Full sta(r)ring
I sit as the window
was a pleading enormous nobody
he declared my head
practically lost.

2.
flustered you’ll doubt that
he glanced
sleep can’t.

3.
Crooked conversation listeners
clenched authority grimy
beside the sight attempt

4.
that chanced amusement
obliged its stiff attempt
by askance explanation
he and the slipped tongue
therefore sitting
on the heels of friday

5.
overhead the engine slipped suddenly when
she whispers explanation
grand

6.
growling hurried difficulty
shouldn’t reason but
the creature bitterly
declared in smaller steps
"you’ll doubt when i"

7.
I blinked and riddle
the shifting moral of executed
fright the cunning
underpromised
dependent muddle
congressional huddle

8.
not the sadistic wet world
glaring or the the the
defended
answers soaped the the the
dyed course
hello doesn’t the the the
let my coming

9.
adding highest denial
we tear the despair
rolling secret sea so far
winter guard softly introduced
my remembered underneath

10.
his daughter
a canary warily dared
to pretend to drink in
bound education of judging

11.
the height dating
and pushy she interrupting
like the party
for wonderful
      couple of sharks

12.
elbow listening did dishes
she declared panicky
we will go by asking
uh um
curled hair blank slate
forming saucepan all sobbing

framed in red light as we move towards the corner it grows larger while you grow smaller and i hope i can remember the image of you smiling while the projection reflected off your glasses with your hair too long in the back and your jeans always several sizes too big and your black t shirt. your underwear was my favorite color that day.

The snow falls around me

in the peacock window light

the trees wave hello to me

while I find a candle to fight

Just let me catch my breath

we spend time wandering through the towns that our father chose

and we spend days looking for the perfect garden rose

because i’ve seen men who stand behind their father’s grave while they hand a gun to the hand they shake and they wait and they wait and they wait

a woman walks into the street with a gun and a boy walks to school wishing he had one

and we hate and we hate and we hate

I’ve stood at the wall and I chased down the hall your sister ran towards the light

we danced in the morning while my brother was snoring and we held each other tight

Tell me, what have you learned?

Where do I begin?
I have learned that
The human experience
Is common to all mankind
And yet each man's life is unique.

I have learned that
Discrimination is unavoidable
For how can you ask a person
To not have their opinion or thought,
But that what man does with that opinion
Is more important than him having it.

I have learned that
Not everyone who is in the position
To teach you, to nurture you, to mould you
Has your best intentions in their hearts.

I have learned that
Love is always conditional
Even when we say it's not
And insist there are no strings attached
Because if love were truly unconditional
Then there would be
No war, no abuse, no struggling, no fights.

I have learned that
I am not the person reflected
In the iris of another's eyes
But rather I am still learning who I am.

I have learned
Many things which words cannot
Begin to describe or articulate
So I just have to end with:

Tell me, what have you learned?

As the years go flying past
you realise just how much
your perspective changes and
when I now look back at how
things were I realise that far
from having had an uneventful life
mine has been one so full and rich
with love and laughter that I wonder
that there was time for it all to fit.

How we laughed as we left the wedding reception
and all those ‘old fogeys’ and drove away
to enjoy our honeymoon together – alone!
and how we loved each other finding fun in
all that we did together, sometimes
just looking at each other – and how
highly amused we were by the ‘jobs-worth’
car-park attendant by our hotel who stuck his hand out
the moment we crossed his threshold and said
“ten *** please”, he did it every time we went
there, often just to hear him say it again, and
how beautiful you looked in that dress that was
covered in the lovely cherry design. I think
everybody else loved you too.

How wonderful the mead tasted as we sat by the
pub fire in a place we’d never before heard of
never letting go of each others hands for a minute
and how the regulars who treated us so nicely
must have thought we were a bit bonkers.

The joys in raising our beloved children and
the intertwining pain of watching them sometimes
get a little hurt along the way, but our always
being there to help them find their own right solutions
has helped weave a rich tapestry through our lives.
The times when you want to take their pain and
make it your own – but can’t, the smile on their faces
and their laughter as they play with friends and
of course the grumpy expressions as they rail against
doing homework and tidying things like bedrooms. But
what pride we felt at their achievements along the way.

And now they too are married, one on a beach
under a lovely blue sky on the other side
of the world, and one in a most beautiful
church in our capital city. We spend such a
lot of time laughing with our grandchildren,
they are so very clever, and so funny – and
they just make us feel so young again.

Illness – illness!! Now there’s an unfortunate
word, one that has been used in our lives rather
more often than we would like. My wife has been ill,
survived and can still love and laugh. I have too,
but I can still love and laugh. Our children are not
unscathed either from this darker part of growing older,
and yet they too still happily love and laugh very much
and with all their hearts. Illness really is just
a small percentage of our time here.

So now when I reflect on my life I realise that
far from being ordinary I have been very lucky
indeed to have taken part in a life that has overflowed
with love and fun and laughter and only the occasional
sadness and it’s then that we help each other through
to the other side of it. It turns out the fact is
there has been nothing ordinary about my life at all.

And I’ll not be bowing out yet – not yet

©Joe Wilson – My life less ordinary 2014

He promised her the moon and stars,
When in reality, it was the sun she longed for.
"I can not give you the world. If I could you know I would."
Her words "I need to move away from your kindness, to find it all.
My greed persists and I refuse to change."
That was the day the sun forever would shine, due to his wishes.
Running back she kissed him, "thank you for this." He turned away and walked into the only bunker, the only protection from the sun. Locking it's door, "now it is your turn to burn."
The end.

"The ocean, the shore, and the grass

The difference between them three"

Can one see where I am?

Here laying in the grass,

Following up to what appears

To be whatever it appears to be

I can’t tell what I need

So content without

But so colorful when you look out

The shore

Like therapy that leaves its mark

I need to be washed

The remains of the abyss

Sink me in

The agony of the hot sun

Wearing me out till I become none

I need to go

Where the tides say no

The ease of the lake

My past feels fake

Will I ever respawn

‘*** now I’m forever gone

At first
I thought my insanity left
But instead
my sanity came;