HumanKIND
You are right for you: I am right for me
One side for me and another for you
Therefore let us agree to disagree
And save ourselves the trouble to argue
I look back over life and I can see
It never seems to help when people do
If others must then let them fight and fuss
But all ideas are free to everyone
We ourselves are satisfied to be us
Content still when all arguments have done
Their worst to divide and conquer us all
The truth remains that humankind is one
So let us lift each other when we fall
Since having disagreed we can agree
The truth remains that humankind is one
You are right for you: I am right for me
Though humankind seems to have lost its mind
Falling sadly short of its name
We humans--even now--can still be kind
And we two remain just the same
Making Homemade Poetry
When you make a thing yourself you care more
Than if you hire someone else to do it
For me making things is what I live for
To have an idea and get down to it
Enjoying the ride as much as the pride
Of doing it myself and showing you
On a rainy night snug and warm inside
Just what it really is all day I do
I enjoy making homemade poetry
I try to speak clearly and concisely
And I find it satisfying to be
Able to say a thing rather nicely
If occasionally in any case
In competition with no one but me
Doing it wearing a smile on my face
I know who I am and what I came for
When you make a thing yourself you care more
Sonnet at the Winter Solstice
This solstice is the return of the light
At which the sun stands still then to decide
That each succeeding day be made more bright
Although it takes until the other one
A moment at a time and day by day
The summer solstice greets winter's work done
And pauses then to turn the other way
The yin and the yang of the year elide
And I am reminded of you somehow
Written in my heart and the sky above
As both winter and summer solstice now
Become two eyes in the face of my love
Another year the sun has smiled its way
Two eyes in the face of my love dawn day
The Constancy of Change
Trained to inhibition
Brought up by repression
Drained to inanition
Brought down by depression
I have never understood life at all
But when I take a walk
Or when we have a talk
I find that I can rise just as I fall
And then no one can see
What the matter might be
With me
Brought down by depression
Drained to inanition
Brought up by repression
Trained to inhibition
I have never understood life at all
The constancy of change
Makes each turn blind and strange
And yet I rise however hard I fall
Embraced by the Moon
So crisp and crystalline this day has been
And now the sun hands over to the night
Such clarity as is but seldom seen
While the stars reveal blue diamond light
Out one by one through their blue velvet screen
The moon hangs ripe and heavy like a pearl
I only wish I could give it to you
Right here on your breast it would shine so bright
Worn cool round the neck of a pretty girl
But it follows you whatever you do
Sparkles in your eyes and haloes your hair
Your radiant shoulders bear witness too
Embraced by the moon my soul and the air
Some light some magic some December dew
And I remember how it feels to love
Within my heart again but as never
Before tonight for this is forever
Looking at you: as below so above
What She Meant After All
last things last
Excuse me for leaving such a mess
May those I have trespassed forgive me
May they remember the best of me
But may not my follies outlive me
Save my books and burn the rest of me
Better save all that music I wrote
I suppose as I think about it
Having poured myself into each note
Perhaps some choir could sing (or shout) it
Nothing exceeded quite like excess
Always "colorful" (if not frugal)
I was quite a character I guess
Just spare me the bagpipes and bugle
I recall how Grandma said "the less
Said the better" and now I can see
What she meant after all (and agree)
Soil and Sky
Small planet of a fading star
I know how it feels to be small
To feel like a fading star too
Or planet smaller than you are
You two and I know after all
That "might makes right" was never true
That greed is rotten at its root
And that the proud someday must fall
My world! My day! This right-sized earth
And sun which bring the field to fruit
Are synthesis of death and birth
I hear the singing duststorm call
When air and land go hand in hand
And wonder sadly vainly why
Men cannot live like soil and sky
Two by Two
How does it help the cause of another
To destroy me?
Having grown up as brother and brother
Can we not see
That when one hurts the other one hurts too?
You are one with me as I am with you
There will never be peace
I know
Until injustice cease
And so
Brokenness seems to go on forever
Even though nothing can ever sever
The bond of the blood of humanity
In pieces now we grieve
Yet secretly believe
That one hope remains for me as for you
Burning behind these clouds we see above
Rising in you as it rises in me
That the blood of humanity run true
Two hearts at a time two by two through love
Delighted to be Invited
As another good day ends
And a new good night begins
The lovers pass with a kiss
Sun and moon as tender friends
In this game anyone wins
Who gives the world half a chance
And the only game is this
The world has been good to me
Taught what I needed to know
(Usually the hard way)
And the possibility
Of life and how far we go
Would appear essentially
Left open for each to say
I am delighted
To be invited
To join in the dance
Of Higher Choice
We come we go
And all too fast
Before we know
Our time has passed
Unseemly haste
Drives on and on
Till life is waste
And we are gone
We come we go
But in the rush
Before we know
Forget the hush
Of higher choice
And all too fast
That inward voice
Of angels near
Is drowned and killed
Or is it we
Who fail to hear
And lose the light
Who once were free
But threw away
Our own birthright
To fully be
Ourselves today?
