Juxtaposed, and torn asunder

Juxtaposed, and torn asunder
Meticulously, I wormed onward
Slogging forth, advancing nowhere
Through the desiccate abyss
Loitering
Idled here

Shrug, gasp, sigh
Another doorway

"Fuck this shit, my path is North-ways!"
Yet, against my will
my feet turned South
Still dwelling here
Brooding doubts

Egotism, mysticism
In the gloom
The one-true vision
Lateralized before mine eyes

Hark, Lo!
Bundle up, dear childer
I feel another bitter winter
Curdling within my bones
The carillon's requiem
Long-lost tomes
Extrapolate the yearning soul

Yet, another verbose excuse

Just live your life

Time will soothe

But still, we can't let go of those grudges
Slanders, slights, and up-and-comers
Challengers who beat us down
Put up your dukes
I'm older now

The phantasmagoria dissolves before me
Like frayed and fractured pictures of my youth

Yet the reveries stripped from mine eyes

Such relief, such privilege
Such dissolute

All fades to ubiquitous blackness
I slink into my cell
Death was once a doorway
The reality is Hell

Depressed

Depressed here
Slinking low
As a scolded child

My dove says
She doesn't care
What I need or want

Brooding here
Stewing here
In miasmic air
It's a wonder
I've not choke to death

The garrote clinches around my neck
Dead-man walking here
I fell as low as bed-bugs
Beneath the furniture

What does love want?
I don't know
And still pondering
Cerebrating
Lucubrating
Self-inquiring

In drug dreams dreary
I've walked among the dead
I felt more welcomed there
Than I do here

Don't admire this
No admonishments
There's no beauty here
Death is not a doorway
Just a prison cell

Erudition
Navigation
Lost among gales

Across tides
Pitch as black
Circumnavigating Hell

Depressed here
And thusly here
I spun a gossamer shell

One day to emerge
And gorge upon myself

The only thing I know for sure

The only thing I know for sure, is that I know absolutely nothing.  But hell, 86% of the population doesn't know anything; 9 out of 17 people know this.  At least, I know that I know nothing.  Some people don't know they don't know anything.

I look around, I look around,
And I think, where have all the role-models gone?  Where have all the John Wayne's gone?

We're so concerned with our own crap.  We call them problems.  But they're just privileges.  I've seen real problems.  And I count my lucky stars that I have none.

Some say, ignorance is bliss.
But I say, ignorance is a way for the surreptitious to take that which they have not earned.

I'm reminded of when thieves were alleviated of their sinful appendages.  Now, I see a time where some need to steal just to survive.  Is that right?  Is anything we know ever been right?

I've read of when, each season,  Babylonian women sacrificed a man by burning him alive.  According to history, such practices were performed to appease the gods and yield good crops.  Apparently a matriarchal society is as ruthless as our traditional patriarchs.  Perhaps, more so.  In Africa, most of the females of each species are bigger than the males.  This is so the males don't eat the young.  Except, instead of an adult predator trimming the weak from the herd, mammoth females kill other matured adults and feed the spoils to their young.

Which is worse?
Does it matter?

I've read of a time, where, if you hurt, trimmed, or chopped down a tree (without permission from the gods), Pagans carved out your naval, nailed it the offended conifer, and forced you to circumnavigate the trunk until all your intestines firmly wrapped around the bark.  

Imagine if we lived back then.
There'd be no paper; among many other things.

Do I wish we still lived in a matriarchal society?
I don't know, I'm just glad we're not sacrificing people to phony-baloney gods in the hopes of a prolific harvest.

Do I wish we still lived in a time where defacing Mother Nature was a capitol offense? 
I don't know, but it would sure be great if we stopped ravaging our own natural resources in the name of progress.

What progress?
What have we really achieved in the last thirty years?  Century?

Most people seem so sure that the world will end any day now.  Y2K.  SARS.  12/21/12.  What a joke that was.  People, the Mayans never said that was when the Rapture would happen.  That's just when they stopped calendaring.  And the Mayan calendar was based on a ten-month-scale, not twelve; meaning the end-of-days would have happened well-before 12/21/12.

Still, we plod  on.
Now, pundits say that things in the Middle East are escalating just as things did back in August of 1914; right before WW1

Day-by-day, things get worse.
Zealots proclaim the impending return of the One True Savior.
Atheists say, "Naw, don't worry about.  Such is the way of things." 

