Tree

StockCake

Yes, often an olive wants to be a fish,

An almond often wishes to be a bird

I am pretty well accustomed to being like this now

Just a while ago I changed into human form

For a few minutes

My supple soft skin, my bones and the flesh wrapping around them

They all felt eerie to me

But in a while when I revert to being a tree

How fondly I will reminisce

About the human body I have now

My fingers, nails, and joints

How marvelous!

I have bones; I have muscles to pull my bones,

And skin covers all

My blood is coursing on and on

I can move myself, like this, any way I want to

I can point at the sky

I can stroke my hair!

Grasses, leaves, fruit or branches cannot do what I can –

They stretch their branches, turn their leaves

Lazily toward the light,

Yes, really, “lazily” as you’d say in human tongue

But when I was a tree, it did not feel so lazy

Rather, it was more like securely

Rather, it was more like steadily

What is this fury inside the human body?

It makes me dizzy

Look

Bones and muscles shed their old selves

To make new bones and muscles

Much has changed between now and just a while ago

When I first met you

So this is what aging means, isn’t it?

Uh,

Your two manly hands

Like rough palm leaves

Rest on my two shoulders

What is this numbing warmth your hands convey

To my muscles and bones?

To speak

We trees don’t have words

Time is running out

Once the time comes, I won’t ever be

A human like this, forever

Tell me

How else are humans different from trees?

What is this?

What is this mysterious warmth

That comes to me through your fingers?

Tell me,

Something I missed doing

Not much time left

Yes –

What a pleasant thing to do, to respond.

Please, tell me.

As I place my hand here like so

The sound of your blood rushing in your chest

Grows so fast

Time is running out. Please, please tell me

What is the biggest thing I missed doing.

I feel as if there is something I should do, something fervent

Something I’d move my muscles for

Something I’d violently rub my joints for

To chat

Isn’t there something else that is more important?

What is it?

What is this something humans do to be wholly human?

Just a while back

When you placed your manly hands on my womanly shoulders

My female muscles and bones felt a certain

Fulfillment and warmth

Doesn’t that have much to do with

What I have yet to do?

Am I not missing something

Something violent

That goes well with the fury of metabolism

In this human body that holds bones and muscles?

But maybe I am wrong

Am I just babbling human words

While thinking like a tree?

What?

Are you saying I’ve missed doing something?

Tell me

Please

Why do you hesitate?

So you are saying, aren’t you, it is different from

Talking,

Pointing,

Jumping,

Counting numbers and the like?

Goodness, how pained you look!

I thought humans had a wonderful thing called words

Which allow you

To convey, to inform or to express anything you want to,

But there are things that words can’t help –

Ah, there’s no time left

I want to know

What it is that I missed doing

With no words,

This

Is what you can tell me, isn’t it?

As you clasp my shoulder as you are doing now

With your five fingers wrapped around my shoulder

Your thumb

Your forefinger

Your middle finger

Your ring finger

And your little finger

Five shocks run through me

Hurry! Time is running out!

Hiroshi Kawasaki

Phase One

Alexander Krivitskiy

For leaving the fridge open

last night, I forgive you.

For conjuring white curtains

instead of living your life.

For the seedlings that wilt, now,

in tiny pots, I forgive you.

For saying no first

but yes as an afterthought.

I forgive you for hideous visions

after childbirth, brought on by loss

of sleep. And when the baby woke

repeatedly, for your silent rebuke

in the dark, “What’s your beef?”

I forgive your letting vines

overtake the garden. For fearing

your own propensity to love.

For losing, again, your bag

en route from San Francisco;

for the equally heedless drive back

on the caffeine-fueled return.

I forgive you for leaving

windows open in rain

and soaking library books

again. For putting forth

only revisions of yourself,

with punctuation worked over,

instead of the disordered truth,

I forgive you. For singing mostly

when the shower drowns

your voice. For so admiring

the drummer you failed to hear

the drum. In forgotten tin cans,

may forgiveness gather. Pooling

in gutters. Gushing from pipes.

A great steady rain of olives

from branches, relieved

of cruelty and petty meanness.

With it, a flurry of wings, thirteen

gray pigeons. Ointment reserved

for healers and prophets. I forgive you.

I forgive you. For feeling awkward

and nervous without reason.

For bearing Keats’s empty vessel

with such calm you worried

you had, perhaps, no moral

center at all. For treating your mother

with contempt when she deserved

compassion. I forgive you. I forgive

you. I forgive you. For growing

a capacity for love that is great

but matched only, perhaps,

by your loneliness. For being unable

to forgive yourself first so you

could then forgive others and

at last find a way to become

the love that you want in this world.

 Dilruba Ahmed

 

The Shape of Silence

R.R. Leone

It never begins loudly.

No slammed doors.

No thunder of words.

Just a pause

that lasts

longer than it should.

At first you tell yourself

they just need space.

Everyone needs space.

So you wait.

But the quiet stretches.

Minutes become hours.

Hours become something heavier.

