Instructions for Electroshock Therapy

Plug the Female end of the cord into the place where it’s meant to go,
Plug the Male end into any, any, any old electric hole.
Now flick the switch,
the light is green,
we need to wait now to warm up the machine
we’re wearing white and we’re feeling clean
for shock therapy!
We strap their legs and their arms
for shock therapy!
They can’t do any harm without their memory!
Shock therapy!
And if you think someone’s insane
why don’t you drive some lightning through their brain?
They won’t remember who to blame
for shock therapy!

Undress the patient and then lay them down just like a sacrifice.
To avoid any bruises let no metal touch the skin,
that’s my advice.
Now take a razor and shave the hair
around the temples, then rub electrode-jelly there,
put some on the electrodes and we’re soon prepared
for shock therapy!
Under fluorescent glow!
Shock therapy!
You know their flesh looks so cold under that canopy
for Shock therapy!
We dance some sparks through twisted wires
and randomly black out the stars.
Best of all it doesn’t leave any scars.
Shock therapy!

Insert and fasten the mouthpiece so the patient won’t bite their tongue,
slip a pillow underneath the back to reduce the spinal motion,
now turn the shock-power-switch on
and rotate the dial to choose the voltage you want,
to serve another cold meal in the restaurant
of Shock therapy!
Let’s fry some frontal lobes with shock therapy!
Add some gelled electrodes to the recipe
of shock therapy!
But if you want to make it work
use a tight rubber belt to hold those spastic jerks.
Let’s burn up the temples and raise the church
of shock therapy!

Keep in mind that every patient has a different convulsive threshold,
so start at three-tenths of a second at ten or twenty volts.
But the voltage on the screen
is not the voltage in the human being,
so let’s meditate upon the golden mean
of shock therapy:

Multiply the patient’s current by the machine’s resistance,
then subtract from the meter voltage.
Is all of this making sense?
Now push the start-shock button on,
and keep your finger there until the shock is done,
secure the jaw and force the shoulders down
for shock therapy!

We’re looking for the threshold
in shock therapy,
but if convulsive codes have not been breached
in shock therapy,
either the threshold has not been found,
or a delayed attack is coming around
in ten to twenty seconds on the killing ground
of shock therapy!

If unconsciousness follows the charge a delayed attack will come,
but if you’re looking for a grande mal seizure, just raise the voltage some.
Two-hundred and fifty volts
at point-one seconds could deliver some jolt,
so it helps us to remember it’s the patient’s fault
in shock therapy!
to get a grande mal seizure,
shock therapy,
you know it couldn’t be easier, get one right away.
Shock therapy!
Just two-hundred volts
at point-fifteen seconds makes them shake like jello,
though for the rest of their lives they will be walking slow
from shock therapy!

For details on injections of amytal and other drugs,
just in case you want to reduce the violence of these convulsions,
refer to current literature,
so now we’ll open our books to page thirty-four
as we all join together now to sing a prayer
to shock therapy!

Dashine

The streetcar is dragging my dead heart home from a minor romantic defeat.
I was standing along with a nervous line,
legs anticipating a seat,
when in front of the firing squad of my eyes
walked a beautiful African girl.
My eyes bounced to and away from her
while my lips tried to jump-start a smile.
Then suddenly and so effortlessly
she poured me a long, sweet smiling drink,
and suddenly I had the ability
to smile back at her, though it was weak.

But what I should’ve done is said,
“Don’t smile at me
unless you wanna have sex with me!
Don't bend that lovely bow to use my heart for target practice.
Don't smile at me unless you wanna have sex with me!
Don’t make my hormones go and then tell me you’re just an actress!
Don’t smile at me unless you wanna have sex with me.

I was far too shy to approach her there,
but I swore that I’d talk with her soon.
I would sit by her side when the streetcar arrived
and I’d start with a “Hi, how are you?”,
So I went to get gum at the Garfields
to chew it and mask my bad breath
in breathless preparation for
a moment bringing rebirth or death.

The man at the counter asked how I’d been.
I told him that I’d been okay.
He said, “Is that why you look so cheerful then?”
and I asked, “What did you say?”
When I picked up his friendly sarcasm I was about to justify
why I don’t smile, when I suddenly saw that the streetcar’d already arrived.

The girl with the smile was just ahead in line
but somehow some other man
had me beat for that sweet seat beside her,
though without any romantic plan.
I was about to turn around to sit just ahead and across the aisle,
when she pulled that red bow of her mouth once more
and unwrapped me another smile.

So I thought, “She must really have liked me
to smile sweetly two times in a row,
so I was determined to talk with her shortly
or else I might not ever know.
I decided to ride until she got off,
to catch up and then talk with her then,
so I stayed in my seat and I missed my stop
because I might not see her again.

