Blogging Through The Brokenness

Kicking the tires...

2011-11-09T22:05:00.000-08:00

It has been a long time since I've posted....Blogger is new looking and I have to get familiar with it again.

NaPoWriMo # 27: Outside the Delirium

2010-04-27T09:04:00.000-07:00

Outside the Delirium

Orchestral movements, diorama dreams

Canines and felines swim slowly upstream

Tiny violins are playing for the complainers.

Overrun with roaches, my

Back scratcher has become a weapon.

Execution or eviction, either one

Reverse direction !

April 27, 2010

NaPoWriMo # 24: REX Surveys the Damage

2010-04-24T23:50:00.000-07:00

REX Surveys the Damage

There aren’t any plastic eggs
after four rains soaked
& overwhelmed his planet.
REX had hard words
for the weather bureau,
all were caught off guard
Clean up started,
all dogs of the planet
had trouble locating
missing bones & balls.

REX decided it was time
to visit his local Barkbucks,
get a double espresso,
ricochet some thoughts
& banter with the baristas.
He need to kills some time
till life got back to
the normal rhythm
and Dogopolis dried out.

Puddles everywhere,
papers & leaves still
floated like butterflies in migration.
When he’d get home
LULU would be glad to know
Barkbucks had cleaned up,
enough to be brewing again.
Soon the Bullet Tube
would be running again,
& working from home
would end.

April 24, 2010

Rex has also made appearances in 2009 and 2008.

NaPoWriMo # 22: Old Enemies

2010-04-22T23:31:00.001-07:00

Old Enemies

The day started as abruptly
as a bomb reverberating
outside the cold war shelter,
the shelter that was never use for
the bomb that never dropped.

The doors of the shelter were
covered in rust,
flowers filled the fears
of tomorrows predicted to
be replaced by mushroom clouds
instead of flinching, crouching under desks
we are all dizzy from the Wall
crumbling in 1989.

While we walked
the emporium of cold war relics,
a squall was building,
a fierce psychosis of false security,
as the loan bombers,
replaced the normal old enemies,
that once could always be
reachable
by a red phone.

April 22, 2010

This poem was based off a prompt at Read Write Poem that showed a Wordle.
Here is a Wordle made from my poem. You can make a Wordle to by going to http://www.wordle.net/

NaPoWriMo # 21: My Sister's News

2010-04-21T23:28:00.001-07:00

My Sister’s News

I know I should have been happy for you,
but I was so sad for me.
Colorado seems so far away.

I know it’s just a phone call,
just an email,
I know we live 100 miles apart now,
but Colorado seems so far away,
you’ll seem so far away.

It’s been a while
since we live so far apart.
We used to live 1000s and 1000s miles away,
you in California,
me in Massachusetts,
Then me in Florida,
you in California,
but it’s been so long.

I know I should be happy for you,
Colorado seems so far away.
but I’m so sad for me,
today.

April 21, 2010

NaPoWriMo # 20: April is Hard

2010-04-20T22:06:00.000-07:00

April Is Hard

Poems have been ruling over me.
Quantity over quality has weighed,
like a bag of bricks on my shoulders.
April is the cruelest month,
so said a great poet.
He must have participated in
NaPoWriMo 1930 something.

Pushing yourself can be good,
can be tiring,
can be surprising.
Worth the effort?
Of coarse it is!
When it’s run the course,
I may be hoarse
in my mind.
April has worn me
down, pushed me hard,
and stretched my writing muscles.
Will I do it again,
next year?
You bet!

April 20, 2010

NaPoWriMo # 18: Cat and Dogs

2010-04-18T23:44:00.001-07:00

Cats and Dogs

Cats are self-centered,
doing what and when they want.
Loyalty does not seem to be there.

Dogs are another story.
You don’t hear of any Old Yeller cat books
Dogs aim to please, sometimes
almost worshiping the ground,
their owners walk on.
The cat could care less.

April 18, 2010

NaPoWriMo #16: Running From Myself

2010-04-16T22:50:00.000-07:00

Running From Myself

my heart is bursting
off my sleeves
I’m broken
the pieces feel
like they’ll never
come back together.
I tried to pick them up
but kicked them
across the floor
under the refrigerator
I could cry all day
weeping through the night
the fog hangs over me
I tried to climb
out of the depressed clouds
but I keep slipping
keep falling
back to the mess of me
can’t quite catch my breath
I’m drowning in pain.
composure’s hard to keep
aching heart bleeds
trying to fake it
barely can contain it
scared to face me
I keep hiding
keep running
but myself
catches up to me
and must run again,
must flee on the treadmill

April 14, 2010

NaPoWriMo #15: Flying Past Saturn

2010-04-16T00:14:00.000-07:00

Flying Past Saturn

The planet Saturn had me in
awe when I was in 6^th grade.
I clipped newspaper articles
from the Providence Journal
when I lived with my grandparents,
and still went by Jamie, instead do James.

I couldn’t get enough,
day after day, in the paper,
in National Geographic Magazine,
that my Nana shared with me.
Wondrous pictures taken by Voyager I
Big dreams, vast dreams I had.

My big Christmas presents that year,
the Micronauts, little translucent spacemen
that went through tubes;
I played with them for hours.

When did I stop dreaming about space?
When did I stop clipping articles?
Maybe the mess of nuclear family explosions,
blew up my love of outer space,
Saturn then Jupiter
Kaboom!
Kaboom
The wonder went
up in a mushroom cloud.
Those dreams floated
out into to space,
on the back of the Voyager.

A bit of wonder,
pieces of dreams
crept back upon me,
when my two boys,
asked for a telescope,
after watching Nova:
Hunting the Edge of Space.
Magnificent pictures captured
all of our imaginations.

“Jamie” may catch a spaceship
flying to his dreams again

April 15, 2010

NaPoWriMo #14: Poem Line

2010-04-14T21:59:00.000-07:00

Poem Line

~~This poem line~~ has been removed to protect the writer.
~~This poem line~~ has been deleted to protect the innocent.
~~This poem line~~ has been stricken to protect the guilty.
~~This poem line~~ has been purged to preserve favorite conspiracy theories.
~~This poem line~~ has been expunged from the record to protect national security.
~~This poem line~~ has been rubbed out to protect the rubber eraser industry.
~~This poem line~~ has been recalled to preserve the Class Action Lawsuit industry.
~~This poem line~~ has been blocked to exclude exclusive clubs .
~~This poem line~~ has been blacked out to preserve the white out industry.
~~This poem line~~ has been blown up to protect the dynamite makers.
~~This poem line~~ has been bleeped out to protect television companies.
~~This poem line~~ has been cut up to preserve the scissor makers.
~~This poem line~~ has been sterilized to be ready for surgery.
~~This poem line~~ has been forgotten to protect the dreamers.
~~This poem line~~ has been crossed out to make the easily angered, mad.

April 14, 2010

NaPoWriMo # 13: Paper Mache Monkeys

2010-04-13T23:34:00.000-07:00

Paper Mache Monkeys

The stories we tell
ourselves, the ending often
the same. Missing pieces,
lost chances, sometimes regrets.
Tigers in college changed
for one of many
manifestos, like changing shirts.
It still haunts us.
Yellowed papers float down,
like confetti ghost parades
trees batter our windows,
wake up, shake loose.

