Modern Children

I read the words of my ancestors 

I hear the songs of my heroes

And I think

I cannot do this 

Their thoughts are so clear 

Assured, confident 

They leap off the page 

Out of the speaker 

Urging me on

Lighting a path for me to follow

I feel the grandeur of their consciousnesses

The clarity of their visions 

The intensity of their longing 

The burning fires of their wisdom

What do I have to offer

In my little home

With my clumsy, jagged thoughts

Chained to my tiny screen

With tired eyes

Like all of us 

Modern children

Only a pioneer can be an heir

And only an heir can be a pioneer 

So help me see it through 

And make sure I don’t go

Exploring off

In the wrong direction

You Should Rejoice

It was the kind of dream it hurts to wake from

Not just because we were together

But because we were ‘really talking’

As you’d have put it

And I had the right words

Though they started to slip away

Even as I spoke them 

As I slipped back towards wakefulness

And away from you 

But I’ll try to put down some of them here 

You were mentioning 

All the exhaustion and uncertainty 

And even despair that you’d lived

And I said you should rejoice

Because these are symptoms of the heart

And that I knew 

The Being to Whom we return

Is concerned with matters of the heart