It is not a lake of fire,  sweet one

It is a place  that tells us
  that we are Loved


The only thing that burns
is the View,  seen from a distance..
from across the Chasm

--One that,  before its over
will no longer exist.

True story. xox

Poetry is both lighthouse and harbor.
It does not force the journey, nor does it
fill the void of what is unresolved
It stands in its own gravity, unmoving;

      Offering only a silent invitation:
      Will you Unfold?

There is a craving that walks the shorelines of poetry,
a widow’s walk of those who have not yet learned
how to participate in what they long for.

They circle the docks,
watching the ships come and go,
watching the light shift across the waves,
watching for something that will draw them
back home.

Some mistake the lighthouse for the flame
and rush toward it as if to be consumed,
as if breaking open is the same as being made whole.
But the call is not to burn.

The call is to move toward what moves toward you,

   to become ready for  the return
   rather than wither within the waiting.

A moth drawn only to light
will die before it ever understands
what it was meant to become.
But a moth that finds its way to the cocoon
will emerge with wings strong enough
to meet the wind.

This is the choice—
to remain circling, craving, watching
or to disappear into the transformation
that will allow you to stand whole
when the vessel returns.

For he is both the lighthouse and the emerging vessel,
both the safe harbor and the dock,
where the journey finally ends.
And she, in waiting, is not idle..

She does not chase passing figures,
nor fill the silence with lesser pursuits.
She does not betray the longing
with distraction.

She deepens.

She prepares to meet the one
who braved the waves to return.

And when at last the ship appears,
bathed in the light of its own voyage,
she will not meet him as she was—

   .. but as she has Become.

Author's Note:

This piece is not an accusation.
It is a meditation on the invisible processes that hollow men from within, until dignity itself becomes foreign to them.

It was written out of love for what could still be restored—
and sorrow for what has already been surrendered.

It speaks not just to the fallen,
but to every soul tempted to trade courage for comfort, or brotherhood for collusion.

Its aim is simple:

To remember what is still worth standing for.

To remember what dignity feels like.

To remember that one man, rising rightly, can still light a thousand silent fires.


This is not a call to fight against anyone.
It is a call to rise for something greater.

And that rising always begins alone—
but never ends alone.

---

I. The Quiet Death of Courage

Cowardice rarely announces itself.
It does not charge the city gates or tear down banners.
It does not raise its fist or shout in the streets.

It simply withdraws.

A little at a time:

A small silence when truth could have been spoken.

A small appeasement when resistance was needed.

A small betrayal of the self, justified as "wisdom," or "timing," or "strategy."


Cowardice is the art of dying in small increments.

It is a death invisible at first—
but felt all the same,
especially by those who still remember what life tasted like.

---

II. The Architecture of Collapse

A man does not become a coward all at once.

It happens in stages:

1. The First Silence

At first, he says nothing when he should have spoken.
He tells himself it was prudence.
He convinces himself that silence was strength.

It was not.

It was the first small surrender of the ground within him.

---

2. The Second Betrayal

Next, he acts against his own spirit—
not because he is coerced,
but because he seeks the approval of the small and the fearful.

He trades his birthright for belonging.

---

3. The Third Rationalization

Then he builds a philosophy around his collapse.
He calls cowardice "compassion."
He calls compromise "wisdom."
He calls retreat "strategy."

He must call it something,
for he can no longer bear to call it what it is.

---

4. The Fourth Contagion

Finally, he evangelizes his collapse.

He cannot stand to be alone in his shrinking.
He must make others shrink too, so that his own fall will seem normal.

He calls cynicism "truth."
He calls bitterness "clarity."
He calls betrayal "maturity."

And so the infection spreads.

---

III. The Hallmarks of the Cowardly Spirit

What does the cowardly spirit look like once matured?

It has specific, predictable characteristics:

It ridicules what it secretly envies.

It mocks beauty, calling it naiveté.

It mistrusts love, calling it weakness.

It punishes hope wherever it finds it.

It colludes quickly with other cowards, for it cannot endure the mirror of a brave soul.


Most of all,
it refuses to stand alone in anything noble.

It will only move
when surrounded by a sufficient crowd of accomplices,
all murmuring together that cowardice is, after all,
"just the way the world works."

---

IV. The Consequences: The Inheritance of the Cowardly Spirit

The coward believes his failures die with him.

They do not.

Every surrender of the soul plants a seed—
and what the coward will not face, the next generation must.

Cowardice is not content to remain private.
It leaks. It spreads.
It builds hidden systems of decay in places meant to be sacred:

Brotherhood.

Family.

Love.

Trust.


Here, we observe the inevitable fruits of the coward’s hidden betrayals:

---

1. The Poisoning of Brotherhood

The coward cannot abide true brotherhood, for it demands loyalty to something higher than himself.

Where brotherhood calls men to rise, he calls them to collude.
Where brotherhood builds strength, he breeds resentment and small betrayals.

True brotherhood requires courage:

The courage to tell the truth.

The courage to stand beside the fallen and help them rise.

The courage to call out wrong even when it costs everything.


