Category Archives: Personal

Vigil of Peace

Silence can be difficult for people. It’s particularly deafening when the person they want to talk to most is actively dying. The feeling of helplessness and longing can feel catastrophically overwhelming. I wanted to offer something that people could use to comfort both themselves and the person who is dying.

I approached Laura Davis, a person I’ve collaborated with in the past, with lyrics for a simple bedside song that could be sung as easy as “Happy Birthday”. She didn’t disappoint. Below is the music and lyrics for you to use as you need to. I sing a slight variation of notes than is written, but that’s because I’m a mediocre singer with delusions of grandeur.

Approaching Senior

older person holding an open book near a window

I am too old to be considered youthful

Yet, I’m a child, still wet-behind-the-ears

I’ve lived a life precariously truthful

But still, I’ve yet to see all of my years.

I have been as close to death as dust

But I still don’t know it by its common name

I have gifted dirges to those I’ve loved

A place in my heart they’ve claimed

If I’m blessed to live an entire century,

I hope that I won’t sit alone by the window

Waiting for those I love to learn too late they love me.

I’d languish for their amity, my companion, my shadow

There is a certain reverence to a life lived unfurled

The spiral tapestries of the lessons learned

Woven back upon itself briefly, beautifully curled

Love and joy have always been the life for which I’ve yearned

Fishing

I entered the Anderson County Fair this with a wood art piece I call “Fishing”. Today I got news!

Fishing

Last year, I entered this piece made of paper and embellishments:

Durga

My confidence is accepting myself.

What Once Was

I know I didn’t fall from grace

But I am here,

Looking in the mirror

Staring at your face

Where once in unison our hearts beat

I couldn’t wait to share

My life stories laid bare

Somehow, now, I feel defeat

The connection that I had

With you has released

The distancing increased

It is neither good nor bad

It is what it was created to be

It’s darker now than ever it was

I cannot feel you in my blood

A monument of a you and I; “we”

Murder

I am repulsed by the weight of my skin

As if my every breath is a sin

Emotional trauma’s affection

Dissociative disconnection

Grappling a height I’ll never climb

For long ago, I was left behind

Every step I’ve made, I’ve done alone

Bitterness in my haunted bones

Illusions of love, of commitment, of joy

Are rotting with lies set to destroy

At times, I believe, I will rise above

That I will know peace of the mythical dove

But the curtain falls and the show is done

And I realize I have never won

I’ve stepped in line with my own path

Which cost me relationships in its wrath

But choices made were neither bad nor good

But all were made from a basic falsehood

That I was never good enough no matter how I tried

So, you see, I murdered her, so that I could live and thrive

Big Bands and Crooners

Trombone sliding around trumpets

Ole blue eyes and Crosby balladering

Loudly enough on the hi-fi to be heard in the kitchen

Cinnamon and nutmeg joined in chorus

Butter whipped with rich brown sugar

Sunshine egg yolks breaking out of their shell

Clouds of flour rising with surprised impudence

and vanilla competing with cocoa

(depending on the recipe)

Blended, folded, mixed, stirred

always in time to the metranome of music

Oven preheated, we hand our offerings into its maw

Patience.

All dishes are washed. All surfaces cleaned.

Attend to the hopeful gifts being transformed

Dusting, vacuuming, beds long made

Wait while the trumpet solo reaches cresendo

Patience.

With the ring of the timer, we engage our success

while Big Bands and Crooners celebrate with us

Soul Pool

Soul Pool

I have existed for eons before I was born

As a descendant of my womenfolk

Who have cradled me within their wombs

Nurturing my spirit they have always known

Just as I know them in my aging, dusty carcass

Animated by their tribal songs that lent me their breath

Extending their pneuma into my mortality

Anointing me with collective wisdom as my inheritance

Courage emblazoned like a scarlet letter;

ushered in with fiercest loyalty

Resilience bestowed as an endowment of hope

Strength of a champion intrinsically passed down

I am born again and again, basking in the immortality

Reveling in the joyful victories of lives well lived

Lamenting the horrors and pains that are birthed;

And rebirthed, and again

I am my mother’s eyes, my grandmother’s faith,

My great-grandmother’s charm,

my great-great-grandmother’s muscle memory

I am because of their willingness to grant me

This Soul Pool in which I float and swim

Discarded Poem

Every word was engrossingly sincere,

examined almost to the point of microscopic ingenuity

Thesaurus opened, riffled, reflected upon

A collagulation of themed ideas

distilled into a rhythmic chorus

whose intention was to spark

depths of emotion, connection, and understanding.

It was a labor of ultimate love, tenderness,

A hybrid beauty without flaws.

“It’s good. I like it.” He said flatly;

returning to the video game without pause.

Growing Myself

My ancestral wisdom is tangible in my sunburnt skin, tasted on my compassionate tongue, washed in glorious joy, baptized in horrific sorrow. I am spirit ever expanding, heated with a desire to be loved, buried in the beaches of hourglass sands using a cracked red plastic bucket and a too small yellow shovel. I’m thirsty for knowledge, recumbent in peace. I am decayed by grief with only a mildly offensive odor. I have rebuilt myself, my life, my dreams with non-stock aftermarket replacement parts out of every past me I’ve ever been.