Monday, February 27, 2012

I am empty

I am plain

I am done

all the same


do not seek me

I am insane

from trying to become

free of my blame


somebody loves me

but I do not know who

what can they see

in me that is so


worthy of trust and confidence?

what can I give that won't give offense?

I wish I knew what to say

I wish I knew anyway


but if you love me

enough to take any risk

be careful... I may fail you easily

even as your intentions insist


on what it totally

beyond its control

oh be careful when you love me

I may drag you into a hole


of despair and I won't mean to

but that's how it will go

because I am done...and you

will come the hard way to know...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
kiss it...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
do you really need to be told

at this late date

what is happening to you

in the groove of your fate?


am I the one to tell you?

who appointed me teacher and provocateur

in the name of a faith

I myself can barely trust?


if you want relief go elsewhere

if you want despair come to me


I defy every edit of warning

because I've gotten resentful

paying for sins without end


if God thinks He'll regain

our love and devotion He's sadly mistaken

His own inexorable law


is 'like begets like'

and how can we transcend when all he can do

is rub our noises in the very shit

from which we are trying to transcend?


join me here in the depths of our pleasures

they are scant and swift...and more precious for it...

and if God wants us so badly

and does not will us to perish


then let Him get off His throne

and show the very things

He demands of us


otherwise let Him blame Himself for everything

for which he takes no responsibility

even as he'll always pass the liability off on us


join me

our tiny time is infinite

in comfort against the inevitable

and the pain of its inevitability...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
oh you thought forgiveness

was a given

a gift you needed nothing to earn


but nothing is given

and nothing retains its value

before the next onslaught


of actuality

and of its intractability...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.



my thoughts have no bearing on reality


I know

they play on some screen in my mind

and overlay the reality

I see with my eyes


and any connection is tenuous...



Content (c) 20082-102 Philip Milito.
oh the crazy pledge of repentance

and all the grief showering like shit

over your uncovered head


we may be cut like diamonds

from our own dust

but sometimes I suspect gouging


but that is desire

the hope (the wish) to improve

without sacrificing anything


well I live in this world

despite my projections beyond these bounds

and if the way up and the way down are One


know that I'll eat your ass

but I won't eat your shit...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


he passes a smile on the street

dully pleased someone still wants to suck him


but it's far too late to reciprocate

and his sarcasm locks him into his reckonings


oh fate oh miserable unalterable fate

contrition means nothing


your prayers and best efforts mean nothing

vengeance first

then your remains gathered...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
there is no more than this

a sullen memory and a haunted kiss


a love of long too long ago

that lingers in some infinity


will I still be too much a part

of my old soul or will there be


a detachment that will confirm

any foolishness I've felt?


haunted goddess you and I

are one and the same in our fates


all is contingent on the Ineffable

and the Ineffable is a name for the unnameable


but you and I have our names

and a sullen memory and a haunted kiss...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
oh where are you going?

oh I wish I knew


a passage has been plotted

but I've no memory of it


so as I stumble cautiously

feeling my way like a blind man


it is because I am a blind man

and a stranger to my fate...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you may not be totally relieved

to leave your skin and depart this life

knowing the weight of lifetimes

still hunches your shoulder


but at least the strictures will be removed

and the weight of the earth will lift

and heavy as any burden may be

it will be borne lightly...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you thought it would go another way


but there is no other way

this route is common to all


and the tracks in the road

are easy enough to follow


so many have come before you

and so many after...


you thought there was another way


but there's not

and now you know...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I will love you...


as little as it means to God and His plan

I will love you


and to do right then I'll die for you

or with you


and God can judge all He wants

but if we're punished even for the right things we do


I will love you yet...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
nothing like a dose of reality

to cure the delirium of hope and faith....


nothing like we hope it will be

nothing at all as it truly is


with a lifetime of delusion

and misplaced aspiration


leading you to be hammered by consequence...

and there...there the measure is taken...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I'm never sure of any boon


anything that looks like

my salvation turns out

to be my downfall


grace forgiveness mercy

these do not seem to be

in the divine vocabulary


and to pray for deliverance

is to be denied

it being the very sin of selfishness


we believe it isn't

you have no information

you haven't a clue at all


God has the last word usually to your detriment




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Sunday, February 26, 2012

no sensibility left

dull as a blank afternoon of hazy sun

strength draining out of the legs

no safe way opening


all life a thatched cover on a pit

all life a trap

that will break you to your measure

and measure what remains to the elements...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

vistas


vast and remote

or narrow and near


share the same

thing...


