#happenstance
Life is what happens when
you unfold what to do with
the raw draw you never saw
letting out-all-the-wood work
I don't have children as result
problems we could not wood
knot marry away our unspoke
foundations ate away youths
Blessings unbeknownst hold
truths we don't know down
roads speed-bumped flying
catch your air up swinging
You can't have children for
body's mystery slick-timing
placing blame on untracked
follies you did while loving
With all life's out-of-crafting
we unfold what to do with
the refined beauty we have
sitting in friendships living
I found what I could knot
have surpassed inside you
Hopefully you see what is
life's full mystery working
May 2
May 2, 2026 at 8:14 PM UTC
Be
hold(v.)
"keep fast or closed,"
as in the grasp of the hand;
wind in the fist, gist of the idea
-- old and given all you know a little
in a world
of plain words,
planned plain easily defined,
with a touch of humility
and some time spent
with Job, for patience sake,
Job and Satan both made points,
Satan welcomed among God's sons,
on duty going to and fro on the surface
establishing the wise serpent referent type
having been taught the who spake true or lied
who admitted novel perspective seeing per mortal
a priori sentience capability, let this mindseye beyourn
a beautifying chaotic whirlwind collapsing on its ownself
inward twisting using science to measure gravity exactly
slinging stones from out of the box, the arc containing holy
what, nada, ala the emperor's new clothes, holy bible truth
is spirit and must be appraised after learning why James is
in truth, a key witness, offering experimental proof, try it,
wisdom from the good side of reality we have being in,
is first pure, uncut
with no provisions
for royal mind pride competition make believe,
exceptionalist nation status under holy writ with Jesus init
a harmless coo', see wait see peace that passeth under
standing stiff pledged allegiance to the representative ideal
liberty and justice for all as envisioned by six year old children.
Whose faith do stories say cannot fail, whose angel serves
just such children as those suffered to come to the truth,
the way life makes life offer wasted years to the truth,
liberty, in truth, wisdom leads little children free to think,
what if whenever two or more agree, we make a holy space…
mutual support structures alluded to by raw knowledge,
experience taken patiently until the gravity bound whirl-
wind contemplates spin-offs fractalling tighter gnosis knots
recognize aggravated cogitations dissipating fog of war
HOLD behold holding true allegiance bound to tell it whole,
as the judge reminds the witness, once under, ever under
hold those self-evident truths true, or disagree, but we
the heirs of salvation, we hold certain truths, tightly
"control or prevent the movement of"
by grasping or constraint;
buckle my shoe, three, four…
opened the door,
hold these truths self-evident, and
should such have been kept closed
secrets of the unforgivable transgression,
how one knows Jesus lied, before opening
We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed
by their DNA, despite flaws,
with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are
Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
All of which have universally true definitions,
Haps as may be disputed, happily, happen,
patterns teach us to find the old way where good is…
accept the wisdom found in all wisdom worships,
the good lessons are easily taught, otherwise,
those lessons taught by greedy people, only
experience teaches those, any fool knows.
Apr 6
Apr 6, 2026 at 6:29 PM UTC
Hey you,
You started off as someone
fun
As someone who could turn
the light of sun
packed inside this bowl of
Hope
And you'd string,
yes...
You'd string me along.
Hey you, again.
Just different form.
You look like someone who'd share that bone
With me
Who'd look at me and see the stars
But you only saw a mirror to your
false ideals
You narcissist who only thought
Of you and only you
alone
With all those chats, you never did
you never asked:
Who I was and why I was born
---
Oh!
Hey you...
You looked different?
You feel a little in between
You're like those other two (or three)
before...
But you still hold some scars
you tore
your heart ligaments
and you'll bring it back
But I can't be here
As you try to tie
it,
zip it,
lock it and unlock it
for the love I can
give
is so much more
Than you ever deserve
NOW or before
So, yes, I missed you dearly
Missed you last night.
Even whispered:
'What if I said it was
you... it was you I was
thinking of?'
Would you...
