when an artist gets healthy

there are those that think they have a
one-on-one relationship
with the faces on their screens,
they draw conclusions from looks that
they give the camera & things that
are said in fleeting interviews---
these individuals secretly want to be
on the other side of the screen,
standing in front of the mic &
not behind &
when they get a bit too engrossed in their
delusions,
they start to speak about
performers as if
they knew them, as if they knew what it
was like to live a lifestyle, as if they
had an idea as to what it was like to
devote all the energy &
torment to the art &
to swim in it,
to walk in the fire---
with all the habits,
with all the self-destruction that comes,
with all the rage,
with all the attempts at
obliteration, with the great great
egos, with the narcissism that
chews away the structure of the
body, with the reflection in the stream
just begging you to
drown
down
dead &
these people praise
all their lil’ fictional characters
when their favorite performers
hang up the drugs,
they close their squinted eyes &
hail the images of the characters from
their lil’ fictional books,
when they feel that their favorite rockstars
are “healthy” now,
because, quite frankly,
they have become mundane, spent &
useless.

i want my favorite artists bleeding,
i don’t know about you---
i don’t give a fuck if they get happy,
if they find the “one” &
they pop out a few rugrats,
move up to the goddamned country &
place their guitars, their paints,
their PC, electronic boards, etc.
all up on the shelf so they can
waddle round
for a restful walk in the grass---
their art always begins to suck
once they start to bathe in their
wealth &
they always start to bloat out & get
fat,
once they replace the drugs with
“love”---
how easy it is to forget the terrors
that you began to speak out against,
how easy it is to lose grasp of that impetus
that made you scream in front of a
mic in the first place,
when no one questions anything you do
anymore &
the red carpet gets rolled out
even if you are just going to take a
shit.