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Canticle

i am not a god
i am not a genius
i am only obsessed with life
i am no more insane than the rest of you
i am only alive
i am only dying
i am only a human
i am only an idea

do you think that all that love is memorizing each others social security numbers? do you think that love is to control another like a marionette? is love only slavery to you? is all that you love yourself? is love a game of tag to you, is love only a game between children mocking each others imagined flaws on a slippery playground? is love a disguise to you? is passion for you the torment of another? tell me, have you ever known love, or have you only known jealousy?

sick from alcoholism and cough syrup, unable to get any herb from anyone because i couldnt think up a hip rhyme to fool the fuzz over the myriad tapped phonelines of paranoid joint peddlers, too much coffee, beer is like ginger ale, sick in the body, and worse in the mind, i put on my new pair of boots, and set out for a walk, listening to headphones. making it three miles down the railroad, my legs began to ache, the shoes made of cheap leather and plastic wrapped around my ankles like dogs jaws. grimacing i stood in the winter night hidden on the railroad, smoked a cigarette, thinking the pain might go away if i were walking on an even surface picked up a walking stick and limped forward, the twisting of my tendons more intense with each step i reach the street and limp upwards through silent suburbia, i cant walk normal, i walked slowly, rocking from side to side the pain in my feet slithering serpentine in my brain i loosen the laces thinking i have it solved, only a few miles back to my parents house, the plastic boots making my legs knot and sear, i tuck my pantlegs into my boots, i roll my socks around my ankles, i waddle onward until the pain has taken over my entire countenance, my brain imagines nothing but fibers of bark on the sides of trees, i walk nearly unconscious until it becomes a burn intense stopping my progression, i stand still rocking back and forth until i awaken and cannot take another step along the side of the highway, cars pass, some slow down to stare at me with stupid paranoid blank expressions, others kind enough not to notice at all. sick now and then, a couple hours ago, the pain makes me prostrate vomit coffee into burnt snow, i can hear the closed minded jabbering from past needles cruel vibrating in my sickly liver and perforated brain, laughter, gestures of hate, social distinction, i am nothing, i want to kill myself but i am already dead, i pull off my boots and walk down the highwayside in a pair of dress socks, through ice, over roadsalt, bits of glass, pebbles, a few minutes of this torture and i can hear a deep groaning, like a buddhist monk coming from my own throat, like allen ginsbergs OHM through the bullhorn i walk along the highway with closed eyes and sock feet, kneeling into a ball when i see headlights, terrified i will be noticed and when my feet get to cold i slide them back into those awful boots and slide down the devilstrip not lifting my feet once, leaning on a stick i find in the bushes, slowly, like the disintegration of marble, making my way past houses where televisions shriek and project sickly blue walls, christmas decorations hanging around me like entrails, im sorry i am here, i should be living under the sea, i should be somewhere else, where love isnt forced on us like a bowl of mold encrusted oatmeal, i feel guilt for the sins of my youth, it is not my fault, maybe i deserve this, to walk across winter americas highway in dress socks until my feet are worn away, forcefeed me a pile of stones or a dead body a week in the sun, i will live until i die, for myself, i am what no man tells me i am, i will walk forward with broken feet until i can afford a new pair of shoes.

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