One moment
One oppertunitity
A simple eye connection
And secret looks at the ground
A bag spilling with coins
Bills 
Faces glaring up at us
Screaming take me.
But this money comes with a price
We both know that.
Take the money 
Pay the price
And you're filthy rich.
In money anyway.
Our hands touch on the bag
A thick canvas sack
Rough under our fingertips
Take the money
In that moment our eyes meet
A train whistles
We stand up and walk away.
Our heel clicks fading into the distance, 
Leaving behind an undesirable canvas sack

 

A charcoal sketch of long ago
Our footprints faded in the snow.
The smell of honey always stays
A reminder of the far off days,
When we liked each other
Sister from another mother.
Music you played I can't delete
It continues on in my heartbeat.
I know I should say adieu
And start letting go of you,
But I can't bear to break your heart of glass
So I guess this lie will forever last.
We are doomed to be together I suppose
Just like the thorn and wild rose.
Someday I'll tell you how I feel
Our movie reaching the end of its reel.
But untill that time
Though our friendship is sublime
I"ll look into your starry eyes
And hope the rain will leave the skies.


 

Our story begins in the bare forests of Vermont, with me. One water molecule among hundreds of others, formed together as a snowflake that is lighter than a feather. It is a wind forsaken day, and the leaf I sit upon doesn’t stir, though it is dipped low to the ground with the weight of many others like myself. Snow covers the landscape in a never ending blanket. And then slowly, as if in a dream, we watch as white turns to green, bringing with it the melty warmth of spring. The nearby river swells with runoff, and as I drop to the ground, now unfrozen and swift, I feel certain I will be joining it soon. But wait! In front of me.. Something white.. I’m stuck to its sides and become slowly absorbed. Roots. As I travel through the plant, other collected molecules beside me are turned into nutrients, but I find my way to the pores at the top of the leaf, and begin transpiring to the sky above.

The brushes of the winter wind
Whisk across the cottage windows.
Only in the darkness do they paint
For they are shy
And work best in the night.
When the world is fast asleep
They come
They come across the freezing moor
Peering in the windows of all the houses
Riding the tendrils of clouds
Carried along by the gusts of chilly wind.
They come to each window
And dip their brushes in the frosty air.
Then they create 
They paint small spirals and designs all over the glass.
They dance through the winter air and dab at their canvas.
When each window is a masterpiece
They retreat back to the sky.
In the morning,
The children wake up and gasp in surprise at the painters' work.
They use their fingers to add their own touches to the frosty art.
Soon the sun
Melts away their work 
Clearing the canvas
So the winter painters can cover them once more.
 

I'm Sorry, But...

I’m sorry, but...
What are we teaching the kids these days?
Are we teaching them to go along with whatever the most dominant person says?
Don’t have opinions, just move on, avoid distress.

I’m sorry, but…
That’s not going to work for me.
Why is it considered bad when someone states they have a side?
When they want to do or be one thing over another?
Saying “I don’t care,” “whatever,” “it doesn’t matter to me...”
Makes you a better person, the desired person, more so than the one who actually knows what they want?

I’m sorry, but …
That just doesn’t seem right to me.
Why is it good not to have a preference?
I’m always told that I care too much.
I always try not to care.

I’m sorry, but...
Remind me again why I don’t want to care?
Why is that wrong, and bad, and strange, and different?

Background:
I wrote this song awhile ago, for the Martin Luther King Day of 2018.
As I was looking through files on my computer, I found it again and listened.
I thought about how we need more people like MLK in our world today, and how we need to realize this more often
instead of on just one day of the year. 
This is why I'm sharing this song now. 

The lyrics are below, and there's also a recording above (the recording at the bottom is the same; please disregard it). I'm the singer, and my former English teacher played the guitar.
The song is titled "The Dream Lives On".


One night I woke up                      
Wishing I’d stayed asleep,                   
Walking into a world                        
Different in my dream.                 

Such terrible suffering around me,              
When will humans solve the inequality?        


Chorus:

A woman hurries down the street, her pale hands pulling a coat tighter against the cold. Her long auburn hair tumbles down her back in loose waves. The brisk air bites at her nose and cheeks, turning them a rosy pink. The red scarf she wears around her neck pops against her paling skin and dark coat. Her tan, freckled skin and blond hair from Summer is gone, along with the glowing, golden brown hair from Spring. The tips of her hair are already fading into a muddy brown color, for winter is coming. Her breath puffs out through crimson lips, wafting like a cloud of smoke in the cold air. Her shoes click-clack loudly on the cracked pavement, drawing the attention of others. She walks with purpose, shoulders squared and head high. She pops in a sea of people, all in different stages of transformation. Red, orange, yellow and brown hues surround her on all sides. A rush of warm bodies, pumping hearts, and hurried strides.

Salt and pepper purled carpets
smelled of sultry dandelion fluff,
the sun illuminating the cinnamon
lincoln-log blocks resting on the dove-threaded swells.
(Is there peace in a metric rectangle, perched on the clashing seas?)

The hickory seeds would take to their feathers
as we kicked through their sunny fluff,
I'd see the full-seeded flower head as a globe
where the equidistant inhabitants raised their wizened brows in triumph.
(How long ago did you realize the world could never be that sage?)

Those dandelions are stitched 
into the foreground of my memory,
though even then I knew
why the fences wore obsidian arrows:
the stones in this meadow were graves.
(Did you know any of the dead, or are you searching again for kinder strangers?)

We searched for the most distant date, 
one eights, one sevens, last two digits trailing...