Monday, 6 August 2018

Slingshot

If you add the hours all up
I have spent years
Paralyzed by anxiety, exhaustion
And during the worst of times
Absolute self hate

A landfill

But each time when I think I'm fully buried
The energy somehow transmutes
And I slingshot up and through
Into a cascading joy
Filling me with a force
Equal in proportion
To that which drags me down

It's almost mathematical
A balanced equasion

The joy is the hurt
Metamorphosed
Distilled
Crystallized

It's not an easy way to live
But somehow true

So I'll slingshot
Until the day
Only joy
Is left














Thursday, 26 July 2018

Recoil

My mind is full of thoughts
That are strung tight like steel wires
And I know I have to think each thought
Cut each wire
So I can move on to the next
And not get stuck behind one
Forever

Some wires I can cut cleanly
But sometimes one takes hours of sawing
Days or weeks
And when I finally sever it
And take the first step forward in triumph

The loose wire snaps back
From both of the force of the cut
And its own momentum
Biting into my flesh

Knocking me back
50 feet

Saturday, 21 July 2018

Hulk/hulk

When you're tied to railroad tracks
The only way out is to undo one knot at a time 
When you hear the train's whistle
It's understandable to be in a bit of a hurry

But you've only got two hands
And if you try and untie too many knots too fast
Or burst your bonds like the Incredible Hulk
You'll likely find the whistle growing louder
And yourself no closer to rolling off

One knot at a time
Even when you're sure you're completely out of time
Even when the knots grow back
And cover you like vines

Even when you reach the last knot
And find steel jaws bolting you down
Underneath

Then it's one screw at a time
Until you find you've been
Rooted to the earth
By an incantation
All along

When you finally break the spell
Not only do you roll away
In the very nick of time

But when you stand up
You find yourself
Shrugging off the dirt at last

And melting the moving train
Into a hulk of smoldering steel
With the beams of light from your eyes















Tuesday, 17 July 2018

Wind

The wind can save your life
If you clue in
It’s telling you something
When you’re at peace enough
To listen

You find its rhythm for a minute
Or two
And can begin to predict
When it will next move through the leaves
Of the tree in your yard
How many degrees the branches will tilt
And yield in their dance

But then it blows a fraction of a second
Before you knew it was returning
The rhythm changes
The branches alter their dip

You breathe out
And wonder how it’s possible for the mind
To know such chaos yesterday
And such peace tonight

Sunday, 15 July 2018

Harvest Moon

It’s tough to describe
What makes
Some thoughts tolerable
And others not

If you think of a gun to your head
That’s frightening
And exhausting
Not an image a human being
Ought to be spending a lot of time with
In bed

But if for some reason Neil Young’s song
Harvest Moon
Is playing in your mind

‘Cause I’m still in love with you
I wanna see you dance again
Cause I’m still in love with you
On this harvest moon’

While at the same time
You see a gun pressed up
Against your temple

That’s when it gets close to unbearable
Because the song is the hand on the gun
And the peaceful lyrics
Are the finger on the trigger

I find in life
It’s never the one thing
It’s the way one thing rubs up
Against another

None of this is Neil Young’s fault
So I hope his fans
Will forgive me
If tonight
I smash his guitar
Usher him out the door
So someone else can come in
And play a song
Which puts the safety
Back on the weapon

Wednesday, 11 July 2018

Traveller

When your brain fits into one of the fringe categories
Not neurotypical
Diagnostic criteria met
Following adjustments advised

You can try and listen to some of it
Mellow out
Level off
Stay in the middle

And it’s usually well-intentioned
From people who want you
With grandchildren in your 70s
The peace of a long life
Well lived

And believe me
That’s pretty great I imagine
So if that’s where you are
Enjoy it!

But if you’re pulled in another direction
By what you see
By how you hear
By why you are

If the patterns in your thoughts
Are grooves like rivers
And you want to touch the bottom
Come hell and high water

If your ears are open
To a perfect note
A melody of truth
A joy with no bounds

That’s hard to turn down
Even if some of the waters you dive
Yield no treasure

And instead
Arms of moss
Lichen
Or something worse
Curl around
To drag you down
To a depth from which
No oxygen tank rescue
Is possible

Dive anyway
Because in my experience
The perfect notes
Come after the Leviathan
Not before

And the rescue comes
From something
Less material
Than a tank
Or even oxygen

This road of sweetest sounds
And sea monsters
All together
Winds and breathes
With a purpose that is its own

