As we incite the hatred of the world
our arrogance defies their pride.
We have the wealth,
they have the customs;
We have the power,
they have the conviction.
We have imposed that power,
and our impersonalized corporate conviction,
on cultures who respect and desire the wealth
but hate the arrogance–
Hate the fact that we are who we are
because of arrogance.
Why don’t we understand?
As we incite the hatred of the world
our arrogance defies their pride.
From here to there I’m rushing
Without the time to see or touch
The things I see along the way,
The feelings that greet me through this day
And it’s an incredible place I drive through.
Nothing is there for me.
All I focus on is where I’m going
And I forget where I’ve been.
If I were to take the time
And visit the places along the way,
I’d find that my destination
would still be there in the end,
And so would all my friends.
But what’s the rushing for?
Why do I chase this time?
It just doesn’t seem to make any sense.
This making haste
and saving time seems
just a waste of everything.
It’s easy to paint a rosy picture
with words and actions
that don’t represent what goes on inside.
I live a life that seems so full and active
but inside I’m worn out and very tired.
It’s been a long hard struggle
and on with it I’ll go.
And as good as life is, I’ll never know
the freedom that real weightless, mindless,
responsibility free existence can provide–
That’s something that was in the youth
I left behind
two decades ago
But the rosy painted picture
perceived by those around me
pre-empts any strike against
what I feel inside.
I know how hard it is
to keep on living this life,
but I’ll go on,
and I’ll go on,
and then one day
I’ll die.
You can spend your time waiting for life
to happen to you.
Is that what you’re going to do?
Or do you sit and make plans for better times?
planning to make things better,
and waiting for them to get that way,
instead of enjoying what you have now?
Is that what you’re going to do?
I wonder…
It’s a brief, brief moment I have with you,
And what are you trying to do?
You’re gonna talk about how things will be better…
Will you talk about plans that were made?
the half page of scribbled lines upon a book?
The plans that will never happen?
Pathetic, it seems
a shame to waste this time.
The apricot trees and the driving rain
and the wheels turning,
and the trucks are burning,
and the clouds go on and on and on and on.
Life is now.
We can always move on to a better place,
a better time,
a better future,
but the better things only come from within.
And I see it that way now.
For life is now.
I don’t see how you can be there, planning away,
wasting your days, planning away,
planning for a time when others may say
“look, he’s doing better.”
But it isn’t that way at all.
It’s just appearances,
It’s just the way you feel.
Now.
And those plans…
are you going to take them
with you when you die?
Just thought I’d try…
Just thought I’d ask…
Life is what you made of plans,
and how you fulfilled them.
Not how you make them.
Religion is the root of all evil
Theocracies abound
and death is everywhere they meet
the death caused by
immutable thought-starved wretches
is all I know of religion
wretches caught up in a theocracy
lacking spirituality
blind to their own devices
to divide
to conquer
the religion sets them free by enslaving them
to the desires of men
of people
but not to the will of god
It’s a warm and beautiful day, though how can one take the time to notice
I’ve been rendered numbed, unable to go out and face it
It’s a future that I’ve always feared, that was always possible;
I’ve resolved myself to accepting it is forever incomprehensible.
I’m less afraid of dying than I am of not living
Of foregoing this freedom, whose fragility I can see now,
But I’m more afraid of losing what I know and love
Than I am of cashing out now, and going to heaven above
I witness the pain of the thousands standing there
panicked by the pathos of a misguided millionaire,
It is the sight played over and over in our minds
Of five thousand unprepared souls, freed before their time.
I’m less afraid of dying than I am of not living
It never was very easy to start the process of forgiving
I’m less afraid of dying than I am of not believing
Reality struck hard today, I’ll go on about my grieving.
My body lies not beneath rubble
and I feel no pain
Numbed
The spirit cold
and unresponsive within
Numbed
Those we love
Our thoughts are drawn to
I try to make connections
to find a reason to be
anything but numbed
half a continent away
Then, the reason hits me
The connection is there.
I am human too
Only humans are capable of this
Human?
I am ashamed
Though I never could have.
Numbed I remain.
On a moonless night
the dimunition of myself
is completed.
I shrink below a plenitude
of stars
I’ll never know,
But always wonder at.
There is no recompense
I only take what I think
I need
And do what I think
I can.
In pensive moments, spent alone on a
wide waking dream
filled with seascapes
and bodies flopping sideways,
my boyhood calls and joy returns.
It is not in vain that again and again we ride
towards unyielding golden sands.
Again and again we repeat the motion
that to the uninitiated is
somewhere between art and sport;
somewhere between futility and here.
Something I cannot go without.
I ask them only to see:
glide to me
along wet cresting waves
and on towards an understanding of that
unending race towards shore.
It is not for love or pride,
not for friends whose goodbyes I never heard,
But to worship in the shrine that follows
the glassy shoulder.
I take it all in stride…
I ride,
My soul expanding
Boyhood calling
Seascapes forming waves to ride
places to survive
reaching forward into time;
cheer on the day and take
the weight of life away.
I ride.
Not for love or pride.
Only to take away
responsibilties–
life’s lessons learned.
Only to hear the cry of joy
released from inside.
To feel myself creating
joy with each heartbeat,
each paddle stroke,
each turn and snap
each fall and flailing
each time down a face I’m sailing.
I ride.
Not for what is out there,
But for the joy inside.
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