Even in the garden of inspiration There will be no second chance..
..to redo that first dance

So don't always wait for the invitation
To step up...to step up and not miss
That awkward and electrifying build-up of the first kiss

What glory will be won by implication
That creates some obstinate need to win it
If you surrender raise the white flag and are still late by 1 minute

Will you be able to dispel the inclination
That persists in what if's.... you had done this
Or might some ironic twist allow something else to miss

Even In The garden of inspiration
Where dreams of  butterfly parades
Lends color and pattern and beauty that never fades

And the artistic squirrel renders artistic deviation
By showing off the scrolls which he carefully unrolls
Depictions of treeless wastelands
beyond his controls

As the squirrels all gather  to witness his creation
A sad vigil they sit the branches where so often each one dances
I stand chastened by guilt felt
the pain in the eyes - as each one glances

From the barren depiction to me and at our symbiotic relation.  
We destroy forests, water... air ....
taking more than our needs
This line of solumn tree dwellers
give back forests by hoarding seeds

So even in the garden of inspiration..
..I cannot see how it will all work out
When the squirrels all stop dancing  
And the butterfly parades wilt in the world without shade

Even in the garden of inspiration I can't see past the destruction and decimation
To what should be our greatest creation

And I wonder - if we even care
To really really really look at the state of disrepair
We have allowed ourselves to take for granted
What the animals and birds and fish allowed us to share.

Everything seems to be so complicated
Understated or overrated
Out of bounds or poorly created
Faded Kings with shining crowns... peddling mattresses on sale after the prices have been inflated

Promises are nothing more
Than an eight letter combination lock
That seem to crumble to dust with just one click of the clock

So we stand in line and await our time... to be sheared
And then we will be able to join a sympathetic flock

But at some point....

The truth became a spare tire for that car we keep up on blocks

Instead we walk with a limp down the road... our shoes full of lies like tiny rocks

Thinking that we will get a pass from all the heartless haters that

Rely on those stumbling, painful, non gainful... Ghost like images of a rat

No one will trust you to be just another fortune teller that's   always drunk on cheap wine

Yet they say it's okay... because all you want when you're drunk is just another sip
And then ... without a price to pay or gold to gain
The truth is the truth this time

But still things just seem to be so **** complicated, understated or completely overrated.

*** please please forgive me
If I seem to take us for granted
Sometimes it's just so easy
You think that having roots...
... Means that life is truly planted
I can see now what I wasn't showing
Like anything meant to continue growing
I am guilty of neglecting the weeds
And all the work it takes to keep up with your needs

I'll pay more attention from now on
As you get to know our fresh new flower our daughter
While I get to know and show our son how it should be done
What to do when  the dry and dusty foundation of our life...
....needs attention and water

Don't know where my head was
But it wasn't where it should have been
That was a boy that thought all it takes is to plant the seed
But it's the man I now am who  knows that's where my life really did begin

My eyes seem to reluctantly open
To an emptiness beside me in bed
Too long she's been gone... As are those smiles we shared
As happily we greeted each dawn

In two lonely days it's the 14th
Valentine's Day on my mind
As I seek in silver tinged memries
For a smile that I now can't seem to find

I know that she'd smile as she scolded
With those emerald green eyes
I've known so well
That never seemed to lose their power
To pull me in and under their spell

Suddenly I hear in my head ... her voice starts speaking
Those words it's not hard to imagine her say
Come on lazy bones get out of that bed
Or you can make it up and I'll make the coffee instead

Then just as if she were actually here
My feet hit the floor as I raced out the door
In order to make it perfectly clear
To push the on switch like the thousands of times... That    I've  
    done      before

Then retracing my steps as a
grimacing smile pulls at my lips
I fluff and I squeeze pillows and spread covers with care
Happily doing what she could never get me to do
In my mind I happily find it's something that we now share

These last 30 days my mind seems to glaze
With all the empty space I must now fill
Along with the loneliness I have to endure
Can't get used to it and never will

So I set myself down at the table
Sugar to sweeten my coffee and more than just a dollop of cream
I need something to help me find pleasure
Even then I could hear her talking to me... as if I were having a dream

Is that what you've been doing here while I've been gone
Slowly I spun my head to look behind me
There she stood  with her suitcase in hand
We finished the project early -  and I really needed to be home she said
But I couldn't stop sitting there staring in wonder
Besides she said as she cradled my head
I couldn't stand the idea of  us spending Valentine's Day alone
But my mind was gone... empty of thought
Flung into the High Heavens... not even missed
From the moment she leaned over  reconnecting our hearts... as we kissed.

I missed you ...so much we said !

Pausing in the doorway
Of my new life to be
Trying my best to recognize
Anything familiar that I see

But a landscape so unfamiliar
Stares back at my form
As if to echo what I already knew
That I... like it... was way out of the norm

As the twilight encompassed
All the picturesque hues
I knew that I was delinquent
In my obscurant obfuscated dues

A voice from my inner sanctum
Kept pounding out the same refrain
Yet no clear thoughts escaped the misty harbor
As a fog of contention muffled sounds like lights on a country lane

Still in this doorway I find myself
No movement or direction has yet occured
For change is not easy to accept ...even
If all but the acceptance has already occurred

So the last vestige of immortality
Sometimes rests on that single second of time
That is suspended in some evolutionary respite
When space  intrusively obscures pushing in from behind

When all I am asking ...
... Is a moment to pause
Making allowance...
... Of what is now being entwined

I tried to
Hold on to you
When I saw
I couldn't stop ... What you were going through

Time does not
Heal a whole lot
Of all those things ..that get caught
In those memories that we never wanted to forget

They are all so
Caught up in that flow
So all I really know
Is that we keep it all or we let it all go

     Let it all go......

So do you think
We might cease to sink
If I hold onto you so tight and never blink
Because...I fear if I take my eyes off you ...you will disappear

Now I see that I
Am reflected in your eye
So yes yes yes I want to try
To see that gleam in your eye
that for so long now...
I havent seen

It tells me that you are willing
To let the past go ...to flow
Away down that lonesome stream
As we stood there on the bank
I wait to fill in that first new blank

Slowly I see you begin to smile
I keep watching and after a while
Your eyes began to dance ..and I
I had to ...had to laugh out loud
          At the wonder of the fates

That had
Brought us...to this place
At this particular time
When we knew we could
Let it all go ...to be erased

Lost you once before
And the reality of that fact
Took me so far away from shore
To leave me ...is to leave me
Drowning in the sea... of misery

Hey dear! I see you there
As I hope you see me here
It matters not to me where we go from here
As long as you too want to be there

   For me...

That much is crystal clear

So as we let the past just fall away
Starting all over..fresh and new
And yes I see your smile and your dancing blue eyes

Love always lives ....
.....if hope never dies .

I'm running along this abstraction
But I can't seem to get any kind of  traction
Still bewildered by your initial action
And I never expected that kind of reaction

I hope it gave you some kind of satisfaction
Trying to break me down to a simple fraction
I just don't think I'll ever see what is the attraction
So it seems that there's no need for any protraction

The light that once shined in my eyes refraction
Has now obviously become some kind of distraction
Whatever once brought us to an impaction
I guess those dreams that were - suddenly weren't - by contraction

Nothing is ever as simple as finding what was ...wasn't
Or could suddenly couldn't
When you find out you were what you thought you weren't
And now tears... I knew I would though I told myself I wouldn't
We still are what we are or we aren't
I got to go now...
... As it suddenly seems that to still care is a new world infraction
I guess satisfied always  has to end up becoming satisfaction

And as I'm running along this abstraction I just can't seem to get any kind of traction.