8-18-2019
4-16-2019
Father, I have seen the eastward sky
descending in a freefall
a raised fist in objection
the first bird, morning sparrow
end of night.
There, where my pillow’s lain
her face in its cradle
a cool breeze wafting through the room
shadows in half-moons
where kisses have left them
my lover’s eyes.
http://wordwulf.com
Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com
© 2019 artwork, music and words
conceived by and property of
Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 ©
descending in a freefall
a raised fist in objection
the first bird, morning sparrow
end of night.
There, where my pillow’s lain
her face in its cradle
a cool breeze wafting through the room
shadows in half-moons
where kisses have left them
my lover’s eyes.
http://wordwulf.com
Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com
© 2019 artwork, music and words
conceived by and property of
Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 ©
8-16-2019 - Father Time I
7-29-2019
7-12-2019
Blind Out - 7-8-2019
Destroyer - 7-7-2019
Axiom - 7-6-2019
6-27-2019
Blow for Blow - 6-25-2019
6-24-2019
Monkey Shines - 6-21-2019
6-20-2019
5-22-2019
Genius, the result of interaction with an entity or thought process of which one was previously unaware. Beware pretending, mirror dancing, mimicry. Scratch an itch that doesn’t exist until you do.
http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2019 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 © 
5-19-2019
“Children as conscience,
spirit guides intentional.” ~WordWulf~ 
“The soul is left to wander
dazed and confused, searching.” ~Jim Morrison~ 
5-19-2019
“There is an ethical aristocracy
just as there is a spiritual one.” ~Friedrich Nietzsche~ The handsome squeals of boys and girls
It’s okay, Daddy come home We’re waiting faces in the window Instance of Id At a deep and necessary level, my children have been essential masters of my spirit. The singer in me might have sung himself to death, the writer written himself over the edge to the other side. Harley Davidsons, brothers of the blood, cocaine nights and meth weekends would surely have claimed me, consumed me, body and spirit. Staring into campfires shared with night riders was different than family camps, marshmallows, snipe hunts, shaking bushes and grizzly bear growls. What a thrill, the handsome squeals of boys and girls afraid to be scared, delighted to be so (and safe). My children’s eyes have been ever-present, each campfire speaking, “It’s okay, Daddy, come on home now. We are waiting, faces in the window.” Not being a man of virtuous patience, I have led a full life with the hammer down. Standing in line, leaning on a shovel, burying fellow madmen over the years, I have wondered what made me different from the good men who died, that shovel full of dirt on the last mortal door slammed shut. Freud described the psychic apparatus as being composed of three parts, three theoretical constructs. According to his model the id is the uncoordinated instinctual self, ego the “now,” organized and realistic piece. Lastly, the super ego is critical and moralizing. In consideration of this philosophy, my super ego has most times been staring into the eyes calling out from the flames. My damned ego was dancing around the fire, flames spewing from the spout of a five-gallon gas can. It howled until it could howl no more then took gulps of gas and spit flames into the face of the night and the astonished crowd ducking and moving on the dance floor. Within the undeniable hunger to create and survive, I find my id, a deep well of desire for creativity, no value judgments, a reservoir of no fear. Such a place in a man, made like the man I am, would demand a kind and attentive master. Shot at, stabbed and run over, more than six decades of life behind me, I understand at last who they are, these keepers, how well I find them and me in their eyes. http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2019 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 © 
5-14-2019
Mulct - 3-26-2019
Hell you say 3-14-2019
3-7-2019
3-1-2019
2-27-2019
2-18-2019
2-18-2019
2-18-2019
2-19-2019
2-18-2019
Confirmation of Darkness