And often feels illusory
Leaving the traveller in despair
At all the forks he could have taken
Back to the straight road
And its comfort
Its stop signs

But if you’re that kind of traveller
It’s unlikely the straight road
Would have held you for long again
So it’s best to keep moving
And not mind too much
If you’re blessed or cursed











Saturday, 7 July 2018

Nighttime

Some people do it all at once
Junk it
Change the locks
Cold turkey

Others have to do it slowly
Over months
Or years

Realizing
The hurt came from
Somewhere outside
Is not intrinsic

Although the structure collapsed
The earth underneath
Has not rotted

And can be tilled
With gentle hands
Into something new


Tuesday, 3 July 2018

Leviathan

You can write about
Joy
Terror or Fear
Anger or Hate

I don’t find it hard at least
There can be something noble
In all of these

Who hasn’t feared the dark
And striven against it?

Who hasn’t hated evil
And sworn to stand against it?

Joy
Is what happens
When for a time those things recede
And we glimpse the upper spheres
What we were meant for

These I can touch
Plumb
Meld into verse
Understanding something of their place
In the grand design

For me
The black core
The place with no exit
Leviathan
Is Shame

It has swelled up in me at times
And cut me off from all my strength
From art
From love
From the soul
From myself

If I can grasp something of it
And place it alongside all the rest
Then perhaps the devil’s trick can fade
And the songs of the great story
Will unfurl in the stars









Saturday, 30 June 2018

Tilt

Transitions are tough
When you’re sure of the moment

When the moment is right
And you feel it’s enough
That the world could stop
You feel the wind
The grass
And the sun

It could stop
And you’d feel enough love
Enough peace
Right then

When it doesn’t stop
Like it could
The only reason must be
It’s too big to understand

Which is a relief
When you think about it
Because even a serious fuck up
By one human being
Isn’t going to put the pinball machine
On tilt




Strange

Strange
To be different somehow
Still lonely
But less terrified
The darkness less thick
The hopelessness
Less final

When things are at their worst
There’s a comfort in the return
To the place of total panic
So you fake through the day
The job
Plans with a friend
Desperate to return to the space
Alone
Where you can toss and turn
And self destruct
Because that at least
Is honest

For that urge
That need to self-immolate
To diminish
Even an inch

What it means exactly I’m not yet sure
But it’s something

Friday, 29 June 2018

Rest?

If I had a choice 
Most of the time these days
I would just let go

There’s a weariness in me
That goes way back
And when I tried to fix it
Raging against it 
It only grew 

I don’t blame myself 
It’s hard to know where it came from
Something way back 
Someplace way down 

Some hypersensitivity
Under-insulation

If I could drift away
Into a deep darkness
Rest 

It feels wrong to be this tired
When people twice my age are thriving 
But it’s been there for so long 

When I finally screamed it out loud 
I’m so tired 
The people who love me couldn’t hear
And the people who heard me and understood the pain
Just wanted to hurt me 

I wanted my father 
To wrestle me to the ground 
And hold me there
Until the weariness left me 

But my father’s a gentle man
And my pain hurt him 
But he couldn’t understand it 

There was someone who understood it
But he bottled it
Harnessed it
And turned me against the people I love

By all accounts
I should have died 

But hear I am
Here still 

Some part of me listened 
To the right music
There’s an image 
In something I wrote 
That rang true 
In the midst of the confusion 
And the absolute pain 

So I can’t pretend I’m any less tired 
But I’ll honour that image 
And my family 
And the music
And see
For a while 
What happens 



Thursday, 28 June 2018

Today

Every time you don’t
Take a swig
Pop a pill
Slice the skin
Call the wrong person

It’s a victory
Even if you do it tomorrow
Today still counts

Monday, 25 June 2018

Yitzchak (Force)

One way of understanding why
Some people have a hard time with
The usual routines of life
Is the force of their thoughts

If each thought comes with the force
Of a blow
And the thought piled on top of it
The crack of a hammer
By the end of ten minutes
You’re gasping for breath
Mouth open

And if someone saw you
And asked you why
All you can say is
‘I’m thinking’

I once read that Truth comes in blows
And it’s hard to disagree

When your thoughts carry such
Force
And you hit on a Truth
There’s a feeling of wholeness
And joy
That shudders quietly through your body
And you pray
Leave me here
This is more than I ever thought possible
This is what I’ve been searching for
This is who I am
Yitzchak