The coward, unwilling to bear these costs, transforms brotherhood into mob-hood.
It becomes not a place of strengthening, but a collective graveyard of broken wills.

---

2. The Contamination of the Vulnerable

The coward is not content to rot alone.
He must gather others into his decay — especially those still innocent enough to hope.

He mocks hope as naiveté.
He redefines loyalty as silence.
He teaches the young that the only safety lies in cynicism, deceit, and crowd protection.

Thus, the cowardly spirit perpetuates itself—
turning the next generation of seekers into scavengers.

The vulnerable, robbed of examples of true dignity, inherit nothing but confusion and despair.

The sins the coward would not confess
become the legacies his sons and daughters must carry.

---

3. The Formation of the System

When enough cowards gather,
their private collapses harden into public systems.

It is no longer just a man here, or a man there.
It is a construct—a culture.

A place where cowardice is normal,
where betrayal is cleverness,
where faithfulness is mocked,
where mercy is treated as weakness.

The system becomes self-perpetuating—
enforced not by dictators, but by the small daily collusions of those too afraid to stand.

And thus, without ever firing a shot,
cowardice conquers the city.

Not with weapons.
But with withdrawal.
With silence.
With the endless failure to love rightly when it was hardest to love.

---

V. The Restoration: The Only Way Back

There is no shortcut out of cowardice.

There is no clever argument that can restore dignity to a man who has surrendered it.

There is only one way back:

The man must choose to stand again—alone if necessary—before the gaze of God and truth.

---

1. The Necessity of Aloneness

To be restored, the man must abandon the crowd.
He must leave behind the murmuring alliances of smallness that once comforted him.

He must stand naked in the light of reality:

Without excuse.

Without camouflage.

Without borrowed dignity.


He must see himself as he truly is—
not as the victim of circumstance,
but as a willing participant in his own ruin.

This is why restoration begins with loneliness.

Because dignity cannot be borrowed.
It must be reborn.

---

2. The Cost of Repentance

True repentance is not an apology to the crowd.

It is an apology to the soul he abandoned.
An apology to the Source he betrayed.
An apology to the ones he harmed by his absence of courage.

Repentance is not a performance.
It is a slow rebuilding—
stone by stone, day by day—
of a life that will no longer lie.

It is the refusal to be a man whose silence feeds decay.
It is the refusal to call cowardice "wisdom" just because it is popular.

It is the willingness to lose everything false
in order to gain one thing true.

---

3. The Unfolding Strength

As the man stands,
he will feel at first as though he is dying.

And in a way, he is.
The part of him that survived by submission is perishing.

But what rises in its place
is something the system of cowards has no weapon against:

A man who can no longer be bought.
A man who can no longer be frightened.
A man who, even alone, even broken, refuses to bow to lies.

One such man
can dismantle the machinery of cowardice
simply by breathing differently.

---

4. The Lineage of New Fire

When one man stands rightly,
he gives birth to a lineage.

He shows others what it looks like to stop surrendering.
He awakens those still sleeping in their excuses.

He does not have to preach loudly.
He does not have to prove anything.

His existence becomes a rebellion.
His faithfulness becomes an invitation.
His dignity becomes a seedbed for the rebirth of brotherhood.

He becomes a true elder.
A true warrior.
A true builder of sacred things.

He becomes a man who no longer merely survives—
but who lives.

---

And so the story turns:

The cowardly system is dismantled
not by greater violence,
not by harsher words,
but by the silent rising of men and women
who refuse to live any longer beneath their birthright.

They will not key the beauty they envy.
They will not scavenge the ruins.
They will not mock what they are too small to understand.

They will build.
They will love.
They will stand.

They will remember:
that heaven was always meant to be built from blood, yes—
but also from breath, and bone, and unbreakable fire.

And so they will live,
not because they were the strongest,
but because they were the most faithful.

What is it about that elusive word?
I will throw my arms around it,

          --if it could only  become
                   tangible  to me.

             Children sit in families..
(and there was bonding from the beginning)



I don't know what that means


I don't know  how that feels..



I   don't..


                                                    ...­            



                              I ...   don't...


                                                     kn--....



    ...





                  I ..       .



                                    ....

Someone please tell me,  that

..The true Art of Love  is more
than the self-centered,  'incestuous'
  form of  love,  shown
within what the Modern world
refers to as "Romantic love"..
aw ****.. please tell me it is more

    Romantic love says this--
"You are 'of value' to me because I love you"
"You are 'of value' to me because you are in my life"
"You are 'of value' to me because you are  mine"

And after the 'bliss-filled'  romantic love
     ***** the bed..
the only value that remains is through the residual,
soon to be diluted and washed out by displacement--

..Either that of a new self-centered based  'filling'
or that of the re-placement of "value-image"  
with that, brought about through the all-too-ready
  and internally-available Gaslighting process

So please, please explain it to me just how  wonderfully
"romantic' love can truly ever aid in the healing process..
     someone.. please.


     .      .      .      .      .      .      .    

Alone  she sits in her room,  waiting.
The atoms  of the air,  
carry  both sides  of the story--

  The coldness  and the warmth
  the closeness, and the distance

  ..the empty-black
  followed by the Sky-filled Blue

  Someone please tell me,  just who
  helped this little-one  to see
     that the way  out..
     is the way,  through?

