To exist in the present moment
is to exist in contentment
to command no extremities of emotion
and take deep breaths calmly.

I felt content today.
Like I’ve walked along a bay
with fresh salty sea air and
the wind gently pattering my face.

I felt like I’ve stepped along a shore
leaving no trace
in the sand.

Like I’ve welcomed
the embrace of the wild wind.

And, like a child,
laughing and smiling
and tumbling in the crumbling sand
without a care in the world.

Except the present moment.

My thoughts—waves in sea,
Footprints left upon the sand
are gone forever.

Distraction after another distraction,
Chasing dopamine but it’s fleeting.
My failure to take any real action,
And patterns go again repeating…

Sitting with it would be better-
Creating space with each exhale-
But instead, I seek quick pleasure,
Can I escape from this mental jail?

With each transient gratification,
Receptors meet a chemical reward.
Producing less natural generation-
I just want my brain restored.

I work in the white palace
Input, output, no ripple
in my body, my mind
remains calm, whatever I do

In between I experience the silence
in the red palace rooms
that I can always enter
wherever I am

There I open my skull
into a cup and I experience
myself, let love flow
to what occupies me

There I also look at the lives
of my loved ones, of strangers
and of the people I meet
I embrace them with many arms

of tenderness

In just one split of an instant
Life force entirely withdrew
With your vitality vanished
I find myself severed in two

As heavens expand between us
I fear I’ll recall less each day…
So, I think back through the senses
To keep time’s forgetting away

I’ll always smell you as diesel
From the truck you tried to repair
And later, the antiseptic
Congealing the hospital air

I can still taste the cheap cigars
We inhaled as an attempt to cope
The blandness of the Psych Ward’s meals
where you hid your disorder’s scope

I almost still hear your singing
Of single half-melodic lines
Always found it quite endearing
How you’d repeat them so many times

And, while your laughter still cuts me
It’s Your voice I try to repress
The sound of its damage haunting
Scarred, by the life support process

I still see the flash of brilliance
Intensely piercing through your eyes
But yet, with a sense of softness
When returning silent replies

And I still feel your energy
In brief moments I feel in tune
So, I remember through senses
Until we will meet again soon

step outside the fire circle,
be swallowed by the night,
step farther into the night,
be swallowed by the stars.