I can't see the light in people
It's obscured by crowds
One by one reaching to connect
In the thick-of-it it's too loud
Picking up the ball to take home
Moody gets dark and broody
I crave and crave and savour
Dark and light, light and dark

We walk and we endure, even if
we're beaten and bruised
like the caverns of our hearts
with its dark crevices
that made us lost and confused

Only if we learn to believe in ourselves
we walk again,
out of this dim passage
that blinded us,
and we will see the stars
in the night sky
that we never saw in that cave

Kindness
was a house.

Knitted by
knowing you.

It was made
of sticky notes.

Encouragement
aching for actions.

Friendship
is the fuel.

Hearts only
in its windows.

Looks didn’t
really matter.

A firm foundation
invisible.

Gates of wisdom
walk to it.

Depression
laughed at it.

Gossip galloped
away from it.

The golden rule
knew better.

Many years
ago, I went to
this little
Irish bar.
On Sunday nights,
there was a jazz band.
They played
Monk
Mingus
Coltrane
Miles
and the Duke.

I drank gallons of
****** marys on
those hot
summer nights.
Dill pickle spears, and
green olives came up
later on those
hungover, dreamless
mornings.

I was young.
I wasted the days,
lying in the sun,
bayonetted by youth.
Copper colored skin,
tin soul.
I would go thousands
of miles, chasing
that train, before I
would be forgiven.