Red Carpet To Quietude
by Odin Roark

Plush the red,
expansive the coverage,
bombastic the stage,
every loser’s dream.

The why of lights,
camera,
media,
masses,
begs kneeling on any and all stages
where fame and fortune’s delusion
plays out.

Why the passionate color?
Why the weave beneath the feet?
Why the studio light?
Why the lenses?
Why the spectators?

Because…

“Bobby Smith, you’re special.”
“Good job, Bobby.”
“Way to go, Mr. Smith.”

Until…

Wake up call.

Smith’s not special.
Bobby’s just different.

The bubble bursts
The damage turns to…

To…

Anything,
‘cause a mommy uttered over and over;
“You’re special, Bobby.”

With that echo in his ears,
he claws his way
to the crimson padding.

How dense this malady of identification,
this malaise of dysfunction,
perpetuated by biological parents,
scholastic parents,
business parents,
know-it-all political parents.

Fostered by newscasts,
nurtured by leaches of awesome variety,
“so-called” grownups of parasitic worlds
inordinate attention continues to flourish.

Unaware…

In the shadows stands calm
certain minds of understanding,
cleansed of remnant baggage,
having already learned they were never special,
save the gratuitous labels given them by others,
merely distinct like everyone else.

How rewarding this awakening,
this silent walk toward nowhere…
and everywhere.

Such is honesty’s reward

Where like a tree’s dark shadow,
acceptance knows well the absorption of all colors
rendering the din of sensory bombardment a cacophonous silence,
trust void of fear in the mind’s own deprivation tank.

Yet

How reluctant such red carpet addicts,
unable to embrace the white light,
where waiting out nature’s tintinnabulation
is to become noiseless with peace.

To lay oneself down
afloat atop the water, the grass,
the ethereal reality of consciousness,
that place where leaves of brown
beneath the awaiting orange of life’s ever changing succession
discovers why jasmine lures the mulch of life into purity’s gateway
is to know why time’s eternal truth continues correlating one with zero,
melding mistakes as lessons through the cycle of quietude.