a horizon...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

cast the whole damn thing away


you're better starting from scratch


even if you're given nothing else

at least you've got scratch...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


never make the mistake

of thinking you've prevailed

against all odds

your 'victory' as you're wont to call it


was given to you

and all you did was rage when things

went rocky but at least acknowledge

you didn't triumph


you've merely endured

and let that be 'victory' enough...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Friday, February 24, 2012

I am familiar with my biography

but I think I'll change the ending


I'd hate to be seen as someone

who sat mourning all the mistakes


of the past while ignoring

every escape hatch that popped open


offering yet a new direction

in which to take the adventure...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
at some point

Alpha and Omega will meet

the finish and star complete

the circle enclosed and fixed in a joint


and you will go out

by the way you came in

relieved of all doubt

about what has been


your past a memory

your memory a fullness

that defines your whole identity


now its completed it's business...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
oh snake pit

I inch my way around

trembling at the edge

on a lip of this trail


claim someone weaker

but know they are not so weak

they will go through your serpents

to find their God


and discover no serpents

but only God

frightening aspect to be sure

but only an aspect


only a pit the enlightened could cross

as common feet trod the earth



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you want to get me excited?

show me a tear in the sky

that will admit all of us

who are so tired


let me find the ladder

I must climb

(like Jacob must I say?)

to enter that gash in the soft belly


of our deceptive blue sky

do that for me

and you will see my holy hard-on

aiming for a union


only lovers who believe

can receive...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I won't say

the darkness is over

and the light is breaking through

the dark eastern morning


I'll just say

whatever its gradient

there's light light light

everywhere



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

on the other side of the change

is a board swept clean of its played pieces


and a barren sullen expanse

that stretches like a Dali desert


into an infinity capped only

by the vision's limit


and an unnerving quiet

as you set new pieces up...


and only one thought..

are you game?



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
bemoaning loss

spoils your gain


it's not the dice toss

but the pure disdain

of settling for

what you've gotten

that makes you crave more

and think your lot's rotten


forgetting that if it were not yours

you'd be unable to keep it

accept that yours is really yours

and you'll find it a perfect fit


better...leave your wallet entirely alone

instead of wearing a barrel home...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
am I forgiven?

dare I go forth boldly

confident the universe

won't fall in on me

for some minor infraction

against the grinding

of cosmic wheels?


can I guarantee

I won't fail

under my own power?

should I maybe bring

documents

to show the angels

who are ever on the case

even if it is to bring you

to some inexorable reckoning?


but mostly

am I forgiven?

do I forgive?

who will I forgive?

me? you? us? the One?


and if I am forgiven

will I not weaken

before some imagined sanction?

oh I am doing nothing

at the moment but running

all this in my mind


running from all this in my mind

running in spirit

while the body waits

for its forgiveness...


am I...yet?



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
the dread is like a layer of earth

blotting out the sky and covering

the entire city

not even a shadow

just dirt itself filling every space


and we push through this

like sprouting seeds from soil


and therein the dread...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

alone


this feels natural to me

no bullshit bowing to the ignorance of others


no crap about honoring the desperate evils

of the underdeveloped


I have no problem giving the helping hand

but the expected crutch I cannot do...


believe all you wish

deny all you like


your reckoning will be as hard

as anyone's


and you'll have no one to blame

but your own cowardly attempt


to escape responsibility

while the rest of us sigh


as much from recognition as from

acceptance of our own failings and the ever painful


pledge to "do better"

better than what I'll never understand


but that is why I bless the ultimate reality

here in the earth


help all you like...get brownie points for heaven

but eventually you will be...each of us will be...


alone


alone with only our tale to tell

and our consequence to instruct...endlessly...



Content (c) 208-2012 Philip Milito.
I can't win


God will do me down

no matter what I do


love is not God's business

vengeance is


and God could care less about human suffering

why should the One give a fuck?


the One does all but blames us for it

and for our limited humanity


and who help us if we dare say anything about it?

give up your bullshit prayers


your sucking-up to the One

who could give a fuck whether you endure or perish


let the One deny all the One wishes

it doesn't change the facts of creation


you'd think God...being all there really is

would be a little sweeter about things


but Power is a narcotic even the Lord cannot refuse

evidently


oh I will perish because I hate creation as is

and the Lord will have none of it


I've exhausted my ability to praise

and perform obeisance


I took the word of the Lord at His Word

and now it seems like nothing but another piece


of cheap lying horseshit

I curse with the full remaining force


of my wasted life

and what does the One care?


at long as I can't win

God will make sure there is all to lose


somehow this is redemption...



