As if you didn't know
I found this poem
Begging outright
On the side of the road

With a sign of the times
Will work for the food of a rhyme
So I picked it up
And took it to lunch

Where over alphabet soup
We decided what we could do
And how we could help
Each other out

As I had the rhyme
In need of a line
And this poem had the place
In which it could lay

So our soups we slurped
In the mixing of words
Rhyme after rhyme
One spoon at a time

When the poem had its fill
I paid the bill
Both happy we helped
Each other out

As we stood outside
Hugged each other goodbye
That's the last that I saw
Of the poem and its sign

It comes in colored leaves
temperatures
frosty winter's snowflakes
and spring blossom wakes
summer's bounty
fall festivals
and an old man's testimonial;
I was once a dumb bud
tempestuous
flighty sinner *******
and grew to know fakes
of my own bounty
half hearted
efforts thinking I knew
it all best;
now I have grown to
only see myself as
the fault
and the fix
and the season's
nor temperatures
nor outsides influence me.
I see it as change
for the better
and am the same, now,
with this religion,
no matter
the seasons.

Roses are red,
But also different colors,
One isn't even like any other.
Violets aren't blue,
Violets are violet,
Is that so hard to do?
I guess they chose blue just for a rhyme,
Not lilies or lilac or the spice thyme,
But "Violets are blue", is that such a crime?
Whoever said it didn't have to use blue.
There are other colors that rhyme, like green,
But "Violets are blue"? that's just obscene.

Sewn-up into not caring
Modelled dispassionate
Roused into fantasy;
This one time would be
different
Oh naive optimism

His sight grows absent from reality when
he sees her
Leaving me unconsidered
he trades grins with her
With no forewarning
he trails off to her
Consinging to oblivon my presence when
he's with her
Nothing assuredly matters when
he's conversing with her

I'll bid farewell
to those so called feelings
Friends can fracture your
Sole heart
If you keep confiding
You will bruise nonstop
So let me advice you this one time
Become cold as ice

A flight of three crows
added to
a dense grey day

Next add four
iconic conifers
as high as the sky
eternally ******* down

These things are
always in my sight
through my window
on this wet world

Multiply all of this
by a sweet daughter
who makes me proud
and raise the whole
to the power of a strong woman
who carries us all
on her back

The equation produces
a result that I am 95 percent certain
equals happiness
though the confidence interval
is wide

And this result
sweet as it is
and as uncertain as it is
will outlive me
leave a faint echo in time
an echo that will bounce off a star
and finally be found
gripped in my shriveled paw
long after the epiphany
nowhere near paradise
somewhere short of
the end of the line

This is a moment of happiness
stolen from time
hijacked by a fugitive
from civil society

I'll hold it close
until death pries it
without mercy
from my hand

Leaves it as a blessing
and a curse
for all who come after

Take the blessing.
Leave the curse.
That's the advice I give
with my dying breath.
And I leave this to you
from the generosity
of my heart.
With a nod to
the scant traces
of God's grace
that I find on these pathways
of travail.

Never lost.
Never found.
Always present
and generous
to all.

Be that.

we are clumsy birds
and clumsy birds have to start flying early
as the Chinese saying says

we are on the ground
surrounded by leaves and predators
we went overturned out of the nest
nobody cares
but we will not stay here
we will fly higher and higher
and far, far away

we are clumsy birds
and we always fly at dawn
so that no one can see us falling
and if that happens
that they see we are giving our best

and the ground is getting farther
and the sky closer
and we can touch the clouds
and we will not return
because we are clumsy birds
and clumsy birds have to start flying early
as the Chinese saying says

you saw, brothers and sisters?
we are clumsy birds
and we are flying