So often
Words are tossed around
Like laundry in a basket
So nonchalant
That when concise information is needed
Many find themselves inadequate
In the ability to ask it

Quit making me laugh ...
... you're killing me
I laughed so hard I almost died
I smile through the pain
Funny as a heart attack

And yet we hear it said
That laughter is the best medicine
If that is really true
And I believe it to be
Then a cure-all exists
That is virtually free
Shall it prove to be true
As the old adage has prescribed
Here you go - let's all do a smile
Overdose ourselves on laughter
And I hope we all
Everyone
Gets totally addicted

Reflecting on the reflections
That's seen and that which we avoid seeing
In Fierce mother like protection
For birth has Universal attractions
Yet we seem to seek out the narrow construct
And our in human ability to find ways to be replete
Fain non responsible- someone else will
Crap I will not yield .....until all truth has been revealed
My feelings are unequivocally in need of a way to vent
As I seek a way to balance ...my anger...that still
Remains plyable - up to this point as is my intent
But we all need to treat EARTH as a suckling babe
In need of love - respect and like us
To know someone really cares
For that is life
That is life's perfect sustenence

The measure of time

An insatiable thirst
Quenched
By the flickering flames of change
As constant darkness
Opens up
To expose
The smiling faces........ arranged
In a ragged circle
As transmutation will
Click a quick tick
Time sets forth a measurement
And right then
Measurement becomes relevant
And the wall
Still and silent now
As it settles into the new place
Having moved backward......
Giving human spirit
A little more space
Nobody knew it right then
But space
Just got bent ..for the very first time
---------And GOD smiled---------
Coal carried the flame forward
Far beyond
Its original role
Iron became harder to tame
As they blend and bend
Creating and celebrating
The birth
Of the very first tool
And the wall slid back
Exposing a gap
In the continuum
As well as a broken chain
So GOD stepped in
Taking a chain in each hand
As to cover the span
Linking the past to the present
Creating a future
Where history will be amassed
To be categorized
Analized
Sorted and filed
And GOD held it all together
-------And again GOD smiled-------
That smile
Must have been
MAJESTIC
As he watched the intrepid airmen
Sail off the dune and fly toward the ocean
Taking a leap and an unfathomable chance
HE may have laughed
As the slapstick unfolded
The two brothers laughing and whooping
As each does their version
Of a happy dance
To a whole new future -- to be
That they alone
Had the ability to see
It did change quite magically
Unfolding like a roadmap
Inspiring technology
With each turn of the page
No smile could have been present
As fat man lumbered in
And little boy followed
Not too long after
And that guaranteed
The absence of smiles
-------The suppression of laughter------
Tragic
Still
The wall slid backwards
By more than the QUOTA
The pattern expected
Considering the folly of man
Whose intelligence suddenly
Accelerating so rapidly
That bit by bit
Humanity split
Religiously
Using a crutch
Saying its all just
Too much
"If GOD wanted man to fly
He would have given us wings"
As others decry
"You spit in the eye
of He who gave us the gift
of creativity
Intelligence and tenacity---
--maybe a bit of bombastity
All fathers want their children
To excel
So shouldn't that be true
For GODS children as well?
That wall is not to be breached
Circumnavigated
Undermined or climbed
We will never realize
The height necessary
To rise above the lofty wall
To see the sacred sights
Where GOD delights
In teasing us
Bit by bit
Inch by inch
Allowing us
To push the wall forward
Encouraging us to learn as we grow
As you know
We would have never  moved forward
Beyond the doubts of those
Who say that we're playing GOD
Then burying their heads in the sand
Dooming us to crawl
Instead of proudly walking tall
If GOD didn't encourage his children
By stepping back
And smiling upon us
As we seek to find wisdom
Just as we need it
We take pride in pushing ahead
As if we somehow
Actually did
It on our own
Managing to move that wall
----And that has to give
GOD
The biggest laugh of all.

Bottled up in the brown liquid
Is the life dreamed but never led
Drenched in the sweat of fitful nightmares
Opposing forces converging to play musical chairs
Fighting over the last seat on the crowded bus
Inside a  mind where I find I ride with no idea where it's taking us

why do I keep on trying
when everything stacked up so high
and I know there is a reason
to believe that tomorrow will be the day I fly

why do I keep on going.
When all the hope and dreams soon vanish.
Like a puff of smoke.... in the wind.
And the path we met and walked along
was the best place I have ever wandered
until suddenly… It came to an end.

I looked around me ...standing there all alone.
And at the barricades there in front of me.
And I knew that you were not always alongside
as I had continued... on down that dream
somewhere along the path I found myself
and the courage to keep going for pain to be denied.

But that hope when based on false dreams.
Cannot maintain for all my days
we wake up sooner or later to realize
that is the way it is, is really just how it is.
And no dream or imagination.
Will ever let me measure up to become…
            ..... Someone who flies

why do I believe that tomorrow
Will be better than the day I had
when I believed it  would be better.
If I could just  lay down and die.
Because I know that hopelessness
is the cold steel binding of a fetter

that would keep me... on the ground.

