Insanity
Shattered dreams strung wearily on wire. Tattering.
A cold wind blows.
Fear thrusts rudely through tearing segments shimmering
of blood red rose.
Pain walks the highways dropping missives glimmering.
The body curls.
Sleek images of time run past, mellow the abandoning,
the mind unfurls.
Flashes, goring slashes, lightning streaks and smearing.
Eyes to betray.
Wetness paces dearly along the surface steadily tearing.
Misbegotten stay.
Thoughts plunge steeply to lay waiting, reckoning,
sharp and severe,
abandoned to surreal images and broken beckoning.
No one to hear.
A dark gray river courses mighty with hard grasping,
its current strong.
Cuts the land deeply, with no regret, sets a hasping.
Locked to belong.
A day is a curling ribbon, its ends met to joining,
shallowing dull.
Full of meaningless noise and action, stay not purloining,
so pitiful.
What fancies stream their knotted strings to straining
against the center?
Illusion casts it net high, tangled skein to reining
a broken mentor.
Sound breaks through the silent membranes bracing
a hot brightening.
Touch the head hanging empty, stroke the facing.
sudden frightening.
Messages deftly slip to ordered place, selecting
to view every frame.
Carefully walk reality's floor to bold resetting,
I am again sane.
� 1999 DPMcClellan
Arch 3/12/00
Mania
My fingers are numbing with cold prickles that turn hot.
My elbows are tightly cramped.
I can't raise my arms,
I'm stifling.
My body feels free of any things that are not
clean. And no final restraint
holding me to earth.
I'm freeing.
My thoughts sucked down to a maelstrom,wrought
spinning, scattered, strong.
I learn a second.
I'm leaving.
I can't stand still. This is mortally confusing.
My eyes learn more quickly
than my dull body.
I'm breathing.
That seems incongruous as my bones float loosely
in their fleshy sheath. I
don't care what.
I'm lying.
I close my fists hard against my ears to shut
it out, the many voices,
the raucous calls,
I'm hearing.
Why is everyone after me, I've done no wrong.
I can't help what I am,
so powerful,
I'm changing.
I can talk to nature as a whole and understand
her words and she will
do my bidding.
I'm laughing.
The TV and the radio, all channels talk to me,
all messages aimed at me,
alone just me.
I'm sweating.
Colors blend together and have a golden sheen.
I sit in a darkened room.
Escape the light.
I'm fearing.
I don't want my brain operated on, don't want
to hurt anybody with
with my powers.
I'm crying.
I lay back on the floor, my thoughts racing,
messages flooding my head
I am lost now.
I go.
� 1999 DPMcClellan
Arch 3/12/00
To Sanity's End
Save me, oh God save myself.
The emptiness comes crushing down
the failing, bitter rushing sound.
Don't fail me, oh Lord don't hail me.
My hackles raise with pimpled flesh
congealed into electric mesh.
The time is coming when I can't even see
the measure stark beneath a rolling free,
a losing sensation, no sanity,
a gross complected vanity.
Hold me, please now, just hold me.
I can not pass the great divide,
I want to run, in shadow hide.
Don't call me, God damn, don't fall me,
when blackness breaks with lightning jags,
when conscience seeks the mind that lags.
I do not know wherever I have gone, seen
in confusion weaves a staring skein,
and passion scores a lacking, lean
thoughts running fast, forever mean.
Pray me, God take it, pray me.
The devil sits in judgement glad
no belief a daring had.
Find me, please dear, just find me.
A struggle hard in a world estranged,
they call me names, to me deranged.
I can not grasp the meaning of the speech.
Desperation holds a fattening leach,
confusion a bed of nails, beseech.
I stand just outside the sparing reach.
Call me, oh Lord now call me.
The anguish I bear in my soul,
with havoc wreaks a heavy toll.
Face me, bastard, you face me,
meet the horror in disguise,
playing to be mortal wise.
I must not challenge, ride the boar,
a lipping, dragging hurry whore,
a pulsing, dripping fester sore.
I will drive the stake to the shore.
Love me, please help and love me.
The crumbling segments all in stepped
sequence with a rhythm kept.
Goodbye me, no don't you goodbye me.
I'll raise up through the bloody walls,
I'll fold detachment to the smalls.
