I will disappear in fog and night
Subdued in sleep and surprise
Blinding lights
Overwhelming might
They will spirit me away
And charge me with my crimes
They will call me many names
And some I might be
But none will be  my own
I will be a traitor or subversive
Or worse
Because I refuse to swear allegiance
To the police state
And fealty to the men
Clad in black
I will not submit
But they don't know
That I stole into the great hall of Valhalla
And took with me
One of their mighty spears
Usurped their valor
And took it back with me
Now they will carry me on my shield
Though my burning bier
Be but a lonely cell
And tonight I will dine
In the great hall of Valhalla
That place that still lives on
In the mind of men

Beyond the chipped paint and tarnished handle
of this old screen door once waited a garden,
a winding path of stone and dirt
I had walked many times in my life,
led to a place of wondrous beauty,
poetic blooms and intoxicating fragrances

Merely stepping beneath the Jasmine covered arbor
lifted spirits and illumined hope that all was right,
and the butterflies, oh the butterflies, winged effervescence in
sapphire, indigo, tangerine and lemon butter yellows
floated from flower to flower creating
the most wonderful dancing rainbow for the eye

I still smile when I hear those old rusted hinges squeak
and I feel that fresh air meet my face
For those memories linger in my mind,
as now I find the path overgrown, the arbor splintered and fallen
the vibrant garden a mass of **** and vine
strangling the beauty that once flourished

And I understand, life changes…slowly,
each of us deteriorate within time’s grasp,  returning
to where we began, covered in lawn and dew
beginning anew or to be forgotten…
an occasional thought that passes
down another path of another life

Now as I stand gazing at what once was,
a tear finds my cheek, meandering over these wrinkles
gathering in the corner of my mouth…salty
yet it is not the garden nor the whimsical path
that collects in my mind…it is the butterflies,
oh how I miss the butterflies…

All those times when you drank the wines
The beauties
The charms
The temptations
As cures
All those times when you went rushing to
What you thought was the end of your quest
Was but a mirage
All those times when you gave all you had
And got but the illusions
All those times when you
Lost a piece of your heart
Come to me and let me make up of for all those times
Let me be your wine
The beauty, the charm, the temptation
I shall be the cure
The magnet to pull all the pieces together
And make you a whole again…
Will I be enough???

Have you ever listened to a song
And in those few minutes
Known your true idenity
You feel the presence of yourself
And the lack of yourself
And everything that is you, inbetween
You are sewn to the earth
You are the moss
You are the trees
But you also dont belong here
You belong everywhere

Please find that song
And never replace it with anything less

I drank way too much last night,
now I feel like I'm paying my dues.

I woke up real early this morning,
my head was dry and  pounding,
I've had me a case of those Hangover blues.

What it was that I had to eat, I really
don't care to remember 'cause my breath
knocked everyone over and my wallet is bare.

And it's now I feel like I have nothing left to lose,
I had one hell of a case of them Hangover blues.

My wife tells me, it wasn't any fun,
I had one big case of Whisky ****,
and couldn't get it on.

Yet I still acted like a ***** and
after an Epic failure, I rolled over
to one side and tossed my cookies,
yes me, a real gentleman, right as rain.
so buckle up because here's the refrain..

Sometimes life is about winning  
just as well as you lose
I woke up this morning
with a case of the Hangover Blues.

It occurred to me today that it take a lot of courage to be hopeful. One has to walk into hope with the knowledge that hope is just a dream, yet, with hope that dreams can come true. What a dichotomy!
Often we have no hope at all that a certain desire may be fulfilled. So much so that we discard the desire as a dream that is dead and buried, and turn to a journey where we actively work for someone else’s desires to be fulfilled. As we travel the road of fulfilling the hopes of another, our own hope peeks out from around the corner then darts back out of sight as soon as we turn to look at it…taking its essence with it. (Wait a second! I saw that hope die and I buried it a long time ago.) Then, it begins to get bolder, and stays just long enough for us to begin to recognize its face. Its essence invades you, almost against your own will, to make a real change in your life.

You begin to question…Do I dare to hope? Do I dare to take the chance? Do I have “reasonable confidence” that this can morph from being dead and in hell into livable reality? I cannot go through much more pain, unless the pain actually produces some positive results. Is this a real hope, or only real because I secretly long for it to be so?

Hope is just a…thing. But what courage it takes to dare to accept it.

I guess I have begun a new journey. A journey of hope…this time for myself and not for another. So for today, I choose to be brave. For today, I choose to hope. Today, I choose to rescue hope from the hell to which I personally banished it…come what may.