Content (c) 208-2012 Philip Milito.


I will not lie


I cannot help you

I cannot even help myself


the world is in the throes of rebirth

it contains all the past and knows nothing of it


it will not listen

it cannot listen


it is following the channel of its manifestation

like a solo tying all the movements

into its grand statement


heaven dancing on the last day

of any reality you are living...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you breathe a sigh of relief

you've survived

you've made it to some distant shore

you stand on the sand

and all looks familiar though

all is radically different


it's all in the head

the same old world

looked at

with new eyes


and head or tail

is beside the point

this is the deal

this is the new way


and the way back is closed

the way forward is a job for spiritual crowbar

and an open interpretation of the facts


ever in conditioned creation

the bloody facts...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
here on the other side of the "new"

all is desolation

a vast barren place

where the Remnant seeks the first

green shoots of new life new aspiration


new directions into a quest

that continues no matter what

the momentary dispensation...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

we have no control in life


stop listening to the fake yogis

as disgusting as your standard issue


priests rabbis mullahs monks

demons goddesses and other punks


see for yourself the grain of the floor

feel for yourself the failure of your will


your pride will fail you and haunt you still

and no effort or penance or prayer or atonement


will do anything to soften the blows

and no one will miss their own accounting


no one but you will face yours

and this is of what you want control?


be grateful you have no control over life


think how much

worse off you'd be...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.



I've gone ahead


I saw a glimmer and followed it

and though I die old and penniless like an old cliche


I lived richly in that peripheral gleam

I saw and followed it


going ahead...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
join me or not


we'll meet again on the same twilit shore

where all I love supports me

and the dark lavender shades of the foaming waves

slap around our ankles like the last grasps

of busy earthbound fingers trying to prohibit flight

into the fading violet light...oh join me or not


we'll both end up there...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
the strange thing about a blog

is the different imaginings there must be of who I am


someone may be reading me day after day

(someone must be...my stats are high enough)


and another will read something I wrote

two years ago (may be in a different head...


maybe more of my usual 'themes')

and say "How true!" or "What is this shit?"


and either way they may be wrong or right

but only their imaginations


can fill in the blank of the 'profile pix' field

and that is the Philip Milito they know


while I can be anyone I choose to want to be

while being this response nerve that is always me


go ahead and keep reading

(as long as reading exists)


there are as many of me as there are of you

and sometimes I'll write and you'll read


the same thing at the same time

and be One in that...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I will be glad to be rid of this life


no more of God snatching away what I work to achieve

just as I'm about to attain it


no more doing what I can to repent and amend

and have it come to little or nothing


no more trying to do the right thing

only to have it explode in everyone's faces


I know now God is not love

but pure cold unforgiving vengeance


liability be damned

I owe up but so what?


the One still insists on the Price

being gouged out of us


well let it be that then

I was as foolish as anyone


with our limited self-serving ideas of religion

atonement is as nothing


because God's vengeance is primary

and it's just too bad if your religion doesn't


support your faith

religion politics law all of it


nothing but enslaving man-made concepts

doing nothing but keeping us


from the Infinite

and the One does it with our own acts


innocent stumbling or deliberate manipulation

you will pay and pay


and no amount of 'sorry' will make a difference

as you stumble and fuck up more and more


and all God can or will do is weep with you

cling to your fake religions


for all I know they work because

of the belief you invest in them


but for me I pay the price for vanity

for thinking I could arrive in good grace


at some resolution and atonement

after scrambling out the box of tradition


God wants you to transcend then blocks you

every step of the way


I have no idea how much more of this I can endure

but as the Light grows I diminish


and the happiest time of this life

will be leaving it


my good never good enough...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.



Monday, February 20, 2012

I have no qualms about dying

dying is just a transition as they say

a removal of the costume we wear

in this particular life's play


a change of expendable identity

discarded after the silver cord

is pulled and let's the curtain drop

releasing the player to his trod on the boards


sometime later in the world

until then

rehearsals rehearsals rehearsals

and no ending of preview jitters when


it dawns oh good God Almighty on some first night

it's showtime...forEVER!