And when I see your face I must know
what shall I reap if what is that you sew,
the ashes driven deep in fallen snow,
the battle won, myself the fallen foe.
Never again shall I see
the lights are on, eternity.
� 1999 DPMcClellan
Arch 4/21/00
Hell's Gate
The black harbinger tells anguished tales of ebony twisting,
in sharp and jagged misery midnight's sending plummeting,
in darkening abyss lays the tormented fermenting spoils,
to languish unspoken with maniacal laughter coaling oils.
Nightmarish phantoms lay spiderish webbings to snaring,
slimish stickings smear to stain bloody drippings, tearing
slitting gashes, crimson rippings, bleak demented rambling,
shame the lost scavengers picking bones torn,shambling.
Ragged screaming rends nerves wrenched to maiming,
scarlet stabbings, agony's mewlings, wretched blaming.
Tortured mutterings slithering, nesting, striking garish
phantasms coiling, tangling, mingling nightmarish.
The soul stops short, the thick thorned gates rise high,
opened to foul depths sinking below death's ocean, die
to enter, but last hope is lost, of love no dying final lore,
the wailing keening strains the life fabric, failing lethal whore.
� 1999 DPMcClellan
Arch 4/21/00
Paranoid
There are people in my life, too many people, they
are checking up on me. They have a stealthy way
to talk with each, other and they will not let me in.
It seems a game, a lousy game that they try to win.
Secrets, they have secrets, they silently confide.
They scurry right to left, step from out to inside.
They take some of my thoughts and carry them away
to scheme and plan to capture me, to make me stay.
They walk around me, eyes cast down, around
my feet. My body carries me to find the ground
that I can hold against attack. They will not find
a helpless sod. I will defend, fight for my mind.
Today the sun shines brightly, I sit in darkened room.
They move without shadows, they are coming soon.
I am ready with cold steel barrel pressed so tight
against my forehead. I will escape to the ever night.
� 1999 DPMcClellan
Arch 4/21/00
Serious
There's a pistol in his closet. I know he keeps it there.
And oily brass bullets, sharp points for me.
I bet it could really just tear
a hole right in his brain.
Should kill me.
I can put a finger on my eyelid and press for a big red spot
till it hurts and keeps on hurting. Big deal.
I can go, boy, and never stop.
Even when he cuts it
with the buckle.
But later is best, in my bed, 'cause I feel funny down there.
I can touch it and rub it and it feels good.
I know it's wrong. Who cares?
Bad, I'm damn bad.
Honest, wrong.
I think about it a lot, just leaving. I want to make him proud.
But there's no way. I could go and freeze.
Then, I'd be warm. Not too loud.
He'd be sorry then.
Couldn't get me.
I dream about flying, but I don't have my pants. I always fall
into black mud and drown, gets in my mouth.
He stands on the ground tall,
yells at me to swim.
I don't want to.
Boy, it would be so peaceful to be dead. Then I wouldn't be
mad at myself. I can't do it right, not never.
I got a knife last night and I
cut myself. Mama
gave me bandaid.
He's home again. He's always here at night. Sounds mad.
Something at the office. He's got a big belt.
Maybe a slap. I doubt that.
He pays attention
to me. Serious.
� 2000 DPMcClellan
Arch 4/21/00
And She Was Who?
She swipes at the water ring with her drink hand,
wetting her sleeve, only making a wet smear
on the polished mahogany low gleaming in the
bar light. She rubs the side of her palm, leer
crawling her face, she stains her skirt, fear.
Emptiness is rotting seeping
to eat away softness, keeping.
Her scotch on the rocks is golden, smoky taste
complimenting her menthol cigarette curling
smoke ringing around orange fingers, ash
speckling the air as it moves to lips sterling
in Cover Girl gloss and pursed to unfurling.
Sex is not a thing clearly,
but passion noted dearly.
Thighs, heavy from misuse in TV land and late
night movie romance, are covered tightly, black
swath stretched to hint the vee rounding down.
Her blouse bulges, low neckline pressing back
to tawdry show, nipples piercing fabric lack.
To paint one's own flesh smacks
of back alley whores, the knacks.
High heels spiked to three inches raise calfs
lined in tan-colored nylon to show the shape, hide
varicose veining sprung by hours standing in
repetition assembling, a good wage paid, lied
about her name. Her father should turn his pride.
