the stuff I write IV

So here's another one of those rap-like things I've been writing lately...this one seems a bit bleak at first, but there's a message in there somewhere...

VICARIOUS

There's a certain something
Something in your soul.
sole and lonely element that keeps you in control.
Controlling your reaction
acting as a brake in tension
tensing when your brain relaxes
and relaxing when the pressure comes.
Compressing, burning in a vise
The certain thing advises and
the turning slows the crank-to fit
the flow the banks are shored up
to protect against the same old story.
Next time when it starts, the stress
the stress starts to affect you less
the less you feel effects of stress
the more the stress will matter less
Unless the pressure's new and
Newly molded in the present
Tenses rise again and gaining
Weighting, straining, cranking tighter.
Tight as may be maybe might a
mitre box be building higher
high and deep it blocks the sun
And sunny days are gone for longer
Long enough to make you wonder
Where's the saw and who's the cutter
But your previous experience
Imperative the consequences
quench the desperation
ration depression to manageable.
Managed by that certain thing
The sting is smaller than imagined
Images are merely mental and
Your pain remains a rental.

(beat) I wish I could say that was me
I can see it in your eyes as we pass on the street
From beneath my cloud I can tell that you figured it out
How to keep yourself from my particular type of hell.
And I know you can see into me as well
And that you say your thanks and think of the time you almost fell.
I'll continue on walking and wishing
that you know what you have and you keep on living.

And then some days it's more like...

There's a woman that I've seen for three years.
Every single day she's there surrounded by tiers
of broken down boxes. Cardboard coveting a cart of
cans and clamshells crusted with last night's chicken marsala.
She sleeps stuffed in a greasy parka packed smack against
the side of the men's suit emporium bored with sideways imploring
glances. Can't she come up with some more appropriate life?
Like they know, but can't help and I can't help either. I see her
Daily and don't stop but know she'll be there, for three years
I've wondered what one wandering conversation might bring her.
Maybe nothing...probably. Probably tension or resentment when
the talking ends, the walking begins again and distance saunters in.
I can spare the change, but I don't have any on me and my quarters can't
conjure the change that she needs. I can smell her, me alone again
Approaching towards my home again where I can choose to sit and wonder
what I'd like to eat and then I might decide to sit or maybe watch
or maybe write and maybe read a bit before I cuddle up and flip the light
and watch my wife beside me knowing that I'll see her there tomorrow.
And I'll see her too and keep on walking wondering what sorrow will befall
or has befallen and I look at the creases of her eyes and he puddle that
trickled to the street and I fully know that I'm lucky to be me.

Days come and days go
whether or not we know
what they're moving toward
they will not slow
Days come and days go
whether or not we know
what they're moving toward
they will not slow
Days come and days go
whether or not we know
what they're moving toward
they will not slow.

...let me know what you think...