So I move along the path of promise.
Where I will always believe in me.
For I cannot expect anyone else to
if I cannot find myself a way to move on.
With an inspired and hope filled life.
How would I ever find that one who

gave me the wings.... and watched...
           ..... the way I flew ?

nobody wants to fight a war
soooowooowooooo
what the hell are we doin it for
surely its not built into our core
or is it ..or is it ..OR IS IT AAAWWW
WWWWAAAAEEEEeeeeeeeeee

so if it is I do not see a way weeeEE
will ever get out of this world alive
IS THIS ALL WE GOT TO DO
TO LOOK FORWARD TO ...?
I'm asking you and I
hope that you
will go and ask someone else

so if we can get the whole world
THE WHOLE WORLD asking
WE may just find out .....that
no one has an answer..and
no one even has a clue ..sooooo
wouldn't that mean it should
it should....... be easyezezez
to break the habit ...because
I have always heard it said
THAT to recognize
that you have
you have a problem
is half the battle

SOOO,.ohhhohhhohh
I guess that's why why
sooooo many youngsters
HAAAaaave to DIIIIEEEEE!!!

SO WE DON'T HAVE TO...
really take that look at ourselves
and fight the other half....
........of that BAAaaaaAATTttteeeell.

WHYYYyyyy !!!!!???

He went from hero to zero
In nothing  flat
Took his foot off the gas
And that was that
Looked in the mirror ..
....did'nt
Like what he seen
With a past behind him
A lifetime ahead
And there he was

Stuck in between
Stuck in between

What would have been
Had he put the pedal down
Where would he be
What  would he have found
Where would he have gone
Would he have liked what he seen
Put the past behind him
Gather up that real life ahead

But still there he was.
Lost and stuck ...

.....somewhere
     .somewhere between..

my perceptual imbalance regardless of talents spread out over a
   chronological lifetime
gives an obfuscated vision of a murky aberration  unfocused on
  all but the aperture
overwhelming  blind ambition especially when wrapped up in
   raiment of religion
becomes translucent in the implications and applications as they
  writhe into obligation
laid out in prostration in their zeal appealing to an ever evolving
  version of Valhalla  

even now we see demonstrations of new world rationalizations
  mired in implications
Machiavellian machinations as we seem to suddenly find need
  of insentient insensate
willing partisan participants who believe participating in sacred
   rights annihilations
in total disregard of patently salacious overbearing lying denying
   terrorizing  abomination...
............A SAD SAD TRADE FOR  WHAT WAS....
                .. OUR GREAT....OBAMA nation.

We know what reality
Becomes .....when the banality
Of everything
Has gone stale from overuse
Try to find  a spark of life
In what is rapidly
Becoming rife
Nothing is worth fighting for
EXCEPT.....FOR A TRUCE
But if you will
Just take a pill
And let it conquere every ill
Feelings ...that you
Just can't comprehend
And in this state of blissfullness
You miss your stop and then you end...up
Coming to the conclusion that you are lost

None of this will harsh your bliss
Unless you find ...that what you miss
Is destined to
Never ever .. Come Back Around

So if the army that you've unlisted in
Doesn't care if they lose
Or if they win
Is that the reality you think
That you have found

Because if it is then what it says
Is nothing but....
A pack of lies
Staring down the open pits
You realize that it's
What used to be your eyes

Then everything comes crowding in
Pushing you to defend
The status
That you never --felt
That you had earned
And then you find
You can't unwind
The tangled mess that you possess
Thats commonly  refered to as
Your daily grind

INDUCE ME TO GO CHEMICAL
REDUCE ME TO IMPERICAL
AS I THROW REASON
STRAIGHT..
... OUT THE DOOR
ANY SUBSTANCE I CAN FIND
TO HELP ME TO ERASE MY MIND
WILL SURELY HELP ME
FIND MYSELF A CURE

For all the pains that I have chained
To myself and noone else
Ever really knew ..that I
Even carried it around

The weight of the world
Wrapped around me like a steel cocoon
The only hope I can see
Is that someday --a better me
Will rise up to take what life will bring

Chrysilis is at the heart of
All my hopes and all my dreams
But chemicals keep putting holes
Chemicals keep putting holes
In all my future wings

First day of Rance s and stormys New Life.
After the first night of sleeping in the camper .
First  realization that he's  on his own ,for the first time in his life. First opportunity for Rance to find ,what will eventually become a great novel so ...off to say hi and meet the neighbors.
An hour later,  back from walking the campsite not have found any great stories, a couple of people nodded back as we passed , and one returned how you ? To my How are you doing today?

. No Epiphanies and no happy mood  as he  cooked up some hamburgers, for himself and for stormy .
   As it came time to eat,   and Rance  does something else for the first time ever, and that is deciding to say a prayer- for the journey and for the meal.

        *×××/\/\//θθ\/\/\×××*
Made some hamburger patties , fixed stormy some food in his bowl turned on some Aerosmith Circa 1982 and waited for what would be next. As it turned out it was just hamburgers. No Revelations , no approaching strangers/ Neighbors to regale with the most amazing story ever to be heard..
   So I grill the burgers, set out the condiments, fill the plate with chips ,open the can of dr. Pepper then did something I had rarely if ever done in my life I made up a prayer'.
    Dear God in heaven
Jesus and the holy Spirit
Thank you for this meal
Both mine and Stormys
And for the opportunity
To see...
..... Beyond my horizons

Lift Me Up
And I will look farther
Open my heart
That I may feel deeper
Fill me up that I may have
Something to give back

I don't know what
My sites should be set on
Or the path
That I should be taking
So I will put it in your hands
To guide me- to show me
Where to look and help me
See what I might otherwise miss

I asked myself a little while ago
If I would do anything different
Than the people who. are camped around me .
I don't know the answer
I would like to believe.... that
The answer is inside me
Where only time and your good graces
Will help me if ....
... .  Understanding is mine to possess.

