aging shadows

Why can’t I hear the Truth?

Instead, aging shadows whisper
a cacophonous symphony
most angrily composed,
scattering a thousand bitter moans
like shards of shredded metal
crashing bit by bit by bit
to the ground around me,
cutting through my flesh
leeching the blood from my veins.

Why can’t I know the Truth anymore?

I have struggled to achieve
even the slightest degree of wisdom
only to fall flat on this loathsome face
erasing youth, scored away
by the fire of age and angst.
I want to hear it again, need
to exceed these too temporal
boundaries and reach that beauty
that only the blessed may know.

Please, God, let me hear again.

[Inspired by David ben Alexander’s https://skepticskaddish.com/2021/02/02/breasts-beneath-or-dream-symphony/ ]

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around and around

around and around she flew
over the well-trodden snow
giggling with such perfect zeal
such unrefined, unrestricted joy
that I found myself trembling inside
so very fortunate to be standing here
watching a child of mine experience
the finest truth of this being:
that to touch the world at its core—
to strive without pretence
to play without avarice
simply to live in this moment—
is to smile the biggest loveliest
smile that one is capable of

My beautiful baby girl playing in the first snowfall of this coming winter

as darkness descends

And now of a quiet evening as the sun gently sets,
its playful rays, like cheeky children avoiding sleep,
sneak through the leaves hanging listless in the trees
glistening around the rim, blowing bubbles in my rum,
tracing tickling one another to silent happy giggles,

while I wander through the myriad thoughts they evoke
with their hopeful dashing and dancing here and there,
shimmering, suggestive, hanging from tender webs,
growing ever more languid as the light diminishes
behind hills and stones and all the opacity of life.

As darkness descends I strain to see and wonder
at the world that was, how woven in transparency,
which is at once enlightening and all too illusory,
and I realize there is a reason why we have evolved
to fear the darkness of the night—to fear its mystery.

The mind depends upon the banal, the utterly predictable.
Light engenders safety, order begets peace, security,
and yet that same mind thrives on mystery and imaginings.
In the light, the mind becomes ever more complacent, lazy.
Give me the night, the darkness, the unquiet mystery.

And one more dram to enliven the dance.

think for yourself

this was never about honesty
for in the temples and councils
deception is all too alluring a desire
for these men and women
who seek dominance over us all

this was never about truth
not when lies come closest to satisfying
the endless voracious appetites
of tyrants and war mongers
who throbbing pulse for power

this was never about you and me
for the guardians who tower tottering
in our nations’ decaying capitals
do not give a damn about the people
they so slavishly so blatantly despise

and no, this was never about God
for the repugnant pastors and preachers
who so lasciviously lay hands
on the golden child of their demented dreams
have never known God themselves

it is time you stopped obeying
the deceitful deranged demagogues
it is time you stopped listening to
the pathetic pretentious preachers

it is time for you at last
to think for yourself

nonsense

it could well be said
that i know more of nonsense
from the bearing of my own
gallus clammering heart

than do the pitter patter ponces
who stroll salamander street
of an evening fair and lonely
and desperately clinging to fantasy

then again, it could just be
that my imaginings tend further
in the direction of aching truth
than i give myself credit for

you never know

maat

i call upon thee
most glorious maat
queen of justice
divinely desired
she who strictly
renders truth through
ages of aguish want

cold your bosom
as i embrace you
warm your loins
angrily birthing
the reptilian regents
of wayward earth and
their amphibian consorts

in fairness commenced
your righteous reign
constraining even
the sovereign of chaos
amorphous conveyor
of utter lunacy
and anguished appetites

yet how could this be
what did possess you
to submit yourself
to the solar fool
who swiftly fled
from your emergence
to herald the dawn

how could you allow
your damnable twin
to spill his semen
throughout the heavens
inflicting his fetid folly
over a needful soul
so heavy with regret

there was a time
when you knew better

oh heartless mistress
of impartial truth

a time before man
ruled the earth

Salt Lake City 27 Mar 2013

pretend

pretend there is this:

pretend there is meaning
not just in the precise colors
of every winged thing in flight
but even in the tones they uniquely
reflect with each whispering flutter

suppose there are voices
persistently beckoning you
from the tip of each green pin
along every creaking stuttering limb
of every forever evergreen tree

imagine that every inch
of your skin, hidden or revealed
expresses a most distinct purpose
all its own beyond any thought
your mind may ever have

envision a fantasy realm
in which every single life
composed of spirit and soul and
heart and thought and leaf and flesh
is more pertinent than mountains of gold

pretend all of this to be
and you, my dear friend
will have found blessings indeed
in a most determined step
along the path of truth

Salt Lake City 03 Dec 2012

whispers

truth can be whispered
by the smallest of voices
we need but listen

Salt Lake City 15 Nov 2012

tears

believe

if i could only
whisper the truth
bending my will
to season softly
this tempestuous
and outraged heart
then most assuredly
would i swiftly kneel
keenly commanding
cleverness to heel
and canvas clear
to bear the brush
of an honest hue

and yet

time torments me
with petty whims
and pretty fears
encased in tears
of sullen sorrow
borrowed from erato
who plays this fool
being overly bound
to aging thoughts
my mind trembling
darkly at the barest
hint of lover’s loss

Salt Lake City 11 Oct 2012