CliffSongs

  The NRA Anthem (As sung by Ted Cruz and Lauren Boebert)   Now children hear us, the NRA preachers, There’s a solution for leftist creatures, We can’t let them advance all their features, What happens when we start arming groomer teachers?   Lefty won’t let you protect you and yours, He would have all of us down on all fours, Let’s help him fill up the seat of his drawers, AR15’s on all shelves in all stores!   Buy a gun, It’s the American way! Buy a gun, Blow the bad guys away! Buy one and be sure That your home is secure, Buy a gun, Then another today!   These communist, fascist, socialist thugs, (Buy a gun) They want to replace us, these leftist slugs. (Buy a gun) They’re all pedo-groomers, they’re all on the drugs! (Buy a gun) It’s time to wipe that smirk off their self-righteous mugs!   BUY A GUN, And help fight off inflation! BUY A GUN, Reduce the population! When demand goes bye-bye, ...

  Midnight At Club Q   It happened again, it happened in Club Q. Just a place in Colorado Springs, something to do. A Saturday night that most would survive, A Saturday night that claimed the lives of five.   A long rifle blazes, an AR15 style, A 22-year-old gunman, what has caused his rile? What is the motive, were they people he knew? Or was it religious fervor, hatred of LGBTQ?     No one should have to die because of who they dance with, No one should have to die because of who they kiss. No one should have to die because of who attracts them, No one should have to die for reasons like this, But they do. And they have. And they do.   A nightclub where they felt home, it was their safe space, Now a killing floor, it is forever defaced. What makes a man so disrespectful of any life, what makes him kill? When do we stop the slaughter, it is on all of us now, this ill.   No one should have to die beca...

  O Caffeine!       O Caffeine! Thy stimulative properties evade me as the slug evades the pillar of salt. Have we not been friends? Have we not shared many hours of drudgery? Fail me not! My motivation comes from thee; Fill me once again with thy falsely promoted energy levels. O Caffeine! Thou art my bladder filling companion. Raise my consciousness temporarily as you once did. Wasn't that yesterday?   Cliff Lake​ 5/3/2015 Sometime in the early afternoon. Copyright © Clifford Lake 2015

  Rosie   She stood in front of me wearing a molten dress. My tongue was all tangled up; I remember sayin’ some mess. She put her hand on my shoulder, pointed me at the door, Said, “Less’n you have your own money, don’t come around here anymore.”   I went out and found some shitty work the very next day. Showed up on her doorstep with a pocket full of pay. She was just steppin’ out with some dude big as a bear, Said, “Less’n you can drive me downtown, you ain’t gettin’ anywhere.”   Why you treat me so harsh, Rosie dear? I thought I made my intentions perfectly clear. I’m not tryin’ to make you all mine, I’m just tryin’ to get me some time.   I came around again some time the next week. That big bear dude put a knot on my beak. Rosie looked at me with my back on the ground, Said, “Less’n you learn to keep your feet, you’re gonna always be down.”   Chorus, repeats…   Cliff Lake 4/3/19      Co...

  Leaf   She never knows just how to say goodbye. She just knows she needs to feel a different sun. She still won’t be able to give a reason why, She just knows when it is over and done.   Chorus: She’s just got to fly, fly, fly! No looking back, Not even in some far-off by and by. This is the way that she can simplify… And you can’t blame her – she’s too good for that.   (Jam)   She travels light; nothing to tie her down. Like a leaf in autumn she just breezes on. No destination; just some other town, But she’s left a mark and you wear it like a crown.   ( Chorus, jam. Possible slow outro)   Cliff Lake 4/2/19 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2019

  Sailor   I run through my emotions as a ship in a hurricane, Blown on winds bought with my trust. Sailing seas of passion squandered in familiar port, I am ungrounded.   Gulls screech above and around me; Their petty screams grate temporary woe. Pitching and yawing my way through each day, Nights storm blackly.   Rest is come from busy distraction- Idleness rocks this vessel in a prisoned tempest. The mind and the heart wrangle in furious opposition, I am cycloned.   The sky above is the wrack and wreck of karma unabated, I am and have been my own cause. The sea below is contemptuous of travel. I sail on.   Cliff Lake 12/26/2014 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2014