In Jesus name amen

Then for some reason I decided , instead of spending the day and night - as planned -at 12:30 in the afternoon- I packed up ,checked  the map,  picked  what I believe would be a pleasant four our trip, then I shook the dust of campsite 12C modern from my clothes and waved hartily at all the strangers  camping down the lane- as I went past.
    One little boy of about 10 waved enthusiastically back at me as I roll by.
     An hour later I found myself traveling a. switchback mountain pass highway when I came around a blind curve to come face-to-face with large backpack -a very large backpack - in the road.
    The backpack - upon reflection - was on the narrow shoulder of the road and rode on the the narrow shoulders of a red headed guy;  walking with a  dog on a string and ,going in the same direction that I was traveling.
      As I passed by, slowly. as  the surprise from  coming around the corner and seeing the sudden backpacks appearance ,along with the steady uphill climb of the road had slowed me considerably anyway.
    It was the dog that nearly brought me to a complete stop , not the - enthusiastic hitchhiker's - thumb sticking out to his side.
      The dog was bone-thin with  ribs showing like Fingers through the flesh and the protruding hip bones that stuck out like golf ***** under the skin just above each hind leg.  A silver and black dog that stood about 26 inches at the shoulders and should have weighed 80 pounds....would probably  tip the scales at 45 or 50.
      I passed by this pair with cuss words on my breath and anger in my heart to suddenly see a pull off/ view area to my right.
    I pulled in with a sudden and violent yank of the wheel that earned me a hard look from Storm .
    I was probably a quarter mile past The Hitch-Hiker when I pulled in and it was large enough to move back away from the road to a point I could no longer see the guy or the dog.
    " Good God" I said to Storm " Did you see .... and then it hit me with the spirit , as sudden  as a bug hitting the windshield would do;  so I looked up to the heavens" REALLY ?" I said "This is my answer?"
   Then I knew right then and there that I had judged, I had assumed , "I saw a starving dog and never thought... maybe he was attached to a  starving human.

I've been flying with the eagles
I've been painting in the sky
I've been eye to eye with angels
I've been graced with memories...
....that no amount of money ....
             would ....ever hope to buy

I was born by pain of obligation
I was born among the fettered planes
I was born same time emerging nation
..... throwing off ties that bound
.......same to me .....what it did deny

I raised myself through time and toil
I raised myself through waves of anger
I raised myself above the place I hated
......by sheer force and dreams of distant
.... mountains  that....I'd someday fly

l lived despite all those cruel  intentions
I lived to see the hope rise absent of color
I lived to see the battle raging all around me
......passing on just after I was given freedom
......laid to rest by some who had chose to listen
.....as I rambled on about my mountains
             ....I'd live to see ....before I die

I've been flying up so high with the Angels
I've been blessed to walk among some as well
I've been carried up here and buried where it'd be
......easier for me ........to reach up and touch the sky.

I'VE BEEN PAINTING IN THE SKY !

passing by the roadblocks
of those utterly devoid of inspiration
I grind my gears in frantic agony
through artless days and pastel nites
the last drops of forbidden nectar looms
far back on the parody of my tongue
and I asleep in the drivers seat...listening
to the horrid sound
my gear teeth clinched hard
to placate the need by the promise
of gold plated plastic ornamentation
fulfilling  the impossible climb

the austere instigator of forgotten melodies
slides closed the gateway ahead
in clear violation of the unwritten laws
that govern all worthwhile endeavor
now those gates wreak of cynical deviance
nirvana open to all who seek to reach the peak
so far beyond impossibility ...wide open
by bane of fence.. no recompense for that gate

with my tongue overhung from morose overdose
in failed attempts of finding the trace
of even the most scant memory
now lies frozen in the throes
of twisted convolutions

while my nostrils fill with acrid smoke
as gear teeth commence to melt
suspended halfway up the impossible climb
I am pushing hard the acceleration
aided by the rigor mortis of my seizure

asleep at the wheel with all wheels grinding

while those below the uninspired guardians
stare up in unimpressed confusion
where fire and smoke screams of agony
as the dream possessed begins to melt
reaching critical mass of inevitability
caught between the high mark of false sanction
and a bottom of craggy rock distortion
like a monsters teeth and open maw
awaiting with patient disregard
at the wheel the visionary sleeps
amid symbolic ritualistic boundaries
od'D on the wreckless need
for heights not guaranteed

but out on the windswept plains
of wordless twists and rigid tongue
the flaming mass shudders to that
unrelenting silent rage of aberration
then begins the tumble to the patient maw

the message flashes through
the sudden adrenaline flooded brain cells
like the flashing signs of hiway construction

last message passing by
in bright flashing neon
tomorrow will bring inspired risktakers
who now know the starting pattern
because I can say I made it beyond
all odds where none before have gone
by passing the dreaded roadblocks
at the far end of human imagination.

I od"D on the wreckless need
for heights not guaranteed .

