in the beginning

[saw]

I was a lonesome kid, sad
got slapped a lot for my transgressions
though I never knew
what I kept doing wrong

whipped pretty good
with daddy's brown belt
for being a fuck-up, he said
he'd dangle me in the air

with one hand, wail with the other
he tore my favorite shirt
the one I bought with my own money
earned from cutting grass

so I took the lawnmower gas
to the woods, struck a match
ran like a bandit to a good hiding place
the blaze made me feel alive

the flames were mine
I gave them life, I was special
I could not be ignored
god himself saw it all

he knew I had the balls
the determination, a half-baked plan
things were too green, too wet
to do any real damage

it was a token statement
a nothing of sorts, but a start

[judih]

flames born from frustration
forest understands
& abides your spark

[dadio]

Bukowski knew that kind of thing, too. Well captured.

[joel]

I grew out of trouble early—traded boys-are-boys for girly—
study took out brawl for book and shook the dual err in burly—
nothing pearly in the gates of peace, but therein yeast to grow released—
and I increased against false comments to a selfhood full of vomits,
purges of the deathly dirges, bullied bullshit 'gainst the urges I took up
to blaze like commets under peaceful Amish bonnets,
bread-and-cup and rupture in the place of rapture—
I'm the Jabberwok uncaptured, drinking beer I'm sure the tap sure'd like to drain
but I remained enlightened by the bonfire brains of poets singing tomes electric
anthrosonic gin-and-tonic and the melodies of sonnets
sung by somehow theocentric flaming tongues
till my adamah inspired tilled an Adam new, rewired,
stretched at dawn and drawn elastic— enthusiatic-&-fantastic—
nothing spastic in rejoining parts I never guessed weren't broken—
fuck you to the labels spoken, whether in- or out- my blindside
I'm not whining more my cried "Why'd you allow me not to treasure
whom you've seem'd in me to measure up a soul who's plans held power?"
Meet the joel neu-trucking-bauer. "How're you" is not the greeting
I'll extend upon our meeting—how you are is mystery equal as it is for me—
"Welcome"—period—you've come well, bienvenido, out of hell—
Nothing doing I've been choosing, but I'm loved and love's not losing, not afraid,
I grew out of trouble, made again and Love brought me to win
to death's chagrin and see me with the eyes that mattered—
came to trust the buzz that chattered
from that autumn afternoon:
fear not Love Love's coming soon.