Listening to the Wind

Listening to the Wind

Sometimes it’s best just to sit here listening

The sound of the Spirit moving in the silence

Anticipation in the air

The samplings of a gourmet chef

With all the smells and whistles

None of the thorns and thistles

But a balancing nonetheless

I break from far-off weary dreams

To embrace this quiet lull that seems

As nothingness is the norm

Yet the violent wind of storm

Awakes me to the difference

I listen, calmer, deeper still

While the windowpane is shaking

I carry on to the throne of God

Where everything is breaking

Where everyone has entered dance

Where no friend is forsaking

It is the best world of them all

For no fright is resting there

It is the greatest world of all

Only love is resting here

I am awakened to the difference

There is no end it seems

To this place of living, immortal dreams

Where colors are tasted

Great is delight

Where sights are mere wonders

Never is night

Except where sons do not shine

Once again, I am awakened to the difference

Into the Depths

Into the Depths

I have dived into an ocean

Now I realize I’ve gone so deep

I don’t know where I am

The only thing I thought I could do to save myself

Is see where the light is coming from

Then simply return to the surface

But now, where I am, there is light coming from all directions

I now have no idea which way I’m supposed to go

But I presume that wherever I go

there will be nothing but goodness

In whichever way I choose

Monolith

Monolith

Running laps around the carousel 

Blitzing at American Dream speed

No time to think of why

Just churn out numbers until I die

I run straight smack into a monolith

It suddenly appeared right in my way

So massive, so resolute 

So beautiful 

I hit so hard my mind just stopped cold

I feared for my sanity 

I lost all semblance of bold

All thoughts stopped 

The words would not come

Silence allowed me to hear

The rhythms of the entire universe 

The ringing in my ears

Still screeches from the impact 

I hear the slumber of others

Their soft snores ebbing as the oceans 

I hear the cries of witches, warlocks

Selling their impotent potions

To the most delusional highest bidder 

But most of all I realize I have never been still before

I’ve never paused to realize the meaning of the floor

I’ve never seen such clear blue sky

I’ve never sensed the rain

I think the most disconcerting thing

Is I never felt my pain

This is why I’ve been so alone

I toss aside my humming phone

Looking up to the folds of granite 

I pause, I linger, I fold, I panic

At the thought I have to scale this

Yet even though I consistently fail this

I put all I have into the ascent

Which all I have is me

The fireflies begin to flicker, burn 

They begin to light a pathway

So though there fades the light of day

I still climb, I still ascend 

Especially when I am still 

The Hope

The Hope

Poetry shouldn’t be forced

I’m not sure anything good comes from coercion

I’m so impeded, the words won’t come

They are there in my mind, in my soul

Yet there is this dark blockade

Anger, fatigue, self-doubt, irritation, impatience

These are the bricks in the wall

I so often wait around for inspiration

Inspiration is too fleeting, too fickle

I might be sitting on this rock for ages

Moss growing all around me

Growing on my face and eyes

While waiting to be mesmerized

The sun completes all its seasons

So I search for more, I look for reasons

Why all this is the way it is for me

Instead of resting along the trees

I wander off into the bramble

Thus the reason I mumble, ramble

Along the sidewalks of the mysterious plodding way

I still don’t know quite what to say

I still don’t know quite what to pray

Or how

I must go deeper than my brow

Maybe I must go higher

My skin has tired of these annoying briers

That daily scratch my skin

I wonder if my past, the lives of my kin

Have gone these overgrown life ways?

No, I cannot go backwards, that makes no sense at all

I set my eyes for the ambers of fall

Knowing there will be a winter

Christmas is coming

The Way

The Way

I can feel the poems within me

Growing, moving, churning

Not yet ready to see the light

Yet building the light within me greatly

Sometimes I feel volcanic, ready to burst asunder

Sometimes there’s simply quiet, undercurrent

Moving the continents

One millimeter at a time

These senses are so subtle, sublime

Yet also they can be a sudden torrent

I don’t have my container ready to catch it all

The drops disappear into the warm, rich earth

Something will grow from them later

Something that creates a vast, deep crater

Too deep to see the bottom

Too wide to know the expanse

No droning lore or circumstance

Can describe or tame it

I can feel the poems within me

They grow, they move, they delight

They torture, they tense, they torment

All at once

All in a day

This is the way

Of the poet.

10/17/17

Upriver

Upstream

I do not like walking around my neighborhood

It reminds me of how far I have not come

I never imagined my life to be this way

I lived the life of academic success,

Hard work

Be kind to everyone

Where am I?

Not where I was told I would be

Or maybe it is the way I’m looking at things

Maybe I’m not looking at what is really there

Maybe I’m seeing what I want to see

I do not know

That should be the title of all my poems

I do not know

That in itself is a place of panicked unfamiliarity

When I was young I knew all

I learned all

Everything was scientific fact

Not a speck of mystery in any of it

Though there was great wonder and order and beauty

No, not one speck of mystery

Then the oceans rose

The rivers came rushing in

Sweeping all of that away

I look back upon that memorable day

And wonder if I should celebrate

Or curse it

There seems to be nothing that can ever reverse it

The waters are always now shifting within me

Like the winds

So here I am

Another member of lonely land, the wilderness of millions,

Wondering why I’m here

What have I done

To be so fortunate, yet to be the one

That seems to never hit the finish line of destiny

Maybe there isn’t one

Maybe it’s in the running

The walking, the crawling,

Doing whatever it takes to continue moving forward

Never still

Never still

For in the moving waters, still is always moving backwards

Or forward if one simply yields

To the rhythms of the undercurrents

That flow within my very soul

I do wonder what is the definition of whole

I wonder more what it is like to experience it

I wonder if I'll ever know

I think I will, if I will only keep moving

Embrace

Embrace

I am not your savior for the day

Nor am I an expert in anything

All of these experts

I hear the future laughing at them

“Those thoughts are ridiculous!

Everyone knows that isn’t so!”
I just don’t want to be there

I don’t want to be in that group

Known for not just it’s ignorance

But for it’s obstinate arrogance in it all

I also do not wish to be amongst the ones

Who refuse to believe anything at all

Just to not be wrong

I cannot waver between correct and not

Trying to avoid the extremes

I must take my stand

Yet so it seems

The most reliable foundation of them all

Is the foundation I cannot see or feel

Can this be so?
Can this be real?
Do I set my life on something that is so bizarre

Instead of the universal comfort in ritual?

I don’t know

I cannot think clearly with all this noise

People blabbering nothings

Phones playing videos 

The Facebook and Twitter accounts brimming

Over the edges of the known universe

The trolls and horrific tales scream the lies

So loud no one knows the truth anymore

But yet there I go on a rabbit trail

No rabbits have been along here for decades

Only wandering, mumbling schizophrenics

Looking for their next doses of medications

I look up toward the sun’s rotations

And wonder when the next wonder will be

Will I even be around to see it? To know it?

Or will I have fallen asleep in the murmurings of my questions?

It’s been a long time since I’ve use any punctuations

I think that is a great sign

A sign I’m beginning to pause

A sign I’m beginning to pause and ponder the purpose of it all

A sign that I’m ready for the borderlines of an embrace