Posted by NL on October 04, 2004 at 13:27:26:
I Am The Mess
I ain't no Lenny Bruce, fella who told dirty jokes and said, again and again, No, No! I am NOT the messiah! But I think he thought he wuz. But I don't think I think I yam. No, no, but I tell you what-- I AM the MESS! It only came to me recently after a long spell of intense soul searching, an experience I can only liken to the agony a guitarist goes through when he or she retreats from the world in order to do a spell of woodshedding. You go to the woodshed with your axe, and in my case, when I did that, I played a Les Paul but not a good one, no, no, it was only a Les Paul TV in that goddamned limed mahogany (muh agony!) finish, one P-90, you know what I mean. And when I searched my soul, or sore, which amounts to the very same thing, I thought at that time I might actually be the secret pope, the pope behind the scenes, you know. And I let my beard grow-- more, like, I mean I wouldn't even trim it anymore, nor my hair which swept across my eyes and irritated the hell outta me. But I smoked a great many joints and availed myself of many beers, many beers, but cheap beers, generic beers, when all along I longed for a savory Lone Star. I took my guitar with me, and I took with me some skin magazines so I would not be so all alone. What more do a man need? Food? Sex? Surely you jest.
One of the things I did to my guitar to make it special was to take a little round mirror and glue it to the body so that under the spotlight, on stage, it would seem to cast a beam of light. Girls find that very impressive when they are drunk and you are stoned, and the music is making their frontal lobes shut down and they are horny to fuck the band. Then I would hit them with that beam of reflected light and hypnotize them and I usually got laid. I was well into searching my sore, or soul, when I happened to look into that mirror, stoned on some weed they were all calling "colitus" or "cleetus" or some shit like that. I bought a lot off a chick I met at a party who was going around supercharging everybody-- she was the only chick there and eventually we all fucked her and every one of us got the clap and a case of crabs for the road. Did she come to service the band or to destroy the band, that's what I was wondering, but, hey, it was damned good weed!
I looked in that little mirror and saw that I was a mess. A MESS! And it came to me! That I AM the mess! I am the mess the whole wide wacky whirl has been waiting for, holding its collective breast and gasping, gasping, ohhhhhh, where is the mess that my cookies might be pulled from the fire, that fire that is leapin' like a wide open pyre? And where is the mess promised us from long ago, that our sores might be salved, and that we might be like unto led outta the wildernesses and unto the light? That mess! That very mess! That mess, why, that was me.
When I realized that, I also realized that, just like the Lizard King, I could do anything. Yes, I could do whatever I wanted and it would be good, by the very definition! And so, looking upon my skin magazine I realized that now at last I could, as the holy mess, go forth among the peoples of the world, and claim any pretty girl I wanted, and do with her as I pleased. That gal, that gal who sold me the weed, for instance, I thought then, at that party, and especially when I fucked her, that wow, she would be a good one to kill, stabbing and stabbing and cutting and killing and then fucking her corpse and then, ahhhh, a shower, a beer, a joint. There were so many girls I've fucked with the band, even though we were not such a good band, and each and every one of them had a body uniquely hers, and could die a death, uniquely hers, suited to the type of her body, like, big boobs or small ones or fat butt or skinny butt, black girl or brown girl or even asian girl. It was remarkable, given that I have written so many songs about peace and love and flowers and trees that once I realized that I was indeed tne omnipotent mess, that I would have such blood lust boiling out, but, hey, who can answer for the mess, eh? The mess is beyond logic, beyond reproach, and beyond your puny powers of comprehension. Yeah, I liked that. And for those of you crying out in the wilderness, those of you longing to be free, longing to have a healthy glop of balm of gilead slopped across your sores, you will just have to wait, I thought, until I finally take a breather, about fifty-thousand dead girls later, when I can think seriously about my obligations as a mess, you know, the hard work and not the fun.
So, now, I guess it IS about fifty-thousand dead girls later, as well as all that other stuff, the destruction and devastation that sort of came along behind me, once I emerged and proclaimed myself the mess, and the angels of destruction came down to assist me, the fallen stars, and the sea of blood. Sorry about that. I guess where the mess goes so goes the death. I guess I oughta think seriously about the agony, about putting things back together, but, damn it, I'm horny again and I've all of a sudden got this thing about arrows and crossbows and pretty naked women on my mind, and I'm kind of pissed off by all the constant yammering-- so, hell, let's say we wait, defer that salivation shit until I've hit the one-hundred-and-seventy-five-thousand dead girl mark. How's that sound?