all the minutes in each day
ticked by with waking, working,
saying hello, tick, tick, tick,
according to plan.

until the explosion.

Rest, breath, let everything go,
hold on to the stable,
keep your job,
don't spend money,
take your time,
let the fire die.
Let the air blow by,
no need to move,
or build,
or go forward.
Stay quiet, stay still
sleep for a few days,
let the world walk by.

today hasn't been special,
crescendo stilled or spent
in a farther landscape.

today I teetered on heavy sighs,
convinced myself to become more
dignified.

today I wished to wash away
the thoughts of a man in a distant land
laughing freely.

today I think I'll buckle up,
tighten my pack, walk a thousand miles
through thick jungle.

today I'll strip down naked,
wear gypsy spangled slippers,
dance wildly amongst a million strangers.

today I'll wonder If I can alter my life,
add a pound of flesh, and find
what I've been looking for all these years.

To be satisfied, comfortable,
nay, even confident avec mon visage,
ma chemise, la couleur de ma texture,
the comforting weather forty years,
silvering chestnut, softened denim,
******* relaxing, cradled lower,
crows feet etched,
sun worn skin leathered well.

To be comfortable with my tone of beauty,
a select vintage for specific taste.

I'll not suite most passers by,
subtle, almost undetectable,
but for the one who cannot
     shake me from his memory,
the one who will turn to follow
     to witness my slow aging,
the one who's weather I recognize as home.

If you
look at me
as though
you
have something
to say,
Tell me,
Say it.
The pause,
with an expression,
gives me
little
to understand
only much
to fill in
with my
own story
of
what
you
want
to
say.

There is no easy route to Liberty and Love
while we wind ourselves up to our shoulders in damages
by stepping on, shrugging off, exploding onto, withholding from,
taking advantage of, not respecting much, demanding everything,
really, just being young, or old, or in the wrong place
with the wrong people.

It's simple and honest when we peek at ourselves
through naked spectacles.

It's resisting the tearing apart that shreds,
like newish Velcro that is so determined to stay together,
despite what forces are pulling it open and away.
Velcro won't be able to resist the ripping,
and eventually, it relaxes back, each side free from the other.

A wind comes in between two halves when they separate.
Grace, fear, danger, sadness, potential, anger, alone time.

I have no rhythm for how one becomes two again.
It can occur with the next rising sun,
or the next passing of Haley's Comet,
or never ever to occur again,
each half to it's own life beat.

I think though,  
if there is an easy street to Liberty and Love,
It probably isn't easy.

It must have a speed limit of eroding stone,
with words like understand, listen, consider, wait, and loyalty
mortared in mosaic all along her way.

In order for our voice
to work properly,
our heart
must be spinning
while simultaneously
our mind
has clear vision.

All the while,
our will must possess
enough force to push truth
through so as to connect
the song of our life.
Then, God too might even listen.

Amen.

Not tonight, I think to myself,
although today was soothing
in it's pace.

Spending time tinkering with oven grease,
domestic moments on my knees.

Still, not tonight.  I care none for
the ache of human neediness.
I wish not to concern my feelings
with another person's wants.
I want us all to be satisfied with what we have tonight.
We can't have all our cravings.
Only the bits that fall in our lap.