CAUTIONARY TALE X--CAREFUL
Crush reality into a fine powder
put it up your nose.
Escape is only five heartbeats away.
Overdose on truth
never worry that care is your enemy
until the next time
you don’t feel like being hard anymore.
Yeah motherfucker take the road less traveled
you will find that a billion or three
have traveled it before you and in the midst of the throng
you’ll feel solitude for never.
Never let them know you care or your heart becomes lunch
but they will sedate you with reality
crushed into a fine powder blown up your nose,
before they eat it.
When you’re seen hanging from a tree deer gutted
from loin to neck
them passing by only wish the best of you
hadn’t been removed yet.
They wanted a bite for themselves
they know the greediest got there first.
And as the rest of you,
hangs and rots useless for anything but a lure
to the other fools
who are to ignorant of the road less traveled,
them that don’t know
they should never have let anyone know they care
as they stop and stare
at all that is left of heartless carcass.
they too become food
they too become food
for the careworn hungry refugee massed
upon the road less traveled.
© M Durfee
© M Durfee
6/8/13
I specially like the opening verses, crush reality into a fine powder ~ The road less travelled, is full of carcass ~ You learn to become indifferent, caring less, if not you are the lunch of the next person ~ This is good Mark ~
ReplyDeleteHappy weekend ~
Grace--that crushing into a powder is how a prescription pill addict gets the rush, the same way a bully gets the rush from beating on a smaller and weaker person who has not yet learned that a hard heart is not all bad but can be a source of strength in the face of tyranny.
DeleteAs you care less AND become indifferent to the suffering of another then your heart is already gone. Thank you--Sometimes Robert Frost irritates me.
We are all consumables of one kind or another.
ReplyDeleteCharles I would rather my leg be gnawed on while I was kicking someones ass, than to see the continuing abuse of another young generation being taught to live the thug life.
DeletePowerful! I get a heavy heart reading this.
ReplyDeleteRosaria, In your former line of work I think you have seen this more times than you care to remember. I think in your retirement cottage you can loosen the grip a bit and live free of all them that would abuse you except the government.
Deletethis is a morning that proverbs seem to be turned on their head. Brian did it with the two wolves, and you are doing it with the "road less traveled." And the transition from the deer carcass to us...
ReplyDeleteJeff--mere coincidence--I was thinking dear carcass but when the human heart is destroyed we become animals.
Deletemy heart becomes lunch far too often but i cant stop doling our pieces of it to feed those around...maybe one day i will regret it...but until then...wow on that first stanza mark...overdose on truth up the nose...that hokked me right up....
ReplyDeletehooked...before you go spitting on me...ha...
ReplyDeleteBrian the last of the cautionary tales for now. It is a natural state to give love with no expectation of return but the heart encompasses so much more. There are pieces that belong to no one but you, those are the tastiest morsels.
Delete"Never let them know you care or your heart becomes lunch"
ReplyDeleteSo powerfully, painfully true, from first word to last. Scary. But my heart is always going to be lunch for someone...
Thank you for this.
ds, you can still be warm and kind but with whom is the question that needs be asked, them you know well or think you do or strangers you will never see again? Some have a great capacity to regrow a heart, sadly most do not.
DeleteA dark and hard poem, It reasonates with your followers - myself included. All the pharses are powerful but the one that gives me the chills is "them passing by only wish the best of you"....RUN!
ReplyDeleteIsn't every path taken littered with the skeletal remains of those who went before? My soul is dark and cynical so I believe there is anything new to be done on the earth only a better way to tell the the story - which I also believe you have just done!
sorry I meant there is "nothing" new to be done....
ReplyDeleteEditting is my great weakness! :)
Melinda it is a defense mechanism to keep yourself, your being walled away from them you travel with. There are new things on the earth unfortunately some of them are the earth's retaliation for the way we have behaved upon her and others I am not so sure are ways that we should be headed. What good is an ear of GMO corn to a hungry man if the nutrients are changed and it cannot be digested?
DeleteI'm always look for the road less traveled ... it's pretty crowded some times ... I want my own road ... damnit ... there,I can swear too just like you.
ReplyDeleteCatwoman damn it is two words not a compound word so you can't really say you speak in the elevated vernacular of swearing yet.
DeleteThe only way to have a trackless path is to dream it and then live it.
The road less travelled.
ReplyDeleteHigh intelligence and low sexual drive.
All the varius Budh's.
This Budh's for you?
Is that a Frosty Budh Ivan?
DeleteAwww...this one breaks my heart. Yeah, when we reveal our tender underbellies, oh, what a crowd there is for feasting. But what a cost, too, in losing the ability to be completely yourself...
ReplyDeleteTalon we are exchanging our heart and hope for stones and depravity. 25 years ago someone came up with the snappy T shirt Logo "Detroit--where the weak are killed and eaten" So many fad followers wore that shirt with pride making it prophetic in nature.
DeleteWow. Last time I took the road less traveled, it was about two hours before I saw another living soul. I tell you, the world population issues are getting intense.
ReplyDeleteAlice, what would it be like if everyone tired of being mashed into population centers just sprawled out from coast to coast continent to continent...how trackless would your road less traveled be then? 2020 the population is expected to rise by 1/4 which would bring us from 7-8 billion people to close to 12. We already have near 1.5 people on the planet desperate for a clean source of water--what do we do when they start landing on the ranches and taking the water from the cattle, rancher be damned?
DeleteI find that instead of appreciating admirable traits many people exploit them. It's not worth wearing one's heart on one's sleeve, if one can help it.
ReplyDeleteIt is an unfortunate world we have allowed to evolve Ily. The sad part is hardening of the arteries of entire populations of people.
DeleteI like the road less traveled. But too many are traveling zonked on drugs and alcohol. It makes going on the road dicey. I prefer to stay as isolated as possible from the nut jobs and those who are unconscious but walking around.
ReplyDeleteSyd maybe the Zombie apocalypse is real and is upon us a'ready?
DeleteYou are heavy,
ReplyDeletebut you're my
brother
ALOHA from Honolulu
Comfort Spiral
~ > < } } ( ° > <3
Cloudia I am not heavy unless the chronicling of a reality some never glimpse into bothers them to think it true.
Deleteroads... toads... slippery when wet... ie. squished
ReplyDeleteEverything is slippery when lubed with enough shit Tony, too many people thinking themselves alone on a road to somewhere new soon enough find that the choice is easier. Both roads are overly crowded with all kinds of people who would eat your heart if you do not keep it close and silent.
DeleteYour poems, Mark, are such a harsh dose of reality... yet, I cannot stay away from them... they make my heart darker and, somehow, at the same time exorcise the darkness... Thank you, my friend!
ReplyDeleteVesper, I wish I had the talent to write about things I know so little of.
DeleteMark, Seems we are so busy just doin' it, doin' it, doin' it, that the thoughts of the less traveled path is harder to take. We are exhausted, and overstimulated with shit that we can't control. Powders up the nose is the easy escape. xo
ReplyDelete