Achilles and the Tortoise - Buck 65

This collection of sketches, rough and scattered, is arranged by instinct.

There’s entropy at work, but mostly it happened by accident

Sure a story goes with this, but for it to make sense you’d have to be me,

And for it to make dollars I would have to be something I despise,

Don’t ask me how I managed, no one gets paid to make change,

Every morning I salute the flag, turn, grab the fingers of my left hand behind

my back and continue my search.

I’m wondering how I got here,

Who besides me is responsible?

I’m not the young man I was when I first wrote the code,

Now I dont have it in me to fuss over much.

I need sleep… more than ever before.

What remains of my violence is so precious that I keep it all of it to myself.

What frightens me most now is my gradual loss of hearing.

So i’m guided more and more by vibes.

I shield my eyes from flickering images and document my dreams with as much

detail as possible.

I figure I’ll write my book when its all I can do, but I don’t know.

Have you any idea how hot these sands are?

Ya, i come in contact with the odd scavenger here and there, but those

encounters rarely amount to much

I just gaze the same few black and white photographs:

Distant loves, long lost souls.

diamonds of my most glorious moments,

I remember the gold rush

Ya, she makes me laugh now to think of the risks I took

The monuments will remain, and thats all that matters but the question always

becomes:

'Am I happy?'

When young, we mourn for one woman,

When we grow old, for woman in general,

The tradgey in life is man is never free,

Yet strives for what can never be,

The thing most feared in secret, always happens: my life, my love,

where are they now?

But the more the pain grows, the more this instinct for life somehow asserts

itself,

The necessary beauty in life is giving yourself to it completely.

Only later will it clarify itself as not coherant

I wandered the fields and listen for the sound of drums

The colder the ground becomes the closer I get I home

The planets not fit to roam but with all the chaos

But, when I saw the savages I played the law of averages

And when the river splits in half, I start to lose my wits and laugh

And cry at the same time, there’s nothing I can do about it

Even though I wouldn’t doubt it, if the winds began to blow

And carry the sounds of my voice to the lands below

So I put my hands around my mouth and hollered to the sunken city

That, wallows in the filth of its own drunken pity

And wait to see a signal but a signal is never seen

Eventually fatigue builds inside me exponentially and so I sleep

And dream that I’m able to fly

«They will respect a man with wings!»

Later I awake, in agony and learn

That while I was sleeping the city had burned

Shrugging my shoulders, I paused and gathered thoughts

Think twice about staying put, then decide I rather not

So I press on in my agnostic pilgrimage

Knowing that I can swim deeper than the grim reaper

Ready for whatever sea creatures may abound

When the water swallows me and not the other way around

Survival saw me through the mechanical district

Starvation leads to being cannibalistic

I have to rely on cons and silence and non talking quick

Defending myself with nothing but this walking stick

I’ve never had friends and no parental guidance

I’m wild at heart and weird on top, I’m feared nonstop

Even though my rage is worn out

My life’s a book with several pages torn out.

I just climb trees and look for rhythm everywhere.

I used to be the town crier in a city of stone throwers

Until my soul was laid bare and displayed in the pearled square

Ignored, more than a lot, not less, no one understood my thought, process

I was gagged and bound over noise complaints

But, commanding the resolve that destroys constraints

I found my escape in a melding of memories

The next thing I know, I’m rowing this boat

And blowing this note on an old tarnished trumpet

(Pause for trumpet sample)

Ever since then I’ve been wondering lots

Watching the sky and pondering thoughts

Strange angel, music box genie

Behind for some time and now I’m blind in one eye

And how this happened exactly will never be known

My thoughts take the shape of the hang-man's house

Never fails in time-traveling salesman visiting