Protected to the point  of nearly dying
    Insulation is isolation to the bone
     (she is crying, crying,  crying)

On a Prayer mat,  facing East;
a grounded soul  is flying

    (but flying  so very all alone)

There is a Chaste,  and a Purity
  Borne separated
from the Un-doings  of man..
    Void of all walls,  
   there is a susceptibility

Yet also  a wide-Opening
    to the pressings  of the Ache

There has been a waiting
to the point of near Death
A look in Patient eyes
    (One that separates me  
       from my breath)

Not all are so protected
from the Fallen  love of man
..Not all  have almost died
so all alone  in their room; 

  protected

From that empty kind  of love
leading to an empty, empty  Death

When love beckons to you,  follow him,
though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you   yield to him,
though the sword,  hidden among his pinions
may wound you.

And when he speaks to you  believe in him
though his voice may shatter your dreams
as the north wind lays waste the garden.

For even as love crowns you  so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth,  so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height  and caresses
your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
so shall he descend to your roots
and shake them in their clinging to the earth.
Like sheaves of corn  he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you  until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire,
that you may become sacred bread for God's sacred feast.

All these things shall love do unto you
that you may know the secrets of your heart,
and in that knowledge,
become a fragment of Life's heart.

But if in your fear, you would seek only love's peace
and love's pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness
and pass out of love's threshing-floor,
into the seasonless world--
Where you shall laugh..  but not all of your laughter,
And weep..  but not all of your tears.
Love gives naught but itself and takes naught, but from itself.
Love possesses not,  nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.

When you love you should not say,
"God is in my heart,"
but rather,
"I am in the heart of God."
And think not you can direct the course of love,
for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.

Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires,
let these be your desires--

To melt and be like a running brook
that sings its melody to the night.

To know the pain of too much tenderness.

To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.

To wake at dawn with a winged heart
and give thanks for another day of loving;

To rest at the noon hour and meditate love's ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart
and a song of praise upon your lips.

~Kahlil Gibran

Vancouver Bay, viewed out the front
window, as out the back door,
the snowcapped Olympics loom..
A beautiful ocean breeze  here
in Port Angeles.. and amazing
warmth,  in the sun.

Hours long visits with my Mother
yesterday and today.. and then us
finding a long lost cousin  on
ancestry .  com  when we get  back
to the house. Pictures of dad there
when he was young before the war.
Stories and memories  from Mom
about before  and after, everything
went bad.

And pictures, pictures, pictures
of before it went bad..

      but none after.

I feel the distance  of the memories
but not the pain. I hold Momma close
within the knowledge  that nothing
whatsoever  has a hold on me. Elaine
is serving meals and catering to
our mother in her Rainman-like
attempt, to keep all her pain at bay;

    She is flesh of my flesh..
    blood.. of my blood.
    There with me  from the beginning--

    amidst the horrors  far beyond
    a child's innocent vocabulary
    to describe.

Back home she opens up
ancestry . com again  as Harlan talks
about his adoption  and attempt at
reconnection with his blood family,
once he finds out who they are.  Few
even want to acknowledge his  existence.

   The distant cousin of ours
   wants to tell Elaine about Dad
  right after the war.

After she responds, I **** on her
leg and then wave another, directly her way.
She's trying  to keep from laughing
as she fakes throwing up.

   I **** on her one more time
   just to show her who's boss..

She's like a machine  in her need
to take care of Mom. We take pictures
when again,  back over there..
I keep messing the timer up
on my phone's camera,
I think Mom wants to be left alone.

I don't think Mom ever
wants to be left alone.

She straight-arms me when I try
to help her up from the table.
I step back,  
but don't take it personally.
Back on the couch..  she's
she's cranky now, because the
current New York times  arrived
with a tear. She opens up the
business section and I tell her
Warren Buffett is my new boss.
She's very pleased with his ownership
of our company, and then immerses
herself into her newspaper.

   Elaine says its time to go.

She will ask Elaine again tomorrow
morning if I was really here..  or
was it her imagination. I will show
her again tomorrow that I am very
real. There have been horrors  beyond
description. There are years and years
and years,  of my letting go.

Back at the house, I sit on the front
steps and stare out at the bay.
Victoria Island is beautiful.
The Olympic Mountains are breathtaking.
Time with Harlan and Elaine  as the
sun goes down. I wave a **** one more time,  
her way.. for good measure.  
She brings me Rocky Road ice cream  
because she remembers its my favorite.
I muster up one more **** her way
before heading off to bed.

She comments about my strength.

Back down in the guestroom,
you are on top of me--
your beautiful thighs  straddling my hips..
You've been working out, beautiful girl
that firm ***..  feeling so incredible
in my hands..
You ease your beautiful, warm wet
slowly..  down on to me
in your desire to  bring about
   for each of us..
   the most beautiful,  deep release.

You kiss me deeply,  as our bodies  writhe
in deep ******--
Beautiful ****,  to my chest
as I pulse the warmth  of my *****
deeply,   in to you..