Vigorously fight off yellow
dogs, make war with
goblins, scratching and scraping,
tearing faded paper Mache
monkeys off our backs
choose a better story,
white out all misgivings,
writing on gilded paper.
Ink spots smeared across,
dress shirts crumpled on
broken mirrored closet floors.

The looking glass never
showed much after shattering.
Pick up shattered shards;
gather up broken dreams
fashion together with sweat,
heart pumping, passions yearning.

April 13, 2010

NaPoWriMo #12: Hack Attack

2010-04-13T01:03:00.000-07:00

Hack Attack

Alabama gray warms hallways
Japan, backs away as
Canada’s land grab starts small.
Pray that Alaska stays away
Wax, wan
Rattan Cane lawn lacks banana
Bar chart all Asthma attacks
Abraham’s sarcasm starts at Atlanta

Marshall Law starts alarm
Always alpha llamas swarm
Straws that crack clay
black claws astray
Macaw tall as salt grass,
Manx attacks
harass Bach’s halls
array carts and racks,
sand bass has mask.
Snaps back spasm and chasm ,
After Bahamas warm manta rays.
warns phantasm and mass class clash.

Any day, ask Graham.
Aack, a cat!

NaPoWriMo # 11: Click For Friends

2010-04-11T23:02:00.000-07:00

Click For Friends

Tick tock tick tock
The plains of Iowa have more ears of corn,
Than Facebook has users.
Tick tock tick tock
How many real faces are missed
Peering into all the virtual faces?
Click click click click
Tick tock tick tock
Loss of something?
We know more and more people,
Less and less.
Does the connecting me
Mean virtual ties,
Hold us together?
Will the bandwidth exceed
Our friendship bandwidth?
Click click click click

April 11, 2010

NaPoWriMo # 10: Wedding Day

2010-04-10T15:52:00.000-07:00

Wedding Day

My wedding day, I remember,
the intimacy of just us and the pastor,
quietly taking communion together,
that part was private,
an imaginary curtain drawn
around us.

My wedding day, I remember,
the reception at Nordahl hall,
All our friends and family were greeting
Us as our wedding party was eating
Mexican food first, passing in front of us
as if we were Royalty,
which we sort of were
for the day.

My wedding day, I remember,
the first dance, a song by Latin singer,
Juan Luis Guerra, Burbujas de Amor.
It ended and went to the next song,
more quickly than I wanted.

My wedding day, I remember,
dancing and dancing and dancing.
Then the cake,
we planned it out,
shove it in each other’s faces;
I think I shoved harder than
she expected,
everyone loved it.
I know I did!

My wedding day, I remember,
the throwing of rice,
running through the crowd,
like we were contestants
on The Price is Right,
as we dove into the limo,
happy for the day, yet
happy to be alone.

My wedding day, I remember,
But the memory fades a little, as that
was one of the many memories we’ve built
and are building over these 17 years.
The humor and joy is what I remember most,
As we celebrate each day and year together and
with our growing family, more adventure…

I remember and smile.

April 10, 2010

NaPoWriMo # 9: Connectedness

2010-04-09T23:43:00.001-07:00

Friendships important.
Loneliness brings heart sickness;
seek companionship.

April 9, 2010

NaPoWriMo #8: Step Into Your Life

2010-04-08T23:29:00.003-07:00

Step Into Your Life

Each step directs,
the last one
leaves behind
regrets
what ifs.

When there’s no
resolution
When there’s no
purpose
When there’s no
grand plan,
heart’s crest fallen.

Falcon crest
was a show in the 80s
I’m a fan of crest tooth paste
splitting hairs
mincing words,
tom foolery

Put behind
child’s play
Dream big
go for broke
burn the ships
Make a leap of faith.
Live larger
Take the first step.

April 8, 2010

NaPoWriMo #7: He Comes Quietly

2010-04-07T23:13:00.000-07:00

He Comes Quietly

The poem is slow in coming,
out run by his friend sleep,
who slips quietly in the back door,
unnoticed, but fast and hard.

Can’t shake him, he’s after me

Must out type him.

Can’t get past.

He comes

without

A word.

April 7, 2010

NaPoWriMo #6: Uncoiling

2010-04-06T23:19:00.000-07:00

Uncoiling

can’t get out the words
spiraling inside.
slow down.
Breathe deeper
Think clearly
Write it out.

Pull out the inside,
from the core,
can’t ignore.

Turn over
Shake it out,
bring emotion
to the fore

Subtlety
beyond depravity.
fight the gravity

That pulls down,
curtains drawn
to reveal the clown,
and his tracks of tears.

Feelings hidden,
white makeup hides
expression
fight the depression.
turn on the fog lights,
as you crawl through the mire.

Find the desire.
Don’t quench the fire.
inner thoughts,
not a liar.

Uncoil
uncoil.

April 6, 2010

NaPoWriMo #: Breathe

2010-04-05T23:30:00.000-07:00

Bursting upon the morning.
Moonbeams shine forth.
Catch your breath,
Breath deeply,
The Napalm never smelled so fresh.
Wake a smell the daisies.
Something is rotten in Finland,
Or was it Madagascar?
Wake up and smell the coffee.
Every breath you take
Someone will be watching you.

NaPoWriMo #4: Held Back

2010-04-04T23:42:00.001-07:00

Dams hold the water back,
power restrained.

Emotions dammed up,
spill out.

Is it like a leaking dike,
just plug it with your finger,

Or will water burst forth,
flooding everyone?

Emotions are more powerful.

Randomness: NaPoWriMo # 3

2010-04-04T00:07:00.000-07:00

What will I do with:
A ½ dog-eaten Patrick the Starfish ornament ,
a Soccer ball, one of the dozen my daughter has
Ibuprofen
Netflix envelopes that arrive almost daily in our mail
Tape measure,
fence that blew down two different times one winter
½ empty Starbucks cup,
one of my favorite addictions,
I mean places to go
Cinnamon Life Cereal can be good
sweet but not too sweet.
2 Grand Prix Derby Cars
will likely never be used.
Index cards to jot ideas,
I’ve jotted.
Can of Diet Coke,
sometimes a lifeline
Hand Sanitizer, germqphobia!
we will clean the world
Purple party streamers
from a party long ago
Gels pens bought to write out the Christmas cards
that we didn’t send
and didn’t write out

What would an archeologist think of all our stuff
100 years from now?

April 2, 2010

In My Mind: NaPoWriMo #2

2010-04-03T00:04:00.001-07:00

In My Mind

I climb the stairs to the attic
on my mind,
Pulling up the folding stairs
behind me

Alone, muffled voices recede
the attic’s rooms expand
before me.
wandering through the corridors
I pass flat screens
Sometimes stopping,
I catch glimpses,
DVDs for the real me,
in High-Def.

I visit the Hippocampus room
There goes the frontal cortex foyer.

I’m lost in the grey matter

April 2, 2010

Falling Down: NaPoWriMo #1

2010-04-01T21:05:00.003-07:00

Falling Down

Before going down,
back to bedlam and chaos
thoughts wander to better days,
a heartfelt celebration,
abundant joys.

Hearts swelled,
like a the Goodyear blimp,
up to lofty heights.
Jubilation.

Now feels forgotten,
like a tire
in life’s dumps
cast off

Falling from graces,
after the beautiful letdown,
I’m left speechless—
I know
I’m spoken for.

