Children of Snow

It’s been years since I’ve seen the snow
and all along what with it goes
Friends asunder disclose their ways
while chanting songs of better days
Grown up closer to the distance
understanding stories that fed us
Longing to believe it will all turn out okay,
what solace is knowing we were right anyway?

A jester and patrician
would love to live their lives together
but for magic wishing
the world is not enough

Feed through shattered glass, this too shall pass
like winds of enlightenment blowing right through me
Need the artifacts absent what was lost
Entropy conceptual belies change actual

Winter death and winter dream
both coalesce in unity
Sometimes the rusting links we pull
bear more weight than our losing loads
Complex heads make simpler plans
discordant with such harmony
Untitled odes to ghosts of old
promise remains from sea to snow

Sometimes a handshake grows into heartache
Knowing the pattern does not exempt the bearer
Some greens survive the desert through a shrouded patch of rain,
fortitude internal discovered….

A jester and patrician
would love to live their life together
but for magic wishing
the world is not enough

Brothers of never still flock together
Children of bad weather repudiate
So far our stories are writ in bone with heartbreak
When we finally move past morning we’ll allow our stones to sun-bake

Years from now a face will rise I once predicted lost to time
I know now as I did back then my sole doctrine’s ruling demise
The certainty of unpredictability sounds certainly lovely
And I’ll remember guessing forward, hoping that I’m aiming homeward

………….

I wrote this about five years ago. When I started a band, I performed it as a song–well, me and four other people performed it. But I like it just as a poem also.

Manifesto Tribute

“You’ve got to be kind”
was once writ by a great mind
I doubt he rests in peace
though in those words I believe

Reality’s more complicated–
between corrupted and complacent,
to mark the spot, the starting shot,
the race was grey, too low the pay
One to ten were the odds–
Oh fuck, I guess we lost
But the death of californication
starts a freshly balanced station

Oblivion’s a tempting treat
My misgivings won’t let me eat
For nine and twenty years I’ve fought it
The rise of every note’s revealed it
Screaming faces reveled in it
Bases dreamed now years abandoned
Bass and strings sound dear abandon
Face the speakers, ears–you’re scared to

For yesterday, we drink our poison–
come what may, we think we’re right on–
toast to memories, and dive in
Try to pray, relief’s denied us

Alive for duties far ahead,
survival strides on hard cement
To size this shoe with heart and head
will take a lifetime in the end

References:

"You've got to be kind"
--Kurt Vonnegut
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater

"The Grey Race"
--Bad Religion/Greg Graffin
song title and album title

"One time out of ten everything is perfect for us all"
--Modest Mouse/Isaac Brock
Bukowski (song)
Good News for People Who Love Bad News (album)

"We pulled the trigger but we forgot to cock
/on every single shot/oh, fuck it, I guess we lost"
--Modest Mouse/Isaac Brock
Parting of the Sensory (song)
We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank (album)

"Californication"
--Red Hot Chili Peppers/Anthony Keidis
song title and album title