Unseemly haste
It seems somehow
Brings future past
And steals the now
As higher choice
Goes unchosen
Freedom frozen
Stifled and stilled
Unseemly haste
Drives on and on
Till life is waste
And we are gone
Christmas 2006: Absolute Aloneness
a sonnet
I am going to hide in my room this year
For Christmas as for my New Year's Eve birthday
Overwhelmed by anxiety filled with fear
I will wait it out until it goes away
I love the Christ of Christmas but for the rest
It is simply unbearable for me now
As I taste the worst remembering the best
It all seems a bitter mockery somehow
Strangers attempt to make it better but they
Cannot see that which is broken inside me
"My soul is weary of my life" as Job said
May Christ have mercy at his Nativity
On me as I excuse myself to my bed
And not to sleep there but to weep instead
War Sonnet
Blessed are the dead who feel no more pain
We were trusting and easily misled
Lied to we went chasing falsified goals
Along with thousands and daily more dead
By little antichrists who sold their souls
A long time ago but how could we know
Our leaders had been leading us astray?
We never would have enabled their lies
If we had known then what we know today
But now as you read this one of us dies
None with a pure heart ever dies in vain
Leaving our dreams behind us as we go
Now we will never be misled again
Blessed are the dead who feel no more pain
A Set of Three on Christmas Eve
One:
Good Day and Good Night
I have decided to tell everyone
That I am in bed with the flu today
Till Christmas passes and the year is done
I cannot bear it any other way
I would like to be a philanthropist
But have no money with which to endow
What I would like and am no optimist
I cannot afford to buy my books now
Nor coffee for Grandma's percolator
There will always be good work for later
If unfortunately not done by me
Everyone would be on my Christmas list
But all I have is all this poetry
So I will stay in bed all day and write
Hibernating to return with the sun
Till Christmas passes and the year is done
I wish everyone good day and good night
Two:
For My Father
My father you have so much blood on your hands
You made your living killing
And yet you would be the one who understands
If only you were willing
From you I learned that life is not fair
Kill or be killed death lives everywhere
You are old now as am I
Here on the battlefield man to man
Let us make peace as we die
If it is not too late if we can
If you are willing
After the killing
Three:
In the Dark
Christmas Eve turned out to be
Quiet and harmonious
My first thought had been to flee
But that proved erroneous
It turned out to be just fine
Not so bad at all for me
Through a twinkle a divine
Spark of love and synergy
Though my heart was bleak and stark
Christ was born there in the dark
This Mischief I Make in the Night
Why do my books have four more pages
In hardcover than in soft?
I would ask of bookmaking sages
Who soar much higher aloft
Than some lowly scrivener like me
Yet somehow it all turns out right
I just write the poetry
This mischief I make in the night
I wonder if those pages are those
Stout outer ones thick for the ages?