Drop your walls and let me in
Take me for what I can bring
And know that I will not be
Your remedy
Because I, too
am looking
for someone to bring that torch
for me.
So, I walked away and said adieu
Stopped looking, really
and in the not so far away tune
Someone called me
As I stand at that corner
Giddily getting my coffee
The voice was gentle
Even familiar
It felt like
HOME
And I knew...
I just knew.
Especially when he called me out and said,
"Hey, you!"
Jul 23, 2025
Jul 23, 2025 at 6:08 AM UTC
A photo, a fragment of reality sent by my mother.
Just a piece of sky, one tree, and some ground,
a beautiful landscape with a hopeful, rising spring.
I am not there, but I feel a gentle wind,
carrying the scent of what is living.
On the tram ride,
I saw the damaged walls of the old house.
Some people still live there.
Are they disturbed or happier than I am?
Appearances can be so confusing and shallow.
Every perspective—another world.
The truth is scattered across small backgrounds.
Why do I feel amazed
that not every puzzle fits?
When I was returning home,
a young man sat next to me.
He started to talk about himself
and a series of unfortunate events.
He was looking at me
as if I was everything
while I was nothing more than a simple listener.
So, I got off, wishing him good luck,
knowing I wouldn't see that person again.
My life is overwhelmed by random encounters.
Now, I watch my memory of past situations.
I’m sifting through unclear interpretations,
wondering why I still dwell on symbols.
I wish I could believe
every circumstance was an opportunity,
a unique chance and not as things are today,
just casual happenstance
without coherence or deeper meaning.
Mar 25, 2025
Mar 25, 2025 at 8:54 PM UTC
Still stuck on the fence
Forced to traverse a world that still doesn't make sense
I could embrace the ignorance
But I don't want to take that stance
So I find myself stepping on toes during this awkward slow dance
I wouldn't call it happenstance,
Not a chance
The culprit is this toxic, three-way romance
Between anger, my dark passenger and everything I can't forget to remember
Nothing to see here folks,
At least not at first glance
And that's enough to keep me in this trance
©2024
Jul 19, 2024
Jul 19, 2024 at 12:34 PM UTC
I have never known love at its awakening; To a mere happenstance, it unfurled in the simplicity of side by side walking through the streets, picturing each shared memory at every corner of it. Like we are the side story of someone else who has been on the same spot of the coffee shop, little did we know that we always share memories for someone else to tell.
Have you ever memorized each word that I said that day, from the first time we met, from the way I said each syllable and how I forced myself to not stutter? Although we cannot recall each scene day by day, what matters is that I always remember each fragment of our memory each time I say your name.
_It's like a collision, but it's a peculiar one. It is perfectly meant to meet each other, like it is measured accurately and approximately. But is it really worth the time?_
Jun 24, 2024
Jun 24, 2024 at 11:20 AM UTC
love to see your smile but only when it’s coated by my love
hate to see you violent but my love will calm the rough
jokes that make you giggle until you forgot how grave it was
to be a passing ship in a sea of storms
this was happenstance, yet we cannot ignore
the embers that burn, the tables we turn
the shells we found on our own
Mar 24, 2024
Mar 24, 2024 at 9:13 AM UTC
Promies, never to,
The premise of us to part.
Should I ever leave you,
Let being be dashed-
Against black canvas.
Let blood be
A medium of art.
These shackled hands,
Consequence of circumstance
And everything I have entailed.
Perchance, happenstance-
That which we have lived
And all that was not availed.
The fog of brokenness, and ache of loneliness.
Against reality, we rail.
Jul 7, 2023
Jul 7, 2023 at 6:08 PM UTC
You could change the world.
You should.
Repeat this inauspicious comment to someone;
Age isn't part of the equation.
Even the youth may listen, may remember,
I should change the world.
You did. Some place, at a time unknown.
It's not so obvious as the Butterfly Effect;
Appearing subtly, less noticeable than
Pedaling into a velvet N-E Huron breeze
A walker feels on her wet lips
During a burnt Autumn stroll.
