Remember, Rose

Remember when you were a child,
before you learned to be afraid?

Remember when you were a child,
before you pushed the world away?

Remember when you were a child,
and swore a rose had words to say?

They say you shouldn't pick a rose,
but leave it standing where it grows,
just let it grow as it was meant,
the little rose that heaven sent.
Since sunny skies have gone all gray,
I wish that rose would speak today.\

Remember when the creek was frozen,
and you fell through, one dark December?

Remember when the house was burning,
and all was lost, to every ember?

Remember all that you've forgotten?
Remember all that you remember?

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(Photo credit: "rose" from Pablo Romeo on flickr)

Slippery

Fall down,
falling down falling,
fallingdownslipontheice.
Slipping.
Slippery slipstick
stuck-a-slide-away.

Just a little bit beyond,
looky close, it's almost catch!
Slidey-slippy down the bruise
since all your feet are got confuse.

(Gamely now!)
Shamely now...
(Tamely now!)
Samely now...

Slippy-slidey up the snatch,
all nice and warm, but there's a catch...
Slippy-slidey on the ice
(said it once, and now it's twice).

Takeaway, breakaway.
System of interconnectivities.
Twelve-step plan.
Goose-step man.
A boss is a boss
no matter the uniform.

Muddy waters seem deep.
Muddy Waters sing blues.
Blue have shorter wavelength than red.
Red the color of love and hate.

Show me what you've got!
Show me the money.
Show me the goods!
Show me your pussy.

Slip it up,
rip it up,
keep it up,
look it up.

Easy good and hard is bad,
hard is good and soft is bad,
weak is good and strong is bad,
short is good and long is bad,
long is good and short is bad...
bad is good and good is bad.

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(Photo credit: Untitled from Miika Silfverberg on flickr)

Listen

Listen, listen, just listen.
Listen while I spin my web
like a spider,
stretching strands into a circle.

Listen while I tell you pretty words,
paint castles and forests in your eyes,
and watch it dissolve like so much dust.
Just listen while I tell you about love,
as if I knew about it,
or tell you everything about the world,
as if I knew everything.
Listen while I tell you your secrets.

Listen, sweet listener,
when I tell you it wasn't always like this.
There was magic in the words, then.
There was beauty in the earth,
and a million beautiful lights,
all shining together in perfect peace.
There was something real,
something that held fast
and didn't blow away with the wind.
But now I talk,
and now you listen,
and now we both know we exist.

What are you?
What am I?
Are you an ear?
Am I a mouth?
Just listen, you sweet thing,
just listen and tell me how right I am.
It's all I want.
It's all you want.

Listen, listen, just listen.
Listen while I spin my web
like a spider,
stretching strands into a circle.

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(Photo credit: "Light up" from Shan Sheehan on flickr)

Peaceful Hour

This is the peaceful hour.
There's no need to think now,
no need to keep on your guard.
You can relax now.
Really relax, the way you thought was impossible.
You can keep breathing,
and the world will move along with you.
You never have to carry anything.
You don't have to worry.
This is what happens when you let go.
Isn't it so lovely,
to let go for a little while,
to let someone else take the wheel?
You won't have to worry about a thing.
I'll keep you safe.
I'll watch over you,
and I'll save you from every danger.
There's no need for that anxiety,
and there's no need for all that worry.
I'll keep the bad things away,
and you'll never have to worry again.
You can just daydream,
just soar in the clouds
and never have to worry.
You're so safe here,
you're so very safe.
There's not a thing to hold onto,
there's not a solid thing in this world.
Let go of your worry.
Let go of yourself.
This is peace.
This is wholeness.
You'll never hurt again.
Don't worry, it won't hurt you.
Don't worry, I won't hurt you.
Keep a hold on nothing,
you sweet little nothing-creature.
Let it go, let it all go.
Remember what you were,
and think of what you'll be.
Think of how quiet the night,
how gorgeous the day.
Think of beauty, and warmth,
and a million fuzzy things that won't hurt.
You'll be just fine.
This is life.
This is the wonder of life.
This is beauty and joy and laughter.
You can be free here.
You can be free here.

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(Photo credit: "Pretty" from Jessica S. on flickr)

Split

I am half a ghost.
I wander in-between the houses,
checking that the walls are far enough apart.
Those solid walls,
too solid, too straight;
I keep far from them
and try to forget I can walk through.
I try to speak, my every word a formula,
rigorous as a line out of Euclid.
I speak, and who understands?

I am half a slug.
I would be a cockroach,
except I'm not organized enough.
I want to dissolve into the earth
and see all the walls turn into dust.
Some nights I sleep in peace
and lie in dreams of oneness.
There I melt into the air
and become more fully the nothing that I am.
But the ghost disturbs my days and nights.