  See Don Run; Run Don, Run   Now see here Orange, there may be a reason that shirt collar feels a little tight: It’s not just hamburger weight, looks like someone may have you in their sights. Oh, I know, you think it’s the holidays and no garland can hang you now, Looks like Justice has taken the blindfold off; she’s coming for you and how. And if you’re thinking that the counsel ain’t that special and your future still is vague, Let me point out that this motherfucker coming at you is coming straight from the Hague. Post one up again on Troth Senchal, give us one or two more cents, Let it all hang out babe, you’re just providing more evidence. Where’s your Hannity now? Where’s your Murdoch when you need him? This is what happens when you put up shitty candidates now, the Repubs know you can no longer feed ‘em. Think you can hide behind a presidential campaign? Think you will continue to get by on rallies where all you do is complain? The glory da...

  True Dream   I had the dream about The Machine again. The Machine is both artificial and alive. The Machine is insatiable and invisible. The Machine is bloodless and bloody. The Machine is corrupted and corrosive. The Machine is everywhere. The Machine lights the night sky in lurid yellow, In fire and flash, in neon and in naked violences of artificiality. The Machine is in your living room screaming: “PRODUCT! PRODUCT! PRODUCT!” The Machine pacifies you with this lullaby, “PRODUCT! PRODUCT! PRODUCT!” Have you bought? Will you buy? The Machine has eaten you. The Machine has eaten me. Hear it thump and roar! It is outside your window. It is under your bed. The Machine feeds you, Most of us get just enough to wake up tomorrow, To stoke The Machine again. To buy PRODUCT. To be PRODUCT.   I had the dream about The Machine again. The one where it ate me. The one where it ate you. The one where I am The Machine. Th...

  Do You Have the Time?   Where has the time gone? You look between the sofa cushions: Remnants of yesterdays, Stale reminders, Reduced to crumbs, ashes, and trash. Were you effective, Or just another consumer - Endlessly plodding the repeating track, Supporting a system made for everyone else? What victory can you claim in this? The machines soon obsolescent, The housing almost up to code, The food poisoned, The water slimed, The air clogged, All so you can strap on the VR goggles to escape it. What victory is there in this? Climb back on the treadmill, Vacation is over, Share your digital representations as proof that you were somewhere, Anywhere. As long as it wasn’t here. Is that where the time has gone? Is it in the cloud? On a flash drive? Have you saved it there to make room for the drudgery? Pixels more real than memory, Affirmations of your lack of capture, Now free to return to the construct you neither own,...

  Proposals (Proudly blocked by the cretins at Facebook)   I think I’ll kill a few hundred thousand people today. That’s what I do to grow my ego. I will use planes and bombs and kill them. I will use tanks and rockets to kill them. I will use thousands of my own people with rifles and knives. Some of them will die in the process but what the fuck? Gotta break a few eggs as they say.   I think I’ll poison the air today. That’s what I do to make a profit. I will use trucks and drills and ruin earth. I will use explosives and chemicals and blight water. I will underpay thousands of my countrymen. Some of them will be exposed to harmful toxins but what the fuck? I’m doing this for my kids is what I’ll say.   I think I’ll corrupt a few thousand minds today. That’s what I do to maintain dying standards. I will use broadcast networks and celebrities and warp them. I will use rhetoric and the churches and inflame them. I will enra...

  Stupid World   Stupid world. With all its existence and stuff… What do we think we’re doing here? Sure, we dig big fucking holes in the ground, We’re GREAT at that… Of course, that’s killing us, And most of the animals we share the planet with, And the trees, And the fish, And the birds, don’t forget those! And the whole ocean too. But we’re melting all the glaciers into it so… That should help. And then there’s the air: On a good day you can even see through it. And what about the rock we live on? Oh yeah, we’re fucking that up too. You got yer acid rains, And yer chunky air, And yer extreme weathers, so… Yeah… But the good part is the plastic, right? In the water you’re drinking, In the food you eat, In the soil you walk on, There’s even big fucking islands of it in the oceans so we can track its progress… Stupid world. With all the existence we’re trying to end. Too bad we won’t be around to see THAT. The sun is ...

