tractors and combines sitting empty out in stubbly, unkempt fields

Staffs at all the hospitals are being replaced by unpaid security guards

The tourist has disappeared as an income source for hungry locals of every stripe

It’s best just to sit quietly in the churches listening to mumbling priests and watching candles burn