Monkish, he is a monkey starving in the limbs of a barren tree watching the ape community thriving on lush jungle life unwilling, unable to join them surviving by consuming vermin crawling through the skin of his brain There’s a tin man howling whose body is a whistle stop where blackbirds rest and cackle dance across his stiff arms make sport of his scarecrow appearance He scatters seeds on the ground to lure them off him A continuum of negativity has swallowed his universe beginning with naked parents the poor rags of their death His lady’s kisses have been taken carried away in strongboxes offered free to strangers Struggling to find peace of ground running bare-skinned through snowfields his spirit howls out to the gods seeking confirmation of destiny its voice singing a litany handed down from the cradleboard in chains, the slave camp of his being If not for the glad-song of his children he might swallow the carpet nails of life sing a rasping, gushing blood-song allow himself the strength and release of weakness Through their innocence, they sustain him demand with the purity of their love that he stand diminished, love them unconditionally She met him in a lightning storm captured, ran away with his heart Years grind our dearest dreams to dust They become clouds to confuse and confound us A poor lover, he struggles desperately to recapture what were, perhaps, only thoughts of a blind man who believed for a moment he could see http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2019 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 ©  2-13-2019
1-23-2019
1-14-2019
12-17-2018
12-11-2018
12-9-2018
12-31-2018
12-5-2018
11-29-2018
11-12-2018
Credit Due 11-19-2018
11-7-2018
11-4-2018
Authoritarian 11-3-2018
from Reptiles and Dust: Delicacy 11-1-2018
birds 9-27-2018
9-16-2018
9-11-2018
Jacked
A guy came into the bar one night, attempted to levitate me. I snagged his martini glass and ate it. He laughed at the blood dripping from my lip. We smoked tar opium after the gig, played poker all night in the harems of our dreams. Very high, I was not levitated. Chords Drawn I found myself singing, a praying mantis listening. Made me feel thankful that gods (if there are gods) have a sense of humor, and insects no predisposition to what is cool. There is death in the music of the fool. I drank deep of it in the whiskey rooms of my youth, hung hopes from it, didn’t wear hopelessness well. An idiot dreamer, midnight schemer, I howled myself hoarse singing Satisfaction, Wild Thing, Oh Suzy-Q, a bunch of other business I made up all by myself. Life is a lullaby, a blending of voices and spirits. Ghost-beings come visit a man. Fools, in particular, listen to what they have to say. http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
9-7-2018
Ample Validation 8-29-2018
Actions Speak 8-24-2018
Actions Speak
Suicide is a dream all beings keep The weak name it nightmare The strong ones Who are they whose name is a whisper a Jane/John Doe promise an acclimation Investigators decide whom peek under the pall voyeurs and fools Which is which http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
8-19-2018
Retrospective 8-17-2018
Only Fly (7-30-2018)
7-29-2018
7-29-2018
Letters from the Monastery:
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Beware - 8-6-2019
7-25-2019
7-24-2019
7-18-2019
7-12-2019
Invisible Ink - 7-11-2019
6-19-2019
“WordWulf, your work reminds me of shards,
those things you find in the kiln, beautiful fragments when the whole thing has blown.” And the Stone Man Said Serve me up dirty filthy and ill-used I am the cartoon at the end of dawn A mother’s prayer quick lips of sorrow kissed echo of the new night God help us we are slain by moments of anger It hurts finally hurts no more Echoes of woe cry the new city built upon pastures flowers of doom Don’t cry me down ye awful lament scarlet promises sea of new blood Following empty you are what lies next stone heart eye of moon Fingernail traces eyelashes weeping a lone figure intolerant shadow Maybe she’s wicked lips apart magick Her tongue of flame passion divides Old soldiers and new lovers pretendering peace a fortune of skin We are the pale standing outside you a misting of star-shine penumbra undone Don’t you dare wake me with mute invitation Where dragons have flown my heart is gone Our cloak becomes a withering wall Beneath the veil a hermit resides She is cooking fish to feed her man slave a bit of wine to hurry him down He places an ear on the pit of her navel A child passes through the face of a dime It ain’t Hitler It’s Ike Hurry on singers watchers impatient They only came to hear the end of your song and so it is father whose breast is without us whose heart is within us whose belt is upon us and mother stirs the soup chicken noodle it is no chicken no noodle soup nonetheless A caravan gathers round an open-mouthed child He points to their camels strange alien hump An hour of madness must I possess a vision of angels heart of the beast Last night I saw you bare assed naked Bombs made your cities and titties dissolve Who were you then with your crack in the sky Who are you now laying spread before me There are brave new voices islands of silence where cave people dwell residue of shame I want a new blanket to cover my faces to shield me from the I want the wind in my home Old man, bite your tongue Your gun lies dead in your hand Cover yourself You are disgusting to the new children A grave in the city where geese go to graze a feast of bones and hollow moments Pigeon shit in the sand the mortar of giants brave deeds spoken crumbling walls Visions of paper pitiful wisdom the shaman in flames who laughs the fool Bruised sky of my face bitter sweet of mine heart Divide the peace of me make arrows and napalm http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2019 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 © 