As long as the binder knows
What those four pages are for
I just hope somebody reads them
Takes good care of them and needs them
No matter how they might I need them more
Because they bear my fondest fantasy
Yet somehow it all turns out right
This mischief I make in the night
The Hopeful Heart Knows
a sonnet
The sun is soaring stronger
If only step by step but every day
The light is leaping longer
Winter is on the walk now making way
If only by a moment at a time
Impatient spring is pacing in the wings
The great wheel turns from sublime to sublime
To hasten the day when the robin sings
Again for those who waited in the dark
The landscape changes unmistakably
Each time I go outside and to the park
But spring cannot come soon enough for me
Sweet secrets lie buried under the snows
Wonders which only the hopeful heart knows
Through Bamboo
a sonnet for someone
I sing a song through a bone-flute of bamboo
As curling upward my voice like smoke rising
Emboldened sings about love and me and you
A song sung through bamboo can be surprising
Some people talk too much as they come and go
But you and I have talked enough now that we
Know each other so well we already know
Transcending what could be said we would just be
Tender feelings are projected on the clouds
By the pink-and-purple setting sun below
Beckoning us rise up there above the crowds
Of people who will never know what we do
Curling upward our voices like smoke rising
Our song sung through bamboo will be surprising
For Her
I remember when I saw her giving up
How it made me feel like giving up to see
After a lonely lifetime of living up
To high ideals some others misunderstood
Perfectly proper invisibility
And sacrificing self to the greater good
Thinking of self last but first of another
Armed with only kindness against cruelty
She did the best she could to be a mother
Did pretty well too and she did it for me
And after a whole lifetime of living up
To high ideals some others misunderstood
In that place of death I saw her giving up
Sacrificing herself to the greater good
For the joys which were not and the sorrows which were
I do the best I can and I do it for her
Ars Longa
a sonnet
Life-poets like my mother die young
Her life remaining as poetry
Mere mortals like me live on and on
Struggling somehow to get our song sung
Making a fuss and then we are gone
Losing our bet with mortality
I can race against time all I want
But my judgment is not up to me
If fate is kind one poem might haunt
Some odd book somewhere or two or three
But leave legacy to what other
People say long after I have died
And been led into light stupefied
An old man to meet my young mother
Birthday Contemplation
A life of fifty-two weeks another year
A deck of cards including the jokers too
I will contemplate truth and what makes it true
On this New Year's Eve as I count fifty-two
Years a deck of cards the game which keeps me here:
+ + +
To tell the truth come what may
That a true r world might be
I embrace the ones before
We came who went before us
To dance on a different day
I thank them that they tried for
And lived for as they died for
Life discovered and love shared
Love lived life loved intensely
As pure possibility
As the ones before prepared
Life is love which we can see
Love which we cannot still more
In which life and love agree
To embrace the ones who dared
Who by this grace restore us
To embrace the ones before
Who dared to come before us
And remember what they cared
For as possibility
Even through their darkest doubt
Even doubt as dark as now
It was worth caring about
And still is somewhere somehow
Ancient wings renewed shake free
Unfold new reality
I embrace the ones before
Who danced on a different day
Who died for what they lived for
To tell the truth come what may
Human After All?
I try not to care
But then: she is there!
And try as I might
Her humanity
Brings mine out in me
It simply feels right
So am I human after all?
At least I would be
In good company
This leap of faith ends not in fall
But in rising creative desire
A lifting to love while tried by fire
Because she is there
Always as now
Beckoning to me
I guess I will care
Reckoning that she
Will show me how
New Year's Resolution
for Franziska with love
I seek to purify myself this year
To do my uttermost in all I do
I seek to forget the feeling of fear
And to be unafraid of loving you
I seek to celebrate your beauty now
To know who my friends are that you are one
I know I want to be with you somehow
To enjoy this life and to have some fun
As much for as long as time will allow
To see how far I can go with my best
And do all I can before I am done
That you might be pleased and forgive the rest
I would like to find our place in the sun
To flourish strong and sturdy stubbornly
Staying in the light of the state of mind
Of struggling to be the best I can be
I look deep within my heart and I find
I want most for you to be proud of me
So I will do my best and start today
If you would like to be with me come on
And we can have a great time come what may
With what there is left until it is gone
Since nothing lasts forever anyway
The Stubbornness of Self-Sacrifice
I have struggled so stubbornly to stay
Because I simply have nowhere to go
They always told me it was mere delay
That I had to sell out and they should know
But I would not be moved not go away
Nor face the sad reality and so
I got my wish at the end of the day
And now I am a complete stranger here
In my own house gnawed by the rats of fear
Be careful what you wish for by the way
Although it is always up in the air
Although I can know no security
And in spite of what those wiser might say
I intend to keep my heritage where
My legacy can enjoy it someday
Someday they will say "that poet lived there
Even though it was impossible to
Endure what he chose to endure to be
A link in the chain of his family
He did just what he felt he had to do"
And so I live with strangers now but I
Will leave it to my children when I die
And if they should have more money than me
They can replace strangers with family
Forget about some old man and his pain
There will be children laughing here again
Although it is always up in the air
Although I can know no security
And in spite of what those wiser might say
I intend to keep my heritage where
My legacy can enjoy it someday
On a Blue Cloud of Dreams
If only I could sleep until I die
Soaring the sky on a blue cloud of dreams
Far beyond all this madness up so high
Where nothing matters anymore it seems
Let the other shoe drop for all I care
Excreted from the body politic