  What Is   You ask what it means. Because how can it mean nothing? How can there be no purpose? How can this be all there is?   You ask what this is. What is its meaning? What is its purpose? What if this is all there is?   You ask what you are. Do you mean something? What is your purpose? What if this is all you are?   You ask what you are doing. Will it mean anything? What was your purpose? What if you have done all you will?   You ask if there really is a meaning. Well, what do you mean? Have you sought out a purpose? Will you at least do something?   What will that mean to someone else? What if all you have to do is mean something while you are here? Will that give you purpose? What if that is all you need to do?   You ask why you are here. I ask what you mean. Living is its own purpose. Doing some good can be enough.   Cliff Lake 11/5/2022 Copyright © Clifford L...

 All In There was never really any choice. They revel in violence. They mock disability. They worship greed. There was never really any choice.  They fantasize copulation with children. They strangle information. They oppose any god than the one they cannot emulate. There was never really any choice. They daydream revenge. They foul the planet. They are proud of the kill. There was never really any choice. They foster destruction. They revel in waste. They exalt any lie that harms. They cannot be cured because they don’t want to be. They cannot be educated because it exposes them. They cannot comprehend the hurt they do to themselves. There is really only one choice. We will choose in spite of them. We will choose because of them. We will choose because it is the best thing for them. There is really only one choice.  Make that choice. Be that choice. For all of us.  Cliff Lake 11/2/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  The Unmaker   It had come from the Outside. Created from the never-dead hate That gnaws on itself.   Life and Light were the enemy, They were the everything it could never achieve, A Thing of failure and the absence of promise, A rage that had no focus, But only was. It would deny itself if it could.   The blue jewel beaconed, Fired with spirits of hope and help, Life was there. It ravened at the thought. It lusted for destruction, death, depression, doubt. It hurried.   At first it assaulted with fires and calamities, Earthquakes that changed continents, Diseases carried by the smallest among them. Still, they rebounded, Rebuilt, Resumed.   They drove it back knowing it not, A confidence in their own aggression. And therein lay the key…   Weapons it gave them, Knowledge of their construction, Faulted understanding of their world, Of the physical place they inhabited, Toys for dang...

  Ownership   Today I owned a lib. Maybe he was a antifa. They never tell you when they are. I said TRUMP 2024! I felt some swelling in my pants. But that’s what happens When you eat too many tacos.   Today I owned a pedo. Maybe he was a fascist. He did not have a MAGA hat. He was reading to a child. I said GROOMER! The child called him “Dad.” Whatever that means.   Today I owned a commie. Maybe he was a BLM. Maybe he was a mail-in ballot. I said WOKETARD! Then he put his sticker on. It said, “I voted.”   Today I owned the Democraps. Maybe they were a science. They asked me to produce documentation. I said FAKE NEWS! Then they showed me video. I had to turn it off before I learned something.   Today I owned the left. That’s what I keep telling myself. That’s what I have to keep telling myself.   Cliff Lake 10/29/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  Fall Ye, Fall Ye   This is the story of the mighty Kanye, Who tried to promote him exactly the wrong way. He jumped on a stage where he acted all miffed, Dude, at that awards show, you just weren’t too swift.   This is the story of the proclaimed Yeezy, Your divorce battles left too many queasy. Now E! and People might be up for the drama, But you coulda done better by your baby’s mama.   This is the tale of the embattled Ye, Who struggled to keep lit up on marquee. He tried to appear as an artiste heretic, But really man, you’re just Anti-Semitic.   This is the story of nutso Kanye West, Whom now so many attempt to divest. He claims that his mental state is a real hassle, That’s not it, Kanye, you’re just a real asshole.   Cliff Lake 10/27/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022    

