I stand alone
When the gloom of dilemma suffocates me

I'm not heading in the wrong direction
As it has been my passion
And I'm going to my cherished destination

But I stand alone
When I need a hand to cover the distance

What tomorrow unfolds will be in my palms
Still I stand alone
Still I stand alone

Today, I am reticent;
But when the inevitable call comes,
What will I say?
Will I profess my pent feelings;
Say what needs saying?
Will you embrace without pity?
The call will surely come,
So why hold back, waiting?
Why so taciturn now?
Now hesitating.

We're old swords, my
lovely— dogged, not
learning from the two
hundred years that our
city's been burning; we're
just ashes to ashes and
in between, yearning.

I looked up “demagogue” in my Websters
And there a previous President was
In a smiling photo with fists in the air
Worried the wind would mess up his hair.
I didn’t bother to study the words -
The picture was worth several thousand.
ljm

We've been... a... part... so long;
We've not been... to...gether, a... lone.
Together alone.

I hear the lonely house sounds
Of dripping, creaking, and window wind whoshes;
The semi-muted fiber optic sounds;
The various vehicles dopplering past.
These I hear in my fractured second,
Before asking, "How ye doin?"
Which shatters into glass the silence
Held too long between us.
But now we are alone, together, alone.
A silent alone, together.

A once dear friend
And I met up;
Twenty years since we spoke,
And neither one could talk.
We left each other's company
On terms of disagreement.

The ice was thick;
The air was clouded;
We stood beneath the shade.

The mountain didn't fall;
The earth didn't swallow;
The roof stayed on.
Nothing cracked our uncertainty.

Then we misquoted some old
Misunderstood memories
Of why we went our ways.
And felt the same.

A good liar
Is a bad liar,
And I was the worst.
I lost your trust;
Gave rise to sorrow
And a life of regrets.
I don't ask you forget,
But forgive, with peace,
Lay it to rest.

You could change the world.
You should.
Repeat this inauspicious comment to someone;
Age isn't part of the equation.
Even the youth may listen, may remember,
I should change the world.
You did. Some place, at a time unknown.
It's not so obvious as the Butterfly Effect;
Appearing subtly, less noticeable than
Pedaling into a velvet N-E Huron breeze
A walker feels on her wet lips
During a burnt Autumn stroll.
I changed,
And rocked the world
Of  my loved ones.

Who would call them losers
Because they couldn't stand;
We lifted when they moved about
On worn out knees and hands.

We didn't call them fools
Because they didn't talk;
We oohed and ahhed with all their sounds
When they stood free and walked.

We heard a blend of letters spew
Like spilled out alphaghetti;
Raving with their oral prowess,
Like roars on the Serengeti.

As years passed by, and they were graded
(And most certainly not by us);
They might return with D's and E's,
But we never judged or fussed.

This is how we treated them,
Our children that we raised;
I pray that our changing world
Will forgive, forget and praise.

How will we progress today?

Will we risk life attending Mosque,
Or have an affair with our spouse's boss?

Will we take the dog out for a walk,
Step on a landmine, use plastic straws?

Perhaps we'll play with our kids today,
Or call Amber Alert, wait scared, and pray?

Will we defy with a righteous tone,
Or leave, tails tucked, like a dog with his bone?

Will we gauge goods for our Vegan menu,
Or show distentions as millions do?

Will we drive around town for cheaper gas,
Or choose pickings from picked-over trash?

Do you sling eggs and sausage for sub-minimum wages,
Or attend visitations in a MADD rage?

Will you tee off at eight, or do a spin class,
Or sit solitary watching a sandless hourglass?

Did we place our script with the shiny drugstore,
Or wade across to Jordan's fair shore?

Will we question the teacher at our kid's school,
Or play Avatar falling off bar stools?

Did you set a reminder on your AI phone
For chicken delivery to your suburban home?

Will you lift copper tubing from construction sites,
Proclaiming your station gives you right?

Do I recline in my La-Z-Boy for a nap with a book,
Or teach someone to live with a line and a hook?

Will you take out your family,
Are you last on your list,

Will you reciprocate a handshake
Or raise a gloved fist?
Our words can't bind all our wounds;
Few are born with silver spoons.
We're not wrapped in silk cocoons.
A metamorphosis is coming
To this world of gloom,
A rousing street flight,
That can't come too soon.

Built on land stolen from the natives
On the back of blacks who were
stolen from their own land.

Indigenous slaughtered like the buffalo they herded
Rounded up and marched into unwanted corners
There to starve until oil was discovered
And it became time to march them again.

Blacks who were declared to be less than human
Denied the right to do anything but work.
Families that were like grapes in a cluster
Ripe for the picking off of the best ones
And no thought given to those left behind.
Premiums paid for those enceinte,
Harbingers of the two-for-one sale.

Righteous blindness is a national disease
That overlooks the broken teacups
In the mad pursuit of tea.
That cannot see the trampled flowers
In the race to make perfume
That reeks self satisfaction
At the carnage left behind
And waves the flag of liberty
At those the cause enslaved.
                              ljm