I want to feel the night-wind in my hair
Where war and folly no more make me sick
Since I fail to see waking hope for me
Except I sleep until I die and fly
Anywhere but here I have broken free
Broken by the earth to take to the sky
But do not wake me when it all ends please
If I cannot die at least let me sleep
If barred from the sky then let me sink deep
I want no more waking indignities
Curiosity and Me
I read encyclopedias all night
Consult the dictionary all day long
And while for me my style of life seems right
For those less curious it might be wrong
But my birthright is curiosity
I like to have a working theory why
Things are as they are here all around me
I was born a very curious guy
To a very curious family
And yet I do not know the answers to
The questions I wonder about all day
As you might and as many people do
For me the questions never go away
And if curiosity killed some cat
If I should die it would not be of that
For me not to wonder would be to die
And Two Stars: Free
Without knowing the secrets of the sun I see
That within its bright self it seems to smile
I have no doubt it is smiling at you and me
So come closer as we smile back awhile
It will have no doubt what we are smiling about
Everyone knows about the sun and fun
Even early this morning before it came out
I felt it dawn on me a new life had begun
Without seeing the secrets of the moon I know
That it is making magic silently
And I can see in the sky wherever I go
That palest of eyes there winking at me
But my favorite heavenly body is you
Just you yourself right there just as you are
So encouraged by what the sun and the moon do
And with their blessing I name you my star
Without knowing the secrets I only guess why
But if you are a star then I must be
And I would love to join you up there in the sky
Smiling sun... winking moon... and two stars: free
Pigs of the Sky!
A tornado blew seven pigs away
But only whirled them around in the air
Keeping them up there a night and a day
And when it got tired it put them back where
They had been found eating down on the ground
After their whirlwind ballet in the round
They had been busy and they were dizzy
Wondering how big they would have to be
Before they could no longer ride for free
Yet after awhile they forgot about
All their excitement and started to doubt
If they had really flown up in the sky
Until a pig-shaped pink puff cloud passed by...
And seven snouts pointed heavenward high
They were relieved shook fat heads and believed
Sharing their secret with porcine laughter
Pigs of the sky! Seven pigs of the air
Who are now best friends forever after
Recalling down here they once flew up there
When a pig-shaped pink puff cloud passes by...
Refraction
As beauty is in the eye of the beholder
Perfection is refracted by the judging eye
We wisen as we wizen smarter but older
Pursuing perfection albeit with a sigh
When it seems just right to me it might not to you
But see perfection each our way is what we do
Live briefly and imperfectly then soon we die
After a lifetime of looking for something true
And whether this is it or something more
As beauty is in the eye of the beholder
May we both find what we were looking for
Perfection as refracted by a judging eye
Secret
The secret he carried was wrapped with regret
And he was just not ready to share it yet
But said when he was I would be first to know
I could see that he was afraid to let go
Of something he feared might make him be loved less
And death interfered before he could confess
I think in his heart he knew I knew because
I had known all along what the secret was
We all knew and loved him more for it somehow
As much in solidarity then as now
Yet I still feel sad for him about
His living a lie he believed had to be
He was never able to come out
And because of this he never could be free
Infinitude
My cat comprehends how alone we are
And stays as close to me as any dog
Ever trotted alongside a master
Although no one is master of a cat
Nor he of me but love and that is that
I want to walk but have to take the car
Or he will follow me into the clog
Of cars where each is bigger and faster
Than the one before and then there are more
When I return he is watching for me
Between the lace curtains or possibly
There under my mother's funeral tree
If someone let him out so he could wait
For me to see I escaped disaster
Such as I had warned him about before
He marks the time and marks the time as late
And I go back to my room alone
To die when I die nor force the spring
With the best friend I have ever known
In an attitude of infinitude
Feeling the meaning of everything
Another Loser of the Human Race
From anxiety down through depression
Was a digression from society
Life took me on between my then and now
If anxious and depressed at least to be
Who I am what I dream and dare and must
At least try with a question on my face
We speak in unknown tongues nor understand
What we say but smile and try to adjust
As we build our Babel of the unknown
And when chaos calls and the tower falls
Because it was built of but wind and sand
Again and more each time we are alone
I wish I had someone to hold my hand
The ones who did once died and in their place
Left me a stranger lost in their strange land
Picking up pennies of hope as somehow
Though orphaned with an unreturned embrace
Of nothing yet I struggle and I stand
A stubborn son of Babel grasping grace
Another loser of the human race
Night Ravens
When one awakens then the day begins
Today my day began along with night
I slept through afternoon and woke at five
It was already dark as the world spins
But in my case a day of night felt right
Though sick all day here I am still alive
I missed the worst an innocent asleep
No day but night no heaven but no hell
My day was dark and now my night is deep
Yet dark and deep describe my feelings well
Drinking strong tea while hoping for the best
Now I will see what can be done with it
Let others have the day we have the rest
To play and puzzle where our pieces fit
The moon the stars and other nightly things
Like the magic when the night raven sings
For me
And you
I see
We two
Agree
We couple of night ravens you and me
Defiance
against one who has wronged me: for all those who have not
Shallower people from sunnier climes
Dismiss my poems as "nursery rhymes"
But I construct these puzzles anyway
Word-games which all are invited to play
When I was shallower and sunnier
Mocking old poets seemed much funnier
And yet the joke is on you (if you do)
As it was once on me
Because I know how to do (but do you?)
