En garde, some days I exhume the hatchet, pull the knife out of my back, and set my sights on every bracket They surrender like Appomattox, it’s a barracks-bound marathon Staring at the ashes, “Is he a pariah or a paragon?” I’m lurching onward, just me and the mountain, distilling my youth into a dried-up fountain. The sound of my blood pumping is louder than the killing floor and if I’ve burned a million bridges, ‘bout to burn a million more This is scorched earth till the score’s inert No more one-upping when we sleep in the dirt This is a ballad for the savage deemed a part of the scourge cause I’m a crepuscular creature emerging straight from the curse This is immersion in a version of my record of events, chemistry altered, memory falters, but this as close as it gets So, what’s the gist? All I’m saying is if I were you I’d duck fast, to my last it’s back to the bloodbath. Now the lion’s overtaken the lamb, fallible man with his destiny slipping out his hand No more diligence or constant vigilance, throwing caution to the wind, this the vigilante syllabus Glass house where he trains for the shot-put Lash out although everything is all good A bridge troll working against his best interests, nothing left to lose, cue the road-to-nowhere tempest. Berserker in a blind rage, battle-ax slashing, a gash for you is one for me, but I can’t stop the madness Autopilot is the captain, I just follow orders, assassin international, crossing lines and borders Sort ‘em out, don’t need a judge or St. Peter, I’ll call for rationality except when I’m the lynch mob leader It’s bad theater, self-inflicted at the root, but implosions ain’t conducive for reflections on the truth “It’s just got to burn out,” firefighters bench warming ain’t wrong, my inferno turned to coals by morning. But I can stoke ‘em, you can drag me to the mud, y’all can wallow and I’ll follow, I’m down to twist the knife for fun I’ll jump the gun, go ahead, spill my guts across the dock, put my anatomy on display as the kind that hosts the rot Nothing to flaunt. This a portrait of ugliness, insides hemorrhaged from emotional punishment

Oliphants rise on the horizon. Try the coded sober mouth Cull your hopes. Scope the loaded polar scout Put him down. Tranq soars like a peregrine Ornithopter locks on and exposes skeleton There it is, pair it with everything evil and laconic paraffin Little bit of weevil. Get primeval. Middleman officially emeritus Take all the merit out of arrogance Dare to be the top model carriage carrying operations imperative Complications emerged in a full-on resurgence Reoccurrence stirred the urge to converge on my purpose I wrote the dirge to accompany my hearse, discordance folded in I crept back into my coffin with my scolded skin Kissed the listeners, viscous. Fish nibble meniscus Bliss would be to exist without a lick of this inner tension I’m getting my sea legs and training to keep them in working order Despondent coma horror. Filling the cracks of my armor with mortar Now there’s a razor between my teeth What’s beneath? I’ll spit it seconds so you can see If the question isn’t who, it’s where or when These claws will never retract again, no, they’ll never retract again Return of the streaming mass kamikaze I’m playing the game by rules pre-Hammurabi. Not sloppy but fast and loose. Castle ruse got ‘em marching in twos The who’s-who from the future of abuse Teach ‘em to tie a noose, I’ll be the first in the exhibit if it begins a descent to our diminished existence Missing the point, mincing any minute enjoyed Commencement at the Obituary Academy, flattery thick in his loins. Sick of the void He seems to scream with a persistence It’s really scary when you can’t find any sign of remission Lotta lava retention. Brushing off a cause for attention Living like a Panem invention. Don’t want to be locked in detention Fearing the fight or flight. Gearing up for the war any day or night Die despite the strides of our time. Covet an eye for an eye cause I’m eating bones for breakfast, way past my carrion preference So left of the leftists, I may be a force to be reckoned with

X-ray of his armor. System diagnostics Rooted out cancer at the tip of his proboscis It’s a fault line combined with one gifted in the Shining Got the mining town mentality, a cavernous cavity lining All of the time he’s been biding ended up flying or slipping and sliding Now he succumbs to it nightly: a feeling he’s doing less living than dying Asleep on his island, he ionizes to Dionysus Blue on blue eyes signify the spice in his diet A poltergeist to the pious, an advocate for the devil, gold was heisted from Midas, and then promptly embezzled Loaded dice loud and clear, I receive the tarpit message Hey Doc, outfit me with that Jarvik 7 Shit, it’ll work better than what I got, necrotic tissue wrapped around a chunk of igneous rock Just a glorified clock ticking off precious seconds Negative effects infect the vestige and reject excessive presence It’s obsessively incessant. Defective would be a compliment The detective marked the doppler shift but wasn’t conscious of the consequence This eulogy is eponymous and when it’s upon us, honest, the sigh of relief will speak to a belief I’m better off It’s a demon preaching from the coffin beyond, it’s a fucking feeble notion the spirit continues on This muscle is the madness, there’s no method I can track, I’m taken aback at the utter lack of awareness in its tact A single crack can amass to a shattered pane These veins ain’t full of blood, just a mix of maggots and shame For once I’d like to play a focal beneficial part Hey Doc, hook up that Total Artificial Heart

