Tag: Autobiography

The Pines

Among the pines we walked; we were in love –
The sun was streaming through the boughs above –
Our hands were clasped together by our sides
Out in the place where happiness resides

And even breathing did intoxicate
Us, stopping constantly, to share a kiss;
The moments between moments seemed so great –
The shining sun looked down on all of this

Just peeking through the pines to see us there –
Two soon-doomed lovers, as he knew we were:
So thoughtlessly we wandered, me and her,
Two lovers in the morning forest air

And though, this sonnet now, I may enshrine:
He pines the most, who lives but to repine

 
(“The Pines” – 7-21-2015)

Classical Condundrum

As a teen,
classical music was
my greatest love,
my strongest passion —

But the business of it
was catty, and shallow, and
competitively spiteful:
all I cared about
was the music

So, I elected
to find another line of work,
choosing to continue to play music,
but not be in the grind of competitions
for scholarships, recital time, and so on

And, these days, if anything,
it has gotten worse.

The most beautiful, thoughtful
performances can be found on youtube,
where commenters savage the performers
with the type of criticism that makes you wonder
if almost anybody that listens to classical music
actually likes it

But then, i take a deep breath, and remember:
youtube comment-leavers do not represent all people,
they typically represent the worst type of people:
cowardly, petty, bitter, and unaccomplished, themselves

The wisest choice anyone can make
is to never read comments on youtube

So i listen to classical music,
and continue to explore and
learn to play various pieces:
exploring unknown repertoire,
and enjoying performances when i hear them
rather than criticizing them

I know the critical mindset:
it is simultaneously self-righteous about criticism
and unable to accept any aimed at them

But these are just shadows of joylessness,
and i can pass them by in silence

For the music is the thing,
And always was.

We will always have reactions to what we hear,
we just don’t need to spend so much time
convincing others to have the same one

Because that is monumentally

Foolish

I Had To Learn

The happiest day
Of my twenty-ish life,
I was sick and hungover
In a piss-smelling trailer
But alight with memories
Of the night before

The first night I’d ever
Been drunk off Scotch
— And the last —

She was a co-ed
I’d seen once before
Down in Florida,
Now we were on her home campus,
Friends driving,
And outdoor cafe —
But the cold didn’t bother us —

When we hit the back seat
Of her roommate’s car
We began to kiss
And did so all the way
Back to her dorm
Where we said goodnight

And my friend picked up
His car,
And we went back
To his trailer

The next day, I awoke,
And he had left
As I knew they all would
On a Drama Club trip
(And, yes, that’s an actual thing)

With my friend I’d drove up with
Still asleep
I walked out in the snow
That came down in the night
So happy, so happy,
Elated, elated,
Although as sick as a dog

But I had to learn
As we all must do,
That you never know when
The peak days are through

Until time and perspective
And bitter regret
Told me that it was done,
Which I didn’t know

Yet

A Resonance

I heard across the span of years the sea.
A younger smaller form of you-and-me:
Our latent powers weakened by the storm,
Each pressured in our ways to fold, conform —

But on that shore, we held to skin on skin,
Our bronze desire: to escape again
Into a world we hoped we could make last,
And be unchained from still more distant past.

But on the brink, a sudden hesitance;
The sea-sound of our hearts, a resonance
That echoed over shores where blue turned gray,
And blew our fragile happening

Away

She Left Me For The Rainbow

Some years ago, she left me for the rainbow.
This I do not regret, but I did then:
I walked in blue as our dreams were abandoned
The things that could not be, but might have been –

An orange sunset, indigo and violet
The sky beside the beach where we would be:
But I’d grow red in anger and resentment
To know that she and I were she and she

But green grows time and love blooms in an instant
And every reason flows to where it should:
The yellow sun breaks through the clouds of mourning
As rainbows hail the coming of the good

The ground where love once grew can still be watered
Or it will grow indifference, or much worse:
She left me for the rainbow and in heartache
I lived to find new love
And write this verse

Another Ex

A on again, off again, thing.

She was my longest love in many ways,
With us so often on, or off, again;
She was a part of each divergent phase
Of all the things I tried to, could’ve been

She called me once in quite a fevered state;
Her voice its magic worked on me in tolls;
I drove six hours – then we made love eight –
A fire burning on in glowing coals

But something about us just was not right.
The chemistry was there, and we could talk:
But our values were different, so in spite
Of all the good we had, I chose to walk.

We have stayed friends, and lately I can tell:
I’m just another ex to her, as well