  Interata   How do you see yourself? Through spectacles reddened by chance, By tint? By temper? By tears?   How do you see yourself? Through age-spotted mirror: Reflection of mistakes made, Mistakes held, Mistakes forgotten?   How do you see yourself? Through the tales of others, Praises taken, Scoldings accepted, Remarks overheard?   How do you see yourself? By numbers accented with dollar signs, By the accumulation of acquaintance? Of children, Of lonely sigh spoken to the night?   How do you see yourself? Do you look from without? Do you look from within? Do you make compare to that which you aspire to? How do you see yourself?   Would you have us see you as you do?   How do you see yourself?   Cliff Lake 10/25/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  Our Day   A fading chance, their failing dance, Ritual held over from imperfect past. Sword held high, blinding clouded eye, Opposing a future arrived at last.   Ragged remnants of imagined glory unlived, Marching in lockstep to defeat the specter, Of notionate monstrous elector, Of dying philosophy, they the protector.   Ear deafened by politician and priest, Constantly informing whom to like least. Enemy constructed of wind and mirror on the increase, Succumbed they are to spoken disease.   Armed and arming: oligarchy’s lance, A rabbled army for high finance, Willing to fight with ne’er the chance, To see their own ethereal fortune advance.   Blinded they are by the fogs and mist Of remote rulers making unfaithful tryst Wielded as a blinded, blunt, and bloodied fist, To pound down those that would resist.   Prided now they are of disinformation, Argument unreasoned in negation, They have pur...

  No Loss?   Dusting off old lies, They scream of contrived assault. An unseen enemy made real by utterance, No need for substantiation, Volume solidifies. A trick writ for the unworthy, With unstung hand, And unbent back, Unskilled in anything save usury. Lessons from the past go unsung, Ignorance is more useful, Exploration is made strange, A new catechism learned by rote and repeat. Sour blood untasted, Flowing only in unreal cinema, Histories told in plastic, Or lowly electron, Easily ignored. A new Holy War is risen, The enemy clear, The outsider is not with us, And must be overcome. They march in ragged formation, Raging over imagined threats undefined, Except by otherness. They practice their clumsy thrust, The unskilled battery, Dreaming of the day their violence reaps gore. They believe they long to wade through bodies strewn, Horror long past their understanding. They are informed of an enemy, Be he fr...

  Dehumanation   Raging against inevitabilities they can barely pronounce, They seek to make proof through violence, Doling unearned vengeances, Against those they already oppress.   Pronouncing inequities, They make attempt to elevate themselves, While wallowing in filthy degradation: Sins they will not allow others.   Dangerous toys they acquire, Undertaking betterment by way of suppression, Enmity is their religion, Greed their deity.   Unnerved they are by intellect, Ashamed that they are so easily seen, Naked to innocent eye, Exposed by accuracy and reality.   Untruths are spun into myths, Myths are woven into dogma, Dogma is accepted as canon, And dogma informs indoctrination.   Lost now in emotion-fired doctrine, They march against all those undoctrined, Enemies found anywhere outside their creed, Worthy only of elimination.   Destruction is their last hold, Persuasion long b...

  Democracy - 10/13/2022   Today we watched democracy when it works. Today we took another step towards reaffirming our laws. Today we held the accountable, accountable. Today we saw the criminals exposed. Today we saw the lawless called out. Today we saw the lies ripped apart. Today we saw the weak diminished. Today we saw cowards revealed. Today we saw truth walk in. Today we saw justice is not blind for long. Today we saw patriotism. Today we begin to rebuild the Republic. Today was a good day. As ugly as the truths are – Today was a good day.   Cliff Lake 10/13/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  Desperata   You ask why they follow him. You ask what the attraction can be. Because he's crass, And heartless, And greedy, And thoughtless and immoral, And stupid, and cowardly, And he's just like them. The world is slowly growing up and they will be left behind, And they know it. They fear it and hate it. There's no room on the planet for the bullying kind anymore. There’s no room on our earth for the users and the abusers. They tear into her as they tear into the population: Their malice is directed at everything and everyone that cannot get out of the way. But some things are bigger than them. Mother Earth is beginning to fight back, and they will neither acknowledge that nor listen to her. They have no place on this earth, And deep down, They know that too. So, they ignore the warnings and glory in their ability to chew faster, To bite deeper. To gnaw more completely. They make their cruel jokes and laugh wildly, An...