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.




I cannot waste another minute

killing myself with my doubt


I must go forth even with nothing in it

that could ever help me out


God has the last word and delights

in reminding us day after painful day


I say fuck it! I ignore promptings and insights

and argue my point the rest of the way


still love me Lord?

more...do I still love You?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
all anguish is muted

in the face of the fact


you're locked in track

to the end of this life


and bitter acceptance

is all can be mustered


and even all you've done

is as amazing as regret for what wasn't...


all this to realize

their were other ways to go


other than the one you insisted on

and all you have now is the cold peace


of a fading ache that is the relief

of the self-conscious soul


who didn't know better

after all...


all causes affecting the dour review of life

simmering before the silencing light...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I'll see you on the other side of somewhere


and even then who knows

if we'll remember each other


or what the fuss was

that divided us in the first place


I'll see you somewhere at some point

in eternity and then we'll


see how honest the air of our continued business...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I'm not called home yet

though I want that more than anything


my time will be up

sooner than I think


I must learn patience

I must learn to let all this horseshit


wash off me while I wait

for the sky to open


and take me despite all the wounds

of the body marked on my soul


and at last the chance

to look back through the canyons of years


to see what set all this

misery in motion...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.



Sunday, February 19, 2012

once the blame is accepted

the strenuous denials fall away

the blasphemies cease

as though relief were a vindication


and all imaginings collapse

under the weight of the reality

the verdict distressing but soon enough

part of the emptiness hunched over your shoulder...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I wished too much

did less than little

locked in a harness

chained to a circumstance


until the stone fell out

and shackles went loose

then I wished less than little

but did too much


I stand in another arena

thumbs are plummeting

I have my work cut out for me

I liked it better when it was all imaging


and I was safe from the beast stalking me now

in the dreadful holding pen...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
echo

across the lands and seas

from

anywhere


you will

become one

with your followers

your echo


the sound

of many hearts

manifest

over the network...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

an end on it...


what endures and what perishes

means nothing to those who've forgotten

how to think

let alone how to feel or how to respond


you'll spout your expression

and deliver unsolicited advice

praising some ever bright ever new "Now"

and no thought as to how long



the world will endure this


a forgotten wisdom

conveyed by some cohesion of consciousness

in a forgotten tongue

and no one remembering that tongue


or for what other people will say

using the words we'd use

come out of a new mouth of some stranger here oh


an end on it!

the Bullshit is huge

it's on every level

it's in every corner

it's in everyone's ear

it's in everyone's mouth


no one will remember you or

the sound of your voice

or what you had to say


an end on it

regardless of what endures and what perishes...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
no one to read the tablet

draw the diagram

pull the switch


nothing left

but the ignorance and vanity

of the clueless


who own and operate these endeavors

without knowledge


mascots of their uber-rich parents

who resent them so...


glad I won't be around when this bill is paid

just how many times must I die?

I'd rather be abandoned and forgotten


than in league with this shit...God's Will or not...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


now everything comes to me

after I need any of it


thank you Eternal Pillar of Strength

and of Vengeance


from the foolishness of one

of your pillars of salt


I turned to see all I desired slip back

but mourning it wasn't allowed either...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I gave you nothing


at least it was

an even trade



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
what will be remembered

of my pronouncements or yours?


each generation effaces and ignores

all that came before it


so when we look for answers

we know nothing about what to ask


waiting for some future mouth

to say words we've used...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
where I'm going

there are no more ridiculous scenes

of ignorance stumbling after a light

someone else told them about...

no more opera over the loss

of someone you wanted to lay this evening...

no more hysterics over missing

the last bit of gossip to flutter from

some televised national calamity...


where I'm going

there is everything standing out lit

in its even portions

and pity for what spillage of emotion

occurred from being bound in those confines...


where I'm going

I will not be gone

but fully present among those who came before

where we'll look on creation

then raise our eyes to each other's

familiar as a moment in the earth

when realization opens its gate


and all we stumbled under is gone...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Friday, February 17, 2012

if there was mercy in creation

it certainly didn't endure

passed the first pounding it took


from the composite of every sin

solidified in the valves of a heart


our own hurt making us quiver

and that fidget drawing wrath like honey

if there was mercy pity for this must have consumed it...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
again the shame and remorse

for an ill-spent life


getting a fresh airing

before everyone


another failure

another fall


another display to the crowd

as if I were naked and scarred


and again not

a sign of grace


and oh what could it do

weak and accommodating as it is?


bow head and be silent

try not to feel the eyes poke at you


glance away and downward

and stay that way


not quite able to feel

God's love in this...


but the shame will keep me

stock still in the open...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
...as if slapped awake by anxious hands

jittery under some inexorable doom

I jolt to see the buttocks of life descend on my face


hands awakening me to this?