I changed,
And rocked the world
Of my loved ones.
Oct 5, 2021
Oct 5, 2021 at 9:00 AM UTC
#
*Like two streams of vapor, intertwining;
in, and then out;;of one life,
'till the next
dance continues: and we find ourselves
once again,
yet under different
moments of history,
each.
How can a soul desire so much
that it transcends, even time- in it's
need to find its fit,
again,
and again,
and again..*
#
Oct 11, 2019
Oct 11, 2019 at 6:03 PM UTC
I don’t believe in her
But how else could I explain
What phenomenon it was
That drew us to the same place
The same time
The same moment
How could I formulate an answer
To define the reason why
Our eyes fit so perfectly
In the same gaze
And why our minds
Seem to mold
Together into one
Single entity?
Was it luck or happenstance
That crossed our paths
And joined our lives?
Oct 3, 2018
Oct 3, 2018 at 11:09 PM UTC
*Long lines looped the carousel
the first time you gazed my eye,
mounted on that chestnut mare,
grasped tight to the reigns up high.
I see his face around the bend,
a corn dog in his hand.
Locking eyes as I rise. I blush,
above the crowd he stands.
Light flickers, mouths water
delicate contoured lips laugh. I smile.
The music hesitates along with my breath.
I think I'll be staying awhile.
Bewildered and a little dizzy,
I dismount with a giggle.
I lick my dry lips, dreamily,
hoping he is single.
With the wind, a light mist blows.
I can see her slowly get wet,
stumbling she falls my way.
I'm excited, this day isn't over yet
Drip, drip, drip upon my face,
anxiously, I turn to hurry.
In my haste, he catches my waist
swallowing... I fall covertly.
Lips moisten, I pull her near
a kiss, slipped, tongues twirl,
wanton whispers whisked away,
drenched deep passion's unfurl.
A stranger's kiss upon my lips
beneath the dreary skies.
Soaking wet, I'm still on fire
He caught me by surprise.
A stranger's kiss upon my lips
beneath the queching skies.
Heaven sent, a burning desire;
she, such a welcomed surprise.*
Sep 28, 2017
Sep 28, 2017 at 1:37 PM UTC
Happenstance
is what's really
happening
Happenstance
is how it all
once did occur
A moment in time
becomes a memory
without end
Chance encounters
with a special someone
along the way
Brilliantly designed random impromptu rendezvous
Casual and natural
Easy and planned
To see someone
there in person
And to know all
that they maybe
might be
A brief hello
How do you do?
Better now that I met someone so wonderful
Exactly like you.
-R.
8.17
-LA
Aug 18, 2017
Aug 18, 2017 at 9:05 PM UTC
hap
*/hap/
noun
1. luck; fortune
verb
1. come about by chance*
And it hit me,
by happenstance,
that perhaps,
per-chance
I'd been
wrong.
Wrong in believing
a happiness
was owed
to people
and would
flow to me
not by happenstance
but by choice.
By choice
and by choosing
the right path.
But the path
of choice
and of choosing
the one
that is right
is a very wrong
and anxious
path
indeed.
And indeed
I am
the anxious type
from years
of fears
that by
trusting choice
over happenstance
I'd choose
wrong.
But I didn't
choose wrong.
Nor did I
choose right.
I chose
not to choose
at all.
I'm also
the sad type.
And now
I worry
that by
definition of
hap
and thus
of happiness
I'm not sad
by happenstance
but of
choice.
Apr 12, 2017
Apr 12, 2017 at 9:32 PM UTC
The black night’s ebbing tide
erased the only remaining hints,
the cresting long ocean swells
did not cleanse without a trace.
