AND ALIVE I am the weak link I am the truth that escapes no lie I am the Rubicon where Caesar burned his ears dispensing with tonality in favor of fame I am Hitler's affection for art But more than that beyond any great man's destiny I am that which creates nations and religion I am a squalling crack baby banging unceremoniously on the insides of a back-alley dumpster fetal, fecal and destined to disappear I am the cruel man's fists and his wife's broken face and (not one to stand on vicious ceremony) the silent screaming terror of their horrid distant child An inventory, strange and small, things to punctuate a dictionary of fear and yet with dismal power, exquisite pain and encyclopedic mannerisms in houses great and odd in shattered pews and misplaced intentions it can only rust the sieve and display a sum too quirky to calculate for every day is different and every morning identical for we all wake up as I do weak and alive (c) David McIntire

BOUND i am caught up in despair unable to navigate so precarious a path as that lain before us by the masters of destruction i am wrapped up in fear disabled not by the nebulous anxiety engendered by the demonized-to-the-point-of-caricature Osama but rather by the all too real idiot-with-his-finger-on-the-button Bush i am entangled with the waking nightmare that has become business as usual in this nation standing on the precipice populate with so many who simply don't want to know, would rather stand in the middle of the tornado fingers in their ears as they chant "lalalalalalalalalalalalal" as if we wouldn't all love to believe that a child's petulant ritual could successfully avoid bloodshed i am inextricably chained to the horror above which we now dangle understanding that we, ourselves, are now the other shoe whose calamitous fall is broadly awaited i am enmeshed with the knowledge that what has been done on countless reservations across this "great" nation that what has been done in countless banana republics that what is being done to our most basic human rights is about to be perpetrated, perpetuated, punctuated and prosecuted on a country whose starving and sickly population, half of whom are under fifteen, will be crushed beneath the machinery of death machinery designed and built with our tax dollars and this knowledge is crushing my head and my heart and the violence seems infectious because the blood in my skull is knocking holes in my courage while the mud in my gut is swamping my convictions and so i trudge enmeshed, entangled, and chained through the day trying to remember how to smile when all i want to do is cry trying to remember how to breathe when all i want to do is bleed trying to remember how to talk when all i want to do is scream 2003 (c) David McIntire some related links: http://www.codepink4peace.org/ http://www.notinourname.net/index.html

BEFORE YOU CAME TO ME I didn't know I didn't know I didn't have it so good before you came to me the notions I thought I had of what love was and could be before you came to me were ultimately shades and wisps, mere approximations of a reality so strangely and surely correct Before you came to me words had meaning but not power Before you came to me thoughts would flit but never fly Before you came to me actions had direction but no purpose Before you came to me arms would chain and eyes would lie I have now a great appreciation of the life I led before you came to me not nostalgia nor regret just a simple understanding of contrasts and comparisons the world after and the world before Before you came to me (C) David McIntire

Oh Christ! They've gone and done it again! another lost boy another lost girl another lost life Brandon Teena rides again and fear is holding the reins Brandon I swear you didn't die in vain despite all evidence to the contrary, we do remember I know they've killed Gwen and buried her out in the woods as if you didn't matter, as if you were never here but don't believe their lies, their eyes, their innocent pleas their shaking knees 'cause they've gone and done it again they've proven how low a human being can go (never underestimate humanity's ability tobe cruel and stupid) and Brandon if you see Gwen, tell her we miss her, tell her we're sorry that they've done it again and I say "they" because I'm afraid to say "we" because I'm afraid we've let you down we should have seen this coming we should have taught our children better than this 'cause goddamnit there's more to raising a kid than don't sneeze on your sister and look both ways before crossing the street and Gwen you were a beautiful child yes a child, not yet grown and full of confusion and questions and a strange power indigenous to youth your friends will miss you terribly, even the petty , selfish parts of you because yes, even these parts carried beauty with them through your troubled gaze and your mother will bury you with your makeup and nail polish intact because she loves you and wants you as beautiful in death as you were in life and as you carried beauty the men who did this carry guilt and as you carried your secret power these men now carry the shame of the angels and I see them now in their shackles and their shame and I wonder we may be able to punish them, but can we teach them? or more importantly, can they teach us?? can we learn what we need from them to not make them again? and these men (I call them men though they are rally no more than boys, as young as you, Gwen, and no more in control of their own youthful powers than you were of yours but these boys on the cusp of hope and potential made some very bad, grown-up decisions and so these boys must now be men) and these men, their faces so heavy now have altered the balance irrevocably and the powers that brought them this far can take them no further they have been destroyed, subsumed by their cruelty and they dance now much more slowly and their tears are now much more obvious and they will declaim their innocence as they devise some misunderstanding to cover their abomination and their anger now, I can understand that they were angry what I can't understand is that somehow they thought killing was an appropriate expression of this anger what I can't understand is that somehow there was no one at that place at that time no one who questioned the brutal reality unfolding before them I bet they've got questions now I can't help you now, Gwen I can't save you from the violent, silent fears so woven into our culture all I can offer is this; I will remember. I will remember you and what was done just as I remember Brandon Teena and Mathew Sheppard I will remember you and I will tell your stories and I will hope that next time this is enough (c) David McIntire some web pages about Gwen: http://www.transgenderlawcenter.org/gwen/index.html http://www.transyouth.net/stories/gwen_arauj