As the streetcar came closer to Parkdale
I was ready to spring for the door,
but my matching that place with her sweet chocolate face,
was it racist or merely a bore.
At Spadina I expected this angel
to descend into some trendy hell,
but if tempted, she didn’t show it,
her hand never reached for the bell.
At University all of the Shriners
who’d gotten on at the Motel strip
stumbled drunkenly out into their parade,
but she still continued to sit.
When Yonge street came she got off the car.
Would she go into the Hudson’s Bay?
“Oh, Goddamnit no!”, I had to pay again
just to follow her on the subway.

I followed her, fifteen bodies behind
and caught up with her on the platform.
“Hi”, I said, with relief in my voice
and she gave a “Hi” in return.
I told her she was very beautiful.
“Thanks”, she said, kind of indifferently.

“What’s your name?”, I asked, and she said, “Dashine.”,
showing pride that her name was unique.
“I’m Christian”, I told her, with even more pride.
She said, “Hi”, one more time to my name,
then I said, “Hi”, in response to her “Hi”,
just to balance that stale greeting game.

“Do you work out in the west end?”, I asked.
She said, “No, that’s where I live.”
“and where are you headed for now?”, I asked.
She told me, “I’m meeting a friend.”
“Oh ya”, I said, for the sake of response,
as the train slid up, packed end to end.
“Oh, shit!”, she said in response to the crowd,
but we managed to squeeze our way in.
As the train jerked itself into motion, I asked, “Do you go to school, or do you work?”.
“I work”, she said, and she seemed annoyed,
asking, “What are all of these questions for?”
“Oh!... I... ah... oh... I’m sorry!”, I said.
She told me that it was okay.
“I need to ask questions to talk”, I said.
She said, “I’ve had a trying day”.
“Do you always smile as sweetly as that
when you’ve had a trying day?”, I asked.
She rolled her eyes in response to that
like she was taking both of those smiles back
on a web running back to her spidery guts
which had spewed them out with so much art.
Now both of those smiles she had given me
left a sour aftertaste in my heart.

I hung nervously from the overhead bar
while the cookie that is my poor heart
was crumbled in the grip of the moment
and it fell to the floor of the car.
I tossed her a couple of whimpering smiles
without daring to look in her eyes,
but the limp smiles that she handed back to me
were just anorexic “Good-byes.
At Wellesley Station she got off the train.
I followed, but got washed far behind
by the counterflow of the passenger flesh
descending to get on the line.
I tried to intercept her
by ascending a clearer stairway,
to explain why I’d taken such trouble,
but by now she was too far away.

But I should’ve found some way to tell her.
I should’ve climbed on a transfer dispenser and shouted.
I should’ve hijacked the fucking public address system and screamed this message out to every post pubescent girl and every woman there with their chromosomal licenses to tease:
“Don’t smile at me unless you wanna have sex with me!
Don’t bend that crimson bow to use my heart for target practice!
Don’t smile at me unless you wanna have sex with me!
Don’t make my hormones go and then tell me you’re just an actress!
Don’t smile at me
unless you wanna have sex with me.

Hello?

My penis
is the hot-line
to the red phone
in the White House
of my heart,

and my penis is always ringing,
but whenever I pick it up
there’s never
anyone
at
the other
end.

Sixteen Tons of Dogma

Well distant early warning
says, “The Blues are on their way!”
Your e.s.p. deception almost
had me fooled today,
but I drove here in my karma
and I smashed yours along the way!
See, I was late for my fate,
and time was thick today.

Well I’ve got to get some exorcise,
my Spirit’s running low.
The vampire and the succubi have gotten me in tow,
so I’d better get my crucifixed
and spit a shine on my halo,
‘cause I’ve got sixteen tons of destiny
all ready set to roll.

I took my crayons to a seance
and I drew the Queen of Cups
She said “If you don’t know the law, you’ll have to make it up”,
so I said, “Demonic possession
is nine-tenths of the law,
and I’ve got this itch that needs a’scratchin’
by some devil-woman’s claw."

Way back at the astral-body shop they’re gassing up my rig,
the fuel-trend is now anti-pain though pro-pain once was big,
yeah they are putting in new chakras
to bounce that sixteen-ton payload,
so that my eighteen wheels of fortune
will be soon burning up the road.

I forgot my catechism,
catechism got my tongue,
so I smoked pranayama cigarettes and coughed up one more lung
and then I played akashic records
until they warped in space and time, then picked some grapes of wrath so righteous
off the un-clinging Divine.

Well its so fun to be mental, funtobementalism’s in,
I have spent my life contriving an original sin,
but the Devil filed a lawsuit,
it was a copyright case,
so my sixteen tons of destiny
had a setback in the race.

I dialed up the Dalai Lama for our daily dialogue
and I detailed my dilemma of a dogma dealing God, but he kept calling me Delilah,
and dug me with his transcendental drill,
then he injected me with Mercury
‘til my aching truth was filled.

