Oh the things that my eyes have seen,
the many places walked I have been.

Upon peak and trough did I roam,
rarely knowing a place called home.

So many turnings along my way,
passing on through to seldom stay.

Staying as long as life allowed,
more times alone than in a crowd.

Beautiful faces that came and went,
both good and evil sometimes sent.

With words sometime of the softest kind,
echoing shrill calls yet within my mind.

Words once soft now turned to stone,
where faces vanish until left alone.

Upon road so full of twist and turn,
until a heart can no longer yearn.

Corners met that were never turned,
unseen paths that were never learned.

Future's short path left to travel on,
in time memory fades and it too is gone.

Things I was and all that I saw,
gone forever through the closing door.

How long then be there just a trace,
that my soul and I ever saw this place.

To dust and particles we all will decay,
those once met too will just fade away.

Until even memories of all are no more,
of a life full lived that no one even saw.

Above the public pool
a volleyball so cool
stuck for years
in the rafters
Someone’s
breath of life
trapped in
it’s bladder
Evidence of
their lingering
presence, me
wondering
if they ever
pondered the
relevance of
the essence they
left behind?
Singsong thoughts
turn inward …
What about me?
In all the places
I’ve been,
pieces of me,
residual traces
of myself
left behind,
cast away!
Small links, unforgotten,
faithfully preserved
by old friends—
threads of connection
reinforced by timeless bonds—
who keep my words,
moves (dancing!), and
shared memories as
precious cargo,
cherished keepsakes,
A clear reminder that
I exist!  I matter!
I’m something much more
than simply air I breathe
on an unremembered day …
Like that beautiful volleyball
in the rafters

W I L S O N ! ! !




Mark Toney © 2023

Be careful
of looking forward
to something
yet to happen
tomorrow,
later -
that you lose sight
of everything
happening
today,
now.

Happiness: the joy

of the quiet awareness --


of your existence.

my biggest fear is to forget
forget how my lips stretched into a smile
forget how my comments made you giggle when you were raining tears
my biggest fear is to be forgotten
like the shoes that carried you 100km or the eldest daughter
my biggest fear is too common
just like me, riding the waves of insecurity
peace is a breath away but so is shame
the only thing unforgotten in my brain
the way it stitches my situation
the way it feeds the roaring flame
my footprints in the sand are destined to wash away
my biggest fear is to exist without a trace

imagine reaching deep into yourself,
past any sense of doubt or regret,
and reliving what made you -you-.

saturday mornings when your dad
cut grass and expected help he didn't ask for while bacon and eggs waited
in the kitchen,

or sundays where evening cartoons robbed you, so you wished
for extra sleep before sermons
and trips to CVS.

or holidays alone because jobs
are demanding, and it won't happen
again next year, where stillness forms into repression,
fueled by discomforts, angsts,
sadness.

and it isn't until much later
that the light of your own existence
takes root, petals up toward the sun,
and chooses to flourish.

And I have severed the bridge,
The bond of the astral soul
To this corporeal form.
Similarly feeling, so far
From all that is tangible.
What I am, I don't know
And the point, in the grand scheme.
A stream of air, a speck of dust
Tiny particles without any meaning