The Void

The Void

It is strange to think that emptiness

Can carry such significant weight

How can it have such a powerful impact

Dropping boulders so heavy and great

They leave my heart a crushed up mess

Like grapes trodden on the ground

My heart it yearns for any sound

That would bring some purpose, some meaning

I’m so tired of trying to force the rhyme

I’m so tired of trying to play the rhythm

These damned distractions do so hinder the art

The art of the effortless beauty

But sometimes these fanciful ideas are myth

They contain a truth,  a touch of bliss

But in the end they always fall short of the filling

So I must move on to find the truth that is fulfilling

But still I have yet to find it

I know these facts inside my head are inadequate

They have no colors to paint the hues of the masquerades

They have no tinctures to match the escapades 

Of the ones who live life so completely

But I believe most of these are dead

The skies are dark, the blood is red

And I just sit here in this meandering state

Frustrated more than ever that this heaviness within

Cannot be described with mortal words

Or mortal wounds

The dog is yipping in the bedroom

Reminding me of the mundane

The ritual we all walk, insane

Doing the same thing every day

Without any vivid recollection

Maybe it’s time to stop the vapid reflection

And instead point my heart to a source

A source of everything the universe is made of

A source of everything we’ve never, ever known

We speak of it all as dark matter

Yet we cannot even measure it

Much less give it an appropriate name

Whether we see it or not, it is all the same

For it makes everything in the universe to be different

Diffuse, unique, mystique, eternal

Whether black or grey or red or vernal

I know not

All I do know is that even in the discussion

My emptiness is no more

Time to soar

My Focus

My Focus

Like the great and mighty redwoods grow 

As they go higher, the weeds below

Have not one prayer for their continued existence 

So it is with me in firm persistence 

I will focus on the light

Not spending energy on what against me fights

But rather spend all on reaching  what's above me, higher

I continue to seek, to hear the lyre

The music of the skies

I embrace the truth, I ignore the lies

Simply growing in the rain 

Despite all loss, despite the pain

I keep on reaching again and again

For the sunlight is always before me

1/12/17

Hope

I see a land of blue skies

White clouds

Just beyond the lands of smoke and plume, beyond fire and lava

Steam and flame

This place where no one knows my name

Nor does anyone care to know it

I see a land beyond

Yet

These ancient trees stand at the entry

They speak with arms all outstretched

They say, “You cannot pass. You shall not enter here.”

I feel an old companion, fear

Begin to rise up inside my chest

I look to the ground, I take a breath

I realize there is always another way

I look up to the trees, leafless, barren

I speak

“There are things one sows, those same we reap

I have sown love and passion and honor”

As I smile, I weep 

and say,

“I will see the lands of my ancient fathers.”

The trees they scoff at such a line

They do not budge one inch.

I hear the calling of the finch

I begin to walk to the singing

“Where do you think you’re going?”

The gnarled garrison barks in unison

“I am going to the song.” I reply

And I leave them in confusion

My feet are anxious to walk in the newly fallen snow

My heart is anxious to begin to grow

So that it might hold all the beauty that is before me

1/9/17

The Dance

The Dance

I often get so frustrated

That there isn’t an infinite amount of poetry in me

I know I need to write it

I can feel it in my chest

I can feel it even Deeper than that

I can feel it in the places where spirit and soul do flow

Yet there is no bridge between here and there

There is no way there I know

Or is there?

Could it be that infinity really is within?

Could it be that there is a creativity that never has an end?

It could be

I guess anything could be

That’s why we have words like “paradox” and “tension”

That’s why there’s so many unknown dimensions

Things that even quantum physics has a hard time describing

I have the choice to be stone solid or imbibing

The deep red wines of mystery

I have the choice

So though I might not have a language for what is within

I can keep dancing with it

I can keep going back and drinking from the well

I can keep breaking out of this small prison cell

Named, “This is the way it has always been.”

I can make the choice to be wild and free

I like this dance with eternity

1/7/17

Grief Bomb (Diffused)

The Grief Bomb (Diffused)

Got a grief bomb going off in my chest today

The heaviness is remarkable 

I guess one cannot know love 

Unless one gets to know pain

They seem to be inseparable 

My head hurts too much to think about it 

My heart hurts too much to move on

So I guess I'll sit here and sing a song

To drown out the sounds of dark derision 

I can sing much longer than grief can cry

I don't even have to know an answer why

I just know the music will make all the difference 

Blue Lands

The Blue Lands

I'm not used to this enduring cold

This absence of heat

This growing old

I'm not used to this sadness 

But yet I am familiar 

I've let it rob me

Of being a man

And even greater still 

I've let it rob me of being a human 

So like C3PO I stagger about

Encompass everything's nothing

I spew and I spout

Yet have nothing to say

To bring colors to the flowers

I go on in my knowledge 

About hours and showers 

Yet never bring rain to the sun fields 

I creak and squeak and groan, my shields

Have protected me from the very lifelines I needed

The singing of the birds I've heeded

It is there I shall find out some answers

The sun,the moon, the arts, the dancers 

Will point me to the way

I go on writing and throwing this day

Into the building of mortar and bricks 

These stones, these shells, these rocks, these sticks

Were never enough to save me

So, though all living may skin and berate me

I will choose to rest on the battlefield 

Because I am weary of the blood, the limbs, the smoke

I am weary of the words that make me choke 

I just want to see the sunshine

Through dance, through song, through sound, through rhyme

I enter into the blue lands beyond all time

And I jolly well plan to stay there

The Tree

The Tree

I see this person that I’ve become

Most seem to mourn this aging

I have come to see it as a stark improvement

Over the ridiculous ignorance of my youth

I was much to sullen

Much too serious

Now I see the world really doesn’t depend on me

Now I see that to taste the free

I get to dance in the world of going lightly

I get to allow my neighbor to walk so slightly

Upon everything I ever believed in

Still I nod with respect

My heart and soul I do not neglect

But rather I go on in the making

I go on with the sifting, on with the shaking

Enjoying this one hell of a ride

I take the hurts and the pains in stride

I keep on walking, I keep on learning

I keep on hoping, I keep on weaning

Myself off of this very drab lore.

I know not what there might be in store

For the rest of the grand delusion

But I do know there is love and there is goodness

For I have found these things are truly eternal

So I like this person I’ve become

I know no answers

Only questions

I know not the length of any gestations

I simply know that I’m growing into myself