I’d trade a million inno-dollars for a hundred innocents
to fill the u.f.o. collection plate and pay for the event
of the second coming sequel
to be broadcast both dead and live,
while I sideswipe a satellite,
sixteen tons in overdrive.

Reincarnation! Holy ‘vaporated Ghost
is crossing Channel-Five between two bodies’ flesh wrapped coasts.
I have been down this road so often
I almost know myself by now,
but once I finally get the “who” down
I’ll need the “where and when and how”.

Then some soma smoking, cattle roping Buddha knocked me down,
some sumo-wrestling, comet-rustling, rodeo clown
hog-tied me with my kundalini
and then weighed me on the music scale,
He said “You’ll need a harder highway
for them sixteen tons of mail.”

In some fifth-dimension living room the angels watch t.v.,
scanning seven-billion channels of
sub-reality,
they’ve got this one
cult favourite,
its a kind of slapstick comedy
all about the dark night of the spirit,
and the lead looks just like me.

Well, rolly-polly poltergeist,
yeah, Casper goes to bat
up against the Holy Trinity
in a strange ménage-a-quatre,
him and ectoplasmic Gumby,
Wendy Witch and Doctor Strange,
while my sixteen tons of destiny
shoot the rapids in God’s veins.

My shaman, Shamus was ashamed
and said "You need a vision quest!",
so I checked into his perspiration lodge/optomitrist's
where I fasted 'til I puked up
the purest form of hydrogen
and then found out my spirit animal
is just a homeless dude named Glen.

Sixteen tons and what do you get?
Another incarnation, but your not home yet.
Hey Siva don’t you call me, 'cause it just won’t work.
They crushed my soul in the Robot Church.
Amen.

Spool of the Moon

Baby’s black
and I am white,
two shades of blue sometimes,
and braided around
an orgasm
that we have at the very same time.

When we make love I both murder her
and revive her from the tomb,
stitching my spirit tightly to hers
with a thread from the spool of the moon.

and when we touch,
when we really touch
we make a mountain out of a moment,
although the elevated view it doesn’t mean that much
‘cept from the viewpoint
of
descent.
That’s why it’s so much fun to slide down moment mountain,
sliding to the bottom of our love.

The bottom’s the
foundation of
the pleasure and the pain,
and the bottom’s where
we do the work
so we can build that mountain again.
But a mountain range
of moments falls
behind a wisp of cloud
and we forget
that they were there,
all of these moments so tall and proud.
and yet when we touch, when we really touch
we make a mountain out of a moment,
although the elevated view it doesn’t mean that much
‘cept from the viewpoint
of
descent.
That’s why it’s so much fun to slide down moment mountain,
sliding to the bottom of our love.

History
is time condensed,
the future’s thin as steam. We cannot move
in either place.
The best we hope for is to sleep and dream.

We tend to look beyond
the moment that
we’re in and won’t allow
the fact that everywhere
we’ve ever been
is radiating from the here and the now
and that when we touch, when we really touch
we make a mountain out of a moment,
although the elevated view it doesn’t mean that much
‘cept from the viewpoint of descent.

That’s why it’s so much fun to slide down moment mountain,
sliding to the bottom of our love.

Beacons on the Inner Highway

I gave up on the road for the very same reason that I gave up smoking weed,
because both of them are windows but not doorways to identity,
and travel for the sake of travel reaps very little at all of value,
unless we are a place in steady motion like a river.

Our human roots gasp in the highway’s hurricane of accidents,
and in our dreams we hunger wide for boredom’s ordered flat-lands,
and the radios that wash them with fresh music every day,
while we work the fields of gravity to harvest weekly pay,
which sets us free to dance inside of the routines of ritual,
perfecting gestures, decorating mantras mimed habitual,
thus polishing each moment till they become events shining
just like beacons guiding those behind us on the inner highway.

The Next State of Grace

Well I’m sitting here cooking
in the stew of the street,
I’m the part that won’t ever get stirred,
and as I am boiling I drink my own broth
and bend noodles to the shape of these words:

Oh when, oh when will I ever learn?
I can’t get to heaven
with wheels that don’t turn.
I’ve got no ambition and that’s a disgrace.
Guess I’ll sit here and wait for
the next state of grace.

Well I’m dug down so deep
in the trench of my heart,
I can’t seem to climb back out again,
and my voice is so distant
it can hardly be heard
by the women who pass in the rain.

Oh when oh when will I ever learn?
I can’t drive a girl home
with wheels that don’t turn.
I’m buried with pride
when I try to save face.
Guess I’ll sit here and wait for
the next state of grace.

And my mind hangs above
this emotional wreck
like a scavenger looking for parts,
and it lives in a mansion
that’s built from the sweat
of my tar-paper third-world heart.

Oh when, oh when will I ever learn?
I’ll freeze here on Earth
with a heart that won’t burn.
So I’m biding my time here
as god’s welfare case
while I line up and wait for
the next state of grace.