April 1, 2010

Based on a poetry challenge at Read Write Poem: Shuffle Poem (http://readwritepoem.org/blog/2010/04/01/napowrimo-1-shuffle-a-poem/)Put your iPod on shuffle and write down the first 5 album titles and use the complete album titles in a poem. My album titles are Speechless (Steven Curtis Chapman) Back to Bedlam (James Blunt), The Beautiful Letdown (Switchfoot), A Heartfelt Celebration (Reggie Coates), and Spoken For (Mercy Me).

Goal Formation for 2010

2010-01-08T14:59:00.000-08:00

I need some big hairy audacious goals this year.....I want to go for broke....I want a better story filled with passion and zeal. I want to strive and reach further than my grasp can reach. I don't want to settle; I don't want to shirk; I want to live abundantly!

I want to have more of the 3 R's in my life this year:

Reading, Running, & Writing!

I have started my goals. I have the different areas I want to cover, which include Family, Physical, Emotional, Spiritual, Writing, and Work.
Here are the goals I have so far:
Family:
I want to go out to breakfast with each of my kids on a separate Saturday of each month.
I want to go out on a date once with my wife (Not including Anniversary and Birthdays).
While not a goal necessarily, Becky are attending 7 week parenting class to just brush up things and get some good perspectives on parenting.
Physical Health:
I want to run a Half Marathon this year. I will most likely be running in a Half Marathon in San Francisco on November 7th of this year. I created a schedule on a spreadsheet, like I did when I trained for the 5K I ran in September. I will be running about every other day, slowly increasing my time & distance; the schedule is made through March 31st. As part of my training & motivation I registered for a 5K on April 11th and a 10K on August 15th, both in San Francisco through San Francisco Dolphin South End Runners Club. I will create a new schedule a couple weeks before that time based on my progress that has taken place. I will also start doing some cross-training and core exercises to improve my overall health and strength. Eating will be something I will look at as well; I think I have been too friendly with the donuts at work :-)
Emotional/Mental Health:
I want to go to counseling through my EAP program. I went to a counselor and talked about depression, stress and how I interact with people. I talked about how more or less I get swept up by other people’s stress at times. She said that sometimes people who have permissive parents have a hard time with “boundaries,” this can lead to reacting. Also, the counselor recommended that I get a book called, SOS Help for Emotions, which I ordered on Amazon but found the first chapter online as a PDF. I also want to explore the possible need for medication for depression instead of just St. John's Wort, but at the moment I will stay the course and continue on with
exercise, etc for depression. I want to seek out new friendships and maintain/grow my existing friendships. I want to be content where I am and not always think that grass is greener somewhere else.

Spiritual Health:
This one is still in formation but I want these elements. Music worship, Journaling, and God's word. I need more specifics for this and will think and pray on this area.
Writing:
I will participate in National Poetry Writing Month in April, as I have the past two years. I want to possibly also commit to writing 100+ poems this year. I will write some longer piece of fiction, a short story or a childrens' book. As part of this, I am going to have a night, or day of the week where I take a break from online activities and do reading and writing. Currently I'm leaning towards doing this on Sunday or Sunday night.
Work:
I'm not sure what I want to do in this area. Will have to do more think on this. I am attending a class later this month and that may help in pointing me in the right direction.
I would like to take a lunch every day for an hour. Most days I don't take a lunch away from my desk. I also would like to implement more principals of Inbox Zero and take more control on how I spend my time, being more intentional in what I do as opposed to being reactive and obsessive. I'm not paid be good at moving emails around. There possibly needs to be more thought on this area.

In all of these goals I want to frame them in Better Stories. I read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller and want to implement a lot of the ideas he laid out in his book. The subtitle says a lot about it, "What I Learned While Editing My Life." He talks about Writing a better life and allowing the Author of Life, Jesus, to help you in doing that, editing your life into a better story.

I want to have more passion, more zeal, more "life" in living in 2010.

The Last Decade

2009-12-30T19:22:00.000-08:00

The last decade I have in a the capital region of California. We moved here from the Bay Area to find better affordability and more room for our kids to run and play. Since we have come here that has been true and we even had a 3rd child while here. I think somewhere along the way, I lost my way so to speak. I forgot why we moved here.

For me, work has been generally stable, as I've only worked at two different companies during the time we've been here. In other areas of my life, it has not been as good. I don't have very many significant male friendships since living here, at least locally. I have several good friends back in my hometown that I've kept in touch with, but here, not so much.

I generally assess the year and look forward to the next at this time of year. I like to take stock of my life and look ahead to the new year, making goals for the new year. It seems even more significant that this is the start of a new Decade. This year I've come to the conclusion that I do not like living here. That is not the case for everyone in my family. My daughter loves living here. She's in 8th grade this year and has lots of friends at her school. But, anyway that has lead me to think about the past almost decade that we've lived here; we moved here in March of 2000. So it's close enough to say it's been a decade here in the Capital Region. What have we accomplished during this time? I don't think it was all a waste of time as I did earlier in the week.

Well, my kids have had a stable home to grow up in: They are 13, 11 and 8 years old. My youngest son has only know this area as home, and the other two barely remember our old city, other than visits to our family back there. My wife has completed her Mastera Degree and is a little over half way through a Ph. D. program. I have worked about half of my adult life here, developing in my career, growing and learning in my field as a business person in the technical realm. I've had a Renaissance of creativity while I've been up here. I have written over 200 poems since living here, not to mention other writings.....Wow, about 225 poems, I went back and counted them!!! I wrote 84 poems during the 90's

I really want to move back, and feel like if I stay here I will be stuck. I may have the possibility of transferring to my old city with my current company. What if I move back and I'm unhappy there? I miss the people, but what if I move back and it is terrible there. I've been living in fear, and excitement about the possibilities. My sister really wants me to move back as does my best friend, and I know my Mom would love it. Sometimes I've been escaping reality by doing searches on Craigslist for rentals back there, mapping to my company and my friends house from whatever rental I am looking at; scouting out the schools the kids could possibly attend; checking the API scores at those possible schools. There is also my wife getting a teaching job there after she is done with her PhD. There are a lot of "What Ifs" and I am afraid to really explore it all for fear that it may not happen and I'm stuck here for another decade and then I would be 52 instead of 42.

I need your help Jesus to not fear. And to not freak out.

I've been reading a Donald Miller book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. It has really given me a lot to think about. The subtitle says a lot about it, "What I Learned While Editing My Life." He talks about Writing a better life and allowing the Author of Life, Jesus, to help you in doing that, editing your life into a better story. It really knocks up against the idea of "Being Stuck" which is what I've felt like for a while. I don't know if it is just depression or that I really am stagnant in my life. I want to move head first into the new year, with expectation and hope, instead of fear and trepidation. I need to cling to the many "Fear Not" verses that God has given.

Will return because I need to think about this decade further........

Quote Surprises Me

2009-11-09T22:56:00.001-08:00

I was listening to an interview with Mary Karr on NPR the other day and she had a quote read by the interviewer that really grabbed my attention. I had to keep going back on the podcast to transcribe the quote:

“When you’ve been hurt enough as a kid it’s like having a trick knee. Most of your life you can function like an adult, but add in the right proportions of sleeplessness and stress and grief and the hurt-defeated self can bloom into place.” ~Mary Karr from her memoir, Lit

I felt it spoke to me so clearly. My life in the last 15 years or so has been pretty stable. I'm married and have three kids and all in all have a pretty good life. But so many times I feel the wounded-ness of my childhood overwhelming my life today when I have to much "sleeplessness and stress and grief," in my daily life. The pain and "trick knee" is palatable and can be very present at times. Sometimes I just can't shake it. The scabs are pulled off and the wounds can seem so fresh, so painful, so present.

