Caught in the loop and around again. Come up for air, then it’s down again, drowning again. I see his mind, it’s spinning, revolver. Metallic light of a betrayed lover. He only hears the voices that call him. Shutters out any other before him. A vacant stare and a shadow figure. He does not notice his hand on the trigger. Watch a bullet bend through the barrel and a shell to the floor. Illusion… Sunflower dresses and brunette tresses, my love. What use is the earth when our place is so clearly up above? You took my hand and melted away my apprehension. But when I saw you that night, I realized you were just my invention. But it was alright, I was lost inside myself. Kept you there behind the veil where we could hide, and the song was the only thing left behind. I thought you could see me, I thought you were a true friend. But you asked for my trust and then for my eyes, and I should’ve known then that anger, that power, that lust drove your every word. But I was stripped bare so I listened and twisted everything that I heard. But it was alright, I was locked inside that cell. Because you said it with your life everything I was trying to articulate, it leaves no room for debate so I’ll go with you. Because we built this place where right now the Human Beings are singing out, it leaves no room for doubt so it must be true. Because we made a vow to eradicate from the world this misery, rather than wait for eternity we’ll follow through. Caught in the loop and around again.

Twenty-four hour news to keep you amused, if you look away, you’re gonna lose what the man in the pressed suit has to say. He doesn’t need to wear a mask, or hide his grin when he feeds you facts, he’s paid to show his addictions bright as day. Yeah, ‘cause everybody’s looking through his two-way mirror. She looks at you through thick concealer, but you can’t touch her, hold her, feel her. Click the page, though, you can possess her with your mind. Aphrodite and the Playboy Bunny, “What is love babe? “It’s only money. Now take me home, I’m so lonely, honey.” Everyone is looking through her two-way mirror. Walking the streets with heads down. Ears caving in so they don’t hear a sound. If the whole world erupted would they feel the ground? Or would they still be watching those screens? Trying to get with the scene? Likes and views and a book of faces, ghosts in imaginary places. Is that you or just the noose you’ve tied? Information and surveillance, now here’s your bill for the monthly payment. Is it trust or just some foolish pride? Is it true you prefer the lie? Everyone is looking through, they see themselves, they don’t see you, so I guess it comes as no surprise, that everyone is looking through that two-way mirror, but there’s no one on the other side.

There’s a twisted instinct written on my brain. I can smell your flesh and blood, wonder if it’s the same for you. So addicted to the sensation, sometimes I’ve gotta put my own self out. But then we’re inundated with it, so elated in it, that if I’m being honest about, I wanna tear you apart and open you up. Why does this violence in me feel so much like love? I want to tear you apart and feel myself sinking in until we’re both complete and the blood from our teeth is dripping. Do I want it for the wrong reasons? Am I supposed to deny myself? Tyger, tyger burning bright, what could feed your appetite when your orange stripes were made from the flames of hell? Well, it’s no different when I’m loving you, returning to something primal again with my heart and my knife holding on for dear life, is this the animal or is this the man, when….

Baby, I’m the white man and I just don’t give a damn. I killed your people and took the land. And it’s all going according to plan. Why was I born with this curse? If nothing else, let’s not sugarcoat. I’m the one that put you on that boat. I’m the one that locked your chains. I’m the one that gave you that name. It’s so simple, don’t you see? Run it through my ancestry. Oh God, I’ve got to feed the need, Anger, Foolishness, and Greed. And if you think that memory is faded, then I doubt you’re the one I’m denigrating, for this denial and self-hatred, is everything I created. Good luck getting me to understand why I can’t wash this blood from my hands. You know I wrote that constitution, the so-called American revolution. All are equal in the eyes of God; just ask the slaves in my backyard. Too bad you can’t just wish it away. A few generations cannot escape being founded on murder, torture, and rape. That’s what made your country great. See, privilege isn’t just what you’ve got, or not getting popped when you’re stopped by a cop. The difference is, who advances the plot? You have to do it, and I can simply not, because… I don’t sing the blues for what I lose. That’s just a song I stole that I call rock n’ roll. Circling your culture like a vulture. Ever since the beginning of time, I’ve been keeping down the womankind. Must be some inferiority that I need someone to belong to me. Come here, girl, won’t you be my object. I’ll dress you up for my pet project. Keep you deprived so that you need me, smile and sex and clean and feed me. So twisted in my sense of worth, my very concept of life perverts when I can’t love the ones that gave me birth, what you think I’m gonna do to Mother Earth? Watch you strip so you can earn my big tip. You think that disrespect does not connect? It’s like when I kill the soil to drill for the oil. You can’t circumvent cause and effect. Columbus would’ve been better shipwrecked. The land and the leaders and the people reflect the history so what did you really expect? White Man’s Burden and the Trail of Tears. Round ‘em up with the gays and queers. Multiply that by five hundred years and you’re left with the sound ringing in your ears; the sound of two atomic bombs, the sound of napalm in Vietnam, of every usurped government gone wrong and the refugee asking you where you’re from, tell ‘em…. I put the white in the Red, White, and Blue. If you’re not careful you might become one too. So what’s the oppressor’s dog in this fight? Like, I hear him, but this man is still white, and you’re right, but this song is all I have left. I’m hollowed out, spiritually bereft. Look in my eyes, I’m trying to get back my soul. Check my pulse, I want to make my heart full. Observe my mind, I’m trying to regain control. It’s gonna take a long time to get back what I stole. Quicksand, falling fast. Look at where you’re at if you want to know the past. The last will be first and the first will be last, but I can’t remember now, who said that? It’s the only way to save the nation, revolutionize the education, so every white kid from preschool to college can grow up to truly acknowledge… The whole foundation was built on sand. A cracker is because he’s bland. Oh please, don’t let this be who I am. Baby, I’m the white man. Why was I born with this curse?

People trying to live their very best lives. People searching for love with their eyes. Yearning for someone to look back at them in some special way. Might make a real good story with one of them some day. People pushing their weight against the plow. People who see what’s in front of them right now. Hands in the earth with a wish to make something grow. Filled to the brim with reasons they don’t need to know. People and all their ingenious ways just for the sake of passing away the days, out on the porch swings on nights as calm as a tomb, through seasons beneath the restful gaze of the moon. Children with their effervescent blood. Children who romp through the rain and the mud. No need to think a second about what they do. You might remember the way it was if you really wanted to.

Honey Gold and Gina Valentina, stir ‘em with your coke spoon, it makes the taste sweeter when you come through that door, electroshock therapy, Le Petit Mort. The Little Death from which you were created is now what’s got you feeling sedated and depleted when just a moment before it was everything you needed, to release it. Oh, and then it’s gone… until it just reforms again. You know what it’s like, how it just kind of tires you out. How it just kind of puts that fire out. I don’t even really need to tell you, when that external stimuli fades. Call me Ishmael when I inhale, set sail, with my harpoon trained on that white whale. Pulled into my lungs and now I’m zonin’. Bring the onrush of dopamine and serotonin. The chemical reaction. An artificial link for an inch of satisfaction. Oh baby, you’ve unlocked your mind. But you know it’s gonna ask a little more from you next time. Dionysus, even words of praise fall from your vine and make sleep for days. The lotus eater lost in space. What if I just close my eyes and never wake?