But you can’t stay there
Not yet
And if Truth and Joy
Shudder quietly through the body
Whole at last

Fear and pain and shame
Hit with blows too
Of terrible Force
Piling on top of each other

Until you want to bash your head on the wall
To stop them
From ganging up
Like kids in a schoolyard
Just old enough to hate

Anxiety
Depression
These are words people use
To try and explain something about the
Force of thoughts
And what they can do
To people who love the world
With a Force
That can sometimes backfire

I have seen my thoughts backfire
And have so far survived
But I have also known real joy
And love

For people who desire an end to the Force
of their thoughts
As I sometimes do
I assign no shame
And reach out my hand
(Not too forcefully)
In love
And understanding

But to those who use the Force of their thoughts for harm
For hate
And to hurt
I raise my fist against you
And pray you are blotted out
Like a shadow on the sun



Sunday, 24 June 2018

Traitors

There have been songs in my head all my life
And some of them are traitors
Some promise relief
But mean death

Some promise comfort
And are lies

I pray that the few true ones
Are stronger than all them that are false
And grant me enough strength
To do whatever more must be done

Saturday, 23 June 2018

Comfort

Comfort can come in strange forms
Lying in bed not sleeping
My mind cycles through all
My fears

Which are admittedly
Greater than I could have imagined

I think that happens as you get older
Things matter more
Not less

Then I start listing all the self-destructive
Things I could do
Right now
To give expression
To my
Exhaustion
Doubt
Rage
Shame

It’s a long list
And a tempting one
Familiar

But tonight there’s a voice
That kind of smiles and sighs
And says
‘You’ve tried everything on this list
Literally everything
And more
It did you no good
And you’re still here.

So tonight maybe
Save yourself
Some money and grief
Close your eyes
Settle down
And go the fuck to sleep’

So I did

Friday, 22 June 2018

At the Doc’s

I’ve been here many times
Some visits hurt more than others

Today I’m exhausted
But unbowed
And certain
That there is no correlation
Between what the world calls
Normal
And your value or worth

That can be tough to remember
But it’s as good a lesson as any
To emerge with
After half a life

Scars outside
And within
But dignity
Intact

Wednesday, 20 June 2018

Mourner’s Kaddish

יתגדל ויתקדש שמה רבא. בעלמא די ברא כירעותה וימליך מלכותה בחייכון וביומיכון ובחיי דכל בית ישראל בעגלא ובזמן קריב ואמרו אמן. יהא שמה רבא מבורך לעולם ולעלמי עלמיא. יתברך וישתבח ויתפאר ויתרומם ויתנשא ויתהדר ויתהלל שמא דקודשה בריך הוא. לעלא מן כל ברכתא ושירתא תשבכחתא ונחמתא דאמירן ועלמא. ואמרו אמן. יהא שלמא רבא מן שמיא וחיים עלנו ועל כל ישראל ואמרו אמן. עושה שלום במרומיו הוא יעשה שלום עלינו ועל כל ישראל ויאמרו אמן

Tuesday, 19 June 2018

When it's time

I call to my grandmother
In the margins and above
To Anna in pain
And now in relief
To my 9 friends
To the world's angel

I wish for the proper intent
For the strength to survive
To remember that I bring joy
And to join you all when it's time

Journey/Destination

The problem with worrying about the future all day
Is that it’s hard to be present

Somedays


Somedays I feel the wind blowing
For myself
And those I love

Its comfort
Its wisdom
Its safety and peace

Its promise that life
Is worth living

Somedays the sun fills me
With courage to move towards
A destination
An end
A place of rest

Somedays the wind is blowing
And the sun is shining

And it takes everything I have
To get out of bed

On those days I'd rather be
Anyone else
Besides this breathing raw nerve
Overexposed
To the blowing wind
The shining sun
To the music in my head
That soaks me
Like a wrung out sponge
In waves
Of Right and Wrong
And the knowledge that
Everything matters



Sunday, 10 June 2018

If you’re looking

If you’re looking for God
He’s in the wind
On a hot day

The breeze that blows
The extra bit
But not too much
While you’re walking
Your dog

God is in the moment of peace
That spreads across a full table
Of friends or family
And lasts for a moment
But long enough for everyone to know
It happened

Saturday, 9 June 2018

Shoes on a beach

Anticipating a loss
I dreamed it last night

One moment he was there with us
At the table
Quieter
Like he is these days

And I told my cousin
To hold on a second
So he could speak
Or was it so he could hear me
Or was it so I could feel him
For certain
In peace