Eric was in the hospital for 2 days last week
With a broken leg , bruised ribs and a bad attitude
5 minutes into my visit and halfway through a barely coherent rant
He just fell out
Just as well I was nearly deaf from listening to him shout

In that blissful silence before I could get up and leave
I couldn't help but overhear but I still can hardly believe

The old man that had entered just before I had
To visit his wife I came to understand not long before she died
63 years of marriage and a timeless love... I believe they had
Why else would I hear him say. " honey you know how you always get mad ...
Every time I tell you over all these years that you weren't my first love  ?"
I don't know what she said her voice didn't rise above
The hissing and beeping of the mechanicals that kept her from fading too fast
" I've waited a lifetime to tell you -you weren't my first love ...because you were my first ,my only and my last!
And in case anything had ever happened to me
Since that first week we were wed
It's been written the same way I just said
And tucked away in the last few pages of the of my families old Bible
                        •••     ••••  ~~    +++   ~~  ••••    •••

I came back the following day to give Eric a ride
They were gone ,the bed was empty and I guess she died

Eric was a  bit loopy as I wheeled him out toward the front door
Because he looked around and said loudly " did you bring the ****?"
"Hell no! " I said" by the way ..you know the people that shared your room ...?"
Do you mean that crazy old man that kept wandering the hall and in and out of the room that kept saying  " she knew all along
She already found it and...she ..knew all along?'

I was still smiling as we made it to the car ..where Eric asked why?
Never mind I said   you wouldn't understand... then again ....
.... I probably don't either.

them words ..them words ..them words
I heard
just keep on bouncing round and round
inside my head
I can't seem to find a way
to let them out
but I just can't let them stay

because they will erode
the tranquility of my inner sanctity
that pious temple I used to be
left like the derelict
bell tower ..standing all alone
out in the desert-long abandoned
slowly eroded ,falling back to earth....
..brick and stone

that's not me
not WHO I AM!!
NOT AT ALL who I fought to become
yet they keep bouncing like wrecker *****
turning my mind into useless dust
like a disease of doom and dread
how do I get back to being me ....
         ....after those words that I never should have said !

Only by a stroke of pure luck
Did we end up talking to each other that summer day
When I was being me and having gleaned  a clue
something was going on in your life with you
That I find out later not even your friend knew
I wasn't sure what was that right things that I should do
so I tossed it in the Wind left it all the Fate telling her to reach out to you

All this while we stood in front of that haunted house she posted
With a question as to whether anyone would stay there for a night
l believe I said something to the effect that it's better than my place
So I would without hesitation or any  reservation
And then there you were laughing and saying to me
You must be friends with ..? which I said yeah for about 5 minutes now

which started off a round of laughter and character assassination
  then  a  friend request from you without hesitation

And  character assassination good wishes and appreciative laughter
Has allowed our friendship to be as natural and your birthday suit
(by the way ...any pictures ) never
mind the point is moot
( not Moot chu all )

So thank you for this almost a whole year now
Knowing somebody who also does realize
That to listen and hear takes more than just ears
And seeing is done with more than just eyes
Just as thinking requires more than just the mind
So cool and you always seem to find
The humor meant and not the offense

For the zings I slings like al dente pasta
Some that sticks while others are at best valient attempts

So I hope you have a wonderful day
That you barely remember tomorrow
And a whole year to come of laughter joy and happiness Sans any sorrow

But if you sit there now wondering about a line I said earlier on.... character assassination
Trying to pretend innocence and confusion
Forget it that won't make the cut
Because I can show you a message just two nights ago from you to me that says I quote....
......"YOU NUT !!"

to truly listen hear and understand
takes more than just the human ear  
required are those intractable elements
that hide somewhere beyond the outerinnersphere
adding the unwanted and too often unnoticed filters
designed to convolute what should be crystal clear
so that others perceive us as something that is more or less
than the way we aspire to see ourselves or wish to appear

again we see no end to connections that tend to override
unseen as any certain or uncertain sets of circumstance
A sharp conflict exists among notes it emotes that never floats
falling instead to B Flat as if dead on that floor so no one dances
where invitation becomes invasion so walls suddenly appear
  to block out light and inspiration as a way to halt any advances
all because we choose our view in direct relation to what applies
to our eyes as we're convinced we see all by quick sideway glances

but it takes more than eyes to realize that which is not there
so convinced we become incensed those reasons we cannot find
that somehow somewhere someway or another someone else
has pulled some kind of magic trick that then did inflict the mind
of all those who cannot see what it is that you believe it to be
" SO THE WHOLE DAM WORLD HAS GONE BLIND BLind  blind
as for all us who accept the truth you hear with more than by ear
see by more than just eyes to think requires more than just your mind

may have the makings of an empath mind if you find you're so inclined ask yourself if you truly TRULY  live up to your OWN expectations
to invest by this simply impossible test taken without time constraints
once able to refrain from creating the walls that block out inspirations to endure the painful cure by could never would never no way I'll ever
change my mind that are self fulfilling prophesies of your inclinations
so that day comes when you realize but know not when the test did end
to accept the grade you give yourself will depend .. ( congratulations )
when you have long talks with those who won't accept their own box
does exist and you persist and are sure you've not built yourself a box...
of clear glass....then friend you have just passed.    
now go find yourself a way to make a difference.     PEACE & LOVE

I picked him up on the highway because he really looked like he needed a ride
  he had never really even put out his thumb
But as he  climbed up into the cab of my pickup I could tell he was like a man dead inside
No light shining through his eyes as if there was no light down deep inside
I asked him where he was going to he said he didn't care one places the same as another..... all the same to him anymore
so I put the truck in gear and then just after a mile or two
I looked over to see he was asleep and slumped against the door

I lit the same cigarette that I'd been smoking the last three days
Turn the radio on low  and set it to the blues  to fit my mood
About three hundred miles of highway and suddenly I thought about my luck with strays
And a voice inside my head said " now you're getting a clue "
I tapped him on the shoulder but really just to verify
He never stirred an inch and no waking ruckus did he raise
I wondered as I took the next exit how long after getting in did he die