I know its weight it comes and destroys

whether all is well or not...


it is the full tonnage of God's indifference

and I will faint again under its benign wrath...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


I waited

common as the air

to see the

precession


take me

as far as it would

before I grew too big

to be carried


it took years

to realize

all my experience was

just the kicked-up dust


of the whole progress

as it went by...


there is only amazement

as how quickly

the moment faded

into its place in my view


this being all

I get for waiting

the Inevitable

shows its ass again...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.



a noble saying

is a lie

to comfort you

while you die...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito



I write and talk and write and talk

as if just talking will externalize

the splinter and heal the gash


so we are marked and noted

a bleeding thing huddled

endlessly grumbling on


and nothing heals so much

as it runs out of blood...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


Thursday, February 16, 2012

I had a feeling it would be you


something detached

fundamental to understand


covered my eyes like a fold

and I shrugged


obviously I could not offer

what you most required


and let it be and let it go

so it naturally came to mind


when the doorknob flew off in flaming splinters

and the door swung open to reveal


you standing amid your creation

kicking aside husks and shells


as you entered and all I could think was

"oh damnable Christ! now what?


didn't she uproot enough

in her last ransacking?"


I ask you who else could it be

and I'm still sorry I underestimated you


when we get tired of wordlessly staring

at each other


after not crediting you with enough brains

to hoist yourself to miserable spats of peevishness


I won't spill on myself

if you're ill at ease


you may yet have more explaining to do

and for a tiny moment


I will be pleased to be silent...go...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you'll go a thousand miles out of your way

to avoid a confrontation


but detour and stray as you will

days months years could go by


and one day without this person

even in mind you'll turn a corner


and wind up crossing that path after all

and the strained pleasantries would amuse an observer...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
incessant buzzing in the mind's ear

capturing the bent wave--



every vibration of every living thing

arising out of this place around us

and into the blood-letting inside the head


like ears popping from the pressure


and blood rushing with a roar through the capillaries--

the white noise scoring this brief awareness




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


the queasy feeling of needing to be

somewhere but there is no place left to go


you stumble slowly down a gray pavement

and it is as if people pass right through you


abstracted from the cloud-laden sky

and the aural smudge of traffic and birdsong


as if where you are going means less

than where you are coming from...


your purpose served (for ill or good)

you won't know in this skin


you threw dice and sometimes you won

you bared your heart and maybe once


or so you didn't get it broken and now to stand

outside all concern of those who didn't do as much for you...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
no need to push so hard now

when release grows imminent

and all the living harm

lies open and festering on the nerves


you've heard the promises of succor

that ease the breaking down

but none of the actual sound of pain

gaining that sanction


and only in the dying silence

does the flash of knowing come

you pushed until your body quit

and played the fool in the bargain


for an afterlife as gray as earthly time

the harvesting of your crop and with it your deliverance



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

I would set you adrift

aflame like a Viking funeral


a gigantic pandering to the glory

you could not take with you beyond


but water will vanquish the fire

and the drifting pyre of seabound ashes


hold you inside crying from every atom

of your residual skin


its identity a puzzle for the ditch diggers

of anthropology


those who construct worlds from hearsay

in their gleaming pits and


who cannot follow the bones and bark

drifting on the mirror of Valhalla...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I survived my good fortune


here in my trench

the silent still moment


surrounds me with...

Scatter!!! Incoming other shoe...


damn it!



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
Saturn wins

Saturn crushes the life out of you

allegedly to save you


but if I had to lose

all that was holding me back

why wasn't slow steady painful


progress through the earth

losing all I've loved and mishandled

not enough?