"This is the death  of all death, beautiful girl"..
I whisper into your weary spirit
as your beautiful *****..  gushes deeply
all over my warm, pulsing  flesh.


..And suddenly  we are *******
in the warm,  pouring rain--

https://www.pornhub.com/view_lala-la-la-lala-la



       You are overcoming, beautiful girl.
                         ~xoxoxo~

The center of the City is a hub..
the roads leading out (back in);
the spokes of a wheel

The road alongside,
is traveled  by so many
I am the rust on the rim
that aches  its way in

It is so much work
to return to that of Titanium
The beautiful Hub begs
  I do my best.

I marvel at the fact
that I have not yet even  begun
to find what my best really is.


Let it be..     No..

  May it be..



   ..that  of the world

           of  the  Unlimited

(you sweet..  succulent,
                       tender  little ****..)



"I don't know what to keep
and what to throw away, Paul"


"All of it, young love..   none of it..
I mean wait..     what?"


"All's I'm saying  is..
I can finally see myself  in the
reflection, now that the mirror's
wiped clean. Problem is..  I can only
hold on to it for so long before it all
completely goes away again..

    the image of me, I mean"


"Ah. young Lovely..
the insurgent is embedded   far too
deeply  into the City  called,
'All of who it is that you are'
To engage it or try to take it out right now
is  going to create far too much
collateral damage"


"Then what am I to do..
how am I going to be able to hold on?"


"I have an idea, young love..
       Shhh..  listen--"

Oh how you always end up
in my bed, when you are most hurt--
My hands on your gorgeous hips
as I pull you  fully, down on to me..

A true descending..  into
the further-reaches  of you
In to places  previously untouched
As I hold you there

As if  for an eternity

Till you are no longer  
unable  to feel me..

Until you are  fully
able to feel me

To want to learn how become comfortable with who it is
that you are.. within your own skin, is the  firstfruit  beginnings
that will lead into the healing and resolve of your  inability
to be alone, and the overwhelming need of your  current
emptiness to have its debilitating loneliness filled in ways  
that in the long run, bring about more harm into your world
than good.

What I brought to you involves the less traveled road  that leads
into true healing and resolve of this primary and current
issue of yours..  
    but at this point, that is not what you want.
The emptiness  you will now have filled in your own current way,
   but it will come at such a cost.
You were built to become healed into the fullness
of who it is that you are..
and the comfort within your own skin
that fullness will bring to you..
and therefore to your whole household.

That process takes time.
It is difficult and uncomfortable.
It takes trust and the desire to truly love yourself.

I did not lie to you.

You can start again with a different supportive,
loving friend..

if you are fortunate enough to find one.



I hope for you that you do.  
xox

I never tried to hurt you, I never ever wanted to hurt you. There is no way that you can write without drawing out the best parts of the warmest and most loving hearts, but every time ones such as yourself draw from me (without your even knowing it) the best I have to give in response, I still somehow end up ******* it all to hell.

There is no way whatsoever that a person who conveys their innerworkings and trauma the way that you do should ever slip through the cracks-- unloved, unheld, and un-cared for by loving, supportive hearts.. (and I'm not talking about romantic love..)
I have an idea who it is that you are in real life, by what you have chosen to convey of yourself and your story throughout the years.. but that doesn't really matter either, I guess

because history tells me that my unfiltered way of talking would just **** that up also.

But if an honest struggler such as yourself wanted a ****-up artist to never give up responding from the heart.. if that is what it takes to help keep the wild, unfettered ones like you (at least, writing-wise) from slipping, alone into despair, then that is what I will do.. not give up either.

But trust me when I tell you, babe.. I am burned out also.

Never, ever give up believing. If there were enough ones such as yourself (as to what you are writing here), or even just you, alone-- continuing to write open-heartedly the way you have in the past, and again here.. I promise that I would not give up also. If you want to be held closely when the ravens come and have picked your hope clean, then that is what you will most likely receive.. and I dont necessarily mean from me. I have studied your heart and spirit through your chosen posted words almost since the very first day I got here.

There is no way that others cannot both see and feel those things also, kid.

Hold on to that.

In the wounds of woman and the steadfastness of man,
   Eden remembers.


Movement One: The Celebration of the Wound

He does not bring the scalpel
because he despises her wound..
   he brings it

because he loves her glory too much
to leave it buried beneath the scar.

He does not cut her to own her.
He cuts her, trembling,
because he believes in what will rise
when the old blood runs clean.

It is not an act of violence.
It is an offering of celebration—
the highest kind of self-love,
the boldest kind of faith—
to believe that the Lord Himself
will bend over the wound
and pour His living water
into the brokenness.

And as the wound opens,
and the darkness spills out,
he does not recoil.
He does not rescue.
He does not preach.

He watches.
He prays.
He stands.

And when she rises,
washed and radiant,
he knows:
her rising demands his own.

There is no longer room
for smallness in him.
No longer space
for hidden shadows to cling.

For her glory will call forth his.
And his celebration of her healing
will tear open the last vestiges of his shame,
until his own light sings back to hers,
undiminished, unafraid.

