We sense the tension

estranged urgency---

flows through

exhausted arrogant

veins

 

flared reds

bruised blues

 

swell and ooze

into

a pool of

violent violets

beneath finger

nails.

 

Quick

we press these quivering lips to

the brink

where we drink from tainted waters

just to satisfy

a

convenient crave

(grease-gas-salt)

how is it that

still---

this existence

can taste so

BLEAK?

 

Swallow down the realization

that things have long spiraled out of control

it dwells deep,

it lingers

digestion cannot rid

it suspends fabricated dreams

that hang feebly like a hypnotizing pocket watch

                --left

                right--

human eye,     you

watch it

believe it

then reject       IT,

when that uneasy feeling begins to seep out

of  those pores

and

when the trance itself reveals

inevitable collapse.

 

Even the hypnotist,

sore jaw in all,

grinds his teeth

knowing it’s all gone too far.

 

Tension lurks,

in the brick walk ways of even

the most prestigious

universities

(blood-sweat-black)

It lurks in the pistons of publicly abused city buses.

It lurks in the grip of the working woman’s hand.

It lurks in stale narrow air between mass produced rush hour crowds of every city in America.

 

Tension lurks,

in the grim face of those iconoclasts

dry heaving

in the face of

MOTHER CULTURE.

It lurks in the hot spit of those

throwing up denial

from the back of their

(strangled)

star-spangled

throats.

 

Tension lurks,

in the arched corners of president Obama’s mouth

when he smiles,

and  lives in the plutocratic pig empires cracked marble facades.

 

We ALL know tension sir,

so

leave us here to sit on the wayside;

as you trot through centuries atop of your beaten horses.

We all are bastards in the lands of our fathers.