Vengeance oh only One?

how human after all

albeit a tyrant's run...


but things are as they are and to hear you tell it

"I Am That I Am!"

fine...how may I please offer up


the last of my ashes

and blow away in some obscure direction

that is anywhere but this particular life?


or must Saturn that ringed turd

trample even that dust

for the satisfaction of the One?


so sorry I got so holy

I'd rather chase ass and legs

down every street in the world


in every age of the planet

than ruin myself over the love and compassion

that our fellow souls require


if only because it is a given

and nothing that can be second-guessed

automatic as breathing


with the risk of being taken for granted

oh Saturn will lock down every move

in a horror show of consequence and despair


and all in the name of a terrible

incomprehensible judgment

Saturn will squeeze you whether you've learned or not


Saturn a loose thick turd wearing halos...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

who will you cry for now?

yourself?

all those who depended on you?

all those you resented

because you were deluded in thinking

you had some grand destiny to fulfill?

don't bother asking or wring out fake tears

you won't cry for anyone you just don't know how...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
where are you hiding now?

to whom did you get hitched

to escape from a plan and go into action

as if a change will transform your life?


you dirty little cunt

all you managed was to close some doors

and guarantee a stumble down the years

when nothing you went for materializes


dirty lying little mercenary of the heart

savage heart-eater turned whimpering little girl

when she's caught out and no excuse

avails in the cacophony of pleadings


that will be your swan song

dirty lying little bitch good for you



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
"one feels like a man about to be executed"


such are the days after one retires from the world

part played

price paid

and nothing left to do but die


to leave a world that no longer resembles the one I knew

to go where all have gone before


serving a life sentence for something somewhere



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
now be a fool for whose reckoning...


did you think you were done

when you fell?


oh that was just the start

you'll ache like a bastard


wandering 49 days in the Bardos

saying "sweet fuckin' Christ now what?"


a fool by anyone's reckoning...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you thought you'd have a chance to beat the odds

foolish mortal

already agents of misuse

seek you out to break your spiritual kneecaps


for daring to challenge the diffident tyranny

of the Almighty

for the more they're told to strive and to grow


the more likely their end at the hands of some demon

of their own devising



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

I've always wondered how I'd meet my end


craven and bleached clutching a sheet

paralyzed by fear of non-existence

wistful and relieved as darkness fell

revealing an ancient light that measured no time

shining behind the facade of night


or maybe downright happy

to shed the heavy flesh and to move without moving

through every aspect of ordinary daily living

free to be closer to loved ones even if they cannot see you


or there's no thing there afterward not even consciousness

but I wonder in vain since the moment will fall and the time ended

regardless of how I imagine my exit or predict when it will come


despite your hurry it will come on time for you...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
if I'd have known the door opened only so

I could pass through and drop thirty stories to the ground

(like "what the fuck happened to the rest of the building!")


I'd have gone to the zoo instead

insulting the chimps and enraging the tigers

being anywhere but where the Powers-That-Be wanted me

then you stinking shits there'd have been no fall


and none of the world's history would have happened...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I am delivered to the ravages of habit


the life-long suicide of sedation and befuddlement

that spells so hard an end to this thread


all I craved killing me by degree

and nothing in the ears but the 'I told you so's


of loved ones trampling their torment in my eardrum

as much a reaping for anything I might have sewn


as for the dreaded and fatally ignored outlook...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
you never thought

about afterward...

it was 'live in the moment'

and yes all moments blend into one Now


but you in your earthly body

take one step one move one action

after another to get there

where all this has happened anyway...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
did you know any better

after you'd lost

and nothing you possessed

was worth the cost?


and now that you know

do you know anything?

have you a legacy to pass?

a song of redemption to sing?


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
who will miss you when you're gone?


the ones the ones the ones

who need you most


because you helped them at times

they should've helped themselves


and now they expect an instant rescue

except your string is played out


and that means so is theirs...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I saved 72 lives

held the beams up with my shoulder

while they scrambled to safety


then the earth grew heavy

and down I went

buried so complete I couldn't be found


my soul looks down

and knows now what all the fuss was...

while the body I was begins


its long return to its elements

a few mumbled prayers over the mound

from the grateful survivors


and a tiny bit of envy of me

for being done...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Monday, February 13, 2012

I am paralyzed in my freedom

each step crucial to be point

of immobility


o age and its fuckin' wonders

I have to think about crossing the street

has it really come to this?


