Poetry by Randy (c)2021 May you see others for their good and offer them the benefit of any doubt. ----------------------------------------------------------- My Lenten Journey (attempting to renounce pride) 3/2/13 My thoughts are lime green and turquoise blue My thoughts are transient wind and showering rain They come and go through pleasure, peace and pain They are guilty of self condemnation, despair, self pity and detraction They are in solidarity with the persecuted, the oppressed, the Jews and Jesus My thoughts survive the seconds choosing to overlook betrayal and calumny They rise out of the depths to hope, forgiveness and icy mountains of joy Eventually they sleep and dream of love, family and friends ----------------------------------------------------------- THE BOOKS The books sat patiently waiting year after year collecting dust. No reader came during that time to glance at the pages condemned to darkness. Finally, one day in a rush, the books were picked up and thrust into a box for a journey. Even the backs of the books, where the titles are displayed, were in darkness now. The box of books was loaded on to a truck and spent many hours bumping up and down on their journey. Eventually the truck came to a halt and the box of books was put down in a new place. The books were unpacked and put back on a shelf like the last one. Here they continued waiting with their backs exposed once again for their titles to be read. They would wait for their new owner and for another journey. ----------------------------------------------------------- 10 years from now (will they remember) he wrote his name in the dust on the piano (F# blues) it could be still be seen 1/2 year later and even after 1 year you could still see it around 15 months the piano was dusted and we'll never know how long it could have been seen or know the music he played long ago she scratched her name on the rock that looked on the sea we could see it for months as the weather and waves wore it away till time itself forgot her joy as she wrote it that day long ago the friend she was with might recall or perhaps they wrote a poem about it they decided to live together as friends so together they made a house and a life with dinners and friends and talk when the spring turned to fall till now when they each sleep alone they sing to themselves and song fills the room ---------------------------------------------------------- The city is loud and it's people suspicious and rude. Expect abruptness and beligerent language on busses. Don't expect to meet anyone under normal circumstances. The streets are full of animals filling animal needs of input and output. Those needs most of us perform in private are now on the sidewalk on display. Communication needs a loud voice to be heard in the city. I see a woman, or maybe a man, standing on the corner waiting for something to do with survival. I see a dog on a leash dying for a patch of dirt but finding only brown cement. I try to look straight ahead at nothing and sometimes I stumble because one should look where one is going. On the bus remember to close your eyes and rest the images pressing in on your mind of so many people demanding attention. Attention is something you learn to give sparingly... and rarely to those who demand it. Trying to find a comfortable place to relax and sing? Give up... unless you take a long ride to a windy beach... your voice getting drowned by the wind and roar of the waves. The waves demand your attention here... and what a pleasure it is to give it now with the light reflecting silver in the afternoon. ----------------------------------------- They're all dead... those people in those old photos. Anonymous people to me and most. I see them being auctioned off for 2 or 3 dollars... some of them stereo images from Japan or France. Faces preserved on antique cards from years ago. I doubt if even their children are still alive now. No one to recognize the instant caught by the camera. We should be so lucky to end up remembered as anonymous, even though we've have maybe 100 photos taken of us. Anonymous always created great art... it would be an honor to be anonymous 100 years from now. ---------------------------------------------------------------- I'm lucky I should be dead Taking blind curves Taking unknown doses Falling asleep at the wheel Shooting blind shots into the night Smoking until it hurt, day after day, year after year Until I stopped and now sit still in silence ----------------------------------------- Today I dialed *69 on my phone and the Happy Cloud answered. She said that her mom was visiting and couldn't talk... so we hung up. That's the kind of thing one has to expect when they dial *69... an un-receptive response must be common due to the suprise. ----------------------------------------- Somewhere I lost my voice. Did I leave it where my dad attacked me because he thought I was lying... when I was? (I really had taken those drugs). Or did I leave my voice where I spilled the shopping cart in the parking lot with fruit rolling and my mom crying. I may have left my voice at the dinner table where what I thought and did was always wrong. I know now... I left my voice in fear... if fear of saying the wrong thing to anyone and everyone. I must go back to that place and get it back before it's too late and silence becomes my face. ----------------------------------------- The truth can hurt... like the time you realized that you were just average... just squeeking by like most of the class. When you discovered that you didn't look good... it wasn't a big suprise.... you always suspected it. It's not a bad thing to be average... you'll have a boring job... nothing fancy or creative. Most of us are average... not like the girl in the Microsoft commercial who's at the top of her class and realizes her full potential. You'll be like most folks who realize little... like an un-attractive lover... it take an effort to do it. ----------------------------------------- As I read, as I write, as I sit, as I might Be it known, so secure, in the thought, that I feel ----------------------------------------- no rules meditation start now listen to the mind racing like wind changes directions with each destination reached a pause an hour a quiet place run. run again. read, watch slow, slow play. sleep sleep move move pay more do the move make contact make make more rest the future rest the past rest. ----------------------------------------- god=nature nature=procreation love=god ----------------------------------------- Ode To The West Sometimes the nights.. and even the days Weigh heavy with the past.. and opportunities realized too late. Surrounded by millions.. and the loneliness won't leave.. and you can't forget. Some learn to stop the act in which confusion puts on a mask and plays The only role in theater written by the mode.... And even they must continue to play With those who don't realize their growing need to reach out.. But only at first.. until the shell is broken.. penetrated.. in the west. ----------------------------------------- Fantasy Of The Earth Mountain of the senses reaching to the infinite sky Our perception climbs up into the air of understanding Asending peaks of truth and desending into realities valleys Give yourself to the path which searches the summit Where a meeting has been pleaded for by your desire I'm speaking to you! Love of the future... Who's understanding & beauty are the sun Which would guide me day and night Meet me at that peak which we must reach at the same time For our lights come from different sources And we would make them parallel allowing them to join Beyond the horizon, well past the dawn of our dream. ----------------------------------------- No Poem No poem came in Hawaii. Poems come in their own time during periods alone, on road trips alone, anywhere alone. Even alone with someone or other but still alone.