In the moments and in the flashes
It is swept over
A feeling to remember

it burdens the soul
like a distant memory
the ground becomes raw
to be part of earth is destiny of all

But to see the beloved depart
The last few moments of agony
Etched into the corner of the mind
Always there, like a company

There was no notice but many signs
If one cares to notice
Never at the time, but in retrospect
Every strand has no result of success
Even if we didn't leave an attempt less

Its just how the control leaves us
and we feel the sinking helplessness

A photograph, a frozen stare
Reveals a world forever changed there.

My wife agreed to marriage counseling before the great divorce,
and of course, she picked the counselor.  This is it; one session, one shot at redemption.  I waited with bated breath for the day to arrive.
It did.  We met at his office, where hope was dashed to shreds like a ship
on a coral reef, like dreams of domestic bliss made of glass and shattered on the kitchen floor with no broom to sweep them up.
We shouldn't get lawyers and go to court.  We should have a funeral and sing, Rock of Ages, because divorce is the death of a family.

The room is nice and cold as ice, and he's friendly, boisterous, and bold, but here's the clincher, he wore an eye patch.  Maybe he had surgery or some type of injury, but everything he said was drowned out by the voice in my head that screamed, "He looks like a pirate, and no ******* pirate is going to tell me how I should have been a better husband."  I quickly scanned the room for a cage where he kept his parrot, which usually sat on his shoulder and sang old songs of the sea.  I glanced at his right hand, but conveniently it was hidden by the desk.  Now I was sure.  It wasn't a hand at all, but a hook, that he used to scratch his ***, or to spear the shreds of broken lives left over from a long day's work.  His hand was probably a casualty, lost on a voyage to a shark he tried to advise.

I leaned over and whispered in my wife's ear, "Where did you find this ******* nut. Long John Silvers?"  The humor eluded her like the sunken treasure did the old sea dog that sat across from me.  I swore if he said, "Aye aye matey."  I would smack him, and jack his ship, and maybe my wife and I would sail south to the Caribbean, not to the ride at Disneyland, Pirates of the Caribbean, but to the islands, where we would lie **** on the sandy beaches and drink Pina Coladas, or some other fruit-filled umbrella drink, until we were so drunk we couldn't see straight, and all our problems would sink like the setting sun into a brand new horizon.  But the old scalawag had no pirate lingo, so the hour came and went, our money was poorly spent, and it was lunchtime, and I was bent on seafood.

There is a gravity to
sadness; it pulls me
downward into a
deep dark well.
I can't climb out.
It's my own private hell.
I pray for levitation.
I jump, only to fall.
I feel forgotten.

I put one foot in
front of the other,
and I will rise.
I move on.
Hope returns like
a long-lost friend,
and I find my sanctuary.

If I could move heaven and earth, I would find you again.
I've asked and asked, looked to the skies, said my Amens.
For you were just a girl, in the arms of a boy, foolish and naive.
Hopeful in the world, the empty promises, all that you believed.
Your heart broken, a yearn to mend, a need unspoken, a will to bend
But they robbed you of joy, lead you down a dark path
Instead of springs of water, taken to a bloodbath

If I could move the mountains, I would've never let you wander
I look back, the times I should've, all that I squandered
I missed the signs, disguised in anger and opposition
The cries for help, as you struggled with addiction
Like a demon inside, your beauty was a curse
Poison nectar whispered daily, to death it coerced

If I could turn back time, I would go back when you were mine
A little ball of energy, a daughter who's light just shined
Now all that I can wish is to hear your voice once more
Holding your cold hand, I beg and kneel to the floor
I pray again as I sit alone, you solemnly laying in bed
If I could move heaven and earth, I ask God to take me instead

The bird sat still
For years.
One wing was free.
First moving wildly,
while the other was tied down.
The bird learned through watching.
Fed by the wind.
To survive this flightless life,
still full of light.
Never reaching potential heights.
Now set free he didn’t even know how to fly anymore.
There sits a still bird still.
Watching.
Wondering what it’s like
up there .


Shell ✨🐚

He left at 67.

No one knew
he caught the first light
through the window glass

smelled dew when autumn came
was joyous at the trills of birds
caught all the blue in his eyes
and smiled the sky was his.

No one knows
if it was too early to go.

He knew
he was briefly happy.

I close my lonely eyes
And listen to the wind
Sometimes, like that, I’ll find
You floating through my mind
Sometimes, like that, I
Dissolve myself in time
Sometimes, like that, silent tears
Blur the passing years
And those lonely eyes
Glisten in the wind.

SE

Yes, here I am
In my 1955 model body
Sipping hot toddy
But on the inside nothing has changed
It’s all on the outside.

And there I go
Like the old man in a song
Shuffling along
Inside, nothing has changed
But, oh, the outside.

The years have passed
One on one
69 have gone
In the blink of an eye
But the changes you see, tell a lie.

SE      May 24