You replay the last conversation

like a physician studying scans,

searching for the fracture

you might have missed.

Was it that sentence?

That question?

The look on your face when you spoke?

The mind becomes a detective

in a crime scene of memory.

Meanwhile the room fills

with a silence that has weight.

The phone stays dark.

No message. No explanation.

Just absence.

And the strange part is

how silence changes the body.

Your breath grows shallow.

Thoughts circle faster.

The nervous system begins to signal

something it cannot name.

Not anger. Not grief.

Something closer to panic.

Like slipping beneath water

and realizing

no one else noticed.

At first you tread carefully.

You assume air will come back.

A word. A message. A sign of life.

But the surface keeps moving farther away.

And the quiet grows deeper.

You begin to understand something

no one ever teaches you about love.

Connection is oxygen.

And when it disappears suddenly,

the mind does what bodies do underwater:

it fights.

It searches.

It reaches upward for something

that isn't there.

Eventually the conversation returns.

Or it doesn't.

But by then something has changed.

Because silence, once introduced,

leaves a mark.

Not a wound you can see.

Just the memory

of how long you held your breath

before realizing

you were swimming alone.

R.R. Leone

 

Each Moment Is Precious

BriBar

The English Lake District, Keswick, Cumbria, UK

Live in the moment,

Just take it all in.

Pay attention to everything,

Right there and right then.

Don’t let your mind wander

To what’s coming next.

Cherish this moment

And give it your best.

Don’t let tomorrow

Make you rush through today,

Or too many great moments

Will just go to waste.

And the person you’re with,

In that moment you share,

Give them all of your focus;

Be totally there.

Laugh till it hurts,

Let the tears drop.

Fill up each moment

With all that you’ve got.

Don’t miss the details;

The lesson is there.

Don’t get complacent;

Stay sharp and aware.

It can take but a moment

To change your life’s path.

And once it ticks by,

There is no going back.

In just 60 seconds,

You may make a new friend.

Find your true love,

Or see a life start or end.

You become who you are

In those moments you live.

And the growth’s not in taking

But in how much you give.

Life is just moments,

So precious and few.

Whether valued or squandered,

It’s all up to you!

Patricia Fleming

 

Steel Cage

Bonny Beth Leah Luhman

We all live happily in our transparent steel cages.

We are happy in our own prison because 

it may be confining but it protects us from the outside world.

That way we need not be effected by the troubles of the citizens of the world.

If we don't like what we see we can change the channel from within our cells.

And even if we watch it we are not effected because 

nothing can get to us within our prison.

But the pressures of the world keep pressing and 

even steel has it's breaking point.

Finally our prison shatters inward cutting and bruising us 

in a thousand different places on the outside and the inside.

The wounds on the outside will heal.

Are you happy with your inner wounds?

You should be.

You earned them.

Steve Hannity

Instructions Before Visiting Earth

forplayday/iStock

In the event that you wake up

and find your soul separated from source

and manifest into material form, don’t panic.

Your condition is only temporary.

You have been selected for the opportunity

of human incarnation.

This 3D simulation is designed

to break up the monotony of eternity

by giving you a fully immersive experience

as a distinct ego identity.

Your body will serve

as your physical avatar

as you navigate a dense and dramatic reality.

There will be many distractions

causing you to forget your true nature and origin.

You will experience a range of emotions

from joy to loneliness to despair.

But remember – no matter

what trials and traumas you encounter,

your soul remains perfectly safe.

At times you may feel lost or afraid.

This is totally normal.

If you ever need guidance,

simply slow down your busy mind

and bring your awareness

to the quiet place

inside yourself.

On this planet, nothing is permanent.

People and things will come and go.

You will fall in love and form sentimental attachments

only to lose everything you hold dear.

So cling to nothing too tightly, even yourself,

and when it’s time to let go, let go with grace,

for nothing is owned, only borrowed.

As you walk among

the people on the planet,

try to be a good guest.

Tread lightly. Remember

that you are only visiting.

Don’t make a mess.

Listen more than you speak.

Give more than you take.

Don’t keep your soft heart

locked inside a glass cage,

protected from wear and tear.

You’ll never make it out alive

and time passes quickly.

So come back with some battle scars

and good stories to tell.

James McCrae

The Darkness

Valeriia Miller

You would never know it,

The constant pain I feel,

Because in the light of day

It almost isn’t real.

Sure, I’ll play, I’ll laugh,

I’ll sing some songs,

But that pain is always lurking

Because it’s been here all along.

And when the darkness comes

With its all-consuming power,

It slowly takes my soul

Hour by dreadful hour.

But they tell me that I’m strong enough.

They swear that it gets better.

They say, “If you can just hold out

and bear this stormy weather.”

They tell me, “You will be happy one day.

All you need do is fight.”

But what they seem to forget

Is after each day comes the night.

And so, I act along.

I play my part

While this crushing darkness

Slowly breaks my heart.