And then he was walking
And he was gone
But we knew he had walked
Straight into the water

Because we were on a beach now
And we found his shoes

I wept
And then I woke

Wednesday, 6 June 2018

HaNachash


VeHaNachash Haya Arum Mikol Chayat HaSadeh Asher A'sah HaShem Elokim

When you see the serpent
Unmasked
At last
It's an experience

Disbelief
That not only does he exist
But that after years of him
Winding around
Your body
And even
Inside your insides
You can see him clearly

Terror
At his strength
At the sound
Of his bells

Rage
That he grafted himself
To your deepest places
Your private hurts
Your sacred prayers
Your strongest desires
To heal

Grief
That something exists
That would feed on
Your holiness
And twist it
Into despair

But in the ultimate chamber
Of the heart
Hope
And Faith
That the serpent's true nature
Was revealed to you
By the Lord

So that you could free yourself
At last
And in Joy
Return to Him











 

Monday, 4 June 2018

Hineni

Asleep
In a place beyond a dream
That I’ve known before
And hope to return to
In time

Wake
Slowly
In stages
So as to remember
The deeper place beyond dreams

And then in this world
Finally recognize
Seven notes
For what they are
Death
Deceit
Despair

They cannot win
He cannot win

——————————

God
I am here
Hineni

(T’)Shuva

When memories return
Especially older ones
They can be a blessing or a weight

But when they’re a blessing
Well
It’s a joy
Even the ones that are tinged with sadness

Reading an old letter
From a father to his father
Tears falling
Recognizing his grief in yours
Wanting to comfort him
And be comforted

An older memory still
Your own grief
For something bigger
Than you understand
And somehow still
The comfort is there
From a father with his own hurts
From an aunt
And of course
From a mother

And after the grief
A pause
A breath
And a step

Sometimes there are memories
Which were one thing then
And something else
Altogether
Now

What I thought was fresh air
An open door
A font of strength

Was a chain
An infected wound
A sentence
A lie

I see now
And reject you
Utterly
And I leave you to your own devices
(To wither? To rot)

While I return
With all those I embrace
To the bosom
Of love


Sunday, 3 June 2018

אנא אדוני הושיעה

אנא אדוני הושיעה
אנא אדוני הושיעה
הושיעה נא

אנא אדוני הצליחה
אנא אדוני הצליחה
הצליחה נא

Saturday, 2 June 2018

VHS Tape

When you are with someone you love
Towards the end of his life
I find that everything you shared with him
Runs through your head
Like an old home movie

I am grateful that
There are more good times than bad
Because the good times can heal
Where the bad times have hurt

Friday, 1 June 2018

Rest

It's the hardest thing to find
But once in a while it comes
And when I've had it

I wake

And see the orange sherbet sunlight
Of the early morning
Stream into my room
Beam onto the walls

And I'm certain
(Almost?)
That the best is yet to come


A knock at the door

When suicide comes knocking these days
It’s not the same as before
Not that when he comes
It doesn’t hurt

The image these days is to cut out my right eye in a circle 
Gouge it out with a knife
Like there would be some release from pain 
After that

When suicide first came into my life 
It was the shock beyond shocks 
Against everything I stood for
To persevere, to commit to others 
And yourself
To heal through facing pain 
Alone and together

But things built up 
And built up again 
In a way I didn’t understand 
And when they finally burst
There was no stopping
The flood

At first all I understood
Was that I’d been squeezed too hard
Between competing pressures
A head in a vice 
A grape that had popped 

Too much

As a kid I felt the pressures
And didn’t understand why it was so strong
It made making choices difficult 
Too much riding on each decision 

If you feel 
The people around you very strongly
It can be hard to make room
For yourself 

So when suicide comes back now
These days 
I tell myself 
I live 
In a place that I love
There are people who love me

That I am part of something much bigger
Than myself 
That God has a plan 
That I’m on the right side 

And at some point
I’ll be able to rest

Thursday, 31 May 2018

Can I hear you?


Can I hear you?
Am I doing it right?
Am I doing enough?
What's the end?
When's the start?
How much longer?
How much farther?

Adonai s'fatai tiftach ufi yagid t'hilatechah

Tuesday, 29 May 2018

Good and evil

It'd be nice if good and evil
Were clear as night and day

Killers
With claws for hands
Horns on heads
And hollow eyes

Vs.