Are we tottering on the precipice of Doomsday?
Or, will the night grow incipiently darker before a long-awaited dawn?

I don't know.
But at least, I know that I don't know.

And I thank God for that. 

Silenty, Incipiently

Silently, incipiently
I've breached another door in darkness
On my knees
I slogged toward it
Adytum, mew
Whatever you call it
Here and now
I dwell inside it

Excavate, emerge
From the gloom
I'm reborn
Inside my maw
New teeth are torn

I hunger
I thirst
I sate and slake
And then hibernate

Nihilists and atheists
Quake before the one true hate

Deep inside
Demons do hide
On our anger
They do thrive

This prison built
Of our free-will
Beleaguered here
Besieged by Hell

Angrily, I fight against it
The rip pulls me under
I struggle
I suffocate
I remain
Ensconced in Hell

Lost in rage
Forever here

New Batman

For the love of God, please, someone tell me that Ben Affleck is not going to take up the cape and cowl.  Don't get me wrong, Mr. Affleck has great charisma and stage presence.  But he can't act.  He either plays a condescending douche-bag, or his usual, Joe-everyman-reluctant-hero-type-self.  I'm sorry, but playing one of two characters is not acting.  Just because you're good looking and can memorize dialogue doesn't mean you should automatically receive the leading role in a block-buster-hit.  Ryan Reynolds, I'm talking to you.

Sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself.

As I said, Mr. Affleck typically plays one of two roles -- every time. 

Consider this, when you're depicting the Dark Knight, you're not just playing a character, but two.  Bruce Wayne, stands tall, proud.  He's audacious, and speaks in an assuaging  voice.  On the other-hand, Batman broods, skulks, and speaks in such a fashion as to get the bad-guys quavering in their boots.

Yes, it's true Mr. Affleck can play two different roles, but neither would do the caped crusader justice.

I've heard the Hollywood tripe that both Mr. Affleck and Dark Knight director, Christopher Nolan, assure fans that they know what they are doing, and that after such a disastrous flop as, Daredevil, Mr. Affleck is more selective of roles.  If that's true, than I and seven-thousand-fans-and-counting are wrong.

DC comics, Hollywood producers, dais actors, forgive my bluntness, but you are fucking up.  You struck gold with the Dark Knight Tribology.  And after sour reviews of Superman Returns (which, I actually liked), you bounced back with Man of Steel [See previous blog:  They should never make another Superman movie again...]  And now you're going to tie the two together with an entirely different Batman, and an entirely different story-line?  Really?  Unless you start with Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character being bludgeoned to death in the streets, and bring back Christian Bale (which would be an entirely different Batman movie), I don't really see this working.  Especially if this is supposed to be a Man of Steel sequel.

Please, don't ruin a good thing.

Why don't you just do what Marvel's been doing, and pave the way for a Justice League trilogy?

I remember a time when the customer was always right.

8,000-fans-and-counting disapprove of Ben Affleck taking up the cape and cowl.

I sincerely hope you Hollywood hoop-la writers know what you're doing.        

Doing Nothing

Doing nothing
Feeling nothing
bereft of maudlin curmudgeon
What is this that stands before me?
Just another canted doorway
Sighing, Perplexed and vexed
I snidely snorted
"Fuck you guys, my path is North-ways"

I had an idea
Then I lost it
Scurried off
Like lambent roaches
Spangled fears
Reluctant cheers
We've lived our lives
Counting drear

Shut up
Stop making excuses

Shut up, you
What excuses?

The ones that blind us
Like white-noise
Lulling us to sleep
Life un-enjoyed

But we're too busy
With the hurry
Hustle, bustle
Scribble, scrabble
Skitter, fritter
We forget
That blissful winter
We once enjoyed
When us childer
And un-employed

Thusly then
And only then
When the snow fell upon my up-turned face

I knew my path
And destiny

This is Hell
Don't follow me

DHS

A friend of mine was telling me about how DHS (Department of Human Services, not Department of Homeland Security; why there's two DHS's, I have no idea), was screwing her out of food-stamps.  Over the last eighteen months or so, DHS has been incorporating new rules and guidelines for those they dole out welfare-rations to.  Why they're allowed to change such rules without prior public notification is anyone's guess.  I have theories.  But sometimes silence is the best card to play.  That's a good rule for life, kids.  Allow me to elucidate.  If you had a bridge-card, you would be subjected to account reviews every six months.  This is not something DHS does, this is something they want you to do, and if you don't, you will experience a delay, or refusal (depending on their new bi-laws), of benefits.

