Holiday Poem

It occurred to me—

Well, I guess to be perfectly honest, it

Was mentioned to me

That thanksgiving is on Thursday.

 

“Which Thursday,” I asked honestly.

“This Thursday,” came the reply.

“Bugger.”

 

That last bit came not so much as a realized unfortunate,

But rather as a realized lack of realization:

Without the kitschy reminders and horns of plenty to

Remind you to buy loads of food and that

You will soon be subjected to the unnecessary prattling

Of your dearly beloved friends and family,

You don’t think about it.

 

I have been trying to avoid holidays lately,

For no reason, really, other than I wonder

What a world would look like in which the

Cumbersome commercial realities of most

Of these loathsome forced socialization

Events were not so consistently present.

 

Funny that each corresponding holiday involves the buying of something special.

These are the ones I’m especially miffed with:

V-Day: Choco, hearts, valentines for the kids, pink things;

Hallow’s: candy, candy, candy, decorations, face paint;

Thxgvg: so much food you could feed a third world country for a week on America’s excess on this one single day;

X-mas: gifts for everyone else, more food, and travel expenses.

 

St. Paddy’s I’m strangely comfortable with. 

Any holiday that involves a body heading to the pub and getting’ pissed up with his (or her) mates is a holiday I can get behind—

Which sort of does an unfortunate job of illustrating where both my and the Irish priorities really lie, doesn’t it?

 

“But it’s about remembering,” one might say.

“Some things you don’t want to remember.”

Most of the time it’s just a reminder you’re alone,

Or a reminder you don’t have a date to the party and you have to find a good single costume,

Or you don’t have any family,

Or precisely how much your family sucks,

Or how poor you are,

Or any number of other negative things.

 

I’m on a personal hiatus from holidays.

Enjoy them if you will, it doesn’t really affect me,

But please, please, please,

Don’t force me to want to celebrate.

Forced celebration feels a little bit false to me.

 

 

 

To Infinity and Beyond

Time is rushing now, and

perhaps it's because I am

so involved with existence,

which is a nice thought to

think, don't you think?

Time can slow to a crawl

when one is bored, and in

this life of endless possible

possibilities, there's just no

need for boredom.

Welcome to the land of the

active.

Even when doing nothing,

the mind can be wholly 

engaged and verdant and

living in exultation for its

infinite probability

of awesomeness.

Actions Reveal Desires IV

With two South African oranges, 

two liters of Minemine mineral 

water,

and the fall leaves falling and

reminding me that time moves

ahead 

whether we like it or not, I set 

off up the mountainside smiling.

Cogitations of existence's

essentially ephemeral

nature keep me company

climbing inclines, enjoying

gentle declines, and 

there's acceptance in my

thoughts--nothing more.

Just enjoy.

Full stop.

Just be.

Step.

Step.

Step.

Composed Reflectively while Toileting

Every day start anew.

Bring out a clean sheet

of the nicest paper you

happen to have lying

around,

bust out that pen you

have been saving for the

really important writing

and start.

Because you cannot know

whether today will be 

your last opportunity to

use them.

So start today as if you'd 

been given a second chance.

Re-Discovery

To discover is a special thing.

To re-discover the importance of a day is a very special thing.

 

When we are children, our daily interaction with existence is so precise,

So momentary,

So involved,

So instantaneously important,

And yet we tend to forget about it’s importance as we grow older,

 

To the point that our days move past us in uselessness.

 

And then on an un-special day,

A realization:

 

“This is the day that lord has made,

I will rejoice and be glad in it,”

 

Still has heft if thought of as:

 

“This is the day I can make for me,

I will rejoice and be glad in it.”

 

Choice, you see.  Choose.

Pick, because it only barely matters.

Choosing is an act, and in the act we learn so much…

No matter what.

 

Choose life.

Do not wander blindly toward death

As if it were the ultimate goal of existence,

Because every day is the culmination of your existence,

And it could not be otherwise:

 

The future exists only in the imaginary

The past exists only in education.

 

Set goals, but do the things today that will

Accomplish those goals by understanding

That you’ll need to pull from your experience

And understanding.

 

Stay away from always,

Not because you shouldn’t,

But because you CAN’T always

Do anything, ever.

 

Re-discover yourself daily.

Ascribe childlike importance to

The mundanities of existence,

Now that you understand.

 

And for your homework:

1) Accept

2) Smile

3) Enjoy it

 

These are your experiences we’re talking about here, and nobody can have them but you—

That’s got to mean something in this existence where re-discovering a discovery of re-discovery

 

Is possible.

 

Dreams... not the Fleetwood Mac Kind

"There is no dream mood for moldy bread."

"But that's what there was, 

just a loaf of moldy bread."

Oh, damnation, maybe I'll have to figure

this one out with my years of dreaming

and analytical experience as my guide.

It is interesting to note, though, that I have been

thinking a lot, and it's important to emphasize:

A LOT,

about excess and possessions and uselessness,

and I think we're at one of those spots ripe for

a full stop.

Bread only can go moldy, truly, if you have so

much

in terms of other food that you can't quite get

to it

in time, and so it reminds you of your excess

by its

very natural way of growing green life on it.

But we think of life as a possession.  Maybe we

think of it, sometimes, like a loaf of bread, on

the top shelf of our refrigerator, radiating its

existence to the world, when in fact, because

of sloth and inertia and excess and whatnot,

our existence is not radiating, really at all.

If it is radiating, it is only because moldy

is a support of a certain kind of life that

is actually, slowly, eating away at your

own.  It causes your life to be useless

to you and everyone around you, so

you radiate, not a superb existence

or magnificence, but rather more

like a smell--a truly foul kind of

smell it is, too.  Leaving bread

leaves you with a useless pile

of possessed excess, doesn't

it?  Resolve has taken hold

of me recently, if only for

illustrating the freedom

of consciousness to be

in a whole new way, 

and I resolve from 

now on to use the

things I buy and

buy less, so as 

to avoid the

pitfalls of

excess.

Language that has no heft 

finds no echo in its listener.