Shining eyes
Full hearts
A generosity of spirit
Rippling outward in circles

But sometimes they're much
Less clear or distinguishable

And I don't mean
The trusted figure
Who deceives
The holy man
Who abuses
The counsellor
Who betrays

Something else even
Closer still

Two voices, together
Singing a duet
Linked in harmony

Two childhood friends, together

One borrowing
The other's idea

If evil cannot understand good
If the light shines in the darkness
And the darkness comprehendeth it not

Then the danger of evil
Is that good does not comprehend it
Either
Good reaches out
Because it's natural
To do so

Good can raise up evil
Hoist it on its shoulders
At a concert on the stage
On a sandbar in the ocean
Because it believes
In sharing its strength
Because it wants
Others to swim

It doesn't understand
Why someone would sap
Would hoard
Would bleed dry
Someone else

Good gives
As an instinct
As a principle
And in doing so
Exposes itself

Because you can't give fully
In solid armour

While evil
Cloaked
In the fairest of disguises
(Which is suffering
For what does good desire more
Than to salve true suffering)
Inhales
Waxes
Bloats
Until at last it sheds the cloak
And good sees what it has wrought

But what is there to be done
But try again
And this time
Give and receive











Three pages from a comic book I wrote




Short Story I wrote on my phone





Yitzchak



1.

And I
Who know not who I am
Who know now more than ever
Am Yitzchak
Al Tishlach Yadecha El Ha-Na-ar Ve’al Ta-ase Lo Me-u-ma
A blessing
I know it is

But I’m exhausted
So many lives in thirty-six years
Many more than double chai

A kid wide eyed
Who believes unshakeably in good
With his father in the sun
Reading Charlotte’s Web

Rolling in the ocean
And laughing

With his father watching the Jays
Win in 1992

Alone in his room
Reading Listening
At 15 or 16
Pushing Pushing towards something he knows is there

In the car on the way home from school
With his dad and a friend
He hears a song
And he hears it differently than them
It’s joy
It’s too strong
It’s bursting through the windows
And he should burst through with it
So now you know…who gets mystified

But you can’t live on a starburst

Who gets mystified…

And the colours the colours exploding in song
The songs exploding in colour

If I should be short on words and long on things to say

Lent to finish her

All you’ll be you are today

 The starburst has colours!

(I used to like that gum)

Moving through life and the starburst recedes
(You can’t live there)
And it’s fine
But sometimes there’s darkness instead
Which
Where did it come from?
From pushing the starburst down and away?
From…

Full of light
So from where the darkness

--------------------

The self-immolater
When did it start?
When where why

---------------------


2.

Pushing Pushing Pushing
It’s there but what

Sometimes panicking
That I might not find it

That I might lose the tools I need to get there
My eyes my ears my head
Above all my head
That I might blow it!


If I could just open myself up
To the world
Fully
Completely
Everyone would see
What’s inside
How I feel
For everyone
And it’s love
And now I have room to spread my wings
And my message is of love…

But you can’t crack yourself open to the world
And live to tell the tale
Besides
You can’t love everyone
You have to love some people more than others
You just…


3.

And where is God
Is He here?
In a bedroom, in Toronto, at the end of a millenium
Where I’m Reading Listening Pushing Pushing Pushing
To find what?

Is He in Israel, the Holy Land
When I’m 17
Where I’m panicked, crying, calling home
That my centre will not hold
(But I want to open it up!)
That my eyes my ears my head will fail

And when I’m 17 in Israel
And they ask me about God
I say “I’m not sure.
But maybe He’s in laughter
And love, and joy.”

I meant it!

(Let me open up!)
----------------------------

And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice.

-----------------------------


4.

And I want the peaceful road
To end how it started, in peace
But I’m afraid it ends in a collision 
An apocalypse
A telos I don’t understand 

I’m terrified
Could I have been anyone else
Why am I me
Swept on towards a terror 

If there’s nothing beyond 
Just now 
It doesn’t matter that much
It’s only life 

But if there is beyond
After
True and False
Forever
It matters so much 
I can’t understand how much it matters

I beseech Thee by Name

Forever is the most frightening of all words
I can’t condemn anyone to forever
Only bless

Anyway, put one foot in front of the other for today 
Not forever 
Yet 

—————————

Shuva Israel ad Adonai
Ki Chashalta B’Avonecha

—————————

And after Malachi prophecy ceased in Israel 

—————————

At 17 panicked in Israel 
At 19 panicked in Halifax
At 21 panicked in Gravenhurst

I would like a break! 