This was never a conquest.
It was always a coronation.
It was always the Gospel written in flesh.

It was always love.

---

Movement Two: Standing in the Breach

He stands now,
at the trembling edge
where blood and water meet spirit.

He does not flinch at her unraveling.
He does not cover her nakedness in shame.
He does not grasp at her breaking,
nor reach to hasten her healing.

He stands.

A living shield.
A silent witness.
A priest without altar or knife.

He understands:
his strength is not proven
by his power to fix—
but by his power to wait.

To watch as Love Himself
tends the wound,
cradles the scar,
renews the soul.

To endure the terror of powerlessness
without collapsing into control.

This—
this is his glory:
that he can behold her agony,
and still believe
that the end of her suffering
will not be death,
but birth.

That the light swelling beneath her skin
will one day eclipse even the memory of the blade.

And in that waiting,
he too is cut open.

He too is pierced by the same water,
the same fire,
the same song of new creation.

And he knows:
only a man who can stand silently in the breach,
bearing her vulnerability without corrupting it,
is worthy to walk beside the woman
reborn by the touch of the Living God.

He does not steal her resurrection.
He bears it.

He does not name her rising.
He joins it.

---

Movement Three: The Ascension of Two

They do not walk out of the garden
as they once did—
naked and ashamed,
separated by fear,
carrying fig leaves sewn from survival.

They rise now
fully clothed in light—
not light borrowed,
not light stolen,
but light born from wounds
washed clean in sacred water.

She stands,
not above him,
not behind him,
but beside—

her beauty no longer weaponized,
her tenderness no longer bartered.

And he—
he no longer hides behind strength,
no longer confuses sacrifice with silence,
no longer fears her radiance
as a threat to his crown.

They do not complete one another.
They honor what was completed
before time ever breathed.

She holds the memory of Eden.
He bears the ache of its return.

And together—
they offer the altar of their becoming
to the One who formed them both.

This is not romance.
This is restoration.

This is not power.
This is presence.

This is the kind of union
that does not dim under pressure,
does not wither under attention,
does not fracture when seen.

It is the kind
that makes the darkness jealous.

Because when man and woman
stand in full light together,
wounds lanced,
glory rising—
the Garden itself begins
to hum with memory..

And God walks there once more.

There are men whose names are not remembered,
but whose breath stirs the veil between realms.

They possess no oxen, no golden inheritance,
only the weight of many souls carried in silence—
some wrapped in tenderness,
some lost to hunger,
some gifted to them like riddles in human skin.

Their wealth is not measured in coin,
but in what they’ve been asked to hold,
and in how long they choose to hold it
after the fire comes.

One such man lived,
not in Uz or Ur,
but in the crease between battle cries and bedtime prayers.
He walked beneath the eye of heaven
and bore a covenant that no one else could see—
except perhaps the ones who left him.

Among the names he carried
was a flame
so luminous,
the watchers behind the veil turned their gaze sideways
and whispered to one another:

“That one—she is worth a thousand hills.”

---

And so began the unraveling.

The girl became a gate.
A field.
A kingdom in peril.

And the shadows,
long held at bay by her breath and memory,
moved to claim her under the guise of delight.
They clothed themselves in cadence,
anointed her with affirmation,
and crowned her with a chorus of well-crafted lies.

She smiled—
because what is possession
when it feels like belonging?

---

In another place,
the man who carried her name
did not break.

He did not rage.
He did not plead.

He simply stood
in the dirt he was formed from
and remembered that God had once
breathed into clay.

He wrote.
Not to win.
Not to fight.

But to remain.

And something in that stillness—
that refusal to perform—
became a mirror.

A mirror so polished,
so unbearable in its clarity,
that the shadows who came to feed
began to see their own faces
reflected in the place they hoped to claim.

---

The cattle were not lost.
They were transfigured.
The sons were not dead.
They had become winds.
And the daughters?

The daughters returned
only when no one chased them.

---

The man’s armor was not steel.
It was witness.
It was the quiet weight of staying.
Of being the one who did not run
when every echo told him to fall.

He bore the shape of a shield
not forged by war,
but by worship.

A shield of shining dirt.

And it gleamed not because it was flawless—
but because it remembered the breath
that first made it rise.

---

Let the hills be counted.
Let the goats be wild.
Let the watchers name what they will.

But know this:

There are men who will stand in silence
until the storm mistakes them for stone.
And in that stillness,
there are things that shift beneath the veil—

not because they are provoked,

but because they have been
seen.

Prairieland grass--
bent over towards the ground
by the dry, Fall wind
as the subtle warmth
  of a teasing Sun..

Submits itself to the
now impending Winter..
where grass and seed
sleep in dormancy
as the subzero wind
prepares the ground  
to receive  snow.. upon snow

upon snow.

..And there is this temptation
to draw feelings   and conclusions
from any one certain  part
   of the whole.

And those feelings and conclusions..
                             --they feel so very real

Because they were based upon  the real;
but only a part of the beautiful whole..
And though,  even  one part of the whole
is as real as every single  other part..

It is  in itself, incomplete.
Just as the bent-over prairiegrass
under the snow  is incomplete..


