I like an ax. I like the heft of the head, and the smooth ergonomics of it’s shaped hickory haft. I like the power conveyed when one is cocked overhead, lightly balanced, playing you like a fulcrum. I like the speed with which one falls, the weighted head using gravity for assistance.

An oddly shaped knife is all it is, forged for chopping. A billet of iron, or dense steel shaped and forge welded to a sharpened steel bit for penetration, and an eye pushed and punched through hot metal by a leathery-skinned artisan wielding a ball-peened hammer.

And with it the iconic images of Honest Abe building a cabin, George Washington owning up to the Cherry Tree fiasco, or even Lizzy Borden, who might have just been a crazy woman, or whose Poppa might have been a mean, mean man… history has left us uncertain as to which.

Either way, Lizzy undoubtedly shared mine and Abe’s love for the versatility and practicality of a good, old fashioned ax. Her daddy must have gained a newfound respect for it’s abilities too, right there at the end.

Monetary systems are typically created to benefit an entire group of people. Sadly, they are inevitably manipulated to mostly benefit only a portion of that group. One of the many reasons the human race is horrible in my mind.

Now let’s talk about what I think should come to everyone’s mind when asked such a question. LASER BEAMS! They can do things like give the family a great show or show the family to a great enemy. Correct a person’s vision or blind them. Remove tattoos from skin or emotional support animals from the living. Kill deadly bacteria or happy, healthy kids. Show what bullet your talking about during a presentation or present where the bullet you’re firing will show. We would all love to think that lasers are only going to be used for good but like the wheels on a bus, they go round & round…. and sometimes kill kids.

Much as I hate

Relying on cold calculators

They keep me company

And don’t ask for much

The not so silver screens

With their artificial lifeforms

Fill gaps in a vacant space

That would otherwise collapse on itself

White noises whispered at night

Mingle with voices in my head

Overcrowding in a thick skull

I can never bring myself to cut the cord

It would only leave me lonely

In a mute world that no longer sings

They switch on and I forget

That someday there is an end

Everything forever sliding downhill

They give me something to do

Too busy for anything now

All time is occupied

Shunning silence

Disregarding the quiet

Pretending not to hear

When I’m being called back

They execute time quick and easily

Exterminate echoes of emptiness

Spreading through my life

Like pests in a decaying house

Things I’d rather kill than face

So as much as I hate it

I lie

Down each night

Asleep with some machine

I live to be able to speak as I will. But sometimes freedom to speak can have someone killed.

To carry an opinion on a matter of consequences. Can lead to devastating circumstances.

If a silent note was carried through a mind of being seen, it would have saved all of the souls that were lost in between.

Yet, deep down inside someone had to be heard. To change history, to create sanity, to make sense of what is absurd.

For that we tip our hats to all of the brave orators in our country today. Stand, Speak, and continue to Evolve us in an American way.

BEWARE THIS READ. THE SECOND PART IS GRAPHIC. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

In the hand of my mother, it was used to feed my brother.

In the hands of my father, it was given with soup when my sister was sick.

In the hands of my brother it was used to paint.

In the hands of my sister it was used to swirl her cereal when she couldn't fathom eating.

In the hands of my lover it was used to feed my ice cream.

In the hands of my enemy it was used to cut off my mothers fingers.

In the hands of my enemy it was used to stab out my fathers eye.

In the hands of my enemy it was used to break my brothers wrist.

In the hands of my enemy it was used to shove acid down my sisters throat.

In the hands of my enemy it was used to rip out the heart of my lover.

How I love spoons.

How I hate spoons.

How they bring memories of good times

and nightmares of the bad one.

Oh my enemy

What have you done?