6-9-2019
5-29-2019
5-1-2019 - After Midnight from Momma's Rain
4-24-2019
Adumbration - 4-20-2019
4-19-2019
4-5-2019
Fearful of death, determined to live forever,
impossibly worried, blind by half, we scurry through the scattered alleys of life. In our time of youth, not enough time, rarely enough money, hardly enough love, grasping at ends, scarcely ever enough. Adulthood finds us pursuing religion, politics and careers, running downhill, fornicating, procreating, recreating, scorched in a pyre of ignorance, tangle-fires of youth. We struggle to earn enough, be enough, realize we haven’t learned enough, paid enough attention before, thought we knew it all, frustrated that our children know too much about the wrong things, refuse to listen to what we have learned. Nearer to and acutely aware of death, fearful there is not time enough to protect and teach them to survive, we worry the empty rooms of elders passed. Graying and balding, regretting, forgetting, slowing, going down, sentimentally elemental, we are overcome by chance thought that what has been may be enough. Our spirits prepare us to journey, leave our feet behind on the worried path we have trod. We begin to remember cocoon water births with new eyes, caress what is left, our lovely children and life mates, that we may tell them in our going the joy of knowing they are the all and ever, more than enough. http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2019 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 © 
4-3-2019
3-29-2019
Mummies 3-24-2019
3-20-2019
3-6-2019
2-28-2019
As a boy, I began to keep a record of things, to write stories and songs. Daddy and Momma fought a lot over his drinking. She got beaten and he went to jail. I began to believe, learning about wars in school and people abusing each other in general, someday as a writer, I could make people think and care about each other, bring an end to their pain. What a damn fool I was as a boy. What a damn fool I am as an old man.
http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2019 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2019 © 
2-23-2019
2-3-2019 Bleed Out
Gotta heal what hurt you or bleed on those that had nothing to do with cutting you.
1-29-2019
Adulterated Standards 1-20-2019
12-28-2018
1-15-2019
12-21-2018
Covetous 12-14-2018
Bee Mental 12-7-2018
Bee Mental
Inner Piece Two/Ten Tin men on the radio, hiding under the knob, a twist of which is summons served, signed and quashed. The People’s Court, net dividing, ace after ace go unanswered. Sing and follow the bouncing ball of life after life. Follow, come on all of you, follow me down. Violence thrives in the city night. Owls swoop, devour wisps of spirit scent. Bees bumble-sex the flower. Will want decide or noxious need, human flora, a lust for demons. http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
Squirrel 11-25-2018
11-13-2018
11-20-2018
10-30-2018
10-15-2018 - Momma's Rain
Contemplating Murder
Momma’s Rain: Introduction to Chapter 20 Ain’t got no place to go I’m just a ten-year-old kid wondering about stabbing myself in the bellybutton like those Chinese ninja guys I lie about god I ain’t saved Poor folk don’t get saved They get used and taught to lie back stabbed and double crossed I understand kids that kill their parents kids that love their parents the same kids spend the rest of their lives listening to people in white coats If I stab Daddy and stab me and we don’t die what’s Momma gonna do Cops and doctors are the enemy They won’t let us alone to die http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
10-6-2018
10-2-2018
Ago 9-28-2018
Veracity 9-21-2018
Veracity
Truth is not won, it is earned, takes time, cannot be bought and paid for. It is not where you find it but when you find it, truth, what you do with it. Uncomfortable, not easy to look in the face at times, be careful how you handle truth. Contrary to the well-worn adage, truth will not set you free. It will most likely bind you to it, open your eyes to the comfort, safety of lies. http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
Shotgun 9-8-2018
What We Are (7-27-2018)
Fade 7-1-2018
6-27-2018
 Mold 3-24-2018
“WordWulf, your work reminds me of shards,