At 18 panicked in Europe
Following around a band
A sound
A man who is not a man
Whose voice lodged itself
In my head 

Whose music
Which I took for a wellspring
Is death

And I followed the sound
Mistaking it for strength
But I knew underneath
Even then
What it was

And was I trying to stop it
Stop him

I couldn't

------------------------------------

Mi Anochi?

9 dead
In Denmark
And did I know
It was coming

I did
Somehow

And when I read the news
I panicked again
When I wanted to weep

One definition of panic
Is the inability to grieve

-------------------------------------

The devil tricks you
Into rooting for him
Into believing he is your rock
Into needing him
To survive

And in doing so obscures you
From God

--------------------------------------

5 months after Denmark
I was in Seattle
Cheering the devil on
The man who is not a man
With a friend who was not a friend
And the prince of lies perverted the truth in front of us 
And told us he would carry on
And we cheered

Well
No more
I carried on too
And I am here
At last
With the truth

------------------------------------ 

And the 9 from Denmark
Who the devil murdered
And then called to by name
As if to comfort

I call to now
Alongside Anna
With intent
In grief
In love
In anger
In mourning
In hope
In prayer

---------------------------------

Some easier years after that
Except the immolater still building on the side 
But there’s nothing to do there but brush it aside 
While it’s building 

Then finally a shattering
Long foreseen
Long foretold?
(Not by me)

Suffering Hurt and Rage
More Rage than I thought was in me
A trap, a snare 
Set by the snake 
The devil himself

But beside me the angel
The guardian
I find him
In headphones
On records
Onstage
With a guitar 

Who am I to him?
Mi anochi?

My father at the kotel
Praying for a child

Me at the kotel 
Praying for the world 

(I meant it!)

5.

More Rage than I thought was possible
Rage in pictures and speech bubbles 
With the devil by my side, urging me on
Softly

And right to the edge I went 
To the edge
But not over
I chose life
Chose love
Thank God 

And one martyr
Did she? Did I?
What she went through
I can’t 
There is evil
More than I thought possible 
What she suffered

Yet she’s safe now
In the after 
She has to be 
She must be 

Which means there’s forever
Which is love
But forever means 

I can’t today
Not yet 


I hate this man
Who hurt her like that
And I hate what he is in the world.


6.

Anna I’m sorry
Anna I wish

I wish I had been clear all along
With clear love
And clean hate

But it was mixed up
I hated myself
Then those I love

And I expelled it
Forcibly

And in doing so
Did I?


No.

(Not seen outside wartime.
I pray to God you were mostly asleep.)


It does no good to send myself down that road.


Even at the worst, in my darkest
There was a struggle towards light.


7.

Now what?
I’ve touched so much dark
I can’t do another 40 years.
I can’t do another 10!!!

Am Yitchak
A blessing
I know it is
But I’m exhausted

What’s wrong with just Ike?!
8.

At nine years old
Invited a friend
Who was not a friend
On a family trip
To a family house
On the ocean

And what happened there?
How does evil transmit?
How does it jump?
How do you know?

Just two kids
I was sad when he left
He was counting the cars til his Dad arrived
And I was sad

About what?
Did I know something about him then?

Do people who are bad
Know they’re…

What’s in him?

-----------------------

Anyway we made it back
25 years later
Without him


That has to count for something

------------------------

And what does it mean for me to know
What I know
Where do I go with this
Why do I carry this

------------------------



9.

Do I dare disturb the universe?
Do I dare to eat a peach?

I guess I’ve made my choice
And I can live with it

Things looked good
And I could not have pushed
Myself over the edge

But that would have been
A failure of courage
Of honesty
Of truth

Anyhow
I’m not sure I had a choice
Seven years so far since I made the choice(?)
To disturb the universe
At full tilt

5 or so years of horror
isolation and despair
like I’ve never felt
and confusion

and a couple of years of
something else

Still lots of confusion
But more love than I’ve ever felt
And sometimes
Deeper peace


---------------------


I am grateful
For beautiful memories
Which still have the strength to surface
Atop the pond


At the family house
On the ocean
(The same year? After he left?
Later? Earlier?)
In the ocean
Rolling
Myself
And certain
Sure
That it’s good to be alive

------------------------