I need the Great Physician to put a healing balm of love on my wounds. I feel sick and need a doctor. Heal me Jesus.

Did my 5K and still going!!

2009-09-29T16:39:00.000-07:00

I ran in a 5K on September 19th and I'm continuing the running. Last night I ran 1.91 miles in 30 minutes. I think I'm going to be living a healthy lifestyle. I am actually enjoying the running.

It is past the 1/2 way point in the year, for sure, and I am going to revisit all my goals in the next few days and see how I'm doing. I want to make an assessment and start planning early for next year's goals.

I need to Be Healthy

2009-08-14T14:28:00.000-07:00

I am going to run in a 5K race on September 19th as a way of getting healthy and putting exercise into my daily life. I found a website that has you do it in 6 weeks, From Couch Potato to 5K in 6 weeks:

From Couch Potato to 5K in 6 Weeks

I have a little less time than that so I am doing it in about 5 weeks.

Here I go!

The long, slow road to friendship in the desert

2009-06-09T23:57:00.000-07:00

This is video of my feelings on friendship, rather a long drought of friendship where I live, or at least a sparseness of friendship.

Health Goals with assistance from a Health Coach

2009-06-04T13:16:00.000-07:00

I met with a Mayo Health Clinic Health coach today and came up with some goals.

Exercise 2 times a week for 20 minutes over the next couple weeks.
Use my iPhone app, Lose It, to record the food I eat.
Eat at least 1 fruit and 1 vegetable serving a day (it's a start!).

I meet with the health coach again on the 18th and then after I return from vacation on July 14th.
He is going to send me some info that will help on food info.

I think this is realy good. Also the Mayo Clinic EmbodyHealth Portal that I have access to has a lot of really good info on related to Fitness, Excercise and Stress.

Hopefully I will be able to work my goals while I am on vacation. I will give it a good shot!

Elegy For Mike

2009-05-14T12:36:00.000-07:00

Mike was a kid I used to know,
He came to Young Life pretty regularly
I gave him rides,
I hung out with him, Jason and Alex at times.

My wife tells me
his funeral Service notice
is posted on Facebook,
would have been only about 30 years old.
His parents must be heartbroken.

What happened in the past dozen years?
So much living, lived.
Did life unravel on him?
Choice were made, or not made.
Was it an accident,
or was it careless living?
I don’t know.

Now I’m writing a poem about,
a blond haired kid from Saratoga,
a kid whose parents loved him,
who I had some laughs with,
gave some rides to,
had some ice cream with,
drank coffee with in downtown,
just a small slice of life really.
He always seemed a little troubled,
but real and honest
in conversation.

He had called my friend,
at high and low points,
over the past couple years,
filling him in on life.
His life cut short,
is there anything
we could have done?
Maybe,
maybe not.

Regrets may remain,
but the grave does not care
and his parents’ hearts are broken,
with no more memories of Mike to be made.

May 12, 2009
"We get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more. Perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless." ~Paul Bowles

Can’t We Discuss It?

2009-05-01T12:35:00.000-07:00

~~dis·cus·sion~~
NOUN:
1. Consideration of a subject by a group; an earnest conversation.
2. A formal discourse on a topic; an exposition.

I am a Democrat.
       I am a Republican.
I am a Libertarian.
       I am a Christian.
I am an Agnostic.
       I am a Communist.
I am a Fill-In-The-Blank

Affiliation trumps citizenship.

We are Balkanized,
       Fragmented,
Breaking apart,
       Instead of coming together.
The tectonic plates collide
       No other view
than yours
       Is heard,
Words spewed out,
       Partisanship trumps citizenship.

But, I am an American.

Care is not there.
                    Debate over
                                The person’s feelings,
All that matters is
YOUR            point
YOU

HAVE

TO

MAKE.
You’re Right
        they’re wrong.

You Win
        They lose

But, we’re all Americans.

Can’t be there be discussion?

“But so-and-so is ruining our country.”
                   Not true.
                   We’re Stronger than that.
Check back in 4 to 8 years,
         the country will still be standing.

But will we find understanding?
Will we hear one another?
Will we listen to anything?

        Or             will            our           blathering           voices,
        spouting            out           OUR         OPINIONS
        So                                                       Loud,
        SO VERY LOUD,

Matter more?

Will the other person’s Voice,
                       opinions,

                                  concerns,

                                                     be drowned out?

We are AMERICANS,

Can’t we embrace this common ground?

February 27, 2009

Written because of my frustration with the inability of being able to discuss any politics with out people crushing people’s feelings and only caring about their own opinions, both from the left and the right. This is especially true of this type of discussion that happens online, on Facebook, Etc.

NaPoWriMo # 30

2009-05-01T00:06:00.001-07:00

Written Out

Late night sessions have been a lot of fun.
Now this month’s scibblings are done.
My lines now will be somewhat brief,
They are written with some sense of relief,
Mixed with some feelings of loss,
Later I will have to put on some gloss
On all these poems I have penned,
and now this month has come to an end.
But I will not have my writing suspend.

April 30, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 29

2009-04-30T00:17:00.000-07:00

My Archeology Site

Simple things are not so
More behind the veil of the past.
Could explain the fissures.
More than can be spoken,
Still hidden,
Must remain buried,
For now.
Like an archeologist I’m at the dig site
Coal and diamonds are there.
Fear holds me back,
From my memories
I don’t think I can lift up the pick,
It must happen another day

Based on the prompt from Read Write Poem, "I Don't Think I can"
http://readwritepoem.org/2009/04/29/napowrimo-29-i-dont-think-i-can/

April 29, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 28

2009-04-28T23:19:00.000-07:00

Mars, God of War

As Mars read the Scarlet Letter
he recalled,
"Though your sins be as scarlet,
they shall be white as snow."
He was red-faced.
White was such a weak color.
He roared, ready to go to war.

What would the Roman God of Mars Do?
I think he might pick up a book,
Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles,
for some insights
Maybe if Mars were feeling fiery,
he’d pull out FAHRENHEIT 451.
Get some of the “Fire” men to help him
fight his war with him.

But Guy Montag wouldn’t be much help.
So Mars would need to enlist Shakespeare
“Waving our red weapons o’er our heads”
Mars liked that sentiment,
and called on Shakespearean actors.
But those people were a waste
all they did after quoting that line
was to start reading all of Shakespeare’s Sonnets,
starting with One and continuing on through.
Mars got impatient
and killed them all.

He then tried to enlist some soldiers,
He chose the soldiers that fought in the Red Badge of Courage.
They too were disappointing,
far too old,
modern weapons confused them.
Mars let them join
Civil War Reenactments in Virginia,
too frail to kill,
Vulcan would laugh at him,
His heart on his sleeve.

He thought, maybe some “Red-Blooded Americans”
might have what he needed.
So he looked up a guy named Bruce,
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.
Bruce called up old buddies of from Jersey,
some welders, dockworkers, and
other blue-collar guys from the Jersey shore.
The Boss asked Mars what wanted them to play.

Mars was flabbergasted!
Play? What did he mean?
He’d heard the Boss could wield a mean axe.
After realizing the “Axe” was a guitar,
Mars resigned from red-hot anger
and asked Bruce and his E Street Band
to soothe him and play a song.