or were we always required to ask permission

of the moon and stars and suffer accordingly

to our disobedient (to our natures) try at adjustment


to loiter at some wind-swept corner on a desolate night

waiting for a doom to befall some common errand

that promised no more than its completion and back to home


I too must quickly choose my method of conveyance

same boneyard at the end of the cul-de-sac



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
I have little happiness to claim in these days

but for memories of easier times

before the weight of a lifetime's ruin

came crashing down on my hopes


pay for my sins? fine with me

I have no special 'out' to play

no trick to play or password

to a new environment


but I can't help but think there might be

some gouging going on

since no amendments we make seem to be enough

for the god of vengeance


but bosses earthly and otherwise call the shots

and we take them as best we can...as if we could do otherwise...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

you look until you find

and if it's still no good


you look until you find...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
...as if a miracle manifested

to the salvation of all concerned


a flaming pillar a parted sea

ceasing of impossible torments


from the daily sidewalk...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
my spirit has an aura

thick as the hide of a buffalo


it needs to be to be sustained in

this butcher shop of a world


chopping blocks for silver cords

as well as the unused portions of the heart


my buffalo's as evanescent

as a spirit's thin membrane of aura...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


Saturday, February 11, 2012

I may become mute or deaf or just plain die

in ten years ten days ten minutes

any instant now


but all I see is a continuation

of happenings from the deepest cuts of the heart

to the light of an April evening


so long ago it could be this instant

which it exactly is...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

insufferable clowning in the heat of the moment

a braying jack-ass shrills in triumph

incomprehensible to himself

the weight of consequence in unchecked expression


back-kicks at something behind it

as he thinks the cops cuffing him are a joke

(the jerk-off learned about the world

and the hearts of men in comic books)


as the sea seeps up the gunnels in the mud

while he acquaints himself with his raw face on the curb...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
as if you could understand

how the killing blow felt to me


how it bashed my skull

as I was unawares and looking


at my first daylight in years


this is how the price is paid


me suffering

and you examining me as if I were a specimen...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
karma is the bugaboo

karma is the ruse


when the One wants to crush you

your pleas will be no use


the One will take your own rope

to hang your hide up high


The One takes no blame and there's no hope

to answer any cry


everything you've done before

you'll end up doing again


consequence will stay your hand and more

and in God you'll have no friend


and no self-imagining will enlighten you

so you won't know why you were refused


but you will sense that you are through

darkening on a last thought stressed and confused


because little of anything you hear is true

even if you in your own heart accuse


becuase karma is the bugaboo

karma is the ruse



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
ephemeral

...what else can be said?




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
God breaks your legs

then commands you to dance


you can't dance?

well it's your fault



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Friday, February 10, 2012

I can't stand the murderous Mass Mind

and every righteous jerk who occupies the Mainstream


safe in your bubbles for now

beware of an exceptionalist like me


in full malice and not giving a fuck any more

I will shit on your lawns


and call it occupy the seeds

you won't know whether to lynch me


or elect me president...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.



you so want to walk

in another's shoes

when yours pinch so badly


why am I always me?

why can't I see out of other eyes?

why not some other point of view?


I hobble along on rocky feet

the shoe cutting my circulation

we all have bad feet


but each feels his own bunions

walking his own mile...



Content (c)_ 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


I may as well be staked out in the desert

honey smeared around my balls and on my belly

in scorching sun


for all the good in Divine Mercy

which also in interests of fairness

backs the soldier ants as well



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

any ghost will reassure you

just by being a ghost

that no story is resolved


the whispers echo in diminishing circles

you can't make them what they're saying

but you know what they mean


and in all the gossip that sounds in the branches

you confront your own story

related in the history of someone else


and see him staring at you

from the glint of light on some flesh and blood

shoulder that is lifted in his midst


as you both head toward a respite

before continuing this compulsion

he stuck in this earth with an occasional protrusion


of the tongue at the unsuspecting photographer

while you go looking for new skin in inhibit...



Content (c)2008-2012 Philip Milito.

what little I know

will work against me


and my vanity will insure

that it's lethal


make as many plans as you may

just when you think you've gotten through


an invisible hand from the sky

will move you an inch off your track


and what was an open way

becomes a cul-de-sac


that gathers you like a migrants hand

shifting through your chaff


for your wheat your harvest

your reason for being...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
so let everything fall apart


in that sundering a new way opens

and with nothing left to lose


there should be little problem going that way...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
sometimes it feels like

