Sturm und Drang

Many things have affected my mood of late; stress, lack of sleep, cogitations on amour, anxiety, desperation and the list rolls on endlessly with all manner of (in)conceivable states.

Here are two pieces, not intended as a couplet, that work along similar themes.

Living off one small meal a day;
no cash, no plan, no ability to maneuver through the ceaseless oceans and winds of time-
trying to chase happiness along the trails of 'panty-lines',
give each day the name of another girl-
I find my monday, tuesday, wednesday... Sunday rolls right into line, with beers and smoke and wine.
Travel the county, paying my dues, paying respects and sweating under an evening sun;
walking further than the limits of my energy to douse my apathy- antipathy-
I am nothing but the concepts and complex terms used to identify me as they come sprawling out the mouths of my company. Old lovers and latent ones, I chase dreams of  intercourse like dragons-
lance in hand, writing, riding out on a drunken horse.
I am at one with many, in this way; friends committed to institutions, institutionalised by a hard life like none ever gone before where tickets are sold at higher prices than we have been given the means to afford.
The air reeks of discommunication- breathe it through phones and 'tablets' too large to swallow-
we pour our lives into a sustainable un-reality as the world and the word withers and dies.
Can you blame me?
Looking for something real in hidden places,
attempting to find a bright spark of understanding, the likes of nothing else, amidst a black expanse.
Vicariously, I live, but through my days, I disappear. The man who walks is not I, for I exist in thought alone.

                                                                            ***

Handsome; slapdash; scallywag.
Everyone looks the same:
same face, recycled, regurgitated
few years later, cut-out, cut-off
fashionistas- same brand, same hair,
"long live the eighties!" decades later
still shouting the same chant,
jumbled image of apostrophised
individuals- look sharp, look here
lookalike, coveting false singularities
like something special. Seen it all before
from somewhere, squint my eyes to see
you at a distance in someone else
ubiquitous race in same tired scheme,
discover who you really are
styled like every other,
make no mistake, digital ash,
white noise- salt and pepper people
like a garbled fuck-fest, can't break
away from this season's hot trend,
same as every other, yodelling
"YOLO!" filling pockets of corporate
aggrandisement, the rich kids assimilating
urbanite poverty, social amorality
"bad boy" types fill rest-rooms like
chocolate bars in vending machines,
so cliche I sick up my palate.
I see a man I think of as my father
and detest him for every minute he is not,
losing weight, losing jobs, losing sleep,
losing sense and patience being
slowly eaten by the money-machine
bones all chewed and spat out back
again into obscurity.
Want to know the truth?
Stop fucking and start using your brain!
Advice for one and all,
we are all the same- identity
like a kid's sticker book
full of amorphous silhouettes-
white girl with a "black girl's bum",
I wretch again and throw up stones
the colour of dyed hair
insecurities: insecurely me...
Hack-job stand-outs all stand up, stand-offish, wanting hand-outs and hand-jobs;
arrogant pricks-
reel in furious envy, reeling in envious furies
from others just the same..
Nothing is exactly as it appears:
empty and vacuous.
Why waste a life living as one
when life can be lived as no other?
Round up the horde and bury them
for they know not that they live.