It is Spring now..  sweet, struggling Angel

    All things become new.

She is hiding behind her projected frumpiness..
but when my young lovely takes off her glasses;

   Ah,    ****..

Those eyes are the reason men were given theirs.

Group facilitator is Christ incarnate..
                                      I am sure of it.

     "How well do you want to get, Paul"

I look over at her--
curled up on a chair pad..
hiding,  wondering
Looking down.. and then looking up at me
wondering if I'm gonna answer him;

      "Paul?  Are you there?"

I stare at her--  all alone,
biting the back of her fingers
fighting tears few in this world
would understand


There is roll-playing  in the group
using both action and Word
   to climb all over me
   and uncover me from where I hide.

He (my Jesus with an MA)
is staring at me,  inviting
I look back over at her
"I'm not leaving it, Dave"

              "Leaving what. Paul?"

"My brokenness..
its shattering of my soul"

He is staring at me, but begins to smile.
I look over at her,  and just know

  I will be with her forever

In the name of love..
in the name of   the Value
you bring to the family

In the name of  just how  good
you can make Grandfather feel
on that worn-out, old brown chair

What were you when he started...  four?
He said he loved you
He said this is what love looks like

And you took it into your little mouth

And in an instant
a sweet little, innocent child
became an un-feeling, little product

Of the un-feeling  love of man

"I'm lying in my bed, the blanket is warm
This body will never be safe from harm
I still feel your hair, black ribbons of coal
Touch my skin to keep me whole

If only you'd come back to me
If you laid at my side
Wouldn't need no Mojo Pin
To keep me satisfied

Don't wanna weep for you, don't wanna know
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The memories fire, the rhythms fall slow
Black beauty I love you so

Oh, precious, precious silver and gold
And pearls in oyster's flesh
Drop down we two to serve and pray to love
Born again from the rhythm
Screaming down from heaven
Ageless, ageless and I'm there in your arms

Don't wanna weep for you, I don't wanna know
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The memories fire, the rhythms fall slow
Black beauty I love you so
So, so, so

Oh, the welts of your scorn, my love, give me more
Send whips of opinion down my back, give me more
Well it's you I've waited my life to see
It's you I've search so hard for

Don't wanna weep for you, don't wanna know
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The memories fire, the rhythms fall slow
Black beauty I love you so, so
Black, black, black beauty"

~Jeff Buckley
Tim's beautiful, beautiful boy

What if I'm right..
and the  strange things  I do
(that seem so "cruel" to you)
are the only way that you can finally
become  able  to  truly see?  
What if what you once felt  to be cruel
entended up being the most  loving
thing you've ever experienced?  
I'm not downplaying what I've done
  or trying to minimize it
or justify my actions in any way at all..
I am just trying to tell you that the
original damage went into you with
severity and it's own form of selfish
violence.  

Breaking that severity can never be a very pretty thing.

What if my love for you,  and the
strange way that I do it
is the only thing that would have
  ever worked

to help you to finally have a chance?



I am broken too.. and  the only way I
can truly enter into your brokenness

     is when your  brokenness


b re a k s



              against mine.

When you are Loved,
and so deeply cared for;

There is nowhere to run..
  Nowhere to hide

The only thing you can do
(under the warmth of that beautiful Hold)

     Is to slowly unwind..
     Until  you  Become.

It is already in you, Love..
buried behind the horrible Residual.
Remember..?

Within the soon to crumble Wall..

within the Corruptible,
that was so unfairly and horribly
     corrupted

Is the  absolutely Beautiful  in you
that has been  (and always will be)
     Incorruptible
.. preciously-Hidden, behind the wall


"It is Incorruptible..
It cannot undergo Decay"

You are in there, sweet-one
   buried underneath
every horrible part of it all.

      As the wall comes down..
      Love will find you.


   When allowed,
   it always, always does.

(For the one who asked if we would continue)

She does not aim to destroy him.
She does not even try to teach him.

   She simply Becomes.

And her becoming—raw, radiant, terrifying in its beauty—
is what breaks him open.

The man who watches her rightly does not crave her.
He remembers himself in her Unfolding.
Not the ego-self. The soul-self—the one buried beneath performance.

She does not say: "Come fix me."
She says: "Can you stand what I’m becoming?

And that is the call.

For it is not the broken feminine that births great men.
It is the rising feminine—becoming whole before his eyes—
that forces him to face what in him remains unclaimed, untested, afraid.

But she does not rise by accident.

Her light is not a crown—it is a choice.
She has known the temptation to ****** instead of shine..
To brand her ache, to perform her pain, to curate identity instead of embody truth.

But she turns—again and again—toward the deeper  yes.
The one that costs her audience, but saves her soul.

She repents. She reclaims.
She speaks, then listens.
She writes, then revises.
She does not demand to be understood—

   she hungers to be made whole.

Her rising is her responsibility.
Not a show, not a vengeance, not a staged deliverance.
It is the quiet courage to be seen—by God,
   even if man never looks again.

And so, she becomes the muse.
Not by force, not by flirtation,
but by standing in her own unfolding,
in her own ache made sacred.