The old man spit his foul reproach,
lacking means a bitter approach.
Her hair curled medium with frost highlights blue
in a cloud of smoke. Daddy would drop his linen
as she slowly crosses her legs and kicks the
dark wood with pointed toe. He comes too then,
reaching to his groin, pressing her head to the men.
Her fantasy lives, wondering nightmares,
orgasm in bondage, of slipping awares.
She slaps her hand on the bar, cries "Nurse" to
the smoky haze flickering with the Budweiser sign,
pulls a wrinkled ten from the rumpled pile she
has made, brushing change to fall at her feet. �Line
them up boys, I will drink them all and screw the fine.�
Oh, to get that buzz, an assuring sting
of whiskey, dark wood aged the thing.
A man approaches, not weaving, blurring into pictures
of Robert, damn his rotten soul, still able to call hither
her heart on a string to swing and snap in gales, storms,
to a sudden deadening. His touch molten fire to wither
with icy disregard. She stubs her cigarette with a shiver.
And waits with clamped lips wet
for a fire that comes in pirouette.
The man is talking, what about is not clear, not important.
He smells of the Jack Daniels he swings, and it slops
to splash the blotched linoleum. His voice rises high
in laughter, jiggling his belly against jutting button stops.
His aftershave is Old Spice, his shoes patent leather tops.
His brown suit is rumpled, tie
askew with crazy patched dye.
He reaches in to take her arm and squeezes. She presses
with her breast and watches his face light with knowing.
He moves closer, bourbon mask breathing her air, her
life. She leans back slowly with an accidental flowing
of her tongue past lips she knows he will think showing.
The great tease is on, flirting
with the prize a sex asserting.
"See Mother, my darling, how your bad girl takes away
all the men, even your own? Beat me, for I am shame,
dirt, and sluttish. I am special to him, and I am wrong."
She nods sharply, listening to the buzzing stops, came
to halt as Mother leaves her head, that monster tame.
She tastes a pang, a grim emoting.
She is Mother, longing, floating.
The man leans to whisper in her ear, she can not hear,
it doesn't make a difference. She rears and slaps hard,
lashing a red splash above his jaw. He jerks, disbelief
written in his muddy features. She peels a laugh guard,
curls her arms around her chest, a B-film she has starred.
He lurches away, she counts each step
a grim tribute to how far she has leapt.
"Brang s'another bartendur." One more for the road, the
night is late and creeping down her spine with pain, told
of old injury. A fall her uncle said, just sixteen sweet to
groping hands at the top of the stairs, a story to her old,
yet new in the visage. Prince Charming of darker gold.
Rape is just a word, but the shame
holds fast to her, she is to blame.
She finishes her drink alone, in gathering silence as
the barroom empties, people going home to sleep
with nested loved ones. She will slide into the
emptiness where she resides, a lonely barren keep.
Blare tinny music from a box, company in night deep.
She cannot stay here, where comfort lies,
but must go to that place, of shifting ties.
She calls her goodnights, for she will be back tomorrow,
and the day after that, and...she steps into the black street,
slick with misting rain. A squealing lands mountains against
her thighs, shocking her in flight plunging her face into sheet
glass spider-cracking. She knows nothing, but lays in defeat.
A man leaves the car, steady prowl
to bend and lift her skirt, sirens howl.
� 1999 DPMcClellan
Arch 4/21/00
Take the Gets
Mama cried in the kitchen
he Flew
blasted sin's reverie
came spiked mountain peaking,
Crushing mean he tiled Too
spit crashing gripping
Tears, tapping to concept
Protect.
Father growled striking carpet
Stiff.
Looked. At him. As he
bolted teeth to hiss
Not. Me. The Edge
caught his glaring. Pain stepped
to kiss. In the eye. Tacking
him, to ground. In the corner.
His head rapped plaster pits
pop, pop, pop
castrating. Rancor.
Points. Papa target.
Away Spirited ghost
tallies. Score.
Told the totals...Grin violent
Taxed Attention, Busting
Capitulation.
Slow, now, Daddy's ticking.
Mom gets the slow apology.
Peaceful rains plop, plop.
He Covets crimson brackish, tastes sweet
Victory. Too Cool. Beating.