those things you find in the kiln, beautiful fragments when the whole thing has blown.” And the Stone Man Said Serve me up dirty filthy and ill-used I am the cartoon at the end of dawn A mother’s prayer quick lips of sorrow kissed echo of the new night God help us we are slain by moments of anger it hurts finally hurts no more Echoes of woe cry the new city built upon pastures flowers of doom Don’t cry me down ye awful lament scarlet promises sea of new blood Following empty you are what lies next stone heart eye of moon Fingernail traces eyelashes weeping a lone figure intolerant shadow Maybe she’s wicked lips apart magick Her tongue of flame passion divides Old soldiers and new lovers pretendering peace a fortune of skin We are the pale standing outside you a misting of star-shine penumbra undone Don’t you dare wake me with mute invitation Where dragons have flown my heart is gone Our cloak becomes a withering wall Beneath the veil a hermit resides She is cooking fish to feed her man slave a bit of wine to hurry him down He places an ear on the pit of her navel A child passes through the face of a dime It ain’t Hitler It’s Ike Hurry on singers watchers impatient They only came to hear the end of your song and so it is father whose breast is without us whose heart is within us whose belt is upon us and mother stirs the soup chicken noodle it is no chicken no noodle soup nonetheless A caravan gathers round an open-mouthed child He points to their camels strange alien hump An hour of madness must I possess a vision of angels heart of the beast Last night I saw you bare assed naked Bombs made your cities and titties dissolve Who were you then with your crack in the sky Who are you now laying spread before me There are brave new voices islands of silence where cave people dwell residue of shame I want a new blanket to cover my faces to shield me from the I want the wind in my home Old man bite your tongue Your gun lies dead in your hand Cover yourself You are disgusting to the new children A grave in the city where geese go to graze a feast of bones and hollow moments Pigeon shit in the sand the mortar of giants brave deeds spoken crumbling walls Visions of paper pitiful wisdom the shaman in flames who laughs the fool Bruised sky of my face bitter sweet of mine heart Divide the peace of me make arrows and napalm And the Stone Man Said was published in the anthology Storm Cycle by Kind of a Hurricane Press in 2015 http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music & words conceived by & property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
Privation (1-17-2018)
Presuppositions (1-16-2018)
Toss Penitence Once (2-19-2018
Ken (1-31-2018)
 One (1-25-2018)
The prisoner knuckled his eyes until stars blanketed his cage.
Blind to his keepers, the stars there to stay. 
Sans Ambit (1-19-2018)
Consumption (1-13-2018)
Abandoned (1-5-2018)
Meet me with your bodies for crosses,
goodness overlapped by sin, jewels of your imperfections worn as bracelets ‘round your thighs. He steps into his shovel. Stones sing; steel voices ring. Yes, the morning dew clings to the flesh and his face. His face weeps sweat at three by six and two yards deep. A blackbird whispers: Alms for the Digger Will we finally remember to be satisfied of moment, realize there is no surprise in time spent seeking back. Mysterious connection, we of human invention tend to view ourselves as extensions of god beasts, anal retention. Shadows in the cave lake, wicked teeth and no eyes. Glide smooth, serpent fish. Celebrate darkness of vision, an ancient realm, copper seam. So pure, we existed before heathen events of mutation. One last curtain call; an old blues man adjusts hiss steel teeth. He takes the bit into his mouth and rides ‘er one more time, each unspecified event of madness. (howling harmonica) (this part sung) I don’t care when the night-wind blows. She gon’ say me a prayer. She gone, she gone, she gone. Tell ya ‘bout woman, author of madness, priestess, witness. Carry me to the killing ground. Lay me on a field of fire. My flesh won’t burn. My flesh will not burn. A mist of ghosts rise, divided by distance and slaughtered anew. They are blue and gray in the dawn, boys wearing masks of men, thin whiskered and hollow of cheek. She gon’ pray us a prayer, mark the end of our war, mark the end of our war. (harmonica moan) A fisher of pearls probing your wound of flesh, discovers a cache of fish eggs, roe. The fisherman fertilizes them, carries them away in a canning jar, calls them sea monkeys. He ends up joining a circus where his life becomes an adventure, a chance to be all he can be, no idle passing of time. Then there’s the plan to feed the homeless in China, inspired by the bleached bones of home, walked over and tossed aside. Few see beyond the tinted glass, pleased to be on their way to aid the less fortunate. Who’s gonna shovel the elephant shit? To youth I say, rejoice in a ravenous feast of years, your blood lust to have it all. Hump your way toward oblivion. Suck energy from the day. Spit it into the faces from whence you came; defecate on the courthouse steps. Wiggle your ass silly and walk away. Breathe deep your smoking revenge. Soon enough you will bury those who made you and, when you went too far, dug deep to arrange your bail. A reoccurrence of dawn is no swift illusion or less real, the morrow. Too young for wisdom, old enough to know better, climb onto your soapbox. Wear them proud, your half-assed clothes. Ah hell, nobody gonna pay the digger. http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music & words conceived by & property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