Sticky. Sliding. Sucking.
Haunting. Hunting. Calculating.
Tell me, old philosopher,
how do you like your matter and form?
Spread me on your table of elements.
Classify me.
Show me the rigor.
You'll die one day, you ghost,
but I am the shame
that has no end.

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(Photo credit: "Slugs" from Andy Rogers on flickr)

Fading Into Darkness

It's in the way you catch a heart,
in the way you hold it with two hands
and never, never let it...

It's in the way you whisper in an ear,
speak all your pretty magic words
of clocks, and birds, and things that...

It's in the secrets that you'll tell,
the ones you hold in your breath
and never share with a...

Can you believe what she told me?
She told me it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Imagine!
She told me it was always there,
always simple, always what it always was.
I believed her. Maybe I still believe her.

Of course I loved her, and that was half of it.
I'd have believed the sky was green, if she'd told me.
Sitting there beneath the trees,
watching the skin of her arms go speckled
in the sunset chill,
it was easy to believe in magic.

Not that it was magic she taught me about,
not exactly. Subtler than that, or more obvious.
It was there on her lips,
when she spoke all breathless, with her cheeks flushed.
It was there on her lips,
when I kissed her for the last time, long ago.

If you knew her, you'd know her.
I know that sounds obvious, but it wasn't like that,
it was precious, it was something else entirely.
She had depths, real depths,
not in any silly, pretentious way, or anything,
not the way you'll see people fake it sometimes.
She didn't know how to fake it, poor girl,
so unlike the rest of us.
I think it's why she passed so young.

Could I ever tell you what she taught me?
Would it even matter in the end?
I could say she taught me honesty,
or kindness, or the joy of living.
(Not so much the words as much as what was in them.)
But I'm not here to preach a sermon,
and I'm not here to give a eulogy.
It was everything she taught me,
everything and nothing at all.

It was there in the way she caught me.
It was what she whispered in my ear.
It was the secrets she told me.
I still see her face,
sitting under the tree,
fading into darkness.
Watching the sunset,
fading into darkness.
Fading into darkness.

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(Photo credit: "Sleepy" from Lianne Viau on flickr)

Flow and Connect

Let it flow in what flows,
let it run together in what runs together,
and let it connect what connects.

Sit and observe the rolling ocean.
In the hottest part of the day, it evaporates.
You never see the wide ocean become a cloud,
you never see it become a puffy cloud.
But it does.
Take a sip of cool water, feel your sweat, and watch the sky.
You never see the cloud grow to raining.
You never see it turn to rain and the flowing river.
You never see that the ocean
runs back to the ocean.

Let it join in what joins,
let it sink in what sinks,
and let it rise in what rises.

Who can remember the beginning?
Who was there to make the first connection?
Ten thousand million years ago,
who was there?
Who was there at the first light,
when the first light was born out of dark?
Who shrank time into a ball
and spread out space across the eons?
Who was there when it all came apart
and all came together?

Let it flow in what flows,
let it run together in what runs together,
and let it connect what connects.

At the beginning?
It was all of us then,
all of us and every one,
until we flew apart
and grew apart.
We separated,
and curled a million miles on every side.
And now we float
like bulbous clouds
that fall as rain into rivers.

Let it flow in what flows,
let it run together in what runs together,
and let it connect what connects.

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(Photo credit: "Proj1_Connection_5" from Fanyun H. on flickr)

Only

She whispers in the summer breeze,
and speaks in the wind
that blows from over the sea.
She is the sound of the sound of thunder,
the echo of the echo of the echo.
Hear her dripping down the cavern walls
(Yes, she drips along the cavern walls.)
like beading sweat on a giant's belly.
Hear her whisper in the summer breeze
that blows from over the sea.

What works within the washing waves?
Only water.
What sands drip through the glass of time?
Only sand.

When I was a boy,
I knocked over a privacy fence
to play with the children on the other side.
When I was a boy,
I didn't believe anything would happen
when the teacher mixed baking soda and vinegar.
When I was a boy,
I was not very well-informed
about theories of operant conditioning.
I didn't understand why I was wrong.

What works within the washing waves?
Only water.
What sands drip through the glass of time?
Only sand.

Still she whispers in the summer breeze.
Still she speaks in the wind
that blows from over the sea.
(Flip the switch and the light comes on.)
She is free, independent, strong,
and she echoes where the mermaids
comb their hair with fishbones
and sing from caverns on the sandy beach.
See the fence around the sandy beach?
(It's nothing a little Prozac won't help.)

What works within the washing waves?
Only water.
What sands drip through the glass of time?
Only sand.

