Are we not

After all

All

Casualties

Of the sexual revolution

Collateral damage

Of a spirit

Waring

To be free

When I’m free of judgment,

I’m free of error.

When I’m free of expectations,

I’m free of disappointment.

When I’m free of pride and ego,

I’m free of irony.

When I’m free of manipulation,

I’m free of lies.

When I’m free of worry,

I’m free of waste.

When I’m free of humility,

I’m free of growth.

When I’m free of love,

I’m free of joy.

When I’m free of thoughts,

I’m free of humanity.

When I’m free of belief,

I’m free of you.

And when I’m free of you,

I’m free of purpose.

And when I’m free of purpose,

I’m a prisoner, free from nothing.

Tell me you haven't been holding on

To the loneliness

All alone

Reaching into pockets

Of last chances

And laying change on the counter

Tell me you haven't hoped

For little paper notes that could float you

Night to night

I pray those pockets

Are silver lined

With ideas

Of spending enough time

That you know you're worth more

Than getting out alive

Tell me you haven't dreamed

And been seduced

By four walls and a bed

Convinced

The only safe-place is in your head

Or that pain isn't real

If given enough time

Please don't tell me

It's all in my mind

I feel it writhing

on my tongue

begging to be spoken,

but toothless

I remain,

vocabulary broken.

What's the fucking word?

I know it

see it

taste it.

Slippery? Slithering?

Nope, stillborn within me.

Slather, was that it?

Or maybe slatternly?

What is

that

fucking word?

Slovenly, splattering, 

sinfully, smattering?

Why does this happen?

Wait, was it "shattering"?

Curses, it wasn't.

Right brain, I could crush you!

Demolish! destroy! I surely distrust you.

Sliver or slaver, shiver or shaver?

Not stricture, not structure,

nor striver, nor strumpet.

Google can't help

without more to go on.

Where's the damn Webster's?

At least then I can thumb it.

Curses again!

Confounded! Can't find it!

Those meddling kids

have carried

it off.

Why can't I convey

my shit's not for play?

A gleam! Ho, I see it!

Breaking the blockage,

is this

the word

that's holding

me hostage?

Stoppage?

Ah, no, that's not it!

You poor little twit,

you'll

never

think of that word.

My tongue how it taunts me,

The word how it haunts me.

I'll never

be free

of the pain.

Marveling at it,

snarling at it,

I look at my tongue

in the mirror.

Marshaling courage,

mustering gall,

perhaps brute force

can make

my mind

clearer.

One last run at the wall,

I give it my all.

Deep breath,

then out with the spew.

Stuttering, strenuous,

strapping, stochastic,

startling, starkly, 

sprightly, spumoni,

(Really? That last one is tenuous.)

stentorian, shimmering,

screechingly, simmering,

summoning, shuddering,

splat, (What? That's just bologna.)

squeamish, staccato,

stelliform, stigmatic,

strident, shambolic,

(my ego, now sorely is suffering)

scotoma, scribacious,

scurrilous, spacious.

salubrious, sententious,

Stop! It's all so demonic!

Stereophonic?

Alas! No effect.

I'm afraid

to admit

that this word has

beaten me soundly.

Hmm, how peculiar?

A sound I

now hear

buzzing my ear

bringing good cheer

my Muse has come near

tongue have no fear

the word will eclipse

the froth at my lips,

now, right at the tip...

Dear reader of mine,

the suspense 

you must feel

in the pit

of your stomach.

Will I reveal

the word

I have sought?

Relax dear friend,

it was slummock.

i was there, at your birth

holding breath to realize

your being, in ways no

longer secret to the world.

i crooned a cradle song

between the days of then

and now. I readied steady

hands to hold you tight; barely

blinked a thousand times and

then – you walked alone into

the world – while tears, both

sad and salty, coursed a trail

long followed down my face

I have moved halfway around the world

and I still can’t shake the smell

of the church doors opening and the

incense pouring into the rain.