"But how free can we really be,
with a mandatory sense of false security,
sailing the seas of hideous idiocy?"
Pablo Smog

Chasing the snail involves cruising below the speed limit on a street lined with golden trees, because who wants to leave this place, anyway?

Chasing the dragon causes you to strap police lights to your own roof so that when you are running from the cops, you're really running from yourself.

Chasing the dragon causes you to wake up in a desert full of burning sailboats with a couple of girls you got strung out with, after picking them up at the scenic overlook.  Why didn't you stay in the city of angelic snails, where the girls were happy, and you were free?  

Why did you drag your muse into the desert to freak out and yell at the telephone with a redundancy of crows?

Why did you look back?

Do you want to turn into a mohawk of salt?

Nevermind.  Let's have a drink with the flesh-eating stripper at the roadside casino.  I must follow the whims of my stupid old heart.

Follow the whims of your stupid old heart.

What.

Are you crazy?

Prefer the slow life to the tail of the dragon.

Heed all snail crossing signs.

Check the roof of your car for police lights.

The dragon you're chasing may turn out to be yourself.

I am a Verb, You are a Noun

(chasin’ the snail)

The sun comes up,
so I pull down the shades
because it makes me sad
to hear the sound of birds
when I'm feeling
bad

& I don't mean to be blunt,
but all I really want
is to smoke some herb
& get outta town
I am a verb,
you are a noun

The blacktop peels
back, to reveal
a railroad track,
and somewhere beneath the veins
of a valley rail,
lie the overgrown remains
of a dusty trail

& I’ve been traversin’ this trail
for 20-some years,
chasin’ the snail
& grindin’ the gears

          *           *           *

Don’t need no map
don’t need no I.D.
all we need to know is here we are,
and you are you,
and I am me

But how free can we really be,
with a mandatory sense
of false security,
sailing the seas of hideous idiocy?

          *           *           *

Now I’m looking at the walls
because how is a man
on a set of wheels
supposed to stand?

And when he falls
and his feet are buried
in the ground,
don’t count him out,
cuz he ain’t down,
he’ll still look you in the eye,
and say, “I am a verb, you are a noun.”

©2012 Nathan Payne