Consoling Exchanges and Rhythm Changes
Whiter than white,
but warming to human touch,
just a stone’s throw away
from sticks and brush.
Hit the dirt shuffling;
pay no attention to rags and bones
or the masked tears and shouts
to send him home.
At times, it seems as if the whole world has become one giant furry-esque Disneyland. Denial is rampant and “turn the other cheek” often means looking the other way. The Internet is crawling with the failed, offering their poor experience as “life coaches” and hawking clichés they have gotten out of a one-dollar book of quotes. Why? Because the Internet is also filled with desperate dreamers—and all the snake-oil-selling sharks can smell blood in the water.
Today, professionalism, experience, initiative, productivity, and creativity mean very little in a dehumanized business climate that more so values the bottom line, politics, or follow-me aesthetics.
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The Last Grasp for a Gasp
Deeply lost in the woods in the unsettling comfort of your grasp.
The misunderstood remain elusive, purposely so …
and, there but before ego, grace falls in serpentine gasps.
The window will turn seasons again in a few moments.
Stay tuned—the show is about to begin!
A cast of characters scatter the dreams, laid out like serpents.
It’s a shame that all relevance is lost
in the to-each-his-own,
taking for granted the lost-in-translation
and the solipsistic lies we tell ourselves.
And in a world desperate for a unified sense of belonging,
we stand alone and wax indifferent about love.
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Otherwise, Other Lives, Other Lies
What we’ve known will always be,
even when we choose to forget.
It’s not about the silent distance
or the march of balanced offset.
The hour approaches
… and the dawn grows dark
…. and the eyes remain unspoken.
The “in a minute” lingers
… as the flame runs from the spark,
…. and the woke sip the lethargy of the moment.
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Breakfast Rapture à la Mode
All hail the new religion!
Anything goes …
Nobody cares …
What’s on the menu?
To Each His Own
Why do we cast our eyes from one to another …
but only to those who nod in kind …
with eyes averted …
from what is common among us?
To each his own …
Oh, what a world …
Oh, what a world …
Hate finds objectivity …
an equal opportunity pervades all.
Tears are subjective …
seeking comfort in the cognate.
To each his own …
Oh, what a world …
Oh, what a world …
Full stop.
Beyond what you feel
you can sense,
but you refuse to see.
Pause.
Too much thoughtlessness,
– the usual behavior
concerning progress.
Freeze.
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This old snake has shed many skins.
He can not take them back.
In fact, he has no desire to.
Was the old snake comfortable in his old skins?
Yes, sometimes for a while,
but in time they grew old,
lost their vitality and betrayed him.
And so, he slithered away from them naked.
Old acquaintances still ask,
“Where have you gone?” and
“What is this new look of yours?”
They spit “We hardly recognize you anymore!”
They grew so comfortable with this or that old skin of his
that they took it for granted.
But this old snake understands all too well;
it is just his old skin they want, not him.
And so he answers “That was just an old skin.
It is gone and I am born anew, again.”
Some say the snake is just a trickster and a fake!
The snake says “No. You mistook me for my skin.
But it was just my skin not my nature.
I have always been just a snake.”
The lesson:
Never chew over dead skin; you will get skinned.
For skin, like clothes, makes neither the man, nor the snake.
In fact, this old snake isn’t even a snake!
He is, after all, just a cool cat and a Dadaist-cum-Sartrist!
This post is very personal because life is ultimately about the collection of personal moments we hold so dear. These treasured memorable instances of self-connection and self-awareness are all we have, and all we will ever to take the grave. If we were Christmas trees, such memories would be our twinkling lights that give us color and character.
Step into my background for context. I’m an American; I live in Greece. I’m originally from Miami (Florida), or more specifically Westchester and some temporally conglomerated junction of Bird Road (near the old trains tracks), Coral Way, Galloway Road, South Dixie Highway, Dadeland, Coral Gables and all the old haunts I still visit in my mind from time to time. If you don’t know Miami, these places have nothing to do with Miami Vice, South Beach, Art-Deco or Calle Ocho. I’m from a period time when neon signs flashed brilliantly in the looming darkness along a two-lane corridor of rushing four-wheeled headlights causing horizontal blurring streaks across falling dusky skies of electric blues and burnt oranges.
But this post isn’t about Miami; it’s about Christmas, self-actualization, self-awareness, self-worth and all those personal selfies we hold so dear. It’s not just about the blues and oranges, but also the punctuated reds and greens that grew out of early images of black and white. Continue reading
Loitering Words 