I found a deputy sheriff sitting a radar trap
And I told him what I had and how it came about
He stepped over to see for himself and I thought now here comes the crap
' But  as he turned back and stepped away from the trucks passenger door
He gave me a soulfull look  and asked where it was exactly that I had picked him up
Doesn't much matter really every body around knew the score.
" He was down at the bottom, long before any even had a chance to catch his fall!"
"BUT THERE WAS A TIME " the deputy said; as tears began flowing from his eyes,"   THAT MAN WAS A Tower and walked 10 feet tall"

Then stepping away  the deputy saying he needed to call the sheriff and coroner
I imagined a bit of that- probably -would  be to wipe eyes and compose himself.
He returned with a cup of coffee for me from a thermos named Big Marlene
He caught the smile I tried to suppress and knew,.
That's my wife's cooler and my daughter ...little Marlene.
She was 7 when she put that on there and said so NOONE would get us mixed up
You won't have no trouble here mister ( I said Dave) Okay Dave" We've all been expecting this for over 4 years now.

At one time he was our doctor and was a great doctor ,but he was one that could not be saved
it was the night the big parade pep rally and football playoffs ..one more game we would  clinched division ..everyone was so excited we could taste it
It was them on the way back from our victory over Hayes 10 cars were following honking their horns and making a grand return when that  bus  flipped..... rolling  over and into the river
It was Crazy. I was on duty so when I arrived on scene there was over 20 cars on the bridge  parked every which way, lights on lighting the bridge, dozen of people in the river- every where in the  the river ....we won the game and division  that nite ,but lost everything else to the river

I found Doc Wilson sitting on the bank talking to himself
Didn't know it then but he was not only wet cold and talking to himself ....he was dead .
We didn't know it for some time yet to come but  he was already dead ..just as dead as if someone had ...no as if he had put a bullet in his own head.

I don't think that the doc could even imagine what he could ever say to any of us.
And no way to know if he ever heard us as we tried over the years to get thru
We know it wasn't alcohol or drugs or excessive speed
But doc was driving so that was all the things he would need
Simply put it was an act of God and the sudden snap of tie rod ?

That's why I still carry the thermos all this time.
As I sat there listening ,I said all I could by nodding and shaking my head listening to the horrors of that night
When some triggering pain came over me and I knew I didn't want to hear
What he was getting ready to say

Now days every time I pass that exit ramp on the highway I hear those words
Yeah I lost both my wife and daughter that night ..I was on duty so they rode over on the team bus

A few hours later I was back on the hiway , only headed in the opposite direction
Yeah I was headed home and to my wife
No longer was business all that important to let it be the excuse
So it's possible to put off and avoid participation
I was a total **** to get mad and leave for a week while she gets to worry over it.

The deputy said all people that seem to be content to wallow within their own crap.....
......That just becomes weight
Should  remember what doc would say those times when he would and did .

" I am getting so tired of always carrying yesterday with me ...as I go on into tomorrow !".                         

Quote by" doc Wilson" Wilson  James Hall. Jr.

from an eighteen year absence as I stood staring into the silver surface
awaiting the appearance as she would once again  part the mirrors glaze
sudden thrill of foreboding anxiety passes across me as ribbon of silk lace
or that momentary nostril flair when a sudden snare of rarified air plays
havoc on the ancient receptors nearly forgotten as aromatic sprites pass
along those corridors memories reside and sometimes hide behind doors of this maze
awash in the dusty overlay of that which still seeking to delay realities consistently amass
when a graphic form of de ja vu breaks thru passing and suddenly does appear
as calm still silver slightly shivers then parts to deliver the hand and then humanistic form
to reach for the rounded edge of porcelain solidity gasping in  oxidized atmosphere
i watch decades lost disappear as if only yesterday i stood here and again this the norm
in wordless anomalous aplomb i watch her face apperceive my image as i etch the scene
so intent upon my scrivener scrawl in my rush to capture all onto my minds private wall
that only in the faintest of my subconscious can i recall the echo call my name as she covered all distance between
attaching herself in ways far beyond the physical bond and thru time uncertain beyond the curtain we fall
tumbling into that void where nothing exists outside that infinitesimal moment of infinity
with the eventual return to the constraints passing back thru the curtain and time certain reapplied
once again the prisoner of the laws of time space and the reality of gravity
plans made to meet later to catch up with those details with smile i say thank you for that ride
her eyes twinkle and i know with absolute certainty she understood exactly what i meant
that is why she said i still do this everyday as i am addicted to that moment when Einsteins laws don't exist
then with laughter she denied me an answer to the question on my face later she said and up she went
so i paused at the door to watch her grace from a hundred feet high she bounced and leaped into the air then i saw  what i had just missed

for there she was not going up and not coming down  suspending all physical laws and she was unbound  weightless and free and addicted

and right then i had to admit to myself ....i was a bit jealous but nowhere  near as brave as i watched her reenter that mirror.

Hello weary travelers .
Welcome
to my living room
for in words
I have found life ...and purpose
in thought provoking
and sometimes
ego stroking words
that can if we're lucky
can ...
paint a thousand pictures
to hang proudly
displayed
along the walls
of any open mind.
Stay
as long as you like
come and go ...as you please
.  The door has no lock
and there is always
fresh sweet tea for all
in the ice box .
My hope ...
is that my LIVING room
is where some will find
living ROOM inside themselves.
So please ...wipe your feet
Wipe your feet
before
you go outside.   thanx.

