Ascendo Tuum

You can't tame the furious beast within

primordial urge that runs deeper than skin

we were born to fight and we fight to win

I follow natural order where defeat is a sin

Violence.

You'll have to forgive the way I bashed in your face

your words fell on deaf ears,I had to show you how pain tastes

insight into my world,in defense of my inner soul

I'm the salt of the earth and life's hardships have taken toll

Violence.

Adrenaline reward for a blood-soaked battle

the discussion is over my pride remains unrattled

you were up to match wits,but hate was chomping at my bit

your broken body and the pavement are a perfect fit

Violence.

I found a choice pic of my old wheels,EXACTLY as it was,pre-crash,same color scheme,etc.Now you can pine along with me.

Twenty-eight days away from my favorite holiday of the year (for the obligatory reasons),I felt it appropriate to relate an interesting story taken from Samhain past to you eager readers out there and better engage the spirit of All Hallow's Eve.At a certain point in my life when I had grown out of the "trick or treat" stage of Halloween,I found solace like so many boys my age in the pubescent aspects of the festival,terrorizing the surrounding neighborhoods for several nights with random acts of mindless vandalism.Eggs,soap,toilet paper,toothpaste,shaving cream,green tomatoes(never a shortage of these in my Italian stomping grounds back then) all came into play as weapons of retribution against whomever we deemed worthy holiday targets as the sun retreated behind the mountainous skyline.I'd excitedly rummage for ammunition,one eye on the living room to make sure my parents were still engulfed in the latest episode of The Equalizer,before grabbing my latex Don Post mask(demons and skulls were a personal favorite) and bounding for the sliding glass patio door out back.My cohorts and I had the entire town mapped out strategically for months previous,and we compared notes under the glow of the back alley streetlamp before embarking.Fools who unknowingly interrupted our holy football games,miserly old hermits who had snapped at us on the streets,the families of girls who resisted our awkward amorous 'tweenaged advances,policemen who took their tin badges far too seriously,all fell in a diabolical sweep of the area,and awoke to the fruits of our sinister labours.On one particular night we had done our deeds,the unjust were punished,yet we still had the adrenaline rush of naughtiness flowing through our young bodies when I suggested we conquer some uncharted territory in the township.Devils whipped unripened tomatoes through window panes,rubbery cavemen egged parked cars on the curb,stationary trees became paens to bowel movements in the dark blackness.Sneakers juked through backyards,dipping and diving as lights were turned on,juvenile snickering mixing with the angry sound of township denizens,disturbed from their barcoloungers by the sound of shattering pane glass and the thwack of eggs exploding against aluminum siding and car windshields.
Sweat beaded down my brow as I artistically depicted pornographic sexual acts and intricate strings of profanity in soap on a line of cars when something I hadn't predicted surprised me suddenly.I was in the middle of sketching a womb's eye view of a willing young nubile with legs spreadeagle,and breasts jutting into the sky onto a windshield(one of my signature drawings at the time) when I heard something come out of the darkness of one of the porches adjascent to the car I was defacing."Hey!Cut that shit out!What do you think you're doing?!!"
