SKUNKED One of those enchanted evenings, A nine Corona nightmare, The rain is pouring down my face, My soul is green with fungus, Nagging thoughts as I stagger home, Crash out on the waiting couch, The wife is gone she cannot stand me, Like all the rest she don't like beer. Uneasy dreams they try to wake me, Liquid slumber wrapped in shadow, Dopey with the best of Mexico, Atlatl thumping like a great bass drum. Mattress awash with sour urine, A clinging pool usurps the floor, My soul is clinging by wispy thread, It wants to stagger out the door. The sun is high awake with start, Somehow this place has changed, A Jungle green with ancient old-growth, I hear a clubber calling my name, No saw he has nor need he have one, The sickle has he great enough, Time to time the eternal time, The grimy reaper in mouldy boots, His patient watching never sleeping. Spoke on me these selfsame words, "Die you might not wake again, Cirrhosis your liver yet shall claim, The bottle battle tears unnumbered, Poorness nothing waste encumbered, Chained you are unto a barstool, The mountain calling it calls your name, Nothing ventured nothing lost, Losing all you have this game." The second awakening this time sluggish, I can scarce arise my dead head, I wish that I could take it off, Toss it out; the waiting, the recycling bin, Recycle it, and get a new one, Maybe I can replace the cells, But that will wait until tomorrow, I hope tomorrow never comes, I plan to stay forever pickled, Bacchus is a friend of mine, We both embrace each other's fogs. Stumble out the waiting car, Starts this time a smoky groan, The weaving gentle, the copper absent, The light is green and never red, The wreck this time is another's. My thoughts now are in a bottle, Soaking up the amber fluid, Distilled consciousness away from pain, All my life is shattered stain. There is no fear as soon I tread, The downward hall where I last led, The sales I thought would make me climb, The dismal thought another's empire, Make it mine I thought I would, The walnut bottled up in grime, The desk disheveled like my shadow, Stubble bearding naked furry, Hair with grime encased in rust. Furtive like an animal forest. The day over all too soon, Pink slip in my shaking hand, The last one I shall ever reap, The business of pleasure is mine to keep, The color of money all too deep, The drugs they sell I have not tried, The drug I need won't keep me fried. I walk and weave on down the street, I see the people I used to meet, Gone forever in unmarked graves, The number of them beyond remembrance. I start with Coors and end with Bud, Somewhere there has been a change, The thing I saw last night again, Visits me amidst the fog, Your chance is forfeit now you're mine, Come with me now enchanted: "Drunk as skunk you ever be, Live as skunk, and never free." Down I fell awake and sleeping, My skin aflame, my senses creeping, My bones a-rot with infernal fire, The stench grew hard and powerful mean, I thought then that I might scream, But then again I was mute, The song I never again did hear, The speech of mystery has flown, The mind of mind has left me silly, The care I now have for worms. Black and white now I see, All who stand in shock and horror, Their noses held with whitened face, The grimace need not speak a word, Somewhere the word has lost its color, Now that I am the smell embodied, The word they say my name is Pepe. Violently empties the hazy room, I try to saunter out the door, I find that my walk is that no longer, I find that I must hop and hop. I look with lust upon a cat, Soft and sleek and round and black, What thoughts I have are Frenchward spoken, When she runs my heart is broken. Daisies crumple in my wake, People hate me all the more, Cars stop dead because my smell, The drivers can no longer drive, The hold of money over them is broken, Black with white the cops are here, Shotgun pointed dead my way, I pick up my tail and blaze away... The bullet handles me like a card, I fly and float and stink so hard, Beer for me and horse for you, I'll see you, there I'll see you through, When you are dead you cannot die, When you stink beneath the sky, And live anon the forest savage A beast amid the fields of ravage...