Ballad of a Guiltless Mind

Ballad of a Guiltless Mind

The sand of time slips through the cracks,
I sit in my chair, wasting away.
Staring out the window at a world passing by,
Leaves of change decaying on the ground.
My eyes scan the Mardi Gras streets, dry of tears.
Buskers executing their grief for donations
See the same lonely tears that stain my shirt.
See the stain on my chair, that same stain of my soul,

I can see Mephistopheles in my peripheral.
Can’t close my eyes, not for a quiet moment.
His demons surround me when all is black.
They rip, tearing. bludgeon, battering.
They laugh, shrieking in my only refuge
The sanctuary of my bed now quarantined,
No safe haven have I, but an occupied mind.
A place of temporal asylum in the streets below.

Music helps when my mind starts to wander.
Shields me from demons when nothing else can.
Noise pollution, it bothers the police
Not me, fuck ‘em. I got my
Peaceful reprieve, no demons in sight,
Until the song changes to something familiar.
Horrors hotly leap in again start with their torment,
I plunge my fist into the radio’s face.

These past regrets are not a lonely terror
Each tourist on the street below is hiding from history
Slowing, strolling to forget the shared spirit
My failures do not slow, they halt- each day
Illuminates the fallow fields of once polished potential
Now thorn filled, arid cacti and weed choked failure
STOP! Futile vicarious games- that field is not mine
My choices may seem foreign but they are mine.

Memories creep up like nightmares.
The regrets of others chew at my thoughts.
Faults forced upon me feed on my spirit
As I progressively flee to a lower existence.
These demons I run from, always
One step ahead in the path before me.
Dodging and dashing, losing my will,
But I can’t find the power to concede.

Unable to end my own suffering,
Too proud to take my own life,
I go to fill my glass with more Jack,
Fuck it, why bother- I drink from the bottle instead.
Getting up from my chair, away from my gun,
stepping out of the cage. I light up a Camel.
Staring at reality, pulling a long drag,
Taking in the smoke as it takes in my life.

November 24 2010

© Perigrine Scott