Terminal Bar

I've been around the world since last I've been here You all look the same, but so much has changed This beer tastes so much better than before For I've been stuck in the ditch, frustrated, angry Swearing my head off and freezing my soul On an old engine seems it won't start again Picked apart by vultures, armchair critics, foes and friends Who seem to have lost the art of folly Awoken In nightmares of will, stranded By endless news of defeat While the omnipotent beat of war doesn't cease, I wonder How can we be the monsters in the shadows? I've been captured in a rank and file line Having to salute to avoid getting shot While cavorting with witches, debutants, and saints Who've sent my soul and body spinning Painfully in frightful enchantment Hurled out of my flesh, I've retreated to depths Where I've had to face myself alone In dark caverns of the helpless void Where convenient rope ladders of mediocrity Will not do Where no faint light of hope is enough To sustain the withering buds of innocence and youth It was here I had to cross the line To usher in new life, Shuddering in fear and awkward, blinding hatred For soldiers stampeding their own promised heaven Far from bliss of dew, close to hunger growling Revulsion how far From enduring solutions, sanity, or understanding? Ravaging Earth with terror Displacing babies, families, and lovers Born and unborn generations will come Bludgeoning life, spilling blood for Earth's oil Expensing forests for concrete Air and water for raping Life's force, raging, fracked, feverishly heating Oceans choking, her drying crust quakes While small and mighty minds delight In throwing stones to protect thrones Squinting from mirrors reflecting The inner light of our own short sight There cannot be a war on terror When the ultimate terror is war Nor does hatred grow from a void Innocent, we are born seeking Love, warm affection, and tender coddling Before our love becomes feared through slogans on the street Perceptions ill-conceived Imagination hammered into paths of least resistance Convenient retreats of material seclusion As tears dry from sacrificing years gone by While the big clock of human destiny Ticks in sync with our mortal heartbeats Violently seeking peace, spitefully loving Struggling to find light and potency To not hate, or act In a manner in which the means contradict the aim. Sedulously growing an independent shuffle Entwined with the dew of possible passion Horizons we may never cross but must always keep alive For futures we will never know, dependent on our hours I've been more discerning of these alleyways Challenging, not relinquishing, tough, unrewarded love Tingling and aching, feverishly aglow I feel I've been around the world one hundred times Since last I've been here with you And calm is my soul I'm ready now To embrace my imperfect mortality Seize this vital season in our history Without stampeding to the next, ignoring its effects Smelling plastic roses, fearing a phantom enemy Will jaded hearts reawaken from schemes of accepted deceit and routines of deathful living? In those caverns of the helpless void I've seen a grim face Stand between pride and a smile of grace In mirrors others help compose but cannot cross Shall we turn inside ourselves to wring the fear and hatred out Forgive the past and try again To glimpse, convey and realize the dawn and like a cocoon from which tender wings evolve Let this soulful night fade on