The Briar Fields: Heretic

Heretic


Outside a house of broken clocks
I wept upon the fishing docks
My hands filled with her raven locks
I threw her letters to the foaming rocks
And the sailors told me to come up to the house
Where I could find… some kind of redemption
Or was it suspension?

The geometry of scar tissue exhaust
Seen through the eyes of Sunday’s loss
Up in sky of charred dead moss
Over the stump that was his cross
Where the followers they string… up their lights
Saying that he needs your money…
With their grins all sunny

The un-living march in a single row
To the top of the concrete plateau
Where the reason is "I told you so"
And death to all who would say no
Cause interpretation is what shapes... the world
So our souls, they must be broken…
In the poisons soaking

On a mailbox waiting for an olive branch
We watch them leave the TV ranch
There eyes abandoned in a trance
Their skin so impossibly blanch
I don’t know how they’re... still alive
When there is no life inside them…
Oh, where is it hiding?

I can’t be your gay bird on a wire
I’d sell my soul wrapped in satire
And in the street, set it afire
Preaching before a broke down choir
Of all these lies... that keep holding us down
Tossing pamphlets like wind horses…
Against the armed forces

I’m just not one to jump off cliffs
Serenaded by their forked tongue riffs
Composing economic myths
Till all there is is working shifts
And time becomes... an orphaned child
Nobody will embrace him…
Or even face him

Crawling through the holes of sunken ships
For the promise of forbidden lips
Rewarded only with electric whips
Feel my youthful soul slowly eclipse
Collapsed... upon a crippled pier alone
Longing for the sun to slay me…
But nothing obeys me

***

An empress of the city lights
Appeared before me with a kite
That burned up in the inky night
Devouring stars, filling my sight
She said, “I know... a place where you might find
All that so long you’ve been seeking…”
Through the floorboards, peeking

Through the grassy hills she lead the way
To the belly of a lost highway
Where the driftwood children dance and sway
And eternity was on display
She said, “Now... take off all of your clothes
And climb up the heat lightning…”
In the highway striking

I climbed and climbed to the very top
To find a bucket and a mop
And a man wearing old tire flops
Who insisted that I call him pop
And forget all... of these silly things
For I was only meant to serve him…
But I don’t deserve him

I climbed back down, a bitter mute
Her beauty’s power had become dilute
She’d crashed her kite into a roof
And spoiled all her youthful fruit
In my rage... I would have scorned her then
Had the Mack truck not approached us…
And so rudely encroached on us

I feel the icy fire within my fists
Like kudzu vines inside my wrists
Creeping up my arms – I can’t resist
And the laughter in my skull persists
Mistaking heaven... for the E.R. room
As the I.V. was inserted…
And my mind averted

The headlight lances pierced my eyes
She planted her feet and spread her thighs
It took me days to realize
Her existence was now fossilized
In my dreams... she’s lying in that ditch
Making love to the reaper…
So happy to meet her

Now I want to turn this madness off
I’m flailing like a one-wing-moth
Force-fed from the lobotomy trough
I turn the other cheek and cough
People see me... and ask, “what’s wrong with him?”
“Oh nothing, he just needs your money…”
Well, it isn’t funny