Clearing out boxes holding once
Cherished things, there was your photo, smiling
When once upon a time
Was still ahead of us
And our minds were full
Of excited emotions I no longer recall

We burned then like a fresh struck match
That flares for an instant, then
Settles into a fire that dies
Before the stem’s consumed.

I shake my head to think of
How I burned for you
And then the hopeless depths where
I sank when the fire died first for you.

Your picture is like a grade school drawing now;
An amusing curiosity I barely recognize
As having once been mine.

For I now know the slow burning fire
Which lasts a lifetime
And maybe more because the fuel is
In the soul and not the *****.

I burned your picture today and didn’t feel a thing.

The good things vary depending on
Who you are, where you live, how you think
And what you want.

But somewhere underneath the value given variations
Is the invariable truth that life is a tragedy
In which we play a role defining what we believe it to mean.

Played for the moment or the geld, life bores.
Motivated by self, it fails to satisfy.
Driven by scorn or anger it is best not lived

Life’s brief play is the chance to share
The depths of us with those who
Lend meaning to our existence.

Played true, the tragedy can be endured .

God, forgive me my thoughts.
Look pst my whims and follies.
Excuse, if you only will, the moments
Of my weakness when my humanity overcame
What I knew I should have done.

Please hear me now as I cry from
This tragedy which is the Test You
Have given us.

Let me find my way Home.

Heroes who were gather at the round table
Under Valhalla’s Golden Arches
Recounting the legends they lived.

They forget now the events of their day
But recall forever the moments of their glory
And the loves they lost who beckon from further on.
Their peers are fewer each year, their families
Shrink and turn from the old and trusted ways.
Most are alone but for comrades around the table
And none know who will be the next to disappear.

The tales grow with age as does their
Wisdom of how the world beyond the Arches
May be saved.  Their hearts are pure in this
Though their scars real and imagined, lend
Perspectives not all accept, but they are to be forgiven
For these are survivors of the tragedies of life.

For years I admired them, listening to the
Stories of their bygone world.
I think of them often now as I sit at
Their table watching the door for my friends.

He would’ve made you first if He thought about it
Maybe He did, make your first I mean,
because you are the fountain of everything.
And it grows uncontrollably from your bounty
Which is, I think, where we come in
Jealous we can help start but cannot  create life
So we give it order which so easily goes too far
And only has value when paired with your nurturing grace.

I suppose that’s why there is you and me and
Why, in our case, it’s good.

You don’t know the power compressed
In the gentle aspect of you,
The strength in a mindless gesture.
The force in a glance
The fearful energy contained in your whisper.

All I am and strive for would be lost
In the darkness of your indifference
Or shredded by a disproving look.

And if you willed it you could make me
What I should become, half a life
Made whole by the union of
Two souls who first met within
The mind of God.

You don’t know the power compressed
In the gentle aspect of you,
The strength in a mindless gesture.
The force in a glance
The fearful energy contained in your whisper.

All I am and strive for would be lost
In the darkness of your indifference
Or shredded by a disproving look.

And if you willed it you could make me
What I should become, half a life
Made whole by the union of
Two souls who first met within
The mind of God.