  The Billionaire Hustle   Got another email from the chump, Lots of scary words, the usual hump. Back into spam I got to dump, I don’t need a grift from an orange lump.   Why I gotta pay to clean up his mess? No matter how he claims that he’s oppressed. I got my own bills to address, Is he a billionaire or is he less?   He’s your billionaire asking for money, Your billionaire begging, Isn’t that funny? He’s in your pocket, folks, And I’m laughing until I choke. Give him your last dime – ‘Cause it’s almost commissary time…   Of course, he’s gonna have a lot of lawyer fees, He’s never gonna pay them, I mean PLEASE. A billionaire like him, it should be a breeze, It’s not my bank account he should squeeze…   He’s your billionaire asking for money, Your billionaire begging, Isn’t that funny? He’s in your pocket, folks, And I’m laughing until I choke. Give him your last dime – ‘Cause it’s almost commi...

  October: A When   Shadows waver in the thin light. Pale and lifeless under a sky strewn with torn clouds overlapped, And swiftly moving. There is no warmth in this morning sun, A lingering frost attests to its defeat. The low steady breeze saps heat beneath layered clothing, Dry and steeled, it seeks exposed flesh, gnawing. A look westward yields only a gathered indistinct gray, The flat cover of clouds without enough moisture, If it would only rain, then it would finally clear, But today is given over to shroud, And the whisper of winter not yet arrived. The ache begins now, Perhaps ankle or knee, a wrist, an elbow, Or low in the back, the old injury. We all have one. A cold low murmur telling tales of incautiousness and accident, Unmeant and unwanted, collected from life. This is a bell that will ring all day. Only minutes under sky have stolen what heat you thought to hoard, One human’s effort pitted against inexorable nature. ...

  Once and Never   I really wasn’t ready For the time that you weren’t there. I didn’t and you hadn’t, And no one seemed to care. They lined up oh so closely, We didn’t have a chance, They stared at us morosely, And slowly began the dance.   I stood off to the sidelines I knew it would begin. Watching the surly bride’s hinds, They came up to my chin. There was much I could have done then, But fate will have its way, I meandered into the den, To watch the children bray.   They were loud and so offensive, I enjoyed it while I could. They were really reprehensive, And surely up to no good. The made a fancy tier cake Out of shoes and Elmer’s Glue I reprimanded them for their peers sake, And shoved them up the flue.   I was forced back to the party By the butler stern and tall. Who rescued the sooty children, And rolled them in a ball. He rolled them down the hallway, Into a garden near. And plante...

  October: The Where   Dusk. The in-between time. Mists hide in the tree line, Insubstantial and too real, Making the minutes elastic. What calls to you now from the roughly familiar? What comes near? Disquieted steps taken, Into the familiar unknown. The paths you know lead to places they have never gone before - Too near to the damp places that do not dry. A déjà vu here. A memory cobwebbed. Misted and near only now. And only then. A dream forgotten and lived once, But vaguely, Vaguely. Then. You almost didn't get back. Then. The thought of it smells like yesterday’s campfire: Acrid and wet. Only then. You almost didn’t get back, did you?   Did you?   Boulders you knew now squat unfamiliar, Shrubs raking with barbed tendril, Blood not offered in twilight, And taken anyway. Fallen branches squirm in the half-light, Are they moved by the mist? Do they reach unknowing? Does the haze return their...

