Perspective

Nothing really matters
now. Only you… and you.
Can’t you see that?

All things stressed about
are just that – things. Ridiculous
things, compared to you.

Work? Politics? The state
of our economy? Please.
Not even close.

Entire cities? Dear friends?
Cherished family. Me?
I clearly choose you.

My sons.  My moons.
My heaven and earth.
If I could just move you

enough to make you
understand. To make you
feel content. To make you
feel loved enough that you
feel hope. To make you feel.

To make you stay. Please don’t
leave me. You are my world.
You are what matters. Even if
you don’t see it.

~ smj

“My mission is to keep the light in your eyes ablaze”
– Ablaze, Alanis Morisette

Nothing to see here folks…

So far… so good. I said I’d start writing again, and I’m managing to do just that. It’s been, what? Three days? Four? Oh shit! It’s been SIX whole days! Yeah, baby. Look at me go! Lol :)

Ok, I guess I should not start bragging six days in. LOL Especially when I’m just rambling and posting gibberish. Besides, I know that it’s always easy when I first start back at it.

This time does feel different, though. At least a little. I mean some things never change. I start reading through old posts…. old friends blogs… and I realize just how… repetitive so much of my writing seems… so much of my ramblings. Same old struggles with certain things… certain insecurities… certain long-lived issues. Doesn’t help when I find drafts to poems that I started writing YEARS ago, and get inspired to work on them rather than coming up with new material. Eh? That’s life, I guess. You can take the girl out of the blog, but can’t take the blah out of the girl…
Or something like that. ;)

firefly nights

fireflies escaping
like sparks flying off the fire
joining stars and you

                       – smj, 5/18/2019

—————

Just a little haiku I wrote for my cousin.  I was thinking of childhood memories of parties at their old house… and, of chasing fireflies.  We would run through the fields at their house in the night… trying not to trip over the dark while following the sporadic flashes.  If we were lucky, we’d manage to catch a few fireflies, and when we did, we would put them in a mason jar with some holes in the lid.  We thought we could use them as a lantern.

We would keep them for a bit, but I never wanted to keep them long.  I was afraid they would die (thanks Dad).  So I’d let them go… sometimes unbeknownst to my cousins while they were busy desperately trying to catch more.  Besides, the flies just were not nearly as beautiful or impressive up-close.  They just looked like…. well… flies (with big glowy butts).   But, with a little added distance?  Oh my. They became magical… mystical…  lighting up in the dark sky if only for a second… here… then there…. then, wait… where?

I still see them in my backyard sometimes.  I don’t try to catch them anymore. My boys are also too old now for that.  I don’t think they were ever as impressed by them as I was anyway.  Am.  I still am.  I still like to watch them flicker on and off, until they are too far away to see and I lose track of them.  They remind me of  the sparks flying off a bonfire… billowing with the smoke up to the stars.  I like to try to follow those as well… watch as they rise up to the heavens…  until they fade into grey ashes that join us once again.  Or until they just mysteriously disappear all together.  Possibly morphing into yet another distant star against the black sky.  Who’s to say?

 

No Poems Today… Just Ramblings.

I wanted to write a poem.  Get out some of these feelings that I know are building up inside of me.  That is what happens when I don’t write for a long time.  And, I should know, because I routinely go through long periods of time, where I let this happen.  I don’t write… I don’t process or deal with things.  And, here I am again.

I looked at some drafts of poems that I had started, and thought they might be a good place to start…  but, it’s been too long.  They no longer make sense to me.  So,  I decided I would write a brand new poem.  But, I just stared at the screen.  It’s been too long, and I don’t know where to start.  So much has been happening in my life.  Problems with my own health, yet again. But, those things don’t seem all that major anymore considering all that is happening around me to those I care about and love. Yet, nothing that I seem to be able to put into a poem.  Nothing that wants to see the light of day,  or that I can use to make something beautiful, or to just try to make any sense.  Not yet.

Which, really, is quite fitting now that I think about it.  Because not much is making sense.  How do you make sense of your 20 year old nephew’s death from an accidental drug over-dose?  You don’t.  How do you help those you love, your brother and your sister-in-law/best friend,  get over the loss of their youngest child, and their only son?  You don’t.  Some things you just can’t get over.  I know this.  So, I’ve been trying my best just to help them cope…  but, I am not even sure how to do that.

I have always been a good empathizer.  Is that a word?  My spell-checker says “no”, but,

Play

Orange record player
First class ticket out of Dodge
“Puppy Love” express

————

I vaguely remember, the time when I was just little… and my older brother taught me how to write my name.

I remember being very proud of myself.  My brother seemed proud of me too.  And he told me that we could now play a game… a great, fun, NEW game.  I eagerly and happily awaited his instructions.  I would do just about anything my older brother told me to do when I was little.  Something I grew out of, thankfully, but not before learning some lessons the hard way.  This was going to be one of those lessons.

I remember my brother giving me an orange crayon… and he said, “I’m going to go out of your room and count to 100.  When I come back in, anything that does not have your name on it – is mine.”

You would think that