5-27-2018
5-24-2018
5-22-2018
5-20-2018
Think Twice (5-18-2018)
Unequivocally (4-25-2018)
Monition (4-17-2018)
 4-16-2018
I can’t hear the night with the lights on
They blind my ears, destroy my focus A tiger of fear stalks their shadows creeping up to capture my spirit and terrify the little boy me I can’t see her face in the music where I go to hide away from her Songs I used to sing to her image are my new door to freedom in their legion of sadness I can’t find my ass in the dark with both hands, invisible arms a tactile prisoner of light whose eyes demand proof and purchase the illusive wall of life Wednesday took the lies of summer wrote them on a book of leaves divided amongst the winds scattered to hither and yon tablets in stacks and stones beyond http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music & words conceived by & property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © A Sense of Sixth was published by Skyline Literary Review in 2006 
Letters from the Monastery: XVI
Art of Denuding self He awakens from a night of no sleep whose black chromium edge has ripped the top off his mind She sits in the laps of bible men accepts the attentions of gentlemen who do it to her but never say it The chisel of love has whittled him down He stares at the skeletal remains of his once fulfilled self in his minds-eye mirror laughs uproariously at the remnants flushes them down the toilet The sword has two edges anger and shame Prostrated, he takes it into his mouth thrusts it deep and twists In a purging gush of blood he initiates an expiation a release from guilt and pain In a garden dark the howling man rages his flesh pricked, punctured by thorns sublime, his retribution far past the death dares of youth He claws at roots and earth shares them with his blood Dawn has no equal in his tortured black-hole eyes He crawls away to hide Lesser than carrion, he gags on the fetid stench his ravaged corpse of night leaves it to the worms The only path through grief and the road to wisdom is to learn to become a withered and empty husk He is blown through himself slack-jawed and empty a scarecrow on a stick http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music & words conceived by & property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
Posit (1-15-2018)
6-1-2018
Points of Reference 5-30-2018
Points of Reference
scents nursing homes abortion clinics life just before death sounds sick folks groaning babies crying old folks laughing baby belly giggles life before soon after kisses on the face in the casket in the cradle in the in the in between touch an open wound a sore back baby’s foot momma’s hands suffering deep felt shallow for others self eyes to see close and dream generations passage rebirth notions of difference indifference confusion on the ground while flying too near the moon greetings salutations hello goodbye spoken intuited each an invitation a blank space for the other to fill tasting momma’s fear daddy’s rage hunger an appetite for garbage so gifted so given so what to do next and why a wandering cloud counterpoint dewdrop pendulum strangers in passing strangers in fact spit in the hand chopping wood embracing violent interludes blood on the carpet in the hair everywhere you look, she’s satisfied surefooted determined lost a country a woman loose reference shoe strings tripping easy LSD falling hard LSD baby in the room disturbing if wailing calming if cooing changing papa’s diaper sad and misbegotten pinpricks aloe vera she bet a nickel on sunrise he raised her a dime so they did it twice despairing at parades birthing rooms scared shitless of clown faces fear of the toilet teetering on the edge relieved to leave the least part of yourself behind the young man and his guitar alone in the wee hours he realizes he can play himself to sleep epiphany to be his father a dear friend said hinge philosophy dead presidents live chickens guess who’s coming and to dinner the highway between wars strewn with bodies and lies a man in a robe blesses them picks their pockets shudders at the ooze gathers their spirits into a censer incites a zephyr to carry their last kisses to the world away from the cloud in ignorance, he stands with those of his ilk thieves whom weep http://wordwulf.com Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail.com © 2018 artwork, music and words conceived by and property of Tom (WordWulf) Sterner 2018 © 
Schism (1-20-2018)
Daylight Savings Time 3-10-2018
 Anamnesis 2-1-2018
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