Dallas E. Krystof

Lines Inscribed Upon a Cup Formed from a Skull

Freepik

 Start not—nor deem my spirit fled:

   In me behold the only skull

From which, unlike a living head,

   Whatever flows is never dull.

I lived, I loved, I quaff'd, like thee:

   I died: let earth my bones resign;

Fill up—thou canst not injure me;

   The worm hath fouler lips than thine.

Better to hold the sparkling grape,

   Than nurse the earth-worm's slimy brood;

And circle in the goblet's shape

   The drink of Gods, than reptiles' food.

Where once my wit, perchance, hath shone,

   In aid of others' let me shine;

And when, alas! our brains are gone,

   What nobler substitute than wine?

Quaff while thou canst—another race,

   When thou and thine like me are sped,

May rescue thee from earth's embrace,

   And rhyme and revel with the dead.

Why not? since through life's little day

   Our heads such sad effects produce;

Redeem'd from worms and wasting clay,

   This chance is theirs, to be of use.

Lord George Gordon Byron

My Inner Life

iantfoto/Gettyimages

 'Tis true my garments threadbare are,

          And sorry poor I seem;

But inly I am richer far

          Than any poet's dream.

For I've a hidden life no one

          Can ever hope to see;

A sacred sanctuary none

          May share with me.

         

Aloof I stand from out the strife,

          Within my heart a song;

By virtue of my inner life

          I to myself belong.

Against man-ruling I rebel,

          Yet do not fear defeat,

For to my secret citadel

          I may retreat.

Oh you who have an inner life

          Beyond this dismal day

With wars and evil rumours rife,

          Go blessedly your way.

Your refuge hold inviolate;

          Unto yourself be true,

And shield serene from sordid fate

          The Real You.

            

              

                

Robert William Service                  

By The Fireside : The Builders

StockCake
 

All are architects of Fate,

  Working in these walls of Time;

Some with massive deeds and great,

  Some with ornaments of rhyme.

Nothing useless is, or low;

  Each thing in its place is best;

And what seems but idle show

  Strengthens and supports the rest.

For the structure that we raise,

  Time is with materials filled;

Our to-days and yesterdays

  Are the blocks with which we build.

Truly shape and fashion these;

  Leave no yawning gaps between;

Think not, because no man sees,

  Such things will remain unseen.

In the elder days of Art,

  Builders wrought with greatest care

Each minute and unseen part;

  For the Gods see everywhere.

Let us do our work as well,

  Both the unseen and the seen;

Make the house, where Gods may dwell,

  Beautiful, entire, and clean.

Else our lives are incomplete,

  Standing in these walls of Time,

Broken stairways, where the feet

  Stumble as they seek to climb.

Build to-day, then, strong and sure,

  With a firm and ample base;

And ascending and secure

  Shall to-morrow find its place.

Thus alone can we attain

  To those turrets, where the eye

Sees the world as one vast plain,

  And one boundless reach of sky.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Sometimes

Valeriia Miller

Sometimes I can’t find the words

That fill my messy head.

Can’t find the effort to smile

Or get out of my silly old bed.

The world just sometimes feels like

I don’t fit and don’t belong,

And even when I make the effort,

A smile just doesn’t last long.

I could pretend with all my might

That I am the happiest I can be.

Surrounded by the world, it seems

Lonelier I couldn’t be.

Not sure what may be the answer.

Not sure if I’m really keen

To spend another day here,

Living this dreadful dream.

But I must find some courage,

Light a fire inside my heart

And find a love for life again,

And I know where I shall start.

I’ll walk among the forest

And feel the crisp sea breeze

And lay among the meadow

And listen to all the bees.

I’ll figure out the mayhem

And gaze at all the stars

And dance at every sunset

With a smile inside my heart.

Lucy Petersen

 

On Growing Old

Tony Luciani

Be with me, Beauty, for the fire is dying; 

My dog and I are old, too old for roving. 

Man, whose young passion sets the spindrift flying, 

Is soon too lame to march, too cold for loving. 

I take the book and gather to the fire, 

Turning old yellow leaves; minute by minute 

The clock ticks to my heart. A withered wire, 

Moves a thin ghost of music in the spinet. 

I cannot sail your seas, I cannot wander 

Your cornland, nor your hill-land, nor your valleys 

Ever again, nor share the battle yonder 

Where the young knight the broken squadron rallies. 

Only stay quiet while my mind remembers 

The beauty of fire from the beauty of embers. 

Beauty, have pity! for the strong have power, 

The rich their wealth, the beautiful their grace, 

Summer of man its sunlight and its flower, 

Spring-time of man all April in a face. 

Only, as in the jostling in the Strand, 

Where the mob thrusts or loiters or is loud, 

The beggar with the saucer in his hand 

Asks only a penny from the passing crowd, 

So, from this glittering world with all its fashion, 

Its fire, and play of men, its stir, its march, 

Let me have wisdom, Beauty, wisdom and passion, 

Bread to the soul, rain where the summers parch. 

Give me but these, and, though the darkness close, 

Even the night will blossom as the rose. 

John Masefield