Adrift and lethargically bobbing
seaweed entangled teakwood box
of water-logged photographs, drowning,
surrendered from the heart of the sea
Like molted wild feathers cast ashore with the tide
to the coarse specks of rasping sands,
Darwin's dream in an emptied sea-bubble popped,
dissipated into its own haplessness,
bestrewn about an untrodden seashore
Washed out snapshots of life’s disregarded minutia
enchained to an ordinary forgotten Kodachrome moment
left out to the consequences of the ever fickle tides,
abandoned happenstance spilled by chance
upon another undiscovered world
The warped and bloated wooden box encasement,
hoary with swollen furrowed woodgrain s,
wearied by an enduring measureless moment adrift;
as if an ill-fated message in a misbegotten leaky bottle,
corked with marooned good intentions,
and images of disappearing dreams
flung out shipwrecked in barnacled azure glass
beneath a sky so far away
someone you used to know
Mar 4, 2017
Mar 4, 2017 at 9:37 PM UTC
in a story,
**
As in,
once upon a time,
and
all.**
May 11, 2016
May 11, 2016 at 12:39 AM UTC
That Old Drug Checklist? Completed. No Shame. So get over it.
(It's rather colloquial, however, revealings as well. This is what I said to a boy from driver's ed who wanted to be my boyfriend... So I tried to scare him off. Hahaha. Rationale a la 15-year-old):
Maple: It's not exactly something I talk about, ever, because it just demonstrates my insanity. But, I want to try everything. Every substance, every drug.
Justin: Um, why?
Maple: Why not?
Justin: Well, cause it’s bad.
Maple: If you believe in good or bad, right or wrong. I don't know what I believe except that we're all robots of each other and nothing matters anyways.
Justin: Hmm, that’s a different way of thinking about it. I think that curiosity isn't bad, just be careful. . .
Maple: I don't know if I am, but, meh. Is there really any good reason to do anything?
Justin: Umm, no, not really. It’s what you feel, not what others feel. Well. . . just be careful.
Maple: Safety is a conspiracy.
Justin: Why do you say that?
Maple: Think about it. You can insure everything you own, walk on the right side of the road and follow strong Christian morals that give the illusion of safety, as if you’ll go to heaven if you’re good and hell if you’re bad. But, with one fire, one plane crash. . . well it's all gone. The entirety of you. And who even knows if there is that insured heaven anyways?
Justin: Hmm, you know I think that the way you think is very interesting and mostly true, I mean, nothing is ever completely safe. You can't always be careful, but I also think that you should use this and try to live life to its fullest.
Maple: Thank you. But what is living life to it's fullest? Everyone always says that, but what does it mean?
Justin: Well, like you, I know that what you’re doing is unhealthy, but your not afraid to try different things. You experience more then anyone else, cause most people play it safe in their comfort zone.
Maple: Exactly! Always judging but never trying. Society has made these things into taboos, but are they really? I know that getting addicted is a terrible idea, but everything in moderation. Why always sit on the sidelines making assumptions behind whispered hands and backs? Why not jump into the game?
Justin: Yep, that’s right. You can't sit there say that’s bad or you should do this if you haven't done it yourself. Because if you haven't, you don't know what it’s like and you’re being hypocritical.
. . .
Maple: Um. . . Says the boy who just told me not to do drugs “cause it’s bad.”
May 10, 2016
May 10, 2016 at 9:48 PM UTC
•
The crux of tomorrow
Remains at stake
Through languid eyes
And double takes.
•
May 10, 2016
May 10, 2016 at 6:14 AM UTC
I sat up in bed, wide awake.
Mere seconds separated my dreams from reality. Yet, consciousness had seized me more effectively than ice water.
I had been caged within sleep, until something ridiculous happened.
Something ridiculous, and something real.
I sprang from the covers, pulled on a sweater, and burst out the door. All around me was silent. Life, it seemed, was not yet awake.
I took a deep breath, and began running. I ran so fast my surroundings blurred into a pallet of color; the sound, still muted.
My feet flew across the dewy grass.
I imagined myself into smaller, simpler spaces; tucked in with the ghosts. How fast could I run from my dreams? How fast could I run towards reality?
If the grass had soaked my socks, I barely knew. If the wind had serenaded my skin, I remained disembodied. The alexithymia of consciousness.
