Someone is tapping my empathy.
They reach out, not to pat my shoulder,
But to reach within to hug my heart, soul and mind.
Wanting to stimulate all three.
It is not a warning of danger, pain or hurt,
For I always note and take heed of such.
This is trying to massage away the stiffness of stretching time,
That isolates the feelings that are carried inside
As treasures of what once was.
What have I forgotten, misplaced from memory?
Is this one from this times past or another?
Odd things happen.
Music not heard in ages keeps popping up to my ears.
Feelings of walking someplace else sends shivers within.
Flashes of not clear images in the corner of my eyes,
All feed the feeling of something just beyond my reach.
Is someone worried they are being forgotten?
Not wanting to disappear into the nothing?
Or are they standing there with a great smile?
Knowing how they cause me to delve deeper within,
Working to answer feelings radiating to the surface.
As they once did while looking deep into my eyes.
I have ideas of who may be the cause.
My frustration is; I know that all of it is just
Out past the fringes of my mind.
The answer will come,
That spirit placated and made peaceful again.
Inner calm will return.
The need to once again express the feelings brought out,
As words selected and placed upon paper,
Settle my heart, soul and mind.
I will once again be able,
To be enveloped into a quieter space and time.

July 4, 2021

Walk your life’s path, softly.
Always notice the minute beauty,
Those small things that so many miss.
When a youngster, you were close to the path,
Spotting everything along it.
As you grew older your outlook began to stretch
Farther and farther up the path yet to travel.
With your gaze being so distant,
Who and what was beside you went unseen.
You tread the path so hard as to make it everything.
Always expecting the better that is yet to come,
Sounds and tastes of life are not noticed.
Thereby missing the flavour of what is being lived.
As you beat down the path so hard, it became a road.
Walk the path softly yet again.
Soon the road will once more be as it was.
Becoming the welcoming path that you seek.
Its way will soften back to what you once knew.
Transforming to a journey that leaves
No notice of your travel except to those who care.
So step ever so lightly that those who follow
Will be able to find what you have discovered
About yourself and the joy you have found
While taking your journey along the path.

When one travels through out time
Whether in reading or research
You are learning from peoples past actions
Adding it to our present knowledge
While forming it for others future reaction.
The past is not dead;
It is the seed to what comes next

                                               Dan Gray
                                                January 4, 2021

When at that point in my life
I came disconnected to the dream of it, my life
It feels as if I became a leaf falling off of a tree
Picked up by the wind before being grounded
Carried to a myriad of places with no control
Stopping but briefly
When in contact with a point to cling to
I know not where I go next
Never seemingly with who it will be
As time makes it seem that it will last
The fates blow hard
I am loosed
To drift alone until I am next caught.

Dan Gray  
December 23, 2020  11:30 PM

How many words are there for love?
How many languages are there in this world?
Each language has how many subtle dialects?
We have words we find in our heart
Our feelings try to incorporate all our passion into one word
The way a person breathes when we are with that “one”
The hyper sensitivity when we are with the one we love
We take much thought and analysis to encapture the word
How our gaze is locked onto nowhere thinking of that one
The taste on ones tongue when we are with them
A word a playwright uses to emphasize the longing
I have traveled to a few places on this globe
Listened to their music of love
Seen the art that they use as a description of love
Studied the look on the faces of those in love.
So every word for love is multiplied how many times?
For me, I have found the word.
The name of who I cannot be without to survive,
This is my word for love.

Feeling empty and lost
Adrift in the void
The not knowing
The not caring
Lack of feeling
Lack of everything
It is truly amazing
How heavy nothing is
Only the strong strings
Of good friends
Keeps me in place.