Hello love how are you?
Me... I'm doing just fine
Now that I know you

I never saw you coming
I thought all my plans...
... Had been set
Me- on my own forever
Never knowing....
.....how lucky I could get
And so...
From my blind side
You suddenly appeared
Behind me
To walk beside me
Into the future I had always feared
Would be a lonely Journey
A trip I would take all alone
No one to help me marvel
At the sites along the road

I've never known where
The road would take me
Just moving on seemed enough
Not much difference
Between the smooth parts
Not much difference
From the rough

The dim light
I never even noticed
The loneliness didn't even exist
Not having had - it wasn't missed
And then you ....
.... my angel
Stood there beside me
Willing to stay - you brighten my world
Helping to guide me

Now if I'm spoiled
You spoiled me
If I can see
Then you are my light
And if I left my old familiar road
With... your loving guidance
Then I can't go back
But it'll be alright..... it'll be alright
For if I hear sweet music
It's from my heart it comes
And if I believe in something now
It's you where all hope comes from.

As the sun
Begins to set
I know my day
Is not over yet
So much to see
So much to do
So much to share
Now that I've found you

The time that's gone
Beyond the bridge
Does not effect the colors
Now forming upon the ridge

As abstract as what
We now have
Should I have tried....
......To see
Yesterday
Any vision
Any future
Any thought
That I would have
Someone....
With whome
To share
The setting of the sun

Now I realize I was
All mixed up
And am just now realizing
I am not viewing the setting sun
I'm in total awe....To realize
We're sharing a brand new sun
RISING
And glory
To the making....
.....of a brand new day

They live beyond horizons
Not yet achieved
And in flashes of color
Too brilliant to be believed
In flicking flames of campfires
Dancing in the silver moonlight
And the next page of books
That sets imagination to flight
Among the woodland sounds
Where  birds chirp with abandon
Brooks babble along with carefree joy
And flowers grow completely random
In those patterns that nature designs
In those soft notes practiced fingers strum
Along the curves of an acoustic guitar or the body of a lover
Those are the places where dreams come from

Picking and choosing
My way as I'm cruising
Down the highway
To my future
And I know by now
That there's something out there
Don't know how
But I'll  find it somewhere
Cuz I know in my heart
That its waiting..waiting
Waiting for me
Waiting for me ....waiting for me
Just like--- I've been waiting
For whatever it is....whatever it is
And whatever it will.. end up....being

I'll know it for its power
That it has on me
When I get close
Like metal to a magnet
I'll be drawn in ....pulled tight
Held so close .....held so close
Like a hug from a long lost friend
When you never ever thought that you'd see em again...see em again...again

It's like I've always known
Where I'm going - but never had a clue
That at the end of my journey
The end of my journey....end of my journey
Would be the start of the road
Start of the road that leads to you
Leads to you - leads to you

So take my hand..take my hand... take my hand
And pull me up from out of this sand
Where I buried more than just my head
WHEN I LOST....
When I lost my all my confidence
And failed at building a fence
That was high enough
High Enough...high high ...high enough
To keep out all of my doubts
I could still...I could still
I could still hear the shouts
Hear the shouts... Hear the shouts
Telling me I would be...I would be
Standing in the same place
When I crumble into dust
Crumble into dust - blown into oblivion
Without a trace of ever finding
Of ever finding a love.. that I could trust

But I looked into my future
Looked into my future and I saw you
Didn't know....
..... Who you were or where you'd be
But I knew somehow - knew somehow
Knew somehow that I was looking for you
And you were looking for me
And you were looking for me

Only by tying us together - tying us together
It's the only way .....only way...
..... Way .. Way.. Way
We would ever be free
We would ever be free ...ever be
EVER.....EVER EVER EVER
THAT WE.......would ever be free

What would I do
Why I would help you
Fold up the corners of the flat earth
If that's what it took to please you
Gather stars to light your room
Flip the moon around for you to view
A side you've never seen as yet
And hold your hand as we walk along
Into a new reality where time will let
The hands stand idle inside our dome
For a while at least I hope it can be so
As we travel the world in our little home
Wrapped in the warm embrace of a happiness I thought I'd never know.
I'd help you
In everyway I can.

I know you were trying
In your own way to help me
From washing  away in the tide
Getting lost in the vastness of the sea
Holding me so I wouldn't crash
Splintered on the rocky shoals
To become the latest victim taken in
By the siren song like so many other souls
You believed I was helplessly floundering
And its true that I always needed you
But not as an anchor to hold me down
What I was in need of was a co-pilot
Together as we sailed to where I was bound
To help me watch the horizon for a sign
     As we sought the new world and the riches
            I believed were our destiny- YOURS ....
                             And mine.

Sometimes the world moves on without me
And I try to pretend that I just don't care
Sometime I think that I move way too fast
And I'll burn myself out from the pace that I know can't last

And I know that there are things that I've been missing
And I feel like I may never know what they were
So when I found you and you seem to be able
To keep up and pull me back when my manic times do occur

Its so weird to know that you don't want to try to change me
Into some cookie-cutter version of a person that I should be
I don't feel that you now wonder if I'm worth all the confusion that I spread
As I paint with no regard for the numbers or the colors
In pursuit of the vision that I see going around and around in my head

I've never thought of myself as being normal
And I resigned myself to the fact
But the places that I've let myself wander
Led me to places from where I never ever came back
The gypsy road never took me down to memory lane
No such road even exists for the things that I missed
So now I look forward to looking back on us
And a memory as simple as just walking in the rain

I've never been as ready as I am at this moment
To create for myself a past
Where together we paint the paintings
Those memories that I never even saw
And to feel normal .....
..........For the first time....
                           ......At last!