The Boss began to play with his Jerseys boys,
over 100 guitars pounding out
a raucous, rollicking song
for Mars, God of War.

This poem is based on a promtp form Read Write Poem on "seeing red"
http://readwritepoem.org/2009/04/28/napowrimo-28-seeing-red/

April 28, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 27

2009-04-28T00:23:00.000-07:00

Beware of Homosapiens

Forget about the dog in that house,
there are people in there.
There’s a man with sharp words,
There’s a woman with biting sarcasm.
Another is rabid with unpredictability,
as he walks through his daily routine.
Insensitivity is on that one like fleas,
irritating all who are exposed.

It’s a always a smorgasbord of surprises,
like a beef stew on Sunday,
or Jambalaya on Fat Tuesday,
when people are involved,
part of the adventure of being alive,
our dark sides shine through,
even in the midst of our noblest moments.
Redemption can come,
moments after purgatorial wanderings.
Personality, character, soul are as
important as the water and chemical compounds,
that hold us together.
Is life is like a box of chocolates?

We are not black and white, cut and dried,
but like snowflakes,
beautiful, delicate, and intricate,
but melting so easily.
We are more complex than a DNA double helix.
The wondrous, beautiful disasters,
are very close,
within us all.

April 27, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 26

2009-04-26T23:01:00.000-07:00

In My Town

I pass them daily
Target, Starbucks, Jamba Julice,
Suburban living.

April 26, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 25

2009-04-26T01:04:00.000-07:00

Life of a Former Childhood Day Dreamer

Why do we always think the grass is greener?
When we get to the new yard it’s full of weeds.
Our cup of tea makes it easier to be an explorer.

We think that they have a nice demeanor,
But seeing what we want, we see their deeds
Why do we always think the grass is greener?

Instead we end up with a misdemeanor,
this time we weren’t someone who reads.
Our cup of tea makes it easier to be an explorer.

A new city is not the same as buying a coffeemaker,
we hope what we are brewing up succeeds.
Why do we always think the grass is greener?

I need to be more introspective and less of a runner.
Problems follow us where we go, more than one concedes.
Our cup of tea makes it easier to be an explorer.

But life’s too short, I need to be an adventurer,
Get out my compass, coffee, map and stead.
Why do we always think the grass is greener?
Our cup of tea makes it easier to be an explorer.

April 26, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 24

2009-04-25T01:14:00.000-07:00

Dog 2.0

If my dog had a Twitter account,
What would he say?

@Scout: “I’m about to lie down on my bed, about to nap.”
8:07 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: Tap, tap on the glass, “I want to go out.”
9:20 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: Ruff, ruff, “I NEEEEEED TO GO OUT!!”
9:27 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: 2 minutes later tap, tap on the glass, “I want to come back in”
9:29 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I’m back on my bed.”
9:36 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Oh, Lady Master has her keys and bag, she’s about to leave. Darn!
9:51 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Lady Master: “Blah blah blah, Bye Scout, blah blah blah, Scout”
9:58 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Well, I guess I’m going to lay on my bed now. Maybe after I’m sure she’s gone, I will take a look in the trash. Will nap first”
10:01 AM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I heard something, maybe my owner is home?!”
12:07 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Nope, just a car turning around.”
12:10 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I found some old bread in the trash, mmm, Good! OOHHH!, AN EMPTY PEANUT BUTTER JAR!!!.”
12:48 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I’m still licking the peanut butter jar.”
1:22 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I need to lie down, again.”
1:31 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I think my Master is opening the garage. It is Herrr!!! Must…find…shoe!”
2:06 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Oh boy, it is her!! Here she comes, it’s so exciting!!!”
2:09 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@LadyMaster: “Blah blah blah, Scout, blah blah, Scout, Good Boy! Blah blah!
2:11 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “She said my name!!!”
2:11 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@LadyMaster: “Blah blah blah, SCOUT! What’s on your bed, blah blah, Bad dog! Blah blah!
2:14 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Oh no, not good, I’m hiding under the food room table!”
2:15 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “The coast is clear, Lady Master is in her room. Need to lay down again”
2:24 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: Tap, tap on the glass, “I want to go out.”
4:09 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: Tap, tap on the glass, “I want to come back in.”
4:16 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Lady Master is at the food room table, I’m going to lay near her.”
4:29 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I hear my Man Master, keys are jangling, he’s at the front door, he’s almost innnnn! Where’s that shoe?!?! Here he is!!”
5:24 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Man Master: “Blah blah blah, Scout, blah Blah, Scout, Good Boy! Blah blah!
5:27 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “The whole pack is here, oh good!”
5:43 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Going to lay on my bed.”
5:45 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: Tap, tap on the glass, “I want to go out.”
6:02 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: Tap, tap on the glass, “I want to come back in.”
6:09 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I need to drink water.”
6:14 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I need to lay down.”
6:16 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “I smell something good coming from the food room”
6:23 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Sitting by Lady Master’s feet.”
6:25 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “MMMMMMM, something in the stove smells good.”
6:28 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “Must lay down, while food is cooking.”
6:32 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
@Scout: “This is taking a long time, need to go back to my bed.”
6:49 PM Apr 24th from mobile web
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

April 24, 2009

Pushing Beyond the Albatross (NaPoWriMo # 23)

2009-04-24T00:22:00.000-07:00

Pushing Beyond the Albatross

Day twenty-three hopefully
Won’t be the death of me.
Cobbling together many lines,
Sometimes leads to new designs.
Its hard to write night after night,
Without coming across as trite.
The pressures of my day,
Sometimes get in the way,
Pushing me to write so late,
Can become a heavy weight,
Not enough time to germinate.
The best poems need space,
For the mind to embrace.
When writing is an albatross,
Often it feels like a loss.
Writing should be a joy,
And never should annoy.

If I write more earlier in the day,
Then it would be less prone to cliché.
The ideas need time to marinate,
And not just some due date.
But I have a day job,
I ain’t no slob.
I said I would write thirty,
And I know some aren’t purty.
I will make my goal,
And in my lumps of coal,
A diamond may be found,
Without making much sound.
Ideas molded just right,
I will continue to write,
When the 30 days are done,
They will be seen as a dry run.
Because I am very content
That this is time well spent.

April 23, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 22

2009-04-22T23:50:00.000-07:00

Form Over Function or Functionless Form

Vertically
Drop
Making
Times
Seem
Strange
And
Ominous.
The form
Shapes the meaning.
We expect certain things
By what come next or how
Punctuation is used,
Or not used when a line ends
Or when a thought is linked to that last line.
What
Comes
Next
Is up to the creator.
Reader,
What do you want.
In the meaning?
(Like a novel has
A beginning
A middle
An end)
What will make a poem
Complete
For the reader, reading?
Challenges arise.
Expectations shape,
What we think
Will come
Blasted lucky one,
The reader,
Brings the past,
Her present,
His hopes, his dreams, her fears,
Inadequacy
Incompetence
Incompleteness.
Long linear lines are what some want in their poems, very prose like in the making , phrases that keep it going, keep the thought coming through,
Staccato
Short lines
Make others
Happy.

What makes the writer happy?
I’m not quite sure-
Yet, yet I continue on, not knowing where this will take
Us.
What
will
keep
the reader
reading?
And the writer

Writing?

April 22, 2009

Thoughts On The Year so far

2009-04-21T15:58:00.000-07:00

In church this past Sunday as I was waiting for the service to start I was thinking of some verses that I had been thinking of off and on recently:
Hebrews 10:24-25
And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. ²⁵Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
Then the pastor started out with that exact passage as an intro to what he was teaching. When God wants to get my attention, I've found he uses repetition.

