with your fighting words
A challenge for you: every line a story.
whenever I say things like
"poetry is a lethal weapon"
my friends get nervous
I can't really blame them
they've visted me in
enough loony bins and dryouts
to know that
the line I walk between
image and fact
is sometimes thin indeed
I've fought my share of battles where
the only blood spilled
was inside my head...
Brecht said
he didn't write his plays
to warm the cockles of the bourgeois heart
now he was bragging, but
what with freebase, croissants, all-talk radio and
credit card blow jobs
we're already entertained to death...
and when I say things like
"poetry's a war"
my friends look at me careful
and measure the whites of my eyes
against the blue of my nerves
and sigh
hopefully poised for ironic topspin
but ready to call my doctor
in the middle of the
night
I stare back at them blank-eyed
just because I'm crazy
doesn't mean I
don't make sense
if I sometimes tilt at windmills
head first
it's probably because
I need a new head...
and when they ask why
I say how
when they ask how
I say when
and when I say when
they say
"But I have to go to the doctor
that week"
or, "I'm busy with my dogs"
or, "I'd rather eat Chinese"
or
it sounds good on paper
but what's in it for me
Nothing, I reply
nothing at all
except a chance to drink fire from a glass
and spit it back in some asshole's face
nothing but a license to
chase the Devil around the block
with a big blue sword
that is sharper than his horns
nothing I can run down in a heartbeat
or prove with math
but I cross my soul and
swear to kill
if I'm lying...
the world can eat itself alive
for another 1000 years
for all I care
I was never much good at
abstract compassion
I just want a moment of truth
so vast
that all the lights on the planet
dim for a second...
we're right at ground zero
the times are suffused with murder
perfect with disbelief
and I say
take an emotion
and file it to a point
with everything you have and haven't
shoot it through the laser
that beats in our bones
turn the sound up
way past 10
and don't sweat the distortion...
and who knows
perhaps one day we'll come to
a fine and deadly pleasure
one free breath
David Lerner, Ground Zero
--
Come on with me. It's Saturday. What have you got to lose?
whenever I say things like
"poetry is a lethal weapon"
my friends get nervous
I can't really blame them
they've visted me in
enough loony bins and dryouts
to know that
the line I walk between
image and fact
is sometimes thin indeed
I've fought my share of battles where
the only blood spilled
was inside my head...
Brecht said
he didn't write his plays
to warm the cockles of the bourgeois heart
now he was bragging, but
what with freebase, croissants, all-talk radio and
credit card blow jobs
we're already entertained to death...
and when I say things like
"poetry's a war"
my friends look at me careful
and measure the whites of my eyes
against the blue of my nerves
and sigh
hopefully poised for ironic topspin
but ready to call my doctor
in the middle of the
night
I stare back at them blank-eyed
just because I'm crazy
doesn't mean I
don't make sense
if I sometimes tilt at windmills
head first
it's probably because
I need a new head...
and when they ask why
I say how
when they ask how
I say when
and when I say when
they say
"But I have to go to the doctor
that week"
or, "I'm busy with my dogs"
or, "I'd rather eat Chinese"
or
it sounds good on paper
but what's in it for me
Nothing, I reply
nothing at all
except a chance to drink fire from a glass
and spit it back in some asshole's face
nothing but a license to
chase the Devil around the block
with a big blue sword
that is sharper than his horns
nothing I can run down in a heartbeat
or prove with math
but I cross my soul and
swear to kill
if I'm lying...
the world can eat itself alive
for another 1000 years
for all I care
I was never much good at
abstract compassion
I just want a moment of truth
so vast
that all the lights on the planet
dim for a second...
we're right at ground zero
the times are suffused with murder
perfect with disbelief
and I say
take an emotion
and file it to a point
with everything you have and haven't
shoot it through the laser
that beats in our bones
turn the sound up
way past 10
and don't sweat the distortion...
and who knows
perhaps one day we'll come to
a fine and deadly pleasure
one free breath
David Lerner, Ground Zero
--
Come on with me. It's Saturday. What have you got to lose?