I’m old and used and weathered now…
my face the inevitable story…
of staring down the seething sun…
screaming at the silent stars…
spitting at the face on the moon…
cursing the dark, crimson curtain…
that smothers my creativity…
extinguishes the fervent fire…
the flame of ingenuity…
the bolt of electricity…
the explosions of insanity…
the oceans of desire…
the torrent of immortal, unanswered questions…
I’ve come to explore and accept the challenge…
I’ve come to know, to claim my quest…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
a ragged book of storied storms…
unavoidably naked and met head on…
now written in the wrinkles of brow and frown…
all hope vanished with a wisp of hair…
nose and nostrils of absurd proportions…
pupils, lashes, singed and scathed…
creases cut from rivers of tears…
scalding winds and reason’s bitter rains…
an avalanche of arctic experience…
crevices colliding, canyons collapsing…
flesh burnt, scarred, and branded…
with the marks of tempests’ tattoos…
I’ve come to posses infinity’s purpose…
I’ve come to know, to claim my mind…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
skin stretched thin over gristle and bone…
engraved with caves and meteor rifts…
earthquake fissures and fortunes flaws…
pocked and pitted, punctured and peeled…
a map made raw by vacuous vultures…
feverishly pecking for gems and pearls…
they could not construct for themselves…
bound as they are to earth and sky…
my eyes Picasso cubes, ears Van Gogh’s painful gift…
my mouth, my lips, cracked and callused…
like the edges of perilous, steep mountain peaks…
my breath rolls down like thunderous boulders…
I’ve come to embrace my imagined misery…
I’ve come to know, to claim my heart…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
a calm countenance of passion and peace…
like worn out shoes or a rusting coffee can…
unrecognizable to the uninitiated…
the heel-clicking clowns of carefree folly…
the students of serious indifference…
now I’m invisible to predators…
now I’m avoided by pretenders…
I’m a fly on the walls of apathy…
I’m a shadow on the streets of pomposity…
I’ve achieved the freedom of obscurity…
I bathe and swim in the great oblivion…
I float and frolic on the cloud of creation…
I’ve come to spread my perforated wings…
I’ve come to know, to claim my soul…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
the boy far beyond recognition…
Sibling death and schizophrenia…
no longer my playful companions…
the obsessive tap dance discarded…
now just a common fool for love…
devoid of questions and promises…
savoring tasteless, unimportant significance…
fencing on crutches with the cold Grim Reaper…
over thin, frail, transparent ideas…
slick, shivering, sheets of ice…
a world of hellish, humorous horror…
beckoning from far below and above…
I’ve come to accept inevitable turmoil…
I’ve come to know, to claim my demons…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
bent and broken, busted up inside…
songs scattered, adrift in my veins…
like crushed, shattered, slivered glass…
once exposed to the bloated diva…
that high pitched screech from poisoned tongue…
her jealous, serpent snake, of surrealistic proportions…
her crass, coiled, comedic opera, a spitting spider’s web…
but the parts, the pieces, are all there awaiting…
the tender touch of a skilled artist’s hands, the whisper of a lonely lover…
to bind again what was once true and whole…
a treasured, translucent, thing of beauty…
a chalice never emptied but often overflowed…
I’ve come to embody eternal being…
I’ve come to know, to claim my muse…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
no wizard’s spell can revive my youth…
no preacher’s prayer can remove my pathos…
no doctors cure can diminish my manic obsessions…
no drugs can quell my perpetual panic…
I’ve given myself to the will of existence…
surrendered to the whims of accidents and chaos…
I have no desire to dodge the inevitable…
I refuse to seek shelter or hide from fortuity…
throw the crooked loaded dice…
calculated circumstance and chance be damned…
I no longer fear the unknowable…
I prefer to wrestle with the now and the known…
I’ve come to win, lose or draw, king, pawn, beggar or thief…
I’ve come to know, to claim my dream…
I’m old and used and weathered now…
I dare not complain nor curse my fate…
even the highest, majestic mountain…
erodes and makes its way, to valley and to shore…
roses wilt, ancient redwoods fall…
nothing escapes the dust of death…
the cruel and frigid universal law…
tramples all and every living thing…
beneath its ever expanding destiny…
and I am left only, with memories of you…
a fragrant flower in a field of weeds…
on a weary, winding, unmarked road…
with miles and miles of nothing…
I’ve come to strangle that fallacious truth…
I’ve come to know, to claim my love…
End.
© Billy Batson, Saber-Tooth Poems.