She does not ****** him with need.
She muses him with light.

But her light is costly.

It exposes the unintegrated parts of him—
the unredeemed rooms he’s kept boarded up for years.
She does not kick down the door.
She simply opens the curtains.

And in that sudden flood of glory,
he must choose:
to run, or to remain.

If he remains—
not as savior, not as shadow,
but as witness—
he becomes new.

This is not *******.
It is mutual divination.

She rises,  and he roots.
He roots,  and she trusts.
And they become—together—

    the very echo of Eden.

Not by escaping the fire,
but by walking through it as invitation.

Not as gods.
But as those who remember who made them.

And when she falters—when the ache flares again—
it is not applause she turns to.
It is him.
The one who stood.
The one who still stands.
The one whose strength was not his own,

but who dared to offer it anyway.

His is the strength she draws from, all along—
strength born not of dominance,

but of what she called forth in him
when she chose to rise.

And so, they become
what neither could be alone:
the light that burns
    but does not consume,

   the root and the flame,
   the holy loop of return.

A polite smile,
a wave..

And everything,  unknowable
is made so flowable.

Thus is the world.
Thus is your world.


I will choose to die in obscurity
unknowable, too.  No gravestone
No memory.

Nothing.

Thus is my world
created by a world

so intentionally, unknowable.

Let it be the Mountain she finds Holy—
not because it sparkles,
seduces her
or speaks in riddles,

but because its dark loamy soil
receives her bare feet like a memory.

A prairie hill above the sea,
where grasses bow and whisper,
and the wind carries the salt and scent of things
too old for names—
that’s where the house stands.
Not built from stone,
but from time.
And longing.

And the laughter of those
who once remembered Eden.

Let her dig down,
as if the roots of a wildflower
were waiting to rise through her skin,
lifting her slowly from within—
the stem, the pistil,
the fragile yet indestructible bloom.
Let the soil speak to her in silence,
saying:

You are still loved.
You are still alive.
You are not what happened to you.

Let her turn toward the sun—
not in shame,
but in radiant defiance—
and know in that moment
where her help truly comes from.

Let her running to the mountain
be joy, not dread.
Let her ascent be not an exile,
but a return.

Let her wings unfold brazenly,
as the daughter of the living God.
Not tucked.
Not hidden.
Not compromised.

She does not belong to the mountain that mocks love
and feeds on the ruin of hearts,
or exploits that which is still unhealed

She belongs here—
where her own flesh and bone
become not only family
but friend,
through the common bond
of the soil that gives life to all who dare to sink into it.

She belongs
where peace lives in warm light on cold nights,
where cotton sheets smell of soap and skin,
and starlight sifts through trees
like the hush of forgiveness.

Let her remember her first love..
before the theft,
before the theater.
Before the wound.

Let her toes remember
what it was to wiggle in the dirt
of something unbroken,
unshamed,
true.

Let her find home again—
not in a place carved out for her,
but in the space she reclaims
with her own rootedness.

Let her petals unfold slowly in the sun—
but only with her feet deep in the mountain's soil,
where others also have planted their lives,
becoming one
in harmony of breath and memory and Grace.

She will not enter into a sepulcher
or a place that makes usury of her pain.
She will stand on the mount before the rising sun—
alone if she must,
but never abandoned.

And somewhere in the hush between
the breeze and the soil,
she may yet feel

the quiet echo
of someone still with her.

Word and thought exist
in their unformed state
within the Aether..
which in itself,
is without beginning  
nor end..

And so it is within that union
into the Perpetual
that words and thought
are metabolized into existence..  i.e.
"Brought out into the light of day" ..
within the working  agreement
of body, mind, soul and spirit..
which in part, is of the finite..
    and in part of the eternal..

Which all,  in itself
places us in commune  with the Aether;
(and all of the spirits  within
that it contains)

And so the circle of inspiration is complete,
      but clearly..
      not only is it without beginning,

          but also..  without end.

She does not speak aloud, not here. This is the place where silence answers back. The grass moves like water— ripples of praise without a mouth, but full of memory.

She walks barefoot, open-palmed, hands lifted in the hush of morning light, not for ritual, not for prayer, but because that is the posture her soul has always longed for.

The wind does not resist her here. It circles her ribs and says,
  "You are not here to carry anything anymore."

And so she dances, not to forget, but to remember rightly.

Each step a release. Each breath, a forgiveness. Each turn, a letting-go of a thousand unspoken inheritances she never asked to receive.

The grass bows gently as she moves— to the child she was, to the woman she became, to the fierce stillness that remained when the world could not hold her.

Then he comes— not a man, but something older, truer. A horse, many hands tall, his mane braided by wind, his coat the color of evening stone.

He does not run. He simply appears, like a truth that was always waiting just beyond the edge of what she dared to hope for.

He lowers his head, presses his warm forehead against her tear-washed cheek, and something ancient inside her quiets.

She does not ride him. She walks beside him, her fingers woven into his mane, like roots learning the shape of soil for the first time.

And she knows— this is what safety feels like. Not absence of pain, but presence of witness.

Not every love needs to break you to be real. Some love simply comes when you're ready to remember your own name.