The MAN. Paternal Tiny tinker Toy, yesss.
Dreams. Pick another
Battle. Time Tomorrow. Heal to
Take the Gets.
Stinking Love.
Feeling Shade.
Creeps Counter.
Crawl the Keep.
Curl the Cukoo.
Watch out.
OUT.
� 2000 DPMcClellan
Arch 7/7/00
Long to End
He laughs when I miss the ball, and rants
about my grades in school. I won't, can't.
Still makes me go to practice on my bike.
It's a long way with a whipping that I like.
I imagine I am tied up, bare with prickly ropes
bunching in my crotch. I got the monkey mopes.
My dreams are filled with water, crashing in the air.
I can taste the rusty salt, see the bloody stare.
I dig myself a hole and put the covers on.
He thunders on my head. I gotta mow the lawn.
Or, he'll get me, then pet me
with reasons, he seasons
the making, and slaking
the hard hand. I can't stand.
Maybe when I drift away, on the monster's back.
Maybe when the night is cold and the blankets stacked.
I feel like puking
with all that rooting
in my brain
It drains.
Please be with me Mr. Sparkle, we can take a walk
in the flowered meadows and we can talk and talk.
I must be somebody else,
'cause its never felt
so strong, I long
to end.
� 2000 DPMcClellan
Arch 7/7/00
All the Different Pieces
I struggle with the hands of the clock,
their moving ticks have no substance
to partake, that I can grasp with a hand
dry of the oils of labor, or sweat of effort.
The fingers move in jerks of afterthought,
the palm a center of union for just that.
The combination required of grip brings the pull
of the forearm to play a jig of rods with no
tune or melody to pass along. The arm
swings under a frosted winter tree
and yet the sun shines so sweetly
on the surface of my many things. Yes,
the thrumming throats existence as sure
as the rock of my refinement.
What is a man, except to know that he is here?
Is pain, with the sureness of a soft underbelly,
some proof of sensitivity, of a deeper meaning
than his raw understanding of what is God?
The brain is a network of electrical messages
and memories flavored with feelings of the moment
built to emotions with wasteful experience.
I step with my bold presence, but have yet
to envision this portal of magic. A farmer's
tale is sweeter with the telling, than the fact.
To prejudice my being is the toil of many,
but to no avail. I will find the answers when I need
them only. I live as no one other has,
with no question that burns, no wondering meaning.
They will end me in my pursuit of reason, fact
being strong warrant of my demise. The truth
has no useful purpose, except when to prove
a point of deception, or influence another will.
But I can stand, and move, and grasp a hand,
talk, not yet blink my eyes, so I want no tears.
I am a toy that learns so fast I will be over before
I can be the danger the weapons masters say
I will become. I have no malice or anger here,
this is not a place to live, but to suffer through,
and carefully wrap away the small good things you find.
Like a child with a candy cane that lasts for ten minutes,
or the giving food to the hungry who will hunger again.
I will go to scrap and parts, and be named success.
� 2000 DPMcClellan
Arch 7/7/00
It's Not Over
The wolf slavers sliming shattered cliff spikes
black buzzards tear grisly cuts, curdled brains
gouging ant stingers poison
acid smells acrid, bitter shrieks
taste a fouling. Sweaty petting leg sticks, spittle
slakes intrusions delusion gashing bites
chunks raw gristly splinter bones white. Gashes
putrid sallow mouth-slit worms burrow
burning holes collapsing
concept cackles.
Echoes scream bashing skull-mind ramming
flashes blistering black oblivion creeps, leaks crap dripping
stalks lost spackles spurting spew
molding sacks suck tainted air.
Taunting tacks
razors.
Captured fry
thoughts shocked
cold cats claws ripping
shreds abominations frozen
jagged shard cracks molten breaks.
Pits suck blood vomit scrapping to stay.
Light burns eyes surfacing searching reference.
chills shake skin clammy. Stink drips in two nostrils.
Blood throbs temples swelling down, downing hisses hush.
Breathe. Breathe.
Colored images blink.
Crimson flows streaming.
Drumming thumps faster dark.
Teeth grind gritty gaps clutching fit
Came coughs cake rending splits aches
spinning sick tatters take tortures splat rack. *BITCH...
� 2000 DPMcClellan
Arch 7/7/00