So I was thinking about these verses again today and grabbing onto them at the same time wondering what God wants me to do with them. I've added them to a list of verses that I am holding onto this year:
1 Corinthians 1:25
For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.
2 Corinthians 12:9
But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. (really all of 1 Cor 12:7-10)
Jeremiah 29:11-14
For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity.
Jeremiah 31:31-34
³¹ "The time is coming," declares the LORD,
"when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah.

³² It will not be like the covenant
I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them, "
declares the LORD.

³³ "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
after that time," declares the LORD.
"I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.

³⁴ No longer will a man teach his neighbor,
or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,'
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,"
declares the LORD.
"For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more."

Isaiah 61:1-4
¹ The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me,
because the LORD has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners, ^a]">

² to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,

³ and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the LORD
for the display of his splendor.

⁴ They will rebuild the ancient ruins
and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
that have been devastated for generations.

Also, I want to be more intentional in what I do with this year. I don't want to end the year and find that events have washed over me over the course of the year and all I have done is react to them. Doing the Poetry Month, poem a day is part of that intentionality, but also I have other things. I started out the year of journaling ever day, but have not done that as much, but am going to get back to that. Life has a way of sneaking up and running you over. I don't want that to happen, but need to be intentional in the choices I make. As I seek to grow friendships live intentionally, I will hold onto these verses.

NaPoWriMo # 21

2009-04-21T12:46:00.000-07:00

Dental Garage

I don’t like going to the dentist.
I was going to turn over a new leaf with the dentist.
I think that tree is broken.

Don’t get me wrong,
Dentists are nice people.
I have a friend who’s a dentist.
But they’re always poking around,
it’s uncomfortable:
fillings,
drillings,
crowns,
root canals,
poke and prod.
The hygienist needs to scrape your teeth,
open your mouth wide for an hour,
while she pokes around
and asks you your life story,
with water squirting,
hoses sucking,
sticks poking,
scrapers scraping,
sonic-noise-maker emitting it’s high pitch noise.

With your insurance,
that will only be $450 for that crown.
It’s like taking myself into the garage,
the mechanic looks under the hood,
pulling on belts and hoses,
we’ll get back you at the end of the day
with your estimate.
Jeez Louise!!
“The reason it is so much Mr. Estes,
you’ve blown out the universal joint and the transmission
by your back molars needs rebuilding.
We’ll have to check for parts,
but we’ll have to have you back into the shop
next Tuesday morning for 3 hours.”

They put me on the rack,
Lower me down,
shine their bright light under the hood,
“Hold on while we put in this foot long needle,
you’re going to feel a little pinch.”
Yeah, it was a little “pinch”
Uh, I need a little more,
I can feel the drill still.

I feel much better now.
I should make that appointment,
for the crown work,
that I cancelled in December,
and continue turning over
my new dental leaf.

April 21, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 20

2009-04-20T19:54:00.000-07:00

Covert Sandwiches

The cacophony of the xylophone interrupted the agents’
clandestine Cambodian delicatessen operation.
Espionage, great food and ambiance disintegrate instantly.

April 20, 2009

The American Sandwich
Write a piece of flash fiction in just three American Sentences. Allen Ginsberg's American Sentence has seventeen syllables. Your task is to use as few words as possible to fill the sandwich.

http://theamericansandwich.blogspot.com/

NaPoWriMo # 19

2009-04-19T23:39:00.000-07:00

Strike It Rich

The Poetry percolates,
but can’t make it up through the granite.
Turned inward,
Inertia keeps me going.
Up the mountain,
through the cavern,
I explore the depths
like a gold miner digging for ore.
I follow the vein,
pull out the pick and start working.
No luck,
pull out the dynamite.

Boom

Boom

KaBoom

I begin to strike my claim.

First I find some rhymed verse,
Hope I don’t come across terse.
Digging a little bit deeper
Finding for myself some meter.

I keep digging for nuggets of memories,
lines mined from the golden ore,
sifting through the rocks and dirt.

I have my pick, shovel and the light on my helmet
Here I go!

April 19, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 18

2009-04-18T23:51:00.001-07:00

Wisdom Takes Time

When he was a boy he lied,
he stole things sometimes for fun,
wisdom showed stealing and lying wrong
Complacency brought white lies.
Again tempted to steal.
He knows stealing is wrong.
And he does what’s right, this time.

April 18, 2009

NaPoWriMo #17

2009-04-17T23:44:00.000-07:00

Dinosaurs and Oreos

The brontosaurus and pterodactyl don’t often make it to the grocery store.
Last time they went to Safeway they made a huge mess.
Bronto told Ptero that he really needed Oreos and milk,
because he was tired of eating Fichus trees and giant ferns.

What’s the big deal anyway?
So Bronto got sick of the salad bar.
Ptero could deal with the Oreos and milk, she got it,
variety is the spice of life, etc.
What worried her is what came next.
She’d seen this before, with other herbivores.

First it started with the junk food,
under the guise of salad exhaustion.
Next it was the lunch meat, some turkey and ham.
Then they moved on to burgers from In-N-Out,
before you knew it, it was whole sides of beef, from Harris Ranch.
It was a slippery slope that quickly led to carnivorous behavior.
Maybe Bronto was stronger than Rex and Stego,
Ptero hoped she was wrong,
she would humor Bronto as he crashed
through the front of Safeway for his Oreos.

April 17, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 16

2009-04-17T00:05:00.000-07:00

Einstein Is In My Kitchen

My age has been on my mind.
I’m not old, yet not young anymore.
I’m on my 42nd trip around the sun.
How many more trips around will I take?

This life is finite.
I put the trashcans out every Tuesday night.
It seems like I’m putting them out every other day.
Is some form of Einstein’s time relativity at work?
Is the planet moving more quickly for me?
I’ve blinked a few times and ¼ of the year is over.

My daughter is in Jr. High.
In two weeks she will be graduating high school,
and in another couple college will be over.
Then 3 days later I ‘ll be walking her down the aisle.

Einstein, are you messing around with my Space-Time Continuum?
Let go into the kitchen and have a cup of coffee.

April 16, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 15

2009-04-16T00:18:00.000-07:00

Technical Difficulties Only Corrected After 11 PM

I submit a very late poem today,
Because working got in the way.
Late nights due to technology
Must keep running, no apology.
Phones are cranky when interrupted,
but these are not so easily corrupted.
Conficker didn’t hit, we run on Linux
Like Popeye, they eats their spinach.
I’ll put you and this poem out of misery
hopefully you enjoyed my delivery.

April 15, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 14: NaisaiKu

2009-04-14T21:53:00.000-07:00

Cross country trip calls,
Leave California in June.
Five people packed in
ARE WE CRAZY :-)
Five people packed in
Leave California in June.
Cross country trip calls

April 14, 2009
This form was found on at the following location:
http://naisaiku.blogspot.com/2009/02/naisaiku-sandwich.html

NaPoWriMo # 13

2009-04-13T23:45:00.000-07:00

34 Remedies

The donkey has an acute case of hiccups.
He cannot get rid of them and turns green.
In singularity of purpose,
the donkey tries to end the constant hiccupping.
First he asks the dog to scare him,
Then the cow tells to hold his breath,
Next the pig tells to drink a glass of water upside down,
After going through 29 more remedies,
No dice, it doesn’t work.

