To Love A Friend

How much harder it must be

to love a friend

when you know

they’ve betrayed you.

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Sometimes Words Are All We Have To Offer

Sometimes words are all we have to offer.
And even when they are not enough,

expressing so,
will appease a forlorn heart.

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Pride and Humility

The nature of pride, and it’s ruin, is to think, speak, or act as if oneself were better than others.

The nature of humility and its salvation, is the thought, speech, and act to become better than one was.

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The Fall

I don’t remember the fall, only bits and pieces surrounding it

I remember the impression earlier in the day that I should keep my cellphone in my back pocket in case there was an emergency.

I remember just before, being on top of the 22 foot ladder and leaning to the left trying to carefully rope it around the tree to secure it.

The next thing I remember was coming to, laying on the ground and seeing my left wrist before me with the jagged bones sticking out of it. I was able to place my right hand  under it and flopping it up an inch and thinking, “Yep, it’s broken.” Strangely it didn’t hurt. Nothing did.

I thought of my cell phone in my left hand back pocket and thought, it wasn’t going to be easy getting it with my good right hand.

At that point I passed out again.

I came to in the ambulance. I asked the EMTs if they would please call my wife Laurie and let her know what happened. They said yes.

I passed out again.

Forward to a month or so later, I remembered trying to decide if I should call my son David who was playing video games in the basement.

And having thoughts that I didn’t know if I’d be able to make more than one phone call, as he may not hear me and I didn’t want to risk him move me and injuring me further while trying to help

So I apparently called 911.

Sometime during the ambulance ride I had asked the EMTs to call David and ask him to look around the base of the tree to see if he could find my glasses. (This would be the first time he heard anything about the accident.)

He said that when he looked where I lay, all of the clothes I had been wearing had been cut off me and were lying at the base of the  tree.

It would not be until after the surgery that I would wake up in the ICU.

A couple months later I would finally learn the extent of the damage:

Broken bones in my left forearm.

A broken rib.

Two fractured vertebrae

A fractured sacrum

A fractured Coccyx

Pelvic open book fracture.

Hematoma  in my right leg

And some elephant man type swelling of man parts that I won’t go into.

The moral of all this?

Always have a spotter when using a ladder.

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July 25th

July 25th,
was the day I almost left this Earth,
and you behind,
after falling most heavily upon it.

Who would have thought
that a mere accident
could claim the life of an immortal?

I look around the garage,
this house,
my den.

And see tools,
supplies,
and things,
that only have meaning for me.

What a mess
I would have left
for you to clean up.

And all the additional responsibilities
you would have had to assume.

I am so, so sorry
that I put you through all this.

And cry,
embarrassing both of us,
with tears of gratitude
for your tender kindnesses since then.

And smile/grimace through tears,
when you in anger say,
that if I ever did  something  like that again,
you would kill me.

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Looking For Love In The Fall Of 1978

I was looking through a small unpublished journal I wrote as an undergrad and liked one of the poems I read in it. So I decided to reprint it here with a few changes to reflect my current understanding. I’m so glad I’m no longer in that situation, and my heart goes out to those who are.

A long time ago,
twenty times before,
I’ve walked the path I’m walking now.

My love is lost.

Lonliness is what that path is made of.

I’ve gone and lost another.

You,
have been stifled

by me.

 

“What can I do?” I ask myself.

I don’t know, I’ve tried so many things.
.
There is a river which travels throughout my mind.
I wish…
to cast myself upon it.
I wish to float…
so freely,
thoughtlessly.

I wish to travel on that watery grave where thoughts become meaningless.

Yea, I say,

where there is no existence of feeling.

In my sorrow,
time has no meaning beyond the moment.

Now I’m feeling, wishing,
that moments had no meaning;

that there was no undergoing, nor gleaning
of the fates which impede our progression

toward the eternal truth of love,
and understanding.

Now I’m feeling, wishing,
that there was no undergoing, nor gleaning

of the fates which beckon falsely,

trapping hopeful lovers, ensnaring us in situations

that dash our hopes,

and those of others.

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Dutchman’s Breeches

---

Every spring,

fae Dutchmen flock to free these fancy breeches

from my forest fronds.

---

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Taylor Swift

I was surprised to find
I dreampt of you last night.

Suffice to say
in looking for your own
I found you reading in your sacred space.

We met as friends
but my profession of wanting more too soon,
led to your exit from the room.

Normally a dream would have ended there, but

I was surprised to find,
I saw you once again!

And in looking for my own
I found you curled up reading
in another sacred space.

And upon seeing me,
I watched you in your haste of flight
to find another place,

I was saddened by regret,

that true intimacy is shared,
not taken.

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So Many Souls

So many souls,
voices crying out.

See me!

Hear me!

Feel for me!

Will others pause their journey through this crowd, in this busy world,

long enough to notice you,

one human being, among the

poets,
singers,
writers
artists,
actors
dancers,
and performers,

whom chance has revealed,

as you vie for the attention of a kindred spirit?

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What I See When I Close My Eyes, Part I

 

The following is a non-fictional writing exercise on perception:

I ask my wife what she sees when she closes her eyes in a totally lightless room. “Black.” She says.
“Anything else?” I ask.
A boring “No.” is her response.

What I see when I close my eyes is… complicated. It’s different depending on the situation.

Color-wise the elements are muted flourescent greens, the kind you see on a glow-in-the dark watch face after a few hours into the night,

and muted flourescent purples; the color of dust on velvet under a black light.

Speaking of black, I see that too. Rarely is it ever the rich perfect vibrant black seen on an OLED color TV screen but is almostly totally muddied, washed out by the overlay of the previous two colors.

The picture is complex.  As I describe this I have to alternate between turning the light on in my room to write, and turning the light off and placing the palms of my hands over my eye sockets to return to my interior vision. When I do, what I see has no boundaries save it be how far I can turn my eyes left and right, up and down. If I had 360 degree vision, I suspect  the picture would be spherical. In fact that is it. It’s just that my viewing arc is more restricted. And “I” am in its’ center.

When I say picture, I mean both senses of the word. The “picture” is what I see, but it also has movement. There are elements which are static for an instant when I focus on them, but change, either when I move my eyes to another part of my visual field, or shift into something else when I concentrate on them.

There is no horizon. There is two and three dimensionality. It is sometimes like looking into a microscope and seeing what you have focused on a two dimensional plane and then turning the dial and seeing the focus of a nearer or farther plane.

The elements are multitudinous, minute.
They comprise my whole visual field. I suspect it is part after-images, but I know upon experimentation that they also are physiological manifestations. For instance, if I roll my eyes as low as I can, I see two arcs/ circles flashes of light which I suspect might be photons silhouetting my retinal disks.

And the elements sometimes strobe. I wonder if this is due to microsaccades generated by my superior colliculus. You know, those little jerky eye movements that keep things from disappearing  if you stare at them too long.

I’m getting sleepy but there are three other things I mention off of the top of my head. Sometimes the picture is cross-hatched. I don’t know where that comes from. Sometimes I see typeface. That comes from reading too long before bedtime. And sometimes it’s like looking through a sponge of neurons, which makes me wonder, since eyes, optic nerves, optic chiasm, right and left lateral geniculate nucleai, and right and left striate cortices are all connected; whether the visual seat of my consciousness is looking from the outside in, or inside out. Perhaps it’s one of those things that’s dependent upon your choice of view.

Am “I” actually able to peer through the cells in my visual cortex? I kid you not. It’s food for thought.

So, what do YOU see when you close your eyes? I’d like to know!

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