a thousand brief winters

Sometimes I can just put it out of my mind.
It drops away like the final leaf on a naked tree
leaving me ready to stand against the winter.

A brief coldness that passes like a sharp wind,
and I realize it’s better to bloom than worry
since within I know I love her.

Regardless of what I think has happened,
it’s better to make a fool of myself in private
than to boyishly act unsure.

Because I know where my suspicions begin.
They are born in the marrow of my psyche
where I cannot hide from what I know I would do.

So my emotions hide in the ground,
waiting for the winter wind to pass by
and giving me time to face what I fear.

© 2010 Wasted Space Publishing

My Playlist 00520

One of the good things about getting people to send me what they like – music, movies, books – is that I get new stuff to try. The songs on this playlist are primarily gleaned from the lists of songs and records that have been submitted. Enjoy. I did.

Song Time Artist Album
A Pillow of Winds 5:08 Pink Floyd Meddle
Somersault 6:57 Zero 7 When It Falls
Ten Years Gone 6:33 Led Zeppelin Physical Graffiti
Optimistic 5:16 Radiohead Kid A
Tryin’ to Throw Your Arms Around the World 3:53 U2 Achtung Baby
Dying on the Vine 5:52 The Jayhawks Sound of Lies
Brown Eyes 4:27 Fleetwood Mac Tusk
Turn Your Lights Down Low 3:39 Bob Marley & the Wailers Exodus
Suck My Kiss 3:37 Red Hot Chili Peppers Blood Sugar Sex Magik
I Could Have Lied 4:04 Red Hot Chili Peppers Blood Sugar Sex Magik
Love You Madly 3:58 Cake Comfort Eagle
Sexy Sadie 3:15 The Beatles White Album
Go, Hippie 3:58 Fountains of Wayne Utopia Parkway
Sway 3:53 The Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers
Cuyahoga 4:21 R.E.M. Life’s Rich Pageant
Hollywood Waltz 4:02 The Eagles One of These Nights
All I Really Want to Do 4:04 Bob Dylan Another Side of Bob Dylan
17 Songs/1.2 Hours

Signs of Dementia

Thomas Frediman is at it again. This week he reassured us that the Gulf oil spill is not this president’s Katrina. Obama is doing everything right, and Bush did everything wrong. This in the same week that Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, said, “They told us it was under control. Then they told us it wasn’t,” about the spill. It may just be me, but that sounds a lot like the former Democratic governor of Louisiana telling Bush they had the response to Katrina under control. Then telling him they didn’t. Maybe pictures of an oil rig spouting geysers of fire and falling into the sea isn’t as sure a sign of disaster as radar images of a hurricane heading towards New Orleans. Both presidents would have been better off ignoring what somebody else told them and taking quicker control of the situation.

But that’s not what has Friedman in a twist. It seems we’ve missed another opportunity. George Bush shouldn’t have wasted his time standing on the rubble of the twin towers with a bullhorn saying, ” I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.” Obama should never have engaged in all the finger pointing about who’s to blame or “we’ve been on top of this since day one” garbage. Both presidents would have been better off heading straight to Congress and demanding something much more important.

A tax hike. On gasoline.

An extra dollar a gallon at the pump seems to be about right to Mr. Friedman. I guess Rahm Emmanuel is right. Never let a crisis go to waste. After all, a new tax is a panacea for what ails our country. Ram ’em through whenever you get a chance, and there is no better opportunity than when the country is worrying about a real problem.

I’m sorry to pick on Mr. Friedman. He’s not the only one over at the New York Times that seems to have lost their logic gene. In just the past couple of weeks we’ve learned what a terrible thing it is that people aren’t watching the network news anymore, or CNN or MSNBC or (gasp!) reading the Times – they’re watching an evil news network that shall not be named or listening to that pesky talk radio. We’ve learned how bigoted the people of Arizona are, as well as 70% of all Americans, for passing such a “troubling” illegal immigration law. Perhaps, like the administration, they haven’t read the law and don’t understand that if the Arizona law is racial profiling waiting to happen then so is the SEVENTY YEAR OLD Federal immigration law. Oh, and the Tea Party. They’re hillbillies. No, they’re racists. No, they’re – what is it they are now? Please.

I don’t think the Old Gray Lady is just old. I think she has dementia. She remembers what happened in the sixties like it was yesterday. But she just can’t seem to remember that two out of three Americans are against about every position they take today.

A tax hike? On gasoline? As a response to 9/11? They must be crazy.

Where Are You?

There’s something I want to talk about.
Where are you?
There’s something serious
I have to tell you right now.

It’s not about love.
It’s not about me.
It’s about the world we live in.
It’s about the way thing ought to be.

There are so many things that are wrong.
Where are you?
Don’t you care that our world is dying?
It’s been killing us all along.

Every day in the news is news of death.
Every day is a contest.
Our leaders simply want to win their wars,
but the wounds they leave are the people’s scars.

Scars of a world gone mad.
Wounds of the starving and the sad.
Pictures of turmoil and despair –
a world on the brink of nowhere.

It’s time to talk about love.
It’s time to think about you and me.
It’s time to heal the world we live in.
It’s time our world was the way it should be.

But I can’t change the world without you.
Where are you?
It’s going to take both of us and all of us
to do what we have to do.

To build a world of love.
To build a world for you and me.
To feel safe in the world we live in.
To remake our world the way it ought to be.

boundless

rising out of the sky
through puffs of cotton clouds
are the aspirations of a soaring soul.

undaunted by the pull of earth
into the weightlessness of silent space
where physical constraints no longer take their toll

on a life released.

once burning in a bitter fire
with vision blurred by smoke and flame
is the sightless depression of a sunken soul.

set free now by a fearsome flood
as it washes away hazy perceptions
and no longer lets the elements take their toll

on a life released.

© 2010 Wasted Space Publishing

Bright New Child

what’s going to happen to me?
today.
tomorrow.
in all my possible futures.

what has already happened to me?
yesterday.
the day before.
in all my muddled past.

is it a loose association
or a concrete path?
is my future predestined
or determined by my past?

what’s happening to me now?
a creation of the future.
a re-creation of the past
in an endless cycle of death.

or is each day a bright new child
to be nurtured for its possibilities?

© 2010 Wasted Space Publishing