Ribbons calling against the wind,
stronger than our fences.
   Ribbons crawling to our feet
speak of our potential--
   They break our defenses

Oh Lord, Take my Potential
And do with it what you will
For I squander opportunity
And fear I always will

I seek to love and honor you
And some days find my way
Yet the next will find me wanting
As myself do I betray

I seek to know and understand
The purpose I am serving
The thing that I most fear
Is that you find me undeserving

So I study and I scramble
For the tiniest attainment
And take solace in the truth
I am providing entertainment

1999

I suppose this lump of clay is just fine the way it is.
Well, honestly, who am I to try to change it?
I know full well the labor that went into making it
The workforce that mined out the sediments from the soil
The minds that designed that perfect consistency
The psychologists and graphic designers that boggled the package to life
The mouths their incomes feed.
The leftover money spent on beer and records to listen to with friends
Yes, that would be preposterous of me to sully their memory by shifting even a single atom.
I’ll place this lump next to the other lumps limping, exhausted on that dusty shelf.
Their lumpy memories will lump onto me. and I’ll take their non-utilized weight with me wherever I travel.
They are precious. More so than diamonds.
**** it, my niece wants dragons.

We all go around the day,
We are all on our way,
Some are to work,
Some are to school,
We are all part of a bigger picture;

I’m just a fragment,
And you are so too,
Our lives are together,
A part of the matter;

We have been taught,
Alone we are worthless,
We have been moulded,
To fit into the system,
But this is no way,
To reach our full potential;

This is a prison,
Guarded by bureaucracy,
And funded by those in power,
We gave up our freedom,
For a little bit of money;

Guess it means nothing
95 or not
Drop out
Drag on
**** up

I hate this potential
Nervous burns wander my skin
Reciting old poetry

Expect nothing
I keep saying
Expect nothing

Remember the morning after
How we bathed in cypress
So we’d live forever?

I talked circles round your neck
And settled in the empty space your body left

Feral mood swings give the elastic momentum to soar from the dark dredges,
As it was previously unthinkable.
From the glorious misanthropic lows, to a euphoric revelry or youth.

These golden days are replete with vicious change,
The growth plates of potential prosperity ease close with a snide unforgiving sentiment.
The bright orifices of the sky plunge into obscurity,
Only the imprints leave us dazzled, thinking the dream still holds an office.

But the endless chapters are truncated,
until the only thing left is the devil's ****, or his charity.
Bubbling youth to grim compliance.

"You need to let yourself lose some sometimes"
He stated, perusing the chess board.
'There must be a way to save them all'
I had thought,
As though it were God's logic puzzle
And I was going for bonus points.

And now I see
Vulnerability is just one of the pieces
There is happiness in sorrow,
In loss, misfortune;
My high score is simply living.

I could close that door
Sheltered by white
I could dream of the potential

I could knock it off its hinges
Splash a rainbow
Risk the dusty wind howling in
To spoil - to alter -
My masterpiece.

Sometimes we have to dare to live.