The hiccups are driving all his fellow animals mad,
so the donkey checks into a hotel.
After falling into a deep sleep,
The donkey dreams of a Changeling
Meeting him with a handful of Tums and a glass of Pepto-Bismol.
“Eat these!” the Changelings shouts, and,
“Chase them down with this pink nectar.”

The donkey wakes in a sweat,
heart thumping out of his chest,
with the fire alarm going off and
he kicks his door down in a panic,
still hiccuping into the parking lot.

Standing with all the other guests,
still in their pajamas,
A spider lands on his nose,
donkey shrieks, “Spider! Ahhhh!”
He charges back to the farm
Jubilant that the hiccups are gone

April 13, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 12

2009-04-12T23:40:00.000-07:00

Departures and Arrivals

How do you choose your destination,
where will you arrive?
Looking up at the monitors for Departures & Arrivals,
can be somewhat confusing.
Life seems to be constant series of Departures and arrivals.

You depart the womb as you arrive in birth, new to the world.
You depart the comfort of family, and arrive at school.
You Depart High School and arrive at college or a job,
everything and everyone is new.
You depart from your family, and arrive in marriage.
You depart your old city, and arrive at new city.
Every choice to arrive to something new, involves
both a departure, or loss, of something familiar, and gaining of something new.

The Arrival and Departure monitors in life’s airport,
show nothing more that city you’re leaving or getting to.
What’s it like there?
Who will I meet?
Will I like them, and will they like me?
Who will I miss, who will I never see again?
Something completely new and amazing is bound to happen,
happenings that can be good, and bad, unexpected
sometimes simultaneously.

I have my boarding pass, a map, and not much else.
Another flight is about to take off.

April 12, 2009

NaPoWriMo #11

2009-04-11T23:34:00.000-07:00

Another Day At The Office

Rex arrived late to work, second time this week,
Darn bullet tube train running late, again.
Rex still hoped his boss wouldn’t remember,
wouldn’t ask about the late report.

Report could wait,
Now time to leave,
had to meet Fido at Barkbucks,
For their usual mid-morning dog scone,
and he really needed his double espresso.
If anything urgent were happening
videomail would come through on his Dogberry.

Fido was in great spirits as usual,
New fire hydrants installed on his block.
The good news was that Fido was able
to trade in his week of time-share for one on Earth.
Lulu and Rex had not been to Earth since their honeymoon,
that planet had some of the best smells, best hydrants in the Galaxy.
Didn’t’ hurt that that was where the first Barkbucks opened,
Must remember to reload his card before they leave.

The Dogberry is vibrating,
must be his boss checking on the report.
Back to the old grindstone.

April 11, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 10

2009-04-11T00:45:00.000-07:00

Dreams From A Frozen Planet

I’m an Angry Water buffalo
Words spill out easily some days
He sends me deep-space transmissions
Hammered by the harshness of wind
discussion
Feeding the obsessions
My attention span is so short
Piles and piles of papers and junk
Some would like to have life all neat and tidy
Dead tired after
I stand at the sink alone in my thoughts,
I’m sitting in the middle of a construction zone
I dreamt of flying last night
I sit waiting for the Papers
Poet touch every hand
Words
Like a dry bone I feel very hard
I am frozen
Crushed down I will rise up
Push and pull of memories
I need to be me
The masters are peering out of the page
Journals
Come on down for some Karaoke
You still have some more time
I can’t seem to get to that pen
Ricochet between life’s curve balls
Celebrate through the rhythm and music
I can’t let of go the memories
For many years I was a missing person
My journals are a door to what I am thinking
Liberty, opportunity, hope
Piping hot strong coffee
I feel it will pour out
Things are not always as you plan them
Piles of papers overwhelm
Sometimes I seem to be trapped
On a planet far away,
I am frozen
I can’t let go of the memories
Poetry, is it
In my quiet dream?
The paper fell down from the window as a butterfly
The keys are clicking as the brain
Walks in rhyming rains
It’s true we may not be Shakespeare
Toast stacked four slices deep rests on the plate
The words are in my head
When I was 18 years old
What can I write on?
A person can go through his life
Look inside yourself
What are you working for?
Memories fill my head
Juggling many balls at once
Things are not always as you plan them.

April 10, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 9

2009-04-09T23:20:00.000-07:00

Listen

God listens to me

when I’m happy,
when I’m sad,
when I’m alone,
when I’m desperate,
when I’m yelling,
when I’m crying,
when I’m joking,
when I’m complaining,
when I babble in moans and groans that word can’t express,
when I am running,
when I fail,
when I cheat,
when I lie,
when I love,
when mock,
when I am hungry,
God listens

Do I listen when God speaks?

Do I listen

in the rain,
in new beginnings,
in the heat,
in the morning,
in the evening,
in my dark hours,
in tragedy,
in birth,
in happiness,
in the hustle & bustle,
in exhaustion,
in pain,
in death,
in the stillness of dawn,
in slow times,
in chaos,
in the traffic,
in the silence.
God speaks

Am I speaking,
when I should be listening?
Am I silent
when I should be speaking?

God listens and God speaks.

April 9, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 8

2009-04-08T23:19:00.000-07:00

Poem Factory

So many poems are needed,
Every April; I will open a poem factory.
I will build an assembly line and
I will hire out of work autoworkers,
to man the line.
Some will help pound out the rhythm;
others will run a conveyor belt,
a belt that carries all the words to the Wordsmiths.

I will hire out of work steel workers too.
These former steel workers will transfer their skills,
skills the poem factory needs and can use.
Alphabet letters will be heated to 2000 degrees,
mixed in with molten ideas and poured into molds.
These idea molds will be put on the conveyor belt.
Beatniks will inspect the molds as they go by,
then on to the Wordsmiths who are waiting.

The fun begins when the Wordsmiths start.
Pounding and clanging resound as they take the ideas from the line.
Sledgehammers, mallets, chisels, and all sorts of poem-making tools
will be used to form and shape ideas into words.
There’s some metaphor,
Clang, Clang, Clang
There goes some rhyme.
Clatter, Clatter, Clatter
Here comes free verse, with attitude.
Boom, Boom, Boom
End rhyme wants a place in the company.
Metal shavings fly everywhere,
as the Wordsmiths shape the ideas.

The conveyor belt screeches to a halt…
oh no, we forgot to pay our union dues.
The former steel & autoworkers are striking.

April 8, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 7

2009-04-07T23:45:00.001-07:00

Out of Context

Clashing and smashing the garbage man came
and took cookies out of the oven.
Out of context in the wrong space the
garbage man keeps pace,
the pace car is in a race. Nonsense,
he tries to erase his place on the totem pole.

The baker gingerly drove the garbage truck
to the dump just as the timer went off.
He’s at a loss to why the flies are buzzing,
in his ear while the beep, beep of backing up
distracts from him parallel parking and
he can’t remember where he left his cookies.

Did he toss his cookies or lose them
or did he lose his marbles,
at least he still has his steely,
and what is the garbage man
doing in his the kitchen?

April 7, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 6

2009-04-07T00:20:00.000-07:00

My Names

Jamie was my boyhood name.
In 6th grade I became James.
Being a good, masculine boy, I couldn’t
Take being called Jamie Summers, the Bionic woman..
A move to a new school, and new state and
I had a new name.