  Inconnu   He slips past you seen, Unrecognized as friend or enemy, He is a moment un-momentous. A breath perhaps, undrawn, Maybe he was here, Maybe he mattered, Maybe it doesn’t matter if he did once. Did he stand next to you at the deli, unnumbered? Was his money given to the great machine That grinds away behind our every action Ravenous as death, And just as insatiable? Did he fall in? The noise of it almost imperceptible? The John Doe given his two lines in the local paper, His eternity ending there. What memory could that evoke? Or does he yet live, As gray and formless to everyone As these words now make him? Why can’t you remember? Why aren’t you trying?     Cliff Lake 9/30/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  Uncolored Eyes   Do you avoid asking the questions, Of those things whose answers you do not wish to know? Have truths slipped past seen and unrecognized? Have they been recognized and allowed past? How would you know? If you could ask one thing, Would you dare an absolute truth? Can a truth cause lasting harm, Or, Would a lie be the more damaging over time? Which will you risk? Whom do you fear more, A stranger with a gun, Or a friend with a knife? Would you ask me questions you won’t ask yourself? Would you hear the answers? Would you leave them unasked? Do you truly want to hear what you wish to be told, Whether it bears any truth, Whether it leaves you unlearned? Would you know the difference? Do you want to know the difference? Do you see with uncolored eyes? How could you know? Do you want to know?   Cliff Lake 9/29/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  The Degraders   The spite that binds, The malice in loss, Cruelly retaliating injury not yet earned, Now more certain through barbarous act. Maliciously unkind to people unknown, They warm themselves with shallow affronts, Hollow congratulations of inconsequent malfeasance. Detaching themselves from compassion they outrage, Effecting little more than insult and indignity. Pettiness is their brand. Outrageous in their racket, They rage that they are forgotten before they have begun, Prescient of the inevitable. Noxious opinions farted from the studiously uninformed, The willfully imperceptive, the emphatically unread, Braying into a cacophony they cannot overcome, They needle those that cannot avoid the prick, Rendered impaired by hurts they could not deflect, Because life is cruel to the innocent and the guilty without bother. Such niggling actors, They portray themselves as guardians of truths concealed, They are the bullies the...

  Q’ing Up   They seek to be made holy through the denigration of others, Baptized in the sins of the worst among them. Consigning themselves to overweening, overarching avarice, Stumbling towards the nearest justification they can find. Lost in the frozen confusion of their unrealized ambitions, Their anger fueled by the willingness to be lied to. Searching for clues in bubble gum wrappers, Satisfied only by the increasingly outlandish. Constructing frail formula from the ragged ends of mistaken follies, They imagine new truths discarded tomorrow. Fueling an anger shared through an imbalanced conduit, Drinking the bitter dregs they wallow in freely. Coherence anathema to forgone conclusions, Rationale a poison to deductions premade. Conclusions to be enforced through sacred bloodletting, God granting them sufferance to persuade in pain. A mob formed from the self-indulgent, To prop up the monster that they strive to be. No turning back ...

  Do Not Speak to Me of Christ   Do not speak to me of Christ if you will not feed a stranger. Do not speak to me of Christ while watching others drown in debt.   Do not speak to me of Christ as children lie bleeding and politicians profit. Do not speak to me of Christ as you jack another round into the chamber.   Do not speak to me of Christ as you claim control of another’s decisions. Do not speak to me of Christ if you can claim rape is the will of God.   Do not speak to me of Christ if violent repression of anyone is your path. Do not speak to me of Christ if hate is always your first thought.   Do not speak to me of Christ while you practice intolerance. Do not speak to me of Christ as you spurn those that are other.   Do not speak to me of Christ while you glorify those unholy. Do not speak to me of Christ as you idolize the unjust.   Do not speak to me of Christ if you are plotting vengeance. Do not...

  A Song for the Damned   Where are you keeping your special knowledge,   Where is it hidden from those that don’t know? Where did you get answers to unsolved enigmas? How will I know if I know? Does your new erudition explain things that you do not control? Do these secrets make plain what you do not understand? Will you not share proof of your convictions? Are your beliefs merely rooted in sand?   There is no hate when you walk in The Way, There is no injury in reaching out, You cannot be damaged by showing some sympathy, Find out what real love is about!   Are you in opposition to the good of heart? Do you find empathy weak? Do you spurn the caring one that is truly courageous, That stands in resistance to the hate that you speak? Why is your satisfaction in cruelty, Which requires teeming cohorts to survive? How long before you find that your blind fealty, Leaves you just a drone in the hive?   There is ...

