What great purpose does our life give?
To but live.
Where is found nirvana’s likeness?
In kindness.
What value does life afford?
Its own reward.
When the whole world you’ve explored
the last of your pages now penned
there is left one truth in the end
To but live in kindness, its own reward.
Wind settles to rise again
Tacit words in the darkness of our mind
both maligned and constrained
What future would bear their weight?
Even the past refused the encumbrance
resigned to slumbrous fate
And thus the wind will collapse
as forgotten phrases from long ago
They flow, fall, then relapse
Yet still they both hide a storm
the scent of distant gray clouds in retreat
like peat the sun made warm
Regrets are the ghost of life
ever they rise again to haunt our thoughts
the mind caught amidst strife
We charge the mic with our song
but often old words hold new words captive
the active words made wrong
The melody thus silenced
we find solace in the moments between
a routine of violence
Witness the corpse of our muse
but bear in mind not all is truly lost
the cost of fear recused
But it will wake in the sea
the crashing waves of errant thoughts at night;
dying light sets them free.
It was so hard to love you
difficult – but no less true
not for our lack of trying
just crying and failed pursuits.
I adored what you should be
if you had ever been free
to choose us over the fight
for the right to always flee
You so loved being needed
until us tributes pleaded
for your need in return
a concern left unheeded
I sat for hours on the bank
a stowaway on the plank
hoping for your kind reprieve
left there to grieve as I sank
I imagined I could tell
that I knew your car so well
to identify the sound –
all I found were my dreams quelled
‘Twas never your car.
cold and alone with the stars
waiting for you to arrive
still alive – gathering scars
These days I’m a parent too
trying not to be like you –
I too feel the need to flee…
look at me – nothing is new.
We should go out
tonight
more often
we are
like songbirds on a wire
alone
waiting for the migrations
in each
strange cloud that drifts past the
other
Charred wood and ash stirred to bright gold embers
violence begat flames that fold in tongues
crack like whips in darkness to inspire lust
the night takes the fire into its lungs
Thoughts are loud – though they remain unspoken
silence is where the sane call their home
the madness restrained surely dies inside
or there resides like eyes free to roam
The sounds of life are encumbered with death
all felt the time plundered as an offense
the cliff ending while they keep running on
absence becoming something immense.
But finality waits for tomorrow
they will travel no more after this
Three weeks to create a friend from nothing
one rope to end it all in abyss.
There is something down there
hidden in the anxiety
I can feel it here
The vibrations crossing the distance
to shake hands
Introduced – we both scream
internally
reduced to sounds and knots
pregnant with them
but unable to birth them.
Hush now
Run
Let’s talk about
establishing healthy values
in yourself and others.
As for yourself
always be a work in progress
know your limits and strengths
There is a seed
inside all of us that will grow
if cared for and watered
There are weeds too
that will choke those seeds to nothing
if not ripped from the soil.
Growth is violent change
raging against the garden
within to find greatness
As for others
gardening is hard, dirty work
find the seed – inspire fruit.
There wasn’t much to go on then
but I’m glad you were my friend
When I kept running
you kept up with me
you saved me.
You were music and love and humor
You were intrigue and guidance
You were the high-water mark
when it felt like I was drowning
There wasn’t much to go on then,
but for a while
we made our own paths together
and those paths exploded into new routes
had you not been there, mine may have ended.
You see
There wasn’t much to go on then
but there was you,
and for that
I would go through it all again.
“I don’t need a doctorate to know
that your facts do not fit with what I think is right”
“The wealthy want what is best for us
why else would they have all the money we helped them earn?”
“The disenfranchised are the real threat
they would kill us all had we not taken all they owned!”
“Poor people are the dregs of life
and when I get rich I’ll put them all in their place.”
“Not everyone needs a living wage
that will just raise the prices for my family to live.”
“Racism died many years ago
we even allowed one of them to be president.”
“Healthcare is a service not a right
Why should I pay taxes for your healthy life style?”
“God gives every cell the right to life
and mothers who abort should be put to death for it.”
“We need religion back in our schools
or else the Jews and the Muslims will brainwash our children.”
“Climate change is a liberal hoax
everything will cool back down once all the ice caps melt”
“They’ve said this before and been censored
but I know they’re right, it’s all over the internet!”
Torn fabric
threads scattered to the wind
reaching out for others
finding
nothing.
but reaching
Reaching should be enough
to overcome deep cuts
but it’s not anymore.
Once we were confidently clothed,
but deep cuts make
torn
Fabric
and we are made naked and anxious
holding rags
acting like that’s going to
keep
us
together
Grow Gray With Me 