Soft focus is not hocus pocus
It is relaxing the locus of concentration
But staying aware of the state of mentation

It is breathing free
With perfect clarity

It is falling asleep
But waking up to dream

It is forsaking worry
For a flurry of focal points
Getting blurry between the joints

So sink into the fabric of space
Erase the stitches of time
Wrap up in this infinite quilt
Guilt-free equanimity
Silt free liquid purity
Rest in perfect surety
Divest your uncertainty
There is no space ‘twixt you and me
Only particles we cannot see

Roll up to the gym
I’m not here to swim
Pre-workout courses through my veins
I shout through forces and strain
I know pain equals gains
And I came to hurt
Give my muscles a good growth spurt
All the ladies are trying to flirt
But my answers remain curt
I am here to put in work

Headphones on and my focus is scary
I sift through my music library
So that I can lift legendary
I need the right kind of song
To make me feel kind of strong
To push me right along, never lead me wrong
It needs the right beats per minute
So I can fight and beat my limits
Go to greater lengths
Accomplish new feats of strength
Demolish two fleets of tanks
Rip my tank top in two
To work out harder than you

When I bench the earth starts quaking
Every muscle in my body shaking
And tomorrow there will be aching
But right now it’s exhilarating

I am manic and mindful
I am so focused it’s frightful
My methods are not intuitive
But they are ingenuitive
I gain weight
To become enlightened
I sit up just to lay back down
I slam a ball into the ground
It’s not insanity
Or disdainful vanity
It’s religiosity
It is reciprocity
I get out what I give in
This is the body I was given
The body that I must live in
That’s why I am fully driven
To maximize this perfect prison

To medicate or meditate
Perhaps both would be nice
But if only one path I may take
I think meditation will suffice

The tragic beauty of being alive
My thoughts of smallness, insignificance
Loom so large that they blot out
The infinite universe that makes me feel small

Oh what a tragedy
to be able to contemplate
your place in an infinite cosmos

Oh what a great gift
to be able to comprehend a small sliver
of the unimaginable expanses of existence

A beautiful tragedy
this cursed gift of consciousness
to be awake is
to fear eternal slumber
while only finding relief
in a dreamless sleep

I should feel blessed
nothing taken for granted
but I find myself trapped
in the thoughts in my head
Unable to see
the beauty in front
and inside of me

Jesus didn’t have no acid
But someone must have been tripping
When they talked about his walk across lake placid
I may not be able to rise from the dead
But I will use my head
And every type of fungus I am fed
To be a warrior for peace
Powered by the energy of psychedelic release
To fight violence with loving silence
To end hate by helping people meditate
To spread rationality, a logical morality
To people of every nationality
So we can peacefully share the same piece of reality

This will be the winter of my contentment
I will shed regret and resentment
I will finally get it
I will not forget it
I will shred this narrow point of view
This prism of individuality
It’s a prison in reality
The world is a superorganism in totality
I see intersectionality and finally find sanity
My mind is now a GoPro
I can view my life in slow-mo
This is not the Truman Show
This is real, I can feel it
As this film reel flies by
I steal a glimpse with these two eyes
Before I meet my demise I will run with these two thighs
I will squat 5 plate, I will lose some weight
I will choose my fate
Lighter than a feather because I have come untethered
I float high among the weather, never weathered
Renewed by cleansing rains
You may call them hurricanes
But that is a matter of perspective
Positivity is infective
So I will spread a vibrant virus
From the Pope to Miley Cyrus
I say nope to the winter blues
This is the winter that I choose
To sway to and fro with the flow
To gratefully frolic in the snow

The way I conceive of enlightenment in my mind is as follows:

Picture a landscape with many people staring into the sky. The sky is filled with light. Each person looks up at this sky of light. You see a light swirling in each person's head. The light beams up toward the sky. Some beacons of light go higher than others. The very highest merge seamlessly into the infinite sky, an ocean of light.

Whether that infinite light represents everything or nothing is a matter of perspective.

Does merging with that infinite light symbolize enlightenment or death? Fullness or emptiness?

What is the directionality of the light? Is the light shooting toward heaven, or is the light actually shining down from above into the minds of humans?

Or perhaps even this image is suffering from a false contrast. Perhaps everything is light. Or everything is darkness.

Poetry, art, and love are when you are soaring up into the light and trying to communicate your experience back to earth in a way that makes sense, but will always pale in comparison to the blinding barrage.

Enlightenment is climbing steadily higher up your beam of light until finally merging with the infinite light of heaven eternally.