Just then from the eyehole in my crimson skull disguise I noticed a guy who had been sitting in the shadows on his porch,unknown to any of us,and who was leaping over his railing towards us.My evil brotherhood scattered into the night like rats freed from a cardboard box and I began to follow suit when the figure shouted again."Stop!"For some ungodly reason I froze in my tracks,knowing full well the enormity of my misdeeds that evening,and the strings my father would have to pull with the authorities to wipe my criminal slate clean this time,yet I stopped on the spot,watching my mates disappear through the graveyard down the block,their forms dissipating into tombstones dedicated to the lives of tomnspeople of yesteryear.His hand touched my shoulder,and frantically in the back of my head,I angled for escape.He was shorter and lighter than I was,and I had never flinched in engaging older guys in combat,I knew I could have taken him down and beat a hasty retreat as he recovered his senses on the cold sidewalk from a well-placed roundhouse kick to the head,but I did nothing of the sort.His voice was strangely sympathetic."What you guys doing tonight?You causing trouble?""...Yeah,I guess so.""That's cool."He walked me over to my soapy handiwork and laughed out loud."That's pretty good.You like girls,huh?""Yeah."What came next nearly floored me."You want a beer?"Of course I did.What fourteen year old in his right mind would EVER turn down a frothy lager?We sat on the steps of his porch,and he cracked us two cold ones."You get anybody good tonight?"My hesitation slowly turned back to the usual braggart's boast I was infamous for."Oh yeah.Got a handful of police cruisers pretty good earlier.""No shit?How'd you manage that one?""Ah,there's a lot full of high weeds next to the one way alley the cops drive down when they pull out of the station.Lookout sees the cruiser make the turn,gives the signal,we turn him into an omelet.Before he can swing a U turn at the end of the alley,we're all gone into the woods at the top of the hill.Works every time.""Hahaha!Oh shit,you're quite the strategist!"I knew I could indulge my secret to the guy without fear of law enforcement retribution,as he was currently contributing to the delinquency of a minor(as if I could be any MORE delinquent than I already was.)and would have been in as much of a pickle as I would have been,had he decided to turn me in."So why you giving me beer?I drew nasty shit all over your car.""Ah,you forget I was your age not too long ago myself.I know what it's like to go out and have fun with my buddies too.""That's fucking awesome."I realized the truth of his words as I finished up the beer greedily."You want another one?""Sure.""You're gonna tell your buddies not to fuck with my car and house when you get back,aren't you?"My head began to swirl from the effects of the tasty alcohol,lightweight I was at the time."Fuck yeah,you're the coolest guy I ever met."I assured him.We finished our bottles and chatted about anything and everything,before I tipped my latex skull in his direction and stumbled towards the cemetary gate escape route.
Under the streetlight at the far end of the dead end street where we met,my cohorts awaited me,masks in hand,smoking cigarettes and discussing the mayhem they had inflicted earlier,excitedly noticing my shadow crookedly walking towards them."Steve!Where the hell were you?Did that guy catch you?""Dude,did you get nailed?""Is that beer I smell?"I smiled,tipsy but ever cool."He gave me beers,he was cool as shit.""No shit?!!That fucking rules!""You think I should go back up there and let him catch me?I'd love a beer!""No,dude.He'll break your fucking neck.In fact,never fuck with that guy's shit or he'll murder you."A few of the boys struggled with my logic,but my words were cautionary enough to sink in."What you got to watch?""Oh man,I just got "Basket Case" at Gallery of Sound.Sixty-four bucks.This guy's parasitic monster twin goes around murdering doctors.Excellent.""Ooooh!We gonna watch it?""Of course.Let's head down to Burger King first,the girls might be there..."And with that,the night came to a satisfying close.
For most of my crew,the cool township guy disappeared into obscurity as Belial Bradley bloodily disemboweled Dr. Lifflander in my parlour,but I never forgot him,to this very day.And though we continued our mischievous holiday rituals in the years that followed,the beer guy's house and car were always left in the same untouched condition,year in and out,thanks to his booze-soaked outreach to me on that chilly October night.

