The hill seemed so much bigger then
the halls so much wider.
That light up there
it was dim
and this hallway was ominous
not quite scary, but
it was better to get down it
fast.
Those were days
back then
– not like today.
Everything seems smaller now,
contained.
The world, compartmentalized,
all in its proper little boxes,
has none of the excitement
of back then
when every corner
held delights or terrors
each in equal measure
waiting to be uncovered
at the very next step.
If the republic
is not the republic
and the ideals we have sought to safeguard
have been disregarded
or left the building like some Fat Elvis
now lodged in a bathroom of hubris
choking on diamonds of discontent
and fluffernutter pies
If what we cared for
what we worked for
what we woke for
what we fought for…
if it fails
if it falls
then so be it.
There comes a day
in every boy’s life
when he looks at the things he has done
and he sees that they are shit
and the people around him are shit
and all the things that he believed in last week
that he made every effort to prop into castles
have in fact sagged into shit
if ever they were anything but.
You can put out fires every day
of every week
of every fucking second
but it only takes another second
of an eye off the prize
for the fire to take hold
and lick at your innards
and flame out your home.
So?
Y’blinked
and no one complimented your fluffernutter recipe.
Let it be.
Let it burn.
Burn it down.
Whatever stories you tell at the ocean’s edge
Whatever lies you may cry to your lover
or any other
at the lip of the lake
or any other place you may find yourself
Whatever songs you write about the river,
the river don’t care.
Nature is inured to your interest
and has been for billions of instants
as you have expressed your artistry
or whatever you call it
to the trees or the sky
or the birds or the waves
– they don’t give a shit why you think.
The river doesn’t want your poems
or your songs or dances
or cookies or films.
None of it offers the earth
an iota of aid.
I mean,
feel free to continue, though.
The river won’t mind.
The river won’t notice you
at all.
When they put you to the test
When they decide how to judge you
When the light is put firmly and solidly to you
with the wattage up
and the blaze flaring before your one good eye
When they glare and interrogate
and ask you their questions
and choose to come to conclusions
as to just what you are
When they put you in the spot
to figure out the spot
they will put you in next
and next
and next
When they put you to the test
you are put to another test
but not by them.
You can chose
to be judged by them
or to judge yourself.
You can pass their tests
or your own.
Or
you can decide
as many do
where their goals and yours
coincide
and then master what skills they may wish
that fit your master plan as well.
All these are options
– multiple choices before you.
Never forget, though,
as the lights blaze
before your sweating one good eye,
just who may be the master.
Never forget
whose test it is
you must finally pass.
Will fuck for food.
Will fuck for shelter.
Will fuck for sleep
for cash
for fun.
Will fuck for peanut butter pie
every fucking day
– every fucking hour
of every fucking day.
will fuck for any sort of cake, really,
even day old.
Will fuck for work.
Will fuck for fun.
Will fuck for love
or lust
or the listless abandon
of a lazy Sunday morning
if the opportunity presented itself.
Will fuck if the opportunity presents itself.
Will fuck for candy.
will fuck for clothes.
Will fuck for the choice between
either one of those.
Will fuck for sex.
Will fuck to end the argument
or to end the conversation
if it’s going in an uncomfortable direction.
Will fuck for forty minutes
or forty seconds
depending on your available time frame.
Will fuck as long as I can keep holding
this sign up.
Yep,
just as long
as I can
keep
it up.
The winds howl.
The windows shudder.
The shutters rattle
and the rattles, left out
by absent-minded marms
roll about, pushed by drafts.
It is safe here
inside
while the world beyond these walls
appears barren
blistered by a preponderance
of nothing.
Danger lurks outside.
Something howls.
The door is locked
and you are protected inside
with gates high and locks thick
and furs heavy and warm
and nothing will get to you
and this will not stand.
This enclosure
is not enough for the day
or for the hour.
You will not allow it
for too long.
The wolves are out tonight
with their evil eyes
and dripping mouths
but you are nobody’s victim.
You will go
to meet them.
Julian Simon does not believe in peak copper.
He insists that we will never run out
of this amazing metal that runs through our wires
our heating
our coinage.
Simon says that one hundred years ago
we had only fifty years’ worth of copper
left yet to mine
but technology and ingenuity
has found ways
to extend that
and we can still dig in the dirt
for one hundred years’ more
at least
– and he wrote this twenty years ago
so… that means something.
Julian is optimistic
that we will never reach peak copper
and this flexible chemical element
will stay with us
for as long as we need it
for we will continue
as clever little beasts
to find better ways
to leech it from the world
and this never will stop
and all of our electronics
and tubes and monies
will be the better for it.
I pray Simon is right
and peak copper shall never be.
Otherwise, what other hope have we?
The rat scurrying across my shoulder
in the dark
was not seen
barely heard
hardly smelt
but could be felt
quite profoundly
and will be remembered
so very definitely
for as long as my skin will crawl.
With no visible evidence of its existence,
though,
no hair
no hide tanned
nor tail caught
I cannot prove there ever was a rat
outside of my fevered imaginings.
I know it was there
but
do I really?
Are the creatures truly rattling in my home
or in my head
or someplace else I don’t yet understand?
I’d ask if there was someone around
and the rodent
it seems
is nowhere to be found.
You spin like a dervish, frenzy full,
a chasm of chaos
ready to swallow any
who will fall for the same old lines
brazen, brass, embarrassing, big.
You go big before going home,
that’s for sure,
but you’re going home alone
more and more
because there aren’t enough buyers
for the snake oil you sell
and the stories you spin
at your dervish derbies
may be dizzying
but they do dignity dirty, dude.
Your truth, like hair,
is thinning,
and I’m thinking
these days may be something
you’ll soon grow out of.
I never thought it would happen
and my will became word,
thought into action.
He didn’t make it
just like I said it would be.
The world I hadn’t imagined
would never occur.
Such is my power.
Thus is my skill.
Pity, though, for he
who would never get to see
what I always knew
would never be.
jonberger 