I don't recall it surprising me then, you saying that I loved you badly it was true - and only the beginning I could never convince myself that you understood my motivations I was so sure of my discretion Perhaps you were not so blind in your need as I was deaf in mine I heard you though and understood that I was not a poor lover but in my rush to be gentle I became awkward, by studying sympathy I became narrow-minded and missed you desperately by the hour cursed myself constantly took confusion in stride like a free set of luggage it's true that I loved you badly but you accepted what I gave It is also true that I asked for little more than to be with you to be for you what you needed Possibly I asked too high a price for too little a return and my notebooks got filled with fantasies, blueprints I knew would never be built and yet when I could hang on no longer and you sent me away I couldn't help but hate you oh, how I tried to hate you It wasn't you though it was me and I punished you by punishing myself in your lap coming around too often making scenes but always exiting a gentleman I was always in some way afraid of you But when we had finally done all that we could do to each other when we had finally made good on our threats of mutual poetry and the versed closed and the scars tamed I finally learned to love you well I haven't stopped laughing since (c) David McIntire

Everything is everything it's all in how you look at it the day is the day the sky is the sky the song is the song all is all is all it's all in how you look at it music is music and that's that but music can't be music if the notes are flat but ears can change and be changed... listen with different ears and you can hear music everywhere on the freeway, the factory floor, in your garden and the creaking of the basement door Coltrane and Bach used the same notes Hendrix and Segovia played the same instrument Cage and Gillespie sang in harmony listen and you'll hear them listen and you'll hear listen and you'll listen art is beauty this everyone knows but the portrait is ugly if you misplace her nose but eyes can see much, much more than we think... change your lenses, clean your glasses, pop out them orbs and replace them if you have too... whatever it takes to see things in a way unknown to you see, see, see! that there is no fundamental difference in beauty whether it is a flower or a sunset or a broken spring coil or a rust stained toilet or... poetry is poetry and it rhymes and it doesn't and it has meter and it doesn't and it is static and it is dynamic and it has almost nothing to do with language if you want poetry listen to your dog snoring if you want poetry go watch snails fucking if you want poetry follow the mailman for seventeen blocks if you want poetry check out the backhoe digging a trench out on Western if you want poetry look closely in the eyes of your lover and don't you dare turn away if you want poetry remember... everything is everything everything is everything everything is everything everything is everything everything is everything everything is everything (c) David McIntire

another moonless night another useless day a few quiet moments in disquieting times we'll take our peace where we find it even in a 3AM weed-fettered patio where everything is shadow everything is shadow even the refinery across the rooftops to the south even the sound of the helicopter as it creepy crawls the city even the neighbor's cat, eyes glowing with suspicion another heartless day another listless night and in quietly momentous times we'll pick up our pieces where we find them even in the hole in the bottom of the bucket even in the storm drains even in the pile of ash and butts dumped out of someone's car ashtray in the handicapped spot in front of Vons the pieces are the peace our peace is in pieces and we'll find it where we find it in moonless shadows and in the stunning silence (c) David McIntire

To think of her leaving is to look into the face of madness to beg it enter through my eyes and play its savage purpose against the confines of my skull To make the attempt to stretch my mouth around the razored putrid words is an exercise in weird masochism the pain so foreign and yet so inevitably mine I cannot, it seems, do this as long as it needs be done my strength wanes with my patience for the violence laying waste to my head and still the most vile fear is that it could yet be worse (c) David McIntire