It was a long morning spent hiding from reality which sunk in like an anchor exposed to Jupiter’s gravity Sadly, ain’t the first time despite promises made, I’ve sent cables to the victims sickened from my past displays Vein of malaise, you know the root, but hesitate to grab the blade, hold the snake behind the head, usher it to the grave So, it rotates. Goads you to locate a battalion of valiance, coax it out to joust for the domain Oust the invader, the seed wasn’t corrupt, but a single cell can multiply to fuck everything up I’ll make the cut, exact incisions for excision’s sake, and if my prey don’t take the bait, I guess it’s time to drain the lake This ain’t no catch and release, it’s till I’m deceased, a no-man’s land from the seas to the streets Sheets are bloodied from a self-inflicted wound, grab that poker out the fire you know what you gotta do Cauterize the wound Ain’t outta the weeds yet and won’t be anytime soon Cauterize the wound If you’d learn your lesson you could get up out this tomb Hold your breath that’s the smell of burning flesh, but the bleeding’s ceded to the treatment sealing up your chest Keep it moving, this a quick fix, nothing too permanent, just curbing nerves so we can get up out these skirmishes It’s time to flourish now the immolation’s in the past, flash flood rising fast, erasing all the aftermath “Combat ready,” but the CV reading empty, clearly just a hothead with some hero worship envy In a feeding frenzy eaten up in record setting times, chum in the water, oh what a public demise Let the phoenix rise or we’ll ruminate till Ragnarok, a pattern of decline summarized in a scatterplot Swim out the sinking ship or stay to feel the pressure grow, the only way is up and you’re fighting against the undertow Thunder in the heavens, storm pushes from the east, keep your head above the water and you’ll live to tame the beast

I’ve had a few seasons of presets A lot of focus on officiating redress These days knees make creases at recess after actors eviscerate attempts to destress He said/she said, a lot of bullshit, pay no attention to the lies of the culprit Eyes be sulking, minds be skulking, cipher disguised in the wise words he’s quoting I’m not a member of any group recruiting, never assimilating and facing the music Won’t be reduced to a fuse for a feud or a duel thats only fuel is bragging rights to school kids And the crowd goes “boo-hiss.” If you’ve got a molotov, baby, let’s do this No time for the foolish, the crimes turned him ruthless, he tires of nights where his mind replies “Who this?” Man, that breaking point, it ain’t far off Me and suicide we’re just star-crossed Missed each other, kiss another while we bar hop Semi-stutter. Drop the rudder. Four count heart stop Hoarfrost settles on a fertile green field ‘fore the grazers go back to enjoying their meal It’s a universal sermon, no permanence to award You can live by the pen and still die by the sword I’m afraid of the day I awake with a bad taste and no escape I’m amazed by the ways I relate to the trapped wraiths in their graves I’m ashamed to admit when I look back a bit and trip at how the time flies, three strikes in on occasion I decide that these are the highlights, these are the highlights Can’t get a grip on the present Paradise lost when hell became heaven Severed the connection that measured up to the question and left the vetted veteran settling in her deathbed Last breath the canary in the coal mine, T-minus zero: the finale of the timeline Dividing the seasons. No hope to break even The size of the fight, it now lacks any meaning All the facts remain secret, seized by the cretins, kept under lock and key frequently The sequence is changing our scenery We’re dreaming of sheep made of machinery An absence of greenery has altered our outcome Bathed us in maelstrom for miles till the cows come home to roost. Flown the coop Another millennia and we’re reduced to primordial soup in round two of the transforming loup garou It’s like the zoo got loose and there’s nothing to do But I’ll be dead before the full moon wanes and that’s alright Guess who’ll be tossing and turning in his grave all night? Maybe I lost sight, cyclically cynical Frozen as frostbite in a Biblical ritual. It’s habitual but instrumental to rid the system of the venom, it’s an embolism for the vision. So, pay the penance. Put an end to the digits. We hit a limit. Woke a demon time to kill it. Now I’m alight like the midnight oil is, sometimes I vibe to the siren’s voices. If the end is nigh the vital signs will bunny hop until they decline to a flatline. Set aside any feelings of remorse, we let a blind navigator set a dangerous course.

It was bound to be fruitless. From the first step, from the first breath it was toothless. Bark of a warhead, bite like a flu shot, stacking, claiming sets rocking jellies and culottes. The tune’s off, encase Vesuvius in ice, but keep an eye on it in stasis, man, cause evil never dies. It took a piece of me, I winced, reciprocated, but the faces never faded from my mind, they’re everyday. It’s not a game I’m fucking playing. End of days if I don’t cage it. Inner Hague if I embrace it, patient zero for the plague. It’s something different...a little fresh hell that won’t diminish so if I’m not on the firing squad I’m sure as hell complicit. Cut the line, watch it sink among the waves; demon screeching for a helping hand, but we all know it’s bait. This is illumination and I hope it stays ablaze; I turned the circle to a virtue so y’all can learn from my mistakes. I lived in a world devoid of light without a compass. A guppy floating in the open ocean, truly lawless. Flaunting all his garbage, need a muzzle and a sedative, transport the heathen, and synthesize the medicine. Step one, need an ego death STAT, this dude cutting off his nose cause he think he all that. Fall back, let the knives sink in, release the beast that takes control when he’s clawing out your skin. No longer pent up in a pen, it’s a real weight lifted, you die for your own sins when that sense of self is shifted. So, I inflicted all the necessary cuts, removed the tumor that was blooming in a garden of rust. Step two, the architect is crucial. If the vines are gonna climb, the trellis got to be suitable. You know the patterns in the plots that lay fallow as well as the habits that brought you through to the gallows. Let’s get to getting, the time is ticking and you’re tending to stick around the thickets but these soils here ain’t the ticket. It’s just a glimpse of something in the distance. Just a mention of the mystery by the mystics. Cut the restrictions. Explore your full range. Begin a dialogue with nature, benefit from the exchange. There are multitudes contained within each of Earth’s features, the rocks and the dirt as much as the creatures. You are no different. A single moment doesn’t make the man, practice resurrection if the day don’t go to plan. And in that instance, be the end goal not the detonation, life’s about the journey and the final destination. Now most days I entomb the hatchet, prioritize my passion for this life that’s everlasting. This is Capsize in action and if the truth be told, I’m getting too old for this shit so let the routine go.