Like a gentle gossamer fog
This feeling of calm enveloped me
As I finally found .....the triumphant breeze
That gave me a sustaining breath
It was as if I came alive
For the very first time as feelings became realities
Soft carressing words soothingly validate
A worthiness I believed would always evade
Leaving me void and hollow as an empty glass
With only trace amounts of the taste I craved
As I died of thirst a thousand times
While drowning in the river of my dispair
Convinced I would be gone and forgotten
Washed away and out to sea
Without ever knowing the utter ecstasy
How it could feel to know someone  cares
About my life my hopes and  my dreams
Turning the raging river of my doubts
Into the calming flow from which your love
So gently streams.

There's a hole in the wall where I stare out at space
Somehow it always leaves a bad taste
As I watch the colors of blue and purple and gold chase
Each other into the folds of that which Darkness soon  has replaced
Often pausing long enough to call it's Bluff
By slinging the remnants of an artist's watercolor palette
To coat in disregard the days dying light through cotton fluff
Or a mad array of angles mean and twisted that as yet
No abstract artists has met
matched least surpassed
With equivocal skill the hands of time lay waste with hues
A pastel haze of grey's pulling down Velvet black amassed
With the billions of twinkling lights that dreams Infuse
Of all those who lay under staring with wonder and awe
Into the Infinity of time and space in all its awesome grace
Of absolute imperfection without a single flaw
Eternity from first spark to modernity all wrapped in God's embrace

A question is simply a question
Unless taken as a slap...
Then refusing to answer is a confession
And the question , they suddenly turn it into a trap ....
....that never existed
       Or ever would have
If answered.... instead of resisted.

I've never spent too much time
Worrying about the future
Then suddenly you came along
And I began to feel I was late
I was late
I was late
I was late in growing up
I was late in finding success
I was late in everyway a man can be
I was late in noticing
How much my life was a mess
I've tried to change
The way I live my life
I've tried to rearrange
The strange...way
My priorities were arranged
As they seemed to be
Suddenly painfully
Stacked up against me
Up up up against me
Constantly blocking my way
Wasting my day
Making me stay
Here ... Living like
Some poor stray
I never have worn a collar
Or been led around
I never would save a dollar
Or even think too far ahead
I never did let myself
Be kept for very long
I never saw..how
Just a little bit of security
Could have really set me free
Not till I met you
Did I do..that thing
That every man should do
Straighten up
Fly right....and become a man
A man with a plan ... A future
A hope a dream and a thought
A cause a reason
To make life seem like
It can be more than
Just acting like some silly pup
That's trying so hard
To spend an entire life
Playing in the yard
Just rolling in the grass
Letting time pass
While chasing his
Or someone else's tail
Giving no thought
To where life is going
Trying so hard to stop himself
From ever growing up
So say... No no no bad dog!
It's time boy..for you
To make a man out of what
Is no longer just a pup
And hasn't been for a long long time now

I never was the kind to
Spend too much time
Worrying about or thinking
Very far ahead
I had no future
Not until you came along
Not till then did I even notice
That it was a fenced yard
That I was happily living in
Not till then did I realize
Just how late I've really been
Once I did ...I did then see
That the fence also had a gate
So yes babe ...I knew just how late
I am
One day you came along
And seemed to notice me
You opened the gate calling to me
By my name
So I hope
I hope it's not too late for me
To start living...my life again
Living right
And to start right
RIGHT from the start.

You somehow got the notion
That you know who I am
But the picture that you've painted
Is nothing short....
         ......Of a sham
Abstract interpretations
Has absolutely --resolutely
No resemblance to me
No image of anything
That I'd ever....even.....want to be
So where did you get
Your Information
Certainly wasn't from
Any true observations
Reliance on opinions
Outside of your control
Gives a SLANTED view
That you used to find a clue
So what you finally created
In your mindless revelation
It's probably more like
A  self -portrait
Than you would ever
Want to admit.....to yourself....
....much less ...to anyone else
Look..... look....look....I say
At the picture
Ain't it getting clearer
Funny how it.... Suddenly
Feels like you're staring
Into a mirror
NOW THEN......
....Do you get the picture?
Do you see the flaw?
It's in your inability
To think outside the box
Those four walls that surround you
Really don't exist
Unless they're something
That you need
To help you to resist
Seeing beyond the boundaries
Opening up your mind
Moving past the mundane
Realizing that
You've been blind
To the bigger picture
To all the colors that exist
Besides the black and the white
That right now
Is muddled into a grey
That surrounds you......
.........JUST... LIKE....A...MIST !

so I sat myself down and made a list
of all those so called four letter words
you know the ones we use to jab in and twist
to regret afterwards or more apt afterwords

devising a scale of definition weight pain
how when why and even where we use them
which are colorful or abstract or just profane
is it gender exclusive and cross plied to anger him

took a while to come to the point to see it was clear
too close to call - a new parameter I made use of
does it hurt as much to say it as it does to hear
said unsaid killing if abused misused four letters ...
                                         ......that spells the word LOVE

For those who chose to throw out reason
here in this most bazaar of times and season
who now fear glancing into the rear view mirror
let me just say "YES" if you wonder its getting nearer

