I am terribly near sighted
Consciously and subconsciously
I see not what I have saw
And
I hear not what I have heard
Sometimes,
In fact most of the time,
I don’t even feel
What I should have felt

But the mirror of life
It keeps a record of every little thing
And I relive in my dreams
All that I have missed

And much much more:

All I ever need
Is just a little hint of life:

Your lovely little smile
I failed to respond to during the day
Would haunt me
With what would seem like
A whole lifetime of sweet champagne
And
Kisses of cherries and grapes
With a scent of longing that
Fills me to the core with
Twinges that burst throughout
My entire being
Shining brightly from
Every single particle of my
Soul

The little chirps and calls of crickets
That alternate between the oblivious
Moon upon a bed of restless stars
And the wizened sun
Would always take me to a land
Unlived, untouched, unruined
A vast nonexistence
A vast ruin full of life
Where I have never been so alone
Yet so fulfilled, so joyful, and so
Free

And

The dreamless gale that
Would raise me up to mountains
From which I can finally gaze down
With sure and confident eyes
Upon the whole of life
And
See, sense, and feel
Every scenery and every being
With the purest of colours
Rowing down the crimson rivers
In a canary boat caressed by
A forest of ocean blue sequoias
Blanketed with a soup of
Violet stars
Into the heart of the universe

Where everything that have lived
Or could have lived
Never went away

Where nothing is ever gone
But just lost
So momentarily
Like a wandering child
Let out into the world
Seemingly defenselessly
Yet, perfectly safe
Under the hidden watch of
The mother

Where everything I love
Love me just as much
And so much more

Where I am never just me
But a child
A poet
A painter
A musician
An ancient pilgrim

Where I can fall into stars
And float up to the edge
Of the sky
Swim in the air without my feet
Ever touching the ground

Where I am finally
Held by you
The one person
I love most unyieldingly
In a death grip of never letting go.

that yellow and black butterfly
I would most assuredly
not flutter around awaiting my return
to pound my wings dance in circles
around my mere countenance

I'd more rather follow the violet
girl into the hills
and encircle her head stutter and prance
wildly aloft on the winds gentle
blow

or set sights on the red rose's open
caress in the glow of the morn'
on some meadow's green
and take chances
on wing

through a sunlit tree
touching each
limb and leaf to
gather more friends
in my brief
visiting.

One day bleeds
into the next

Leaves wounds
that won’t heal
measures our moments
into finite statements
that knit the hours
into a tapestry of tedium

Where is the joy
I was promised?
Where
the lively waltz?

I grieve before every hour
and bend before fate’s great weight
tremble incessantly
and starve in the midst of plenty

Yet I hold my head up
march on
determined to reach that far shore
where fate will take us
and luck will leave us.

The Lehigh is chaffing
at the shoulders of her banks
Swollen
with mood of mud
brown and flat and far too fast

She tore those young girls
from their rafts
Decorated the trees
of a midstream island with them
hanging on like the leaves and silt
once did

Their cries swallowed
as she roared past
harvesting souls with clinging hands

Chosen
to be victim
Chosen
for a reason
to be spared

a yellow rose winds to the skies,
blossoming, letting soft petals fall to
the cidery earth, blushing in
the caverns of the sweet-flowering day,

inspired like the greek
sun-god helios but
drawn out of rhododendron
and apple, drawn out of love.

a thousand years of summer,
the wolf, the thin mouth of sky,
a diamond bumble bee, the
gifts of a stolen sun,

shaken out like a rattle snake,
the broken angles of death,
the lost side of each word,
with all its intentions and promises -

fallen to the floor, like an apple,
or a blind mole loving
the soil, the dry earth,
the faded parchment sun,

or a rock of ice, in a tangy glass,
where the summer sun
grows roots and shoots,
shadow domes and leafy golden skies.

The right eye
is the window of hope
the left eye
the window of despair

And this proposition
is proven in my photograph
a portrait of a grizzled guy
taken just before
he stepped in front of a speeding car
while gesticulating wildly

Who knows what happened there?

Yet I will live!
gather fallen timbers
to form a stockade
against time

Because finally
I have discovered
that time is not my friend

It's a simple game she plays
time girl
trickster girl
but my ancient beams
will prevail

I swear it
by a handful of ash
and mark the moment
with a rune that exists
outside of time
and says simply

Be this.
You were forever thus.

It's a difficult rune to read
and a harder path
to follow.

The birds no longer give their song
They have given up the forest
To my sorrow
It is silent
Love is gone
There's nothing left of hope
The seasons change
Love is gone