Walk with the Devil, Talk with the Devil

For K.

Walk with the devil, talk with the devil

He’s “charming”

And anyway, he’s not going anywhere

And you know you’re good

That’s not going to change

He may consider you’re trying to undermine him

But he doesn’t think you have a chance

Of course you do have a chance

And that’s the point

Time is long

And you’re not going anywhere either

He doesn’t know your kind of power

Never did

Walk with the devil, talk with the devil

He’s gathering evil people around him

He’s destroying them all by himself

He’s digging their graves

Of course they don’t know that

But he can’t dig your grave

You don’t want what he has

So talk with him

Let him spin his dreams

Walk with the devil, talk with the devil

He’ll think you can help him forward his plan

Because the plan is all he knows

And he believes he can fold the entire world and its contents

Into it

Time is very long

And he can’t understand

Your kind of power

Deep in his mind and soul

He wants to know what is evading him

What he can never discover

The secret that is parked beyond what he has

And the secret is you

It always was

But he can’t bring that fact up from his subconscious

This is why he has sleepless nights

And ends up returning to his flock

Walk with the devil, talk with the devil

He has a limited repertoire

He keeps coming back to the same plots

And he doesn’t know why

It’s a source of discomfort for him

As he pushes on

How much evil can he project

Until he feels the fatigue of boredom

Until he runs out of novel experiences

Until he can predict the details of his future wars

Until he comes back to where he started

And tries to remember why he began doing what he’s doing

He has very little imagination left

He’s a lonely figure on a dark street

Looking for excitement

After all this time

But he’s been through the same gamut over and over

In decay he has no equal

He has no equal with whom he can share his past

Walk with the devil, talk with the devil

Watch him scuttling his perverse thoughts

In bottom mud

Hoping for something new

That never shows up

It turns out his territory is quite limited

And for that he would wear his heart on his sleeve

If he could imagine a heart

Walk with the devil, talk with the devil

And knowing his primary

Number one

Prime-cut

Business

Is

Broadcasting

Subversion

Pass along a dream about a new good world

And watch him burn in his meditation

As he considers how he can parlay that future

He’ll take your hints, your dream

And gleefully release it to the world

Because he must

Because that’s what he does

Thinking his profits and advantages will obscure the message

But he has limited intelligence

And your thoughts reacquaint people

With something they laid aside

In the fountain of energy where they once lived

They’ll shake off a piece of the trance

And feel their blood coursing again…

Madness is a strange thing

And this preeminent madman

Eventually confesses his plans right out in the open

He can’t resist the opportunity

And he’ll even confess he knows The Good

It’ll come to that

More, he’ll urge people to do good

Believing he can forestall defeat at the last moment

IT’S THE ONLY CHALLENGE HE HAS LEFT

He’ll back up to the edge

And plead with the world to do good

And still think he has a chance

Take his hand

And shove him hard

Over and out

And down

Into the Void

The Nothing

The Great Nothing

Where for a day, a year

A thousand years

A million years

His fate will be in his hands

Not your concern

Not anyone’s concern

You’re good

And he never understood your power