Birth waltz

We with pickled eyes
Chew bits of fetid candy in fields
of darkness; pulsating fervor
Staunch shame melting from once-stoic
bodies, now formless, now fearless
Now the end result of man
A being existent in one segment of time
A being at odds with the past and the future
With anxiety, depression, and racks
of medicine cabinet wives' tales
We the oracles of truth
expired crates of vermouth dribbling
From concussed temples
Dilated pupils entombed in casks
Of filtered spirits, ales, and vodkas
Liquored neurons and flickering tempers
An elegy, then, for our forgotten friends
Who dipped off the path of excellence
Who were trucked off in wheelbarrows
For dissension, for clamoring to walk outdoors
For more than they could bargain for
Those husky, vibrato aspirants
Shout down your terrors, crunch them
into Pandora's box, organize your anathema
So that one day we can arrange your doom
And all chains, all histories writ large on LCD screens
Will wither away in the phoenix flame
The flame of new - that irresistible itch
We the scratchers of an age
Whose lives are broad, uninspired strokes
punctuated my moments of intense, sensual violence
will antagonize and pester until the old
bleeds, and we will watch mercilessly
As sand passes through sieve
And the chessboard empties;
We hunger for the perpetual game