My thoughts snaked and swerved and collided in my head, but in that stretch of oblivion, a lone inference guided me.
Nothing mattered in the world but one thought.
Wake up, Maple. Wake up.
The House of Addictions was the epithet I chose.
It nestled several blocks from mine, and was the type of estate that demanded normalcy.
Upon reaching the front hedge, I examined the house; two blue paneled stories. I didn’t know what I’d expected, but this wasn’t it.
I coaxed the front door.
Locked.
I circled around to the backyard. The room I sought was on the second level. I ascended the balcony onto the porch; the room’s window stood several feet from where I could stand. There was a vacant flowerbox sitting on a ledge outside the window.
Without question, I clambered onto the deck’s railing and extended my leg into the flower box. It was a long way to fall, but I wasn’t scared. I had no choice. I clung with all my might to the window’s ledge, shifted my weight to the flowerbox leg, and plopped over the other. A scream frozen in my throat. Breathing heavily, a death grip on my perch, I crouched; the box seemed sturdy enough.
I peered through the window.
At this ungodly hour, he was most likely still asleep.
Unless.
The bed was vacated. Did this mean? I closed my eyes, took a breath.
Wake up.
Things like this did not happen – plain and simple.
A minute later, after clambering off the flowerbox and scampering back down the stairs, I rejoined the street, sprinting along with renewed vigor.
The sun glistened on the grass, the morning, ripening. Yet, I heard not the sound of birds chattering on secluded sycamores, nor my feet pattering along the sidewalk. I was immaterial. I was the wind – gliding fluidly towards that which waited.
My body was to be found at a stoplight, punching the button spastically.
But my mind had already arrived, several streets away.
The stoplight changed. I ran. Stores whizzed by, early morning traffic sheathed the street. I had to slow my thoughts, I had to separate from the stark possibilities that incased me.
I’d dreamed of his death; simple, like the twelve forget-me-nots he threw across my floor five years ago. The last expression I saw as he departed still had yet to leave his face.
Although he moved home a year ago, he never really returned.
Wake up.
I veered my course to the left, dodging through traffic, and found the street.
It was there that my mind had arrived.
This avenue was vacated and tranquil, an eclipse of the earlier. And there was that house; green and silent as ever.
Clutching a stitch in my stomach, I dove over the waist high fence and tripped on my own foot. I fell, scraping my elbows on concrete and swearing beneath my breath, but I couldn’t stop. I scrambled to my feet and staggered towards a ground levelled window.
Exhausted, I tripped again. Then several strangled events laced together. First, I tumbled to that window. I held my hands out, expecting to hit glass, but realized too late that it was open. Before that fully registered, I was toppling – headfirst – through the open window. My insides plummeted, muting my scream. I hit the bed with a sharp thump, before it tossed me to the floor.
There, I landed, **** first, mute and sprawling.
While my body congealed, my heart auditioned as drummer, and stars teased my peripheral.
The room materialized as I blinked through confusion. Softy, I sat myself upright.
His eyes were the first thing I saw.
Reality zapped me so hard I almost fell back again; he was alive, I’d woken up.
Then my senses caught up; my elbows cried, my head throbbed, and my breath rekindled in ragged crackles. As if a switch was flicked, I suddenly identified sound; the humming of cars outside, the crisp ticking of a clock, the gurgling of his fish tank. So loud – so distinct. Color sharpened and brightened.
My mind in overdrive.
He was here.
He sat on his bed, alive and well, speechless with alarm.
Oliver was shirtless, lidded only by flannel pants and black gloves. He considered me with bleeding elbows, disheveled hair, and desperate eyes. Then, the shock on his face gave way for a giant grin.
“Come here often?” He inquired. His voice, raspy with morning.
Still panting and shaking, I conjured a smile to match Oliver's.
“You’d think so. . .” I choked.
“And I’d be right, Maple.” He finished. I managed a laugh.
Nothing had changed.
May 10, 2016
May 10, 2016 at 12:35 AM UTC