Egmont Eegan woke up that afternoon, drained from a prolonged previous evening catalogging his silver and bronze age DC comics, lovingly changing the mylar sleeves and cardboard backers on each funnybook, as he was certain he had left the bathroom window open momentarily a few days ago, absurd as it may seem, as he was deathly allergic to pollen and ragweed, as proven by the monumental puffer he kept next to his 1/450th scale bust of Wolverine.Either way there was a minute chance second hand smoke may have crept in and compromised the graded condition of his comics,which would certainly have been disastrous.After several hours of funnybook upkeep,it was off to the internet where he levelled his dwarf mage amidst a furious siege round from the rival clan of chaotic orcs,led by their fearless general,Buhlcandrian,who was marvellously helmed by Jean-Phillipe, off in a particularly nerdy corner of a Paris suburb somewhere.Egmont had once virtually pummelled Jean-Phillipe in a chat room argument one night over who had successfully sacked a blessed bag of holding,after which the two rp warriors never got on quite the same.Once his party had achieved victory nine and a half gruelling hours later,Eeegan treated himself to an hour of self-pleasure on an upskirt webpage full of Agent Scully from The X Files while his ears were hypnotized by strains of vintage Thomas Dolby on his ipod.Gillian had very nearly exposed one of her fleshy vaginal petals while climbing out of a limo in Cannes,and the mere thought of a glimpse of her fiery love mound,or any human female privates,was enough to send Egmont into a two fingered assault on his virginal dagger,spurting creation cream onto his bifocals,though making sure he did not exclude his favorite anime porn,Kwandan Rose,or "Ol' Reliable",as he referred to it,as it was always good for a few hearty whacks.Covered in his own dork-spew and panting nearly enough for a few shots from the puffer,Egmont envisioned himself as Captain Kirk,post-coitus lying next to a blue female alien he might have saved from the giant eel-birds of Rygiiel 5 one episode.When an actual flesh and blood human female finally decided to show him pity enough to free him from the chains of forty-two years of virginity,he was most definitely going to give her the eight second ride of her life.As the hour neared dawn on his vintage Star Wars Darth Vader digital watch from 1977(still in mint condition,mind you),Egmont broke out the model paints and put some finishing touches on the scale sheen of the fire dragon resin model he had been working on.Easy,Eegan,you've painted him so ferociously he'd be bound to give your mother a serious case of the willies when she brought your dinner down to the basement,he thought to himself with a haughty snicker.Indeed,it had been a fruitful night for Egmont,and with that,he slipped into his U.S.S. Enterprise adult sized footie pajamas,pulled up his Ewok bedspread and floated off to an enchanted mystical and medieval land where busty maidens would appreciate his plus six Elven bow and blessed plus 4 chain mail helm.Meanwhile,the outside world which had previously left him behind,making snide remarks about his high water polyester slacks when it did bother to notice him,was now under his thumb,since the influx of high school jocks and bimbos who once ridiculed him in science lab had need of his webpage customization skills here in the MySpace age.
He squinted meekly at his watch.It was closing in on five pm.The Lord of the Rings calendar informed him that the date was February 14th.Valentines Day.Then,like a stun blast froma level 68 cleric,it dawned on him.He had never received one single valentine in his whole miserable life.No heart-shaped cards,no hard candies stamped with profession of affections,no stolen kisses at sunset under the cover of a weeping willow,no holding hands with striking brunettes whose eyes could see the contents of a man's soul.Nothing at all like any of that.A lone tear,not attributable to his allergies,welled in the corner of his nearsighted eye,and before he'd even become aware of it,the tear cascaded down his acne-ridden cheek,past his pocket protector and into an open mylar bag containing an ex/mint copy of the first issue of X-Men.When he noticed the depreciated comic,the shock sent him backwards into his model shelf,knocking Spider Man,Grand Moff Tarkin,and Gollum floorward where they shattered into hundreds of pieces,which caught the tread of under one of his K-Mart Asian knockoff bo-bo Adidas(faux leather with only two stripes),causing him to slide across the basement floor into his computer table,the impact bumping his Cherikee Red soda can into his hard drive,frying the motherboard and wiping out all the screenshots he'd taken the night before of himself wielding a ball of ethereal energy for his signature on the Middle Earth message board forum.The smoke that billowed from the vents in his pc tower managed to compromise the graded condition of nearly all his graphic novels and put a near permanent foul odor on his collection of Bearbricks as well.Having gone from a most satisfying evening previous to the most encompassing unnatural disaster on this night,his only logical course of action was to kill himself,which he did.No one ever inherited his gold pieces or quest items afterwards,but the world was no worse for it.

Why is it that when David Bowie's in the process of rocking out on stage or in a video,he kneels and rubs the ground?What the eff is goin on there??!!It's not bad enough that moments earlier he was wiping lipstick across his face(Boys Keep Swinging video)blowing his t-v cover,or walking in some 80's tinted haute couture fashion show from hell(Ashes to Ashes)in front of a bulldozer,The Thin White Duke's gotta rub the ground in there somewhere and turn the whole affair into some cryptic oddball David Lynch fantasy.For quality David Lynch work on dvd,try out "Eraserhead"(1976) and "The Short Films of David Lynch" dvds available at Signore Lynch's own official website.You could do a lot worse than spending an evening with the lady in the radiator.