A few things you might never understand
As some reading agree
I will be around if you need a hand
And I am not offended
(Anymore)
What you started I ended
(At your door)
Poetry is my neighborhood my town
You will never shut me up nor shut me down
Now just one more time
(Although you cannot appreciate it)
A nursery rhyme
(And oh how you know you love to hate it!):
Poetry is my neighborhood my town
You will never shut me up nor shut me down
Lonely Eyes
The cherries of their cigarettes flared
Through the dark simultaneously
Too much in a hurry to be scared
I felt lonely eyes questioning me
Good kids in a bad place cold and bored
I was not what they waited to see
So in a puff of smoke was ignored
In favor of what the night prepared
To cook up out of the day's debris
They smiled as I smiled and turned to go
But it felt good to be understood
Wandering with cold wind in my hair
In my face as theirs and everywhere
Looking for something no longer there
Something I lost a long time ago
Might have mislaid it might have turned wrong
All of us look but none of us know
Where it has gone except far away
Trying to sing a forgotten song
Eyes of the night remember the day
Lonely eyes questioning all night long
As If This Were It
I leave it to you to figure out how
But what I would advise you urgently
Is live all you can and do it right now
As if this were it with nothing to come
That you taste hear smell touch all you can see
As much as mortality will allow
All the potential you have and then some
Since it would appear that this might well be
Our singular chance our once-given turn
Our one moment out of eternity
Although we never know we always learn
My Last Refuge
sacred to the memory of Mildred Naomi Eckart Graham
A very warm blanket embraces me
Each stitch by hand with love each one by one
A souvenir of death and destiny
My Grandma crocheted until it was done
A deep design of love drawn patiently
And even though she is gone I have this
Living proof of her love a hug a kiss
If sadly in the lonely cold of night
Which though so dark still holds one point of light
The way this blanket embraces me now
I wanted to go with her but could not
Where saints in heaven no more sorrow see
But left behind to muddle through somehow
With no more to lose and cornered I fight
Take everything but this no matter what
Leave me with this one scrap of self-respect
Left here for me by one of the elect
To enshroud my broken remains and be
My last refuge in this bitter twilight
Of ruin and loss and indignity
As strangers disrespect the memory
Of someone who cared and still cares for me
The Diet of Worms
I used to sweep the floor at the barber shop
And then sell the hair to Mr. Atherton
Packed by the lug box for a quarter a pop
Who fed it to his worms until he was gone
I had not known worms ate human hair before
But Mr. Atherton assured me they did
And that they would go on to eat a lot more
It was a pretty good living for a kid
Although when I agreed to the position
I only thought of life with lots of money
Not of the riddle of decomposition
Yet in an ending both tragic and funny
And in any case awe-inspiringly weird
The worms I fed consumed Mr. Atherton
A very strange outcome not thought so not feared
Feeding him to his worms until he was gone
Just as he wished I became a magician
And I learned his secrets all at once one day
Mortality is only a worm away
Franziska and Me and World War III
Franziska at the fall of empire now
As chickens with their heads cut off run blind
Let us embrace while the fire will allow
Baby and maybe go out of our mind
It seems so much the thing to do these days
Flamed-out follies falling down to always
As they do make me wonder if we two
Should fall in and fall out to always too
But whatever whoever else we do
If this is our turn to go down the drain
Then I want to go down the drain with you
As the world shoots-up for world war again
We could snuggle in to give peace a chance
Smuggled in by Franziska and by Lance
Unwilling world-warriors not sitting still
To take it as we take over the place
Although apocalypses make some ill
We both have a certain redeeming grace
Which seems to manifest at times like these
Tinny tawdry total catastrophes
If this is the end of it all then I
Think we might better hurry up and be
Doing and being our best as we die
Rested and ready for the revelry
Of the world turning itself inside out
(And we can share my little stash of doubt)
Brazil Nuts Over the BBC
The BBC burbled Brazil nuts all night
Or at least bantered them at some length it seemed
And how for the EU they must be just right
"Four parts per billion of..." something... as I dreamed
And along with Brazil nuts I dreamed of you
Since Brazil nuts are something we might enjoy
I would like to share a Brazil nut or two
With you in the EU before they destroy
Those nuts not approved and sent back to Brazil
We might have to get them from Bolivia
Given what I learned tonight we might but still
Somehow I know more than I do through that voice
Of authority by BBC my choice
Which left unattended chirps on through the night
Like the busiest bird in Britannia
From across the sea while the nuts at the store
Are shut up tight with no Brazilians in sight
First thing in the morning I will go explore
Dreaming of you in the EU far away
If we find Brazil nuts eat some then some more
If they come from Bolivia that's OK
We dream of the jungle through the cold grey light
Of our northern dawning of our winter's day
Street Sonnet
Is that blood on the street? You bet it is
What did you think? Some Hollywood effect?