Anyway, DHS screwed up my friend's paper-work, thereby decreasing the rate of monthly benefits from $180 to $59.

I'm not like most people.  I don't eat that much.  At most, I eat twice a day.  More than that leaves me feeling lethargic.  But to my friend, $59 doesn't last an entire month.  At most, it buys her two-weeks worth of groceries, and that's predicated on the stipulation that she only eats once a day.  Seriously, $40 buys me two weeks worth of food.  Once again, I don't eat that much.  But try living on less than $60 a month, I double-dare you.

My friend said she tried calling DHS, but the phone number never rang through.  Interesting side-note, the particular branch of social services handling her case is two counties over.  Why?  Because the government likes to make things as confusing as possible. 

So, my friend, a productive, working member of society, had her benefits cut due to a clerical error, and her case worker will not return her calls.

Perhaps, this a scenario you are all too familiar with. 

Do not distress.  There is one sure-fire way to get a DHS case-worker to call you back, 'though I only recommend it as a last resort.

About five years ago, I too applied for food-stamps.  At the time, I was working at a local sub-sandwich shop.  I won't say which, but I am a sandwich artisan.  When I was first hired, I was told by the manager, that, they thought someone was stealing, and they wanted new, trust-worthy employees.  I was hired on the spot.  Two-and-a-half months later (and before I could claim un-employment), I was fired for theft.  Apparently I was their culprit after all, though the thievery  transpired well before my employment.  I think the manager was the one to blame all along.  I, the unsuspecting patsy of corporate theft, could have fought such slanderous allegations, but fuck-it, it was Subway.  Who wants to work there for life?  Hopefully, not you.

Anyway, I too applied for food-stamps, and I too was given the run-around until the point where I wanted to just say, "The hell with it."  DHS dragged-ass on my benefits.  So, I called and left a rather nasty message, saying that I was starving and would soon resort to violent thievery.  Within twenty-four hours, my so-called-case-worker, called back with a snide retort.

He said, my benefits were disqualified because my previous employer wouldn't sign a piece of paper.  Of course, he wouldn't.  For two-straight weeks, I went in to my previous place of employment to get the boss-man to sign off on my paper-work.  But he wouldn't.  He was never there.  I left the forms.  But he never filled them out.  Why would he?  After all, I was the one he tried to frame.

In the end, I just said, "The hell with it," and got another job.  Then, I got a second job.  People, jobs are out there, they're just the ones nobody wants.  I don't know why.  The types of unemployment that seem the worst always pay the best.  I have a disgusting job, and it pays well.  Not as well as it could, but I digress.  I guess actual labor isn't worth the pay-off to some folks.

Anyway, the reason pissing off your DHS case-worker will guarantee a call-back, is because the people working there are the kind of people that love to rebuke anything you say.  Those folks are often mean-spirited and condescending.  A few years back, when me and my girlfriend started living together, her DHS case-worker wanted my personal financial information.  I wrote them a letter saying I refused to disclose any such information, because I was not the one seeking assistance.  I also wrote that, "I now consider this matter to be closed.  Any further attempt at collecting any financial or personal information will be construed as harassment, followed be legal action on my part."  Two days later the case-worker called, demanding to talk to me.  I reiterated my letter.  She said, "DHS is changing their rules.  Some people live with girlfriends, boyfriends, and baby-daddy's, trying to scam more benefits."  I held my tongue from responding to her slanderous insinuation that I was a, "baby-daddy."  Nor did I relay to her that neither me or my girlfriend had any children, nor were we planning to in the immediate future.

Yesterday, I bumped into my friend and asked if DHS had fixed her problem.  She said when she finally got ahold of her case-worker, the case-worker told her that it was not a mistake.  Her benefits had been decreased from $180 to $59 a month.  And she had to make due with that.  When she told me this, I pictured her  well-feed, government-compensated, case-worker with the receiver held up to a maniacal grin.

Sure, we're broke as hell, but do we really gotta be such assholes to each other just because the so-called-powers-that-be say it's our job?