  Parry   I stood in the dark Unraveling my confusion Looking for an answer For all the questions asked. I stood in the dawn Grasping threads of illusion Asking all the questions That I did not want answered. I stood in the light Dispelling all the rumors Getting all the answers To questions I hadn’t asked. I stood in the dusk Ignoring all the murmurs Fending off wrong answers And hoping I wasn’t asked. I stand again in dark Masking my confusion Wading through the answers No longer afraid to ask. I am waiting for the daylight No nearer to conclusions Waiting to make answer To all that I’ve been asked.   Cliff Lake 9/10/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  An Affirmation   Are you where you thought you would be? Are you the person that you once meant? Have you seen all you wished to see? Do you wonder where all the time went?   When will you know the last truth? When will you sing all that is unsung? When will you have asked the last question? Have you accomplished all that can be done?   Is there more to what you already know? When will the last bell be rung? Have you moved past what you once intended? Can the pendulum be all unswung?   Do regrets keep you in a stasis frozen? Have you adopted shadows shamed? Can you unwalk the paths that you’ve chosen? Can your aspirations be somehow reclaimed?   Can an atrophied spirit be unwithered? Will you be more than what you are not now? Are you caught in an eddy in this life’s river? Have you already taken your final bow?   Does not the sun still rise for you shining? Do not the birds still call for you t...

  Seeing You   Behind your cracking walls of stone, You’re hoping I just pass. That I will just go on my own, And not notice that they’re glass. Imperative I not see in, No stories to be told, No whispers of collective sin, A trail you think’s gone cold.   You won’t suspect I’ve really woken, While you cowered and you slept, You won’t believe I see you, It’s too much to accept. You don’t know I’m right behind you, You don’t see the closing net, You only know the secrets that, I know that you have kept.   You speak of all the anything, You’re telling creaky lies. You think you are deflecting, There’s holes in your disguise. I know you will never come clean, You’ve dragged too many in, But I have facts unforeseen, Your excuses have worn thin. You won’t suspect I’ve really woken, While you cowered and you slept, You won’t believe I see you, It’s too much to accept. You don’t know I’m right behind you, You...

  Balances   The pendulum has begun it’s swing, Though evil does not see it yet. The arc has begun its return, The median will be reached. The counterbalance has been adopted, Nature will not be denied. The ballast is its own weight, Stability finds its own level. Darkness has always been followed by light, Which is it that banishes the other? As the tides come in, so they also go out, What is exposed when the waters recede? Every action has a cause, every cause calls for action, Be careful of the seed you sow. The ravening will devour itself, If it cannot feed on the just. Hatred has no cure but death, If that is all that you made of. The end always has a beginning, And the end is because of the beginning. Parity creates itself, Like water, actions must be flush where they exist. The pendulum has begun its swing, Have a care that you are not in its way.   Cliff Lake 9/1/2022 Copyright © Clifford Lake 2022

  Hey, Former Guy…   Listen: You were made president by Russian interference.   You beat that rap even though you were caught. You mishandle and misappropriate public funds. We saw you. You beat that. You vilify and demonize public demonstrations and use excessive force. You beat that one. You drop the ball on the biggest global pandemic since WWI. The world saw you. You beat that rap. You break law after law in public while you're "president." We saw that. You beat all of that. You let racists be racists and get worse and worse and get called out for it. You beat that. You enrich yourself, your family, and cronies off of the office of the presidency and beat THAT. You incite a riot and attempt a coup... Everyone saw you. And now things might be catching up? But you can probably beat this stuff? But then you get caught with your hand deep in the cookie jar. The DOJ has documents you stole. The nature of those documents pro...

  The Tide   In soiled cities and greasy towns, Broken promises are passed around. Sold they are as education, To any with less information. And the elders there accept their gold, Faulted glitters should leave them cold. They walk with steeled averted gazes, Through streets filled with starving faces. Now empty aching walking corpses, They’ve accepted their empathies’ rigor mortis.   The American Dream, it’s banners furled, Is only one part of a dying world. And money blooded in drugs and violence, Cannot fill the angry silence, Of skies and water now turned brown, By people who’ve turned their vision down. Who try self-healing with fancy cars, And bigger, cleaner, more expensive bars. And get their dirty hands in off the street, Where the others are, with naught to eat.   This is the world I that must roam, This bleeding place, this gutted home. “Increase the concrete! Tear down the green! Then rape some brains ...