we're given things

for the express purpose

of losing them


and what and how and why

mean nothing

to the puny human

consciousness


me I just scrambled

a little way up the dung heap

so my fall will not be

deep and frustrating


but it will still be a fall

and it will still be a raging of mournful ignorance



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

I am marked by whatever passing scrape

I grow quiet on my post

seeing the dreams that form some escape

first preparations for a ghost


scratching away 'til the skull is shredded

I have been taught my pace

and blur myself on the edge of the scene

an onlooker out of his place


I bear my fix like an edgy peace

the still moment imminent but unarriving

when I will lift and deep breathings cease

while here remains will ever drop from striving


I am not free I am wide awake

and I feel along some passage to find the way I did not take...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

a transition so comprehensive

you live in its air


like the bond of emulsions on old photographs

that fills sense-memory with its vividness


the living moment preserved in living

even as I gaze at its moment occurring in


a previous time its image of familiarity

this moment


(except for changes of style and presentation

in the fashions of our 'world')


right here...




Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

I don't feel cart-wheeling wonderful

but I'm not exactly on the roadside

with a broken axle either


in this skin all I can do is magnify the horrors

ignorant of what good I may have done

because I'm too self-centeredly busy


counting a cost beyond my ability to tally

the last comedown of pride

the vanity of thinking you could control your amendment


it is a mild winter morning

the low sun shines dully on the trees and building on the avenue


let me be content with the moment

it is all I've got

it is all it is...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
it is hoped you will not

disregard the love of those in your life


as he dishonor them with your self-destruction...


barring death-bed conversions and plain old blank

stares at a fading sky you should be able to go


clean with some dignity


some much you tore so much you healed

and you won't know it as long as you're in this skin



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
oh fool who ran his string too long too far

he will face the stiffest price


but it will buy the release

from the world he's craved as long as he's lived here...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
we lose everything in the earth...

the price we pay to enter the heavens



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
oh we control freaks are so polite

we wish not to offend anybody

we want it all to come right


and but for the fewest times it does turn out well

we generally collapse when it doesn't

all good will exhausted by our feeble fuck-ups


and those who looked favorably

now look another way...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Monday, February 6, 2012

be grateful that

you can have

no occasion

to occupy

more ground

than on which you stand


be grateful

you can only

fill that particular spot...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

I'd as soon turn and walk away

from every hardship with which

you've burdened me


I've grown stronger under the weight

and pressure

and the heart no longer pumps in a panic


I'd easily glide away

with all discussion ended

what would I lose?


What would I have to fear?

each person carries another's death

within them we assassins stalking ourselves


time thought time to deliver

a gift too late or

a chance whose instant has passed


to each other

as on twilit evenings

we experience the passing faces


on the concourse

seeking out the recipient

under the glow of streetlights


presenting (perpetually)

with each unique clamor met

I'd as soon go there now but won't


for chance of ruining it

I can as well stay on track with

as many hellos as goodbyes in abundance



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.










Saturday, February 4, 2012

oh the things we do

to keep peace

that cost us our peace


my tongue is bleeding

from been bitten

every time a moron


exercises his right

to be a moron


yes everybody has their right


that's the sin and the shame of it


I'd rather be broken

than bow to the vainglory

that is the puny effort

to keep peace

and praises what hurts us most...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.

Thursday, February 2, 2012

my gal and I are careening

down some metaphoric highway


loving between the stop-gaps of calamity

that are moments of the world


where one good day is paid for

by twenty bad ones


we greet some fellow travelers

flip the bird to others


but always moving forward

we don't dare stop


lest the world leave us behind

in its insane processes


and our journey toughens

to just that degree


we all careen down that unpredictable road

grip the sides of the bed children


that rocking may be your passion

but more than likely


it is just the contours of a rocky road

asserting themselves


just when you thought the coast was clear

and 'forever' was the destination at which


you had finally arrived

regards from me


and from my forever girl

regards and regrets and a helping hand where possible


and all of it

in a greater hand than ours


see you at some truck stop down the line

eating greasy food and swapping tall tales...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.


Wednesday, February 1, 2012

to hell with Camelot


I myself am thoroughly wondering

what the Queen is doing tonight...



Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
my new 'forever girl'

is the same as my old one


that is how multitudinous

her facets


all things to all others

but everything to me...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.
all this traveling just to go nowhere

because all journeys begin in the mind

and end at the destination we have dreamed for ourselves


and all that transpires between those personal nodes

just enacting the whole quest in Reality beyond Time

which is now


all this traveling with nowhere to go

and everywhere to be...


Content (c) 2008-2012 Philip Milito.