This is Fair Warning! I will not accept the language that you place upon my tongue I will not accept the lies that you place upon my lips The misdirections and obfuscations that you try to insert will not cleave to my consciousness I will grin and bare my teeth to barricade against the misnomers you wield with shameless abandon I will refuse your constructions and deductions they do not hold sway It is my intention to hold you accountable for the uncountable It is my perception that my reception is insurmountable I will refuse your assertions of reality I will continue to deny what you claim to be true The words you use drip with falsity and fear the lubrication of lies Your language serves only to perpetuate deception your vocabulary consists only of misdirection your sentences permeated with ill intent will not penetrate my understanding I do not accept your language I will not retain the lies I do not accept your language My mouth doesn't stretch to that size my tongue will not speak your language my mouth will not form your words my lips will not shape the sounds my ears hear only a whirr I will not accept the language that would only soil my mouth I will not utilize the untruths that would blister my lips your sinister dictionary is quite contrary and I will not accept your language I will not accept your language I will not accept your language (c) David McIntire

is it just nostalgia? - get out while you can accelerate the beat beat, beat them at your own game following unknown rules beat the sense they knocked in - out is it just convenient? - wishing death or suicide or just a violent surprise did the hardcore lion slam into the wall for nothing more than a buzz? time, what a time it was the feeling of self-worthless missing the target - keep pulling the trigger placing bets on your own reality driving fast and hiding hard some of us got good at insulation some of us got good at aggravation some of us disappeared some of us never were some of us were great (or not) some of us lived on frightened laughter (if Darby were alive today he'd be dead from AIDS) guarantee you missed your chance guarantee you lied to get out promises are what you are memories are what you wish you were what was hatred is now pure what was gutter trash is now sainted bemusement delusion we are what we loved and feared and nothing has changed we were happy we were scared and nothing has changed (c) David McIntire

How long will we remember the name Amadou Diallo? For how long shall we recall his death? Certainly the forty one shots have been well documented, examined, reexamined, decried, defamed, explained, excused, justified, criticized, twisted and warped until these shots no longer even resemble bullets but rather simple molecules from a complex chemical equation So the parts are there; the journalistic diatribes, the enraged denouncements, the pompous denials, the photos, the interviews, the witness accounts, the innumerable op-ed pieces all of which will well serve any future historians who may have some studious interest in turn-of-the-century police/community relations and the socioeconomic ramifications thereof But what about us? How long will we remember? What lessons will we truly glean from such an act of sadness? How long will we remember the name Amadou Diallo? (c) David McIntire a web page on Amadou Diallo: http://www.amadoudiallofoundationinc.com/

we must finally speak aloud of the violence almost secret the hidden brutality that makes our lives so convenient (it's not safe until half of them die) we cannot live proud bathed in the blood of the mostly mute the secret shame shown in the pictures they don't want us to shoot (it's not safe until half of them die) the flawed science of profit and loss dictates a premise so skewed; if you call me a monkey you can put a wire in my brain if you call me a monkey it's alright to make me insane (it's not safe until half of them die) if you call me a rabbit you can pour acid in my eyes if you call me a rabbit you can use the science of lies (it's not safe until half of them die) in the white room in the clean, white room the inquisition continues in the white room in the clean, white room the inquisition continues (it's not safe until half of them die) (c) David McIntire some related links: http://www.hsus.org http://www.peta.org/

Every freak on the street Every geek in the room knows the daily paranoia like a mutant hothouse flower living life under a glass the only one in your class If you're smarter than your classmates If you're stranger than your peers you will be pushed away Because being odd is a crime you will be convicted you will be evicted you shall not be free We must free the West Memphis Three a knife a lie and stupidity are the ingredients of a conviction ignorance fear and vengeance are the ingredients of a death penalty Destined to die Damien denies the lies Jesse and Jason face only their lives locked away We must free the West Memphis Three murder charges are meaningless when three boys are convicted only of being different in a world that needs things the same in a world that feeds the insane and starves the good the decent and the fair that kicks the just and the compassionate in the teeth in the head in the eye yes, it's a kick in the eye to realize that what got my ass kicked in high school got three boys convicted of murder "they got weird hair" "they wear black t-shirts" "they listen to that devil music" We must free the West Memphis Three I've been told that justice is blind but I think instead she's lazy She won't rise from her bed of nails She won't rise to the occasion She doesn't care that these three were condemned not for any murder but for the high crime of being different She ignores the evidence She is deaf to the pleas and her blindfold is stapled in place and so it's up to me and you - it's up to we to sing for Damien to shout for Jason to dance for Jesse it's up to we We must free the West Memphis Three We must free the West Memphis Three (c) David McIntire a link for the West Memphis Three: http://www.wm3.org/splash.php

Like stealing truth from a baby's mouth she slipped into the dimness of my house and made the silence sing She transformed my confusion with subtle brash abrasions returning to me a jewel both bright and dark She walked through dawning darkness and brought me the light She took a look of hope and gave it definition, direction She wiped away my slate and handed me colored chalk She created a wondrous act of love out of what had once been only words and talk She stole me from the stranger I was and gave me back to the man I should be by burning away the falseness of my face she brought out the beauty in my scars by walking through the dawning darkness she brought me to the stars (c) David McIntire