Funny is it not how blind we can be to what lay ahead
that can and often will fill our dream with that dread
that may cause a momentary sense of discomfort
upon wakening and fading before we get a chance to sort

What was or wasn't that little shake of head we make
to allow a reset from that data moving quick to opaque
even though moving on puts reality into front and center
that data was downloaded waiting for when you hit enter

Seldom if ever will it endeavor to open as a full screen view
awaiting a chance for conflating as - THE SPY WITH A CLUE
slipping in now and then to drop off another subliminal hint
as to if and why ,where or when we allowed a place we went

That was just a tangent a separate thought of a pervious  mind
a footpath off the path we blazed an adventure for what we find
that will sometimes have a cost ...the toll for getting lost ...is fear
so when we start again often so impervious to what may appear

no longer who it was that blazed a new path into the unknown
consciously unconscious to tangent paths staying where shown
Content? to follow a map someone drew that is way ahead of you
are you so frightened that unenlightened means ignoring the view

That then becomes the difference between living life that's defined
and freedom that is achieved on a roadtrip.. through an open mind
because life is a journey and no map can ever really be your guide
unless you end when and where that map maker did... No I decide

and if you still fear to glance in that mirror and see its gaining on you
that fuse lit the day your'e born won't gain an inch by anything you do
so defined destination headlong rush or meandering along your way
there is no cost to getting lost ..no toll to pay it's a roadtrip dude .....until your dying day

so why not sit back and enjoy the ride ? YOUR'E NOT DRIVING !

My friend Darryl had
photochromatic skin
He never knew it till he was almost 19 years old
We met when I reached the age of adult consent
Even though I just spent three years in battle with the post Vietnam War Navy that I had been in
Before escaping the grip of all of those lost and crazy old man of  35
With gray or white hair ******* turned into hooks on one hand or the other
Made to fit coffee cup handles and with faces filled with wrinkles like desert land after a flood

I escaped by walking into the psych ward of the base Hospital through one door and skipping out 3 days later through another
So back in Oklahoma City as far from any ocean as I could possibly be
Summer came along and waved goodbye but took Autumn away with it leaving me in the middle of December
Frost covered and freezing I became aware of the shortcomings in me
So shivering myself back into reality I managed somehow made it to April and a one year gone that I could barely  remember

Buckling down I find a nice little cottage in this old lady's backyard
She gave me homemade cookies and goat's milk she always had frozen in the freezer
Took a job invading the Suburban domain of dogs to gather garbage trying  not to get scarred
Three or four hours a day paid for 8 me and Darryl and a 200-year old geezer

The old man drove the truck and had a corn cob pipe permanently stuck
Between corn kernel teeth that he could revolve and then keep  smoking in the rain
But he was cool and dropped us off at my house after the shift and and he would return the truck
By June uniform of cut offs tennis shoes and no shirt I had a good tan  but Daryls was freaking insane
And this was something while growing up that he never really knew

This was his first year being away from home and the strict Nazarene discipline
Where all shirts had to be white with long sleeves  buttoned up to the collar and  to the wrist
So it was fun to watch him awakening as his hair grew into curls Michael Landon looks super tan and handsome
Maybe I was a bit jealous but I was also happy to watch his confusion as those things became something the girls couldn't resist

We spent our afternoons in the places where pool tables and foosball and girls were played under florescent light
Here he learned something else that he never knew and I saw something I had never ever seen
So I'd get other people to go out to see it and verify that I was right
Three hours under fluorescent light and within three minutes of sun he would darken back to mahogany from an olive green

I'm telling you it was weird  !!!

Late summer ****** his 16 year old brother Dwayne drowned while swimming in a farm pond
And if it wasn't tragic enough the preacher wouldn't let them have the funeral at the Church they grew up in
But he was good enough to say  that he would Preach at the funeral parlor up the street
So with all that was going on that day all the way to the service Daryl I never got a chance to meet

Reasoning being that Dwayne was swimming on a Sunday afternoon which was a sin

So in that crowded Auditorium I was  where I never liked being
10 rows up in front of me Darryl was sitting beside his mom and dad
Somewhere in between was Sharon an old friend of mine that Darryl has been seeing
And if I wasn't uncomfortable enough it was nothing compared to the effect his words had

He was so old with a skull covered by barely enough blue skin  stretched so tight
You could see the veins as he blurted out an unbelievably vicious hateful attack
He was saying Dwayne was in hell and if he could he would come back to tell you not to do what he did because he knows

Yes  he knows he did wrong  and he knows now because of where he is and where he's been
Unbelievably he was saying Dwayne was in hell for swimming on a Sunday as if he had some right to condemn

But with every grotesque punch the old ******* would throw
Darrell's dad would throw up his fist and yell amen
Try as I might to Tamp it down but that anger in me  continue to grow
I was literally on my way up to scream you f** *******
when ........ Darrell threw up his fist and yelled amen

Later that night we were all together and Sharon my old  friend asked me why
So I admitted how close I came before you ...Daryl yelled amen... like your dad
Sharon said I knew ..I knew something was wrong and I wanted to but all I could do was cry
And as Daryl looked at both of us he said I only did that as sarcasm because  I was mad

So you know that little cottage I said I had rented was right down the street
Corner House had an umbrella looking clothes lines right out   front 24/7 covered with white on white long sleeve shirts
So one night about a week later me and a pair of scissors went down the road and came back with 42 sleeves white as sheets
Thinking that'll get him right where it hurts.... hateful *******

Truthfully I never did but I thought about it many times it's been 40 years and I still regret that I didn't!!!