Mike Zone writes

Not quite there

sometimes you just have to get off the screen and
   bleed

reception from the savage kitchen

cooking with heat - the lava and star dust kind

too much we ignore the state of dreams

faltering toward the beast,

mashed between teeth and acidic saliva - you've

    just prepared yourself for consumption

regurgitated into place - unknown

panic- at year zero, panic - at the non-days

there's no new frontier but the same old same old

pattern recognition - bells and whistles... mod?

    extra mod?

shut the fuck up you were about to speak or think

    clearly

or something along those lines

whatever happened tomorrow?

why are you languishing like that?

don't you see the outline here?

what'd you go to school for?

higher learning? you should be practical training

we have a special program here

pay to train - market style

pay to learn - market style

pay to play - market style

frying up scallions with a six-pack - I just don't

    think market-driven sources are quite

the direction humanity needs to be going in,

so yeah you can just walk away and really learn to

    open your mind

increase awareness - that's the real culinary art of

    existence

when economics is just a failed religion - a pseudo

   creed of failed directives

nemesis to reality

the what if? saga projects the grandiose what-the?

   scenario and then what?

maybe I've taken too much of your time....

time? what time? what was that like before hours

   were divided by pay?

before chunks of life traded for borrowed being?

life - borrowed or held hostage?

don't go looking for answers in poems

life isn't just cherries but pits too,

the beast can break its teeth as well and be just as mirthful in fractured reality

the beast is dead, the beast is fallen, the beast 

   bleeding but still victorious

no - to all the above

but somewhere along the line you may wish to

   find yourself

struggling and slaying will be there without the

   hopes of a better tomorrow

for living and the haven of contemplation along

   with soul serving

will override false transmigration through the

   poison maps of replicant being,

it's a prayer of sorts

but maybe the best I have

in demonstration

Halemaumau Crater -- Diane Burko