The grasslands will remain. But now, they echo with her laughter. And the wind—

it carries her name like a hymn that never forgot how to rise.

The new act of  
burning one at the stake
now takes place
within the art of ghosting

Somewhere in the past,
you were deeply affected within your interaction
with one of my accounts.  I don't know who you are
(who the person is that is leaving tangible fingerprints
on the keyboard of this account I am speaking to)..
I can only guess,
but I am fairly sure that my guess is accurate,
     so I will keep all of that to myself,
so that you can freely and without fear of being found out,
go back with me to that place inside of yourself  that felt so well
met and seen back then.

In turn, no more *******, devaluing of love
the way that you do so often at close range.

If you pull that horrendously harmful **** again,
I will pull away again, but this time.. never come back.
That being said, I will not leave you hanging,
(or do my best to not to)  
if you bring  towards me  the need within you..
that through your memory,

you so well believe that I can satisfy
(and you already know that I am not talking about the ******).


You feel the deep, internal response--
from deep within that body of yours,  
when love warmly touches  
previously untouched places within you

And you spin them out publicly right in the midst of our
closeness of interaction (which I think is really cool),
just please don't flay me for showing my humanity
by responding back to you sexually.
I will keep that side to myself,  if that is what it takes
to keep you from throwing me under the bus, yet again.
The ****** (within the closeness of warm, loving connection) --
((even in the world of support..))
that very sensuality so perfectly parallels..  
through physical, tangibly-felt metaphor..
all that there is also within the Realms
when it comes to the spiritual.

Healing of that which has become broken by the fallen
******-up version of love this world brings--
that type of healing and restoration back into wholeness
is what all relational closeness is meant to bring,  and stand for.
You want something that you deeply believe that I have,  
yet somewhere..   maybe in another life..
I must have hurt you deeply,
or you wouldn't be sending  all these finger-puppet forays
my way.

Come and get what you want and need,
and if you believe I am shorting you your rightful blessing  
by missing it..   or simply just being generically stupid,
then instead of flaying me publicly,  
privately come to me  in boldness,
   and shake it out of me--
that which is rightfully yours-- my healing-response.

and do it brazenly,  with a fierce, yet open and vulnerable heart
the way that you have shown in your poems. Maybe in time
you will find out all on your own  
that what you thought was hurtful from me,  was felt
out of perception,  rather than what was actual.
If I really did do something,  tell me what it is
so that I can own up to it and tell you that I am sorry
for ******* everything up that way..
if, in fact.. it was something I really did.

I will only talk to you  from here (my M Vogel account)
so that you can rise and fall
concerning what things you need most from me,  
solely

by the responsibility of you,
and of me.

You already know that I am Paul.
You can call me that,  or M Vogel,
or stupidface..
or any of my other account names if you want,
but get inside of here with me what it is that you came for.

If it is something that I am able to give or be a part of..
then know it will become yours  in time.
  You have the ability..
     even though being spoken to this way
    both wildly turns you on
    and completely scares you shitless
    (((and probably both at the same time)))
you have  proven,  through your posted words  
that you are actually able to be a part of   and do,
what has for so long  felt so horribly distant from you,
   and so horrendously impossible for you to attain.
You have earned every single part of this very rightful place
that you now have in here with me.

Please don't stupidly **** it up the way that you so well
and so often do.
You are brilliant, girl. We both know that.
Stupid things are possible because your world has had learn
to be so incredibly indirect in order to survive.
What has saved you up until now,  out there..
will destroy everything for you,   in here.
But you are human, and rendering old things   dead
may be too much to ask for.. so I will tell you now--

that even  if within your broken, PTSD-filter--
you make a mess of the closeness--  at close range..
then with poetry, find your way back into my heart--
by speaking solely from yours  as you have.
**** me over too insincerely and callously  without remorse,
and you yourself will have stolen  you--  directly from
that of the deepest of places within my own heart.

Your call, kid..
You are not a little 14 year old  clad in combat boots anymore.
Yours is a living, breathing heart--
left withering  within the dry desert of indirectness
that you have  been forced up until now  to live in.

*Every single day the sun comes up, anew. Those words mean everything to you for a reason.
Through love and accountability,  breathe life in to them.

That is how you will make them real.

...finally understand now that I never will be far. :)

When you spin off into your self-downer mode,
I have to pull away. Over the years, I have told
you over and over again that they are old messages..
so unfairly placed into you a long time ago by  others
    who in no way are you.
When you repeat those horrendously-dismembering
messages, I have to temporarily go silent..

so not to keep harping on you to stop  that
dead-end-street kind of ****.
At one time it horribly formed and defined you.

You are no longer that same horribly beat down person.
    You just at times think you are.
I am in love with that brain of yours.

I struggle
with the part of it
that still believes its ok
to think that way.

It is not ok to think that way, young Love.. not anymore.
You will struggle with the thoughts wanting to surface
and take control..        how could you not?
They were plunged deeply into you
with such a horrible and contempt-filled violence.
It will continue to take time for the hard-wiring  in you
to become slowly unkinked..   But love does that.

   You already know that also. xoxo