Pleasant Dreams -- Proof

"Pleasant Dreams"

A dream I had
Once drove me mad,
But I'm not starting to pray.
It made me glad --
The loss is aching bad --
I just wanted to stay.
 
Never sure of the start
Stekel's headline may say
Anchored by a full heart --
Trapped in an empty world
I arose (a rose) in the wasteland
Any tongue I could understand.
Molding molten glass by hand,
Shapes inspired by Chateaubriand:
Fractal forests and a Taurus
Playing djent metal jazz
To nymphs with eyes
Emerald, and topaz.
Plucking a gem
I cut myself, but never bled.
I ate poison, and felt well fed.
Then as my skin shed,
I awoke to the joke --
I was still in bed.
Vague pieces in my head
Told where the dream led
Breathing underwater
Shark born to slaughter
Tearing thru a parade
Of siren mermaids
I paved a highway
With blood and bone,
Never looked back,
Never once felt alone.
I worked a nightmare factory
For a blessed whole century
Pleased to build
The horrors who killed
Every child's evening.
Sure some monsters thrilled,
But that's just fear they gild
To enjoy how it chilled.
Then a satyr dancing in the abyssal womb
Of the queen of carnival creation
I evolved to a higher station
The night of her cremation
Composing threnodies
To pull rain from heavenly bodies;
I recited for gods
All the truths I shouldn't
 
Regina Saturnalia agunt de animabus pereunt...
 
...though what exactly is gone.
Forced to carry on
No clue how to return
The only way to earn
A hint if it's possible
Burn my soul like coal,
Exhale a brown cloud,
And howl thru a keyhole.
Hope to summon
Some numen
Who could take me back
To a world that doesn't exist,
A land of ghosts and mist.
I'd rather be the panegyrist
Eulogizing that purest
Impossibility
The glorious infinity
Of fantasy;
I visit nightly,
And lose daily.
 
Because I think it's the loss I love.
 
"Proof"

It would be judicial malfeasance
To ascribe importance
To these circumstantial offerings
Priceless as pencil shavings.
Objects little altering
Perception of the raving
Claiming these are paving
A collective abstract impression
A mosaic human conception
Fully fleshed and present.
While the court may assent
This apartment reliquary
With various types of library --
Musical, cinema, literary --
And collections of clothes,
Art, and furniture compose
A sense of someone
When all is said and done
Aren't these borrowed forms?
Piling up what conforms
To the desired expression of self,
Many set on a dusty shelf.
See what I've read, watched, heard;
This painting:  Cubist Bird --
Fallen asleep admiring.
Always acquiring
Others' expressions
To inspire impressions
Of being this and that,
Aligned to a format.
Ready to flow
With the rebel psycho
Status quo,
Quote with Infinite Jest
Instead of daring to manifest
Fresh seeds to sow.
A turn of phrase like fingerprints
Offering some subtle hints
It isn't a tape recorder,
Or MP3 on repeat,
Thesaurus masked trending tweet,
IKEA floor show,
Cardboard Millennial
Joe Blow.
All the free trade coffee can't prove
There's a decent human being here,
Just a tasty cup of hot Columbian tears.
And that grass clipping beer
Settles no existential fears,
Though it keeps the fridge full
Of the right wool
To pull over eyes
About to glance in a mirror
Because you can't risk seeing clear:
The cracking veneer...
 
Except as sarcastic hashtag
Then able to brag
What lies beneath is hideous,
But fashionably monstrous,
On march spectral wisps of humanity
Cloaked in thrift store finery
And artisanal
Chipped porcelain masks
Under which they bask,
In communal seclusion
Instagram cracker occlusion
Keeping out any semblance of hostility
Cattle prodding towards
More fulfilling possibility.