Hear the sound of the sound of thunder.
Feel the echo of the echo of the echo.
(Tell me, how does that make you feel?)
The mermaid lies in the sand like a beached whale,
But, oh! Isn't her hair perfect?
(On, off, on, off...)
When the sun sets the echoes stop.
Why do the echoes stop when the sun sets?
Leaving only water.
Leaving only sand.

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(Photo credit: "Mermaid" from Cyberesque on flickr)

Dissolve

Just let it all go, right here, right now.
Let your thoughts slip away,
let the moments pile one on the next
until your separateness dissolves.
There's no need to hold yourself in tension.
There's no need to keep yourself moving.
Just take a breath, take a quiet breath.
Feel one moment flow into the next.

Your body knows better than you do.
It was here first, and it will be here
after you're gone.
It will guide you in every way,
and it will remain here
when your separateness dissolves.
Just take a breath, take a quiet breath.
Feel one moment flow into the next.

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(Photo credit: "breath" from Andrea Castelletti on flickr)

Walk in the Park

Why choose one flower over another?
Walk in the park on a summer afternoon,
see Friday's girl running the trail.
She's just out of biology class,
and the way she runs
is enough to set your heart pounding.
She's just out of biology class,
and you can feel she makes the wind blow.
I sit on a bench
and watch her till she turns the corner.

Why choose one flower over another?
Walk in the park on a summer afternoon,
where the girls go run after their summer classes
and the men sit on benches of wood.
See the man playing catch with his dog
while he tries not to wonder about his wife's test results.
The Jack Russell springs across the fields
and always gets the tennis ball back.
I sit on the bench
and watch the field of flowers singing.

Why choose a flower over another?
See the purple fields of little blooms,
see them swaying in the gentle breeze
like cornrows rippling in the wind.
Choose a flower.
Pick a flower.
How to know, and how to choose?
Barking dogs and women running.
I sit on my bench
until I dissolve in her vanishing breeze.

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(Photo credit: "Smell the Lavender" from Vincent_AF on flickr)

Push

Keep going.
Never quit.
You'll get it
if you want it.
Prove you want it.
Push.
Push harder.
Push it till it moves.
Get up early.
Run.
Love the burn.
Love the ache.
Let it purify you.
Keep telling yourself,
"I am nothing
until I make myself something."
Say it. Know it. Live it.
Push.
Push harder.
Push it till it moves.
If you want it,
earn it.
If you need it,
live it.
Never feel good.
Never let go.
Never get comfortable.
On to the next thing.
Keep moving.
Keep active.
Problem? Solve it.
Broken? Fix it.
It hurts? Ignore it.
Make it work.
Make it real.
Be something.
Become something.
Tell yourself,
"I matter
if I make myself matter."
Push.
Push harder.
Push it till it moves.
Do it again tomorrow.
Keep it going.
Never quit.

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(Photo credit: "Another Eagle Photo" from vladeb on Flickr)

Water Girl

See the waves lick at her feet?
They've rolled for a thousand miles
to spill out on this shining beach.
Can you see her there, the water-girl,
the tide pool girl,
with her hair like the warm sand
and her ears straining through the rush of water?
She's waited for a thousand years
to lie here on this sandy beach.

Do you see the sun shine for her?
A thousand million years he's lit the earth,
and all to light her brilliant smile.
He plays his light upon her skin,
and makes her oh so very warm.
She walks like dancing candlelight,
with her skin soft as the waves.
She is the desire
that's made this sandy beach.

See the waves that spread and die for her?
She doesn't even look at them.
She doesn't need to look at them.
The sea salt waves, and waves, and waves...
She is the water-girl.
She is the tide pool girl.
The little boy builds sandcastles.
The silly boy builds sandcastles.
Does she know why he builds them for her?

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(Photo credit: "Blue..." from micadew on Flickr)

Shell Girl

Do you remember how it was,
when we would wander the woods after nightfall,
hand in hand without a worry?
You picked up snails
and watched them slick along your arm.
I called you the shell-girl
and traced a spiral to your heart.
It was a hot summer, that year,
and the nights were oh so long.
You remember that, don't you?

Do you remember when it rained,
and we hid beneath the tallest tree in the forest?
The birds sang in the glade,
and you curled under me to keep dry.
You felt so soft there,
you felt so peaceful.
You fell asleep,
lulled by the sound of my heartbeat,
do you remember?
I never loved you more.

We said we'd never be apart.
We said we'd love forever.
We said it never had to end.
Was it I who let you down?
Was it you who drifted off?
I missed you.,
long before we said goodbye,
and I so hated to lose you.
I hope you won't forget me,
but you I'll always remember.

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(Photo credit: "Time does it to all of us" from stanze on Flickr)