It was more.
Silly as it seems,
that was my Bar Mitzvah
It was my attempt to become a man.
I didn’t live with my father, so there were
no rites of passage,
no coming of age.
My new name was an attempt at growing up,
But it was only a name change.

James is a name that is serious
not overly common,
but I think it fits me,
Even if I miss Jamie, sometimes.

April 6, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 5 Thunderbird

2009-04-05T23:06:00.001-07:00

The old homeless man dove into the pool.
Cool water soothed the summer night’s heat.
The moon reflected off the water,
the man saw all his life’s mistakes reflecting in the moon.

Why did he leave Martha for another,
his lover, the bottle?
His son he never knew; John grew up fatherless.
Why did he leave home at 16,
never speaking to his own father again,
Breaking his mother’s heart?

Liquor’s seductive voice called him,
and he always followed her,
always listened to her
She was his only counselor.

Sure, He’d cleaned up for a while,
Many times,
fooling no one but himself,
but he’d always went back to her, again
and again, and again

He could feel the Thunderbird wine
running through his head floating in the cool water.
He wondered if it was too late,
to late, for him to change,
probably,
he thought,
gazing up at the moon.

April 5, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 4

2009-04-04T23:39:00.001-07:00

Haiku Poems

Sleeping Enemy

Conficker headache,
April fools not a big deal.
A big boom later?

Sleepy Eyes

Coffee maker drips,
Caffeine is calling to me.
Steamy, satisfies.

April 4, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 3: Perspectives

2009-04-03T16:06:00.000-07:00

I am in an iron lung and someone just turned up the pressure.
I have a grand piano on my back and just past the 13th floor of a 20-story building.
I am a VW Bug pushing an 18-wheeler up the hills of San Francisco.
I am an ER waiting room with every chair filled and 20 people standing.
I am a pounding headache with no aspirin left in the bottle.
I am a Costco parking lot the day before Thanksgiving.

I am an ocean breeze on a warm summer day.
I am a 2-week vacation and just finished the last day of work.
I am a cold Diet Coke in a frosty glass.
I am a cat lying in a sunny picture window.
I am a quiet Saturday morning with everyone still asleep.
I am a cruise ship pulling away from the dock.

April 3, 2009

NaPoWriMo # 2: Egg Fiaso

2009-04-02T23:49:00.000-07:00

After I woke up
Boiled eggs fell on me.
Can’t we fix this problem?
Don’t think it’s solved that easily,
Ever optimistic, I press on,
Fighting through the egg yokes and whites.
Gingerly I wade through my problem,
Hoping I don’t slip deeper into trouble.
I never thought eggs could cause me such strife, 
Just eat these problems for breakfast. 
Kellog’s would have been easier this morning,
Lucky Charms, bowl after bowl as a kid, even now.
Maybe some Frosted flakes would have been Great! 
Never forget to let Captain Crunch soak in milk,
Otherwise it tears the roof of the mouth.
Put the cereal in perspective, the egg
Quagmire still tripped me up.
Ruined! I think not!
Search for solutions.
Try different options and
Understand that the same old
Vapid ways don’t cut it,
What would Ben Franklin do?
X marks the spot where my eggs landed.
Zealots are chasing me; they’ll never get my eggs!

NaPoWriMo #1: The Box

2009-04-01T13:24:00.000-07:00

My dad was with us for a long time,
long after he was gone.
I had his ashes in the box,
the box they gave me at the funeral home.

The box was in my closet,
at more than one house.
It wasn’t fancy, but a hard brown plastic box.
My friends and I would joke about it,
I had “Bud in a box”
We had a lot of good laughs about it.

Being the oldest, responsibility fell to me.
I didn’t know what to do with it;
we often don’t know what to do with death.
Death’s uncomfortable,
sometimes unspeakable.
Laughter’s easier.

When I married,
Bud made his way to the trunk,
to the trunk of my VW bug,
and there he stayed for a year or more.
My dad rode around with me,
in with the spare tire and gas can,
wherever I went.
My mom said he would have found this hilarious,
riding around in the trunk of a VW Bug.
I agreed.

I thought we should do something
better with my dad,
something better than a brown plastic box.
So I went with my sister and brother;
we drove to Half Moon Bay, to Dad’s favorite beach.
I said a prayer,
after looking around wondering if this was legal,
and poured his ashes into the waves.

It seems less funny today,
looking back through the years,
but I know my dad would laugh with us,
in hearing about his adventures,
riding around in my VW Bug.

April 1, 2009

Wanting to Write vs. Actually Writing

2009-02-02T16:13:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking about writing poems a lot lately, but have not actually written anything. I've listened to a lot of poetry on podcasts, but have not written anything. Sometimes it takes a lot to sit down and clear the noise inside my head and around me and to just write. I let the busyness of life push me around, to bully me around so I do what it wants to do and not what I want to do. Why is that? Why can't I just do it? What's holding me back? Is it fear? I want to write, but I don't do it. Usually when I sit down to write I can do it. It's not like I'm sitting there in front of blank sheet and not being able to produce like most writer's block. It is more of block of even sitting down to put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard.

Jesus, help me to write and sit down and move past the imaginary wall that is stopping me from writing. Help to just do it!

Heavy Hearted Tonight

2009-01-26T23:06:00.000-08:00

Reading a Facebook status of someone got me thinking. It is hard to wait. Patience is hard. I feel a bit of heartache, my own and others. I fell like I am a character is this poem I wrote a while back:

For the Broken

Poet, touch every hand.

Drop down every weight.

Lift every burden.

On the lead-lined highway

brokenness calls out;

desperate cries,

subtle sighs,

and pleading groans pour forth.

At the foot of the mountain

I hear the strong, quiet voice of God whisper,

“You are mine; I am not finished with you.

Take heart and be courageous.”

I walk, my head held higher.

My steps are planted more firmly.

In desperate moments

people are hurting.

“Be my voice.

Be my light.

Be my hands.

Be my comfort.

Be my vessel of grace.

Give them my Living Water.”

Written May 25, 2004

I feel a sadness, a mourning. I need your help, Jesus.

Lamentations 3:22-26
Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

I say to myself, "The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him."

The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;

it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the LORD.

I end this on a more hopeful note that all is not bleak, Jesus is for me.

Psalm 37:23-27
If the LORD delights in a man's way,
he makes his steps firm;

though he stumble, he will not fall,
for the LORD upholds him with his hand.

I was young and now I am old,
yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken
or their children begging bread.

They are always generous and lend freely;
their children will be blessed.

Turn from evil and do good;
then you will dwell in the land forever.

Philippians 1:6
being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

Update on Goals

2009-01-07T22:53:00.000-08:00

So far the only goal I've committed to is journaling which I have done every day. I must say that it has been great to be writing in my journal again daily because when I examine my life, pray via journaling it leads to me reading my Bible more and just being more conscious, or intentional of what I'm doing. I've also played guitar twice since the new year started. That is something I want to do more regularly.

Intentional. I really want to be that way.

Health. I need to start working out on a regular basis. It is so hard to get started. I could get going by walking the dog. The first step is getting workout clothes to work.

For friendships, I need to spend less time online and actually do something face to face.

Well, I will revisit all this again soon.

2009: Goal Planning Continued

2009-01-02T00:42:00.000-08:00

I'm still thinking about my goals. I'm pretty sure I'm going to journal everyday. I want to have a health goal, that can consist of both mental and physical components. I want to have a family goal and friends goal. I may want