Bleeding Colors

Sunlight trickles through a labyrinth of branches overhead, while I lay silent listening to the wind a-stirring. Inhale the breath of morning with my face impressed in grass. A fox on my right arm pins me down while the elephant on my left helps me create.

Ideas flow like water onto the page. Once they are brought to life, they inspire reality to change. Even a tiny stream can carve dry, desert sand; if there’s a tree to drink, it will transform the land.

The trees chatter overhead, trunks swaying and leaves splashing their secrets. If only I could hear what they have to say…Still, I get the general sense – the feeling transcends words.

I am connected to this tree, just as this tree is connected to the land. And that goes for all people, all life on this bountiful planet. Maybe, if I didn’t pass through brief as the wind, I could understand what the tree was saying without losing details in translation.

As I wander, I leave behind a trail of scent. My presence lingers like a ghost, invisible except for my footprints. Follow them if you wish – they’ll lead you to a stream where they stop short because I’ve joined the cycle that knows no time, which has and will be spinning long before and after we’re all dead.

Lotus blossoms bleed color in the water. Trickling down the stream, they get lapped up by curious creatures and manifest in their dreams. How does a single thought change the world? Just as a pebble paints the surface of a silent, starry lake.

Prophets of a Lost Generation

Rusted sand and sage-ribboned dunes

stretch far as the eye can see.

Tattoos fade and nostalgia ripens

Like the bitter fruit of our intentions—

A mystery even to ourselves.

This is the desert where we waste our youth.

Geckos slurp our spit from rocks,

While rattlers laze in the noontide sun,

Every day seems hotter than the last,

Until night prowls around, offering peace

On the melodic wings of insects.

This is the desert where we waste our youth.

We used to wonder our destination,

Keep track of where we’d been,

Until the desert rainstorms washed away

our footprints, our compass, our map.

Only then could we find the way.

This is the desert where we waste our youth.

Everything that once felt important

No longer carries the weight.

As the desert shifts with the wind,

So is a moment erased by time,

Except when we stop to bottle the sand.

This is the desert where we waste our youth.

Chickadees wing the violet dusk,

As clouds swirl ‘round the moon,

Your voice casts a spell over dancing flames

Stoking the fire higher and brighter,

While we get drunk on impossibilities.

This is the desert where we waste our youth.

Our youth is a desert wasted.

Horse Feathers

On a hill with eyes to the horizon,

two ghostly silhouettes stand

in the mouth of the setting sun.

 

I run to them wishing for

knowledge to quench my thirst;

Uncertainty burning me from the inside.

 

A boy and his stoic stallion,

composed of dancing flames,

drink the sunset with their gaze.

 

“Drink!” he says to me,

“For this will set you free.”

His fiery horse snorts consent.

 

As I breathe the light, I taste 

poetry on my tongue,

truth on my lips.

 

When I try to speak

the words won’t come out.

He says, “It’s better that way.

 

“Knowledge is always around

but some can only be found

when you sit quietly and listen:

 

to the breath of the wind,

the fire of the sun,

the lyrics of the rain.”

 

He plucks a feather from his horse,

hands me the dancing flame

and says, “A gift for the land.”

 

I hold out my hand

and cradle the flame

as if it’s the light of the world.

 

For an instant, all life

stands still. And I

have a place in this painting.

 

Then the feather lifts,

chasing the sun on the wind,

igniting everything in it’s path.

 

“Now you see,” he says.

“That you and me, are we.”

And the world burst into flame.

 

 

Here I Lie

Millions of rocks whisper softly

to my naked feet, as light ignites

an ocean vast as imagination

 

Here I lie, a breath from nowhere

Juggling thoughts of uncertainty

Like abstract balls of fire

 

Indecision is the jester of fate

A lizard says, as he flicks his tongue

To drink of golden nectar

 

A single gull flies swiftly

Like an arrow on the horizon

To dwell in the flame of infinity

 

Here I lie, a breath from nowhere

Paralyzed by fear

As life revolves around me

 

My shadow swells then vanishes

As if carried on the wings of a bat

Into the black fabric of night

 

Ponder a shadowless existence

Until the moon ascends, invites me

onto her nocturnal stage

 

Dance upon a sea of shells

Alive with moonlight melody,

Smile and remember all I don’t know

 

Here I lie, a breath from nowhere

Free of future, past, and vessel

Happy just to be.

 

Paralysis

Droning, the incessant droning….
Ononononononon
Buzzing in my head it never
Stops it never stops

Time trips over itself
As it derails from the linear
Synchronicity it knew once
Upon a time

Cylindricals and circles,
Like a record spinning
Three ways at once
Axis revealed from an invisible
Indivisible state

Past future now – stir until blended
A congealed blob worth
Tasting…here, have a taste–
An ice cream cone without
singularity

Bitter Morsels

Bushels in the orchard ripen
With the land
Soil and sun give morsels
To hungry hand.

Starving mouths will eat albeit
Ugly shriveled fruit
Glean what they can because
Desperation can’t discriminate.

Grown on ash and bones
The fruit tastes
Bitter with memories the land
does not forget.

Nor can the people forget
Their darkened past
Shadow stifles, suffocates, grows with
Every infant seed.

Death killed glory but hope
Will never die
The land still slowly bleeds
Always and now.

On the Wings of my Illusion

I first saw her in the dawn of my childhood. White, pristine, a thing of beauty, and she was mine, all mine. I named my mare Illusion.

“That’s great,” everyone told me. “Enjoy it while you can. Soon, you’ll have to give it up and be like the rest of us.” They seemed like they were happy for me; I didn’t see the envy in their smiles.

So I did. I woke up in the morning and went running to my mare. I rode her all day, only coming in for lunch and water. Clinging tight to her mane, flapping like feathers in the wind, we galloped through fields and valleys and cloud-covered plains. Illusion and I galloped all day, till the sun went away. I never felt so much freedom as I did with my mare; together, we could go anywhere.

Then I forgot her. I listened to what everyone told me, and set my mind to other things. She died and I didnt even mourn her. I thought that’s what adults were supposed to do.

But she came back to me in my dreams. We would ride together across new landscapes, which neither of us had seen. Exploring together, and now she had wings. We were bound by less than even before, free to glimpse the world with a view from the skies.

Still they told me, “you can’t be wasting your time. There’s too much else to be done.” I didn’t believe them, but I listened anyway. At least, I tried.

I got a job, I bought useless shit, I accrued some debt, I paid the debt, I bought more useless shit, and society deemed me worthy. I went around in the circle of delusion, dancing to the same tune as everyone else. Yet, still I wasn’t happy.

The only thing that made me happy was flying with my mare, across snow-glittered peaks and through blue misty clouds. Streamlining with the geese on their perpetual march south, to the lands of blissful warmth, with lakes steaming from beneath. Soaring to steep heights trying to get a taste of sun, or at least bask in its warmth until we absorbed it into our being. Then I got an idea and set to work.

Putting my pen to paper, I brought to life all the adventures we’d had, my mare and I, because what is a joy if it’s not worth sharing? And I brought them to life for the people who told me I had to do something meaningful with my life, to show them what meaningful meant to me.

Now everyone is happy and joins me in flight, and they’ve given up their lives they realized were just lies. For true happiness I showed them, and I’m happy to share it with all, is on the wings of my Illusion.

Take my hand, close your eyes, and take flight.

Sundream Reverie

Furry calico cat on my lap
Groans in sun-drenched sleep
No concerns or cares in the world
State of zen too deep.

The hour of mystic light’s upon us,
As we breathe beneath the trees,
Our souls and vision stir to life
In light shining vehemently

Not until now have we truly lived
Or seen things as they’re meant to be
For in this light that drenches all
Secrets surface before unseen.

Strings of strong silk silver web
Bend graceful and majestically
Insects flutter like stars from home
On the hunt for obscure galaxies

Vines on stone and stripes on wood
Names inscribed in runes
When golden sunlight disappears,
They fade away too soon

For now in hour of mystic light
The truth is unveiled on canvas
What will change when the hour is gone?
Nothing and all, so time passes.