I'm walking alone,down the long
street, midnight the moon shines
high, a pale moon, and wan with
the sickly light of the thousand
thousand city lights jewling the
streets and lanes and alleys of the
great city so prettily, seen far off,
a conflagration of multicolored
stars brought to earth, shining amidst
the vast lonley dark of the plains in
the night under the stars and the
pulsing moon, like a great halved radish,
red around the edges, from drink,
from laughter, from the lack of sleep
and the joy of the knowledge that
everything exists and that we are alive
right now and roaring, yelling up under the
madly glittering lights, circling circling,
all around us over our heads, and now the
most awful roaring of sound and of
smell and of sheer surging drunken glory
and then black, and the sleep of the abandoned,
of the holy ones who live raw and free
and mad and idioticly, wild in our sheer
shining distinct lack of soberity, and of the
great rationizer, common sense be ******
and sleep until the shine of morning comes
dawning over the horizon, and shines in our
eyes and makes us cry out, and up to the
business of the day, to the long mad glorious
trek onwards, ever onwards, and all a great mad
comedy of life rovolving around and around,
and on we go, on, on till death do us part,
sweet love affair, the road and I and us and everyone
apart from the masses, crazily determined,
singly in our passion, to walk and love and
sing and yell and drink under the moon,
not a care in the world, and on and on and
on and on, till death do us part, my dear
projected love.

I will not nurture hate
Like a rotten seed in a lush forest
Tainting hallowed ground
Poisoning fruit, instead
I will taste forgiveness
Sweet and rich and I will let it
Consume me, knowing that
Nature herself does not know anger
Or anguish, and though I may hurt
The green of the woodland soul
Is the healing salve for all ailments
And after being ravaged by fire
I, too, can grow back whole.

a tribute

~

memories...
in fading sepia we find,
the romance of
another time;
albums filled
with black and white,
of glossy faces
burnt in fading light;
boxes of our ko-dak-chro-ments,
gone-by treasures,
once-upon-a-moments;
wistful years once crystal clear,
mem’ries drowned in haze,
resurface now,
renewed in tears,
...as we remember well.

memories...
the yellow ribbons tied,
’round an ol’ oak tree;
anxious waiting to make an “us”,
the anticipation of a “he and me”;
until the news from distant shore,
yet another casualty of war,
and now remains but this,
a marble slab inscribed,
in accolades of former glory,
merely remnants ’midst the pines;
on forest lawn where promises,
tween two for’er became untwined,
...as she remembers well.

memories...
so many are the ways
the mem’ry onward lives
even this, a,
“do this in...” request
restores a covenant anew
a "remembrance of..."
the “we” here left behind,
be it in the bread we break,
this forever to remind,
a sacrosanct entreaty made,
promise sealed as blood in wine,
reserving not for deities alone,
but given us immortal souls,
to us a gift at birth,
of staggering import,
responsibility of heavy worth;
of after-ashes keeping still,
an ever-after captured with
the shutter, brush and quill,
...so we remember well.

memories...
its keeping cherished lovingly
though its loss,
its diminishment bereaved;
as lovers silent grieve,
those lost to us yet breathe,
in memories ’midst the breeze.
forgetful of the slightest
until one day in finality
their mortal soul is set free
into immortality.
...to for’er remember.

memories...
to us, a call, a charge,
a “ne’er forget”
a duty large
a “do this in
remembrance of”
this our promise
to e’er remember,
always keep;
forgetting never,
to carry the flame,
while we yet live
in sunshine’s grip;
an oath is sworn,
that forever we,
shall always ready be,
for in remembering best,
the tears flow easily,
and so it isn't pity,
of a loss i seek,
no,
for ’tis in finding memory
that i shall always weep,
...as i remember well.

~

post script.

of love lost in the haze of war; of lives changing motion, a baby is born, as a grandmother moves into memory care... a cycle of life, brought full circle best in remembrance.  and this makes remembering perhaps the most important facet that defines, sets us apart as humans, best captured in this thought, "in forgetting the past we cease to be and bring hope forward for the future. and so we remember... for we must never forget!” and so we line our shelves, our walls with them, visiting inscribed stones behind fences.  

dedicated today to our memories each of loved ones, lovers lost; but on this dark eve, especially those who lost those souls, three thousand strong, a darkest day of remembrance, this September the eleventh, who never got to say goodbye... so we remember well!