And so I have indulged myself
With every stray thought in my head,
And though I’ll post this in the morn,
It’s time for me to go to bed
Where I can close my eyes and see
More images for keeping,
And where I can indulge myself
With just a little
Sleeping
There’s this weird condition some people have
Where they despise anyone who’s not the ‘best’ at something,
Even though they themselves aren’t really good at anything.
I played the piano as a kid, and
I found out that, it turns out,
Absolutely everybody is an expert on music,
Even though few people can actually do it.
So I got lots of advice when
I began to play professionally.
Others would ask if I could play
This or that,
Disappointed or even scornful
If I could not.
Or would not.
I see people like that still:
Experts on sports, politics, business —
You name it.
When I do, I remember why
I turned away from music as a profession:
Which was,
Because I loved music more,
Much more,
Than I loved competition or
Pleasing others
He built his house upon a hill
To free him from distraction,
The lived his days in busy-work,
Avoiding interaction
He played out on a tire-swing
He’d had somebody fetch him —
But what good is a tire-swing
With nobody
To catch him?
It was so hot last Saturday
That I (I am afraid)
Insulted my worst enemy
Just hoping he’d
Throw shade
Divorce: it is a word so full of pain,
He will not say it, nor will speak her name;
To lose so much – it cuts against his grain,
And all he knows to use is spite, and blame —
But, Lord — sometimes within the honest night,
He sees her as he knew her at the first,
And though the image fades with coming light,
It’s always there. A hunger, or a thirst
Reminding him of what he won’t admit:
That though he knows that she is gone for good,
He really doesn’t blame her — not a bit —
For doing what she had to do, and could.
But when outside, he’ll wear his righteous pride:
That thing he traded for, with his own bride
The moon that she was promised
Has crumbled into dust,
The stars that she was told she owned
Turned to decay and rust
But then, she started life anew,
And found, to her delight
That all these things are beautiful
When someone gives them
Right
Sometimes I think I hear you,
Across the field or lake,
Sometimes I think I see you,
And do a double-take
Sometimes I think I miss you,
Though years have since grown long —
Sometimes I think I have no right
When I did you
So wrong
I see the world better in illustrations
than I see with my eyes,
The world is just clearer in pen and ink,
where, stripped of all disguise,
We can see the beauty, the flaws, and all —
the whole in every part —
That’s why it’s much harder to learn from life
than from a work
of art
In summertime, the children dream
Of books they’ve read and water splashed,
Of superpowers they have used
Against the foes with whom they’ve clashed
And night is frog-and-cricket songs,
With moonlight bright and gleaming —
In summertime, the children dream
Because there’s time
For dreaming