This is where someone determined that his
Money was worth less than his self-respect
The roughest of the rough trade is the truth
That people will die in gutters tonight
The beginning of the ending of youth
The dawning of the distance of the light
However far from home a candle here
Burns in my window until you return
I promise you no matter what you fear
The main thing we are here for is to learn
The beginning of the ending of youth
The roughest of the rough trade is the truth
Living the Good Life Badly
The only thing I can bring
To leave behind more or less
Is nothingness of something
Like something of nothingness
At last I find my question
Is not answered yet I guess
Commandment or suggestion
Of some faith I should confess
Is answer now no longer
But forgive me: I digress
The time wheel is turning on
To the flarings of the sun
With the ghostly moon and drawn
Automatic once begun
Living the good life badly
The wheel is turning madly
My Hiding Place
From the tumult and the trauma
The dysfunctionality
Of the daily psychodrama
In propinquity to me
On the other side of the wall
Round the corner down the hall
I escape into poetry
The only place where I can go
Where reason understands I know
How lonely it is to be me
To tame the chaos of the time
By counted syllable and rhyme
To seek a spark by which to see
And though it seems impossible I know
At least I have this one saving grace
As angry voices fall to rise again
Since all they have in common is their pain
Through chaos I see cosmos and I go
Through loneliness to weep away the stain
Into poetry: my hiding place
Sinus Sonnet: An Independent Nose
Deeply determined it has to be free
My nose confronts me with a loss of face
It misbehaves and embarrasses me
Sneezing then running all over the place
Making up its mind independently
Attached as we are I have to give chase
Persuade it to perch with the dignity
Of gentle hypo-allergenic grace
Pointing out the path of civility
But carrying a hanky just in case
Out where the starry-eyed winter wind blows
In where the kind furnace makes my cat purr
Some things stay as true as they always were
Some of us sport an independent nose
The Plaza in Orange California
the hub of my small universe
I sit beside where flocks of sheep once drank
Where ladies planted flowers long ago
And tended stubby palm trees now so tall
My mother pushed my pram here and I thank
The stubborn who had sense enough to know
Our Plaza really is the best of us
The homeless sleep here next to me and I
Can think of no splashier ending than
To dive into the fountain if I can
If it gets warm enough before I die
This is where we say goodbye to it all
This is the place for all the rest of us
I remember life and brush back a tear
Would it be better if I just forgot?
The Sterling Silver rose still blooms right here
Just as I wrote of it so long ago
I did not expect to be understood
Yet I was and it blooms inside of me
I lost it all then got it back again
Right here in this place through lines scratched in pain
Like cuts in the thickening hide of me
But if you read my books I think you could
Get some idea of who I am and why
I linger here these years no matter what
Would it be better if I just forgot?
+Steven Curtis Lance
Copyright MMVII
"You are right for you: I am right for me
One side for me and another for you
Therefore let us agree to disagree
And save ourselves the trouble to argue
I look back over life and I can see
It never seems to help when people do
If others must then let them fight and fuss
But all ideas are free to everyone"
I quote This Because It Is Imperative for all to know (Those Who Don't) it is perfect in a gift of poetry's Wisdom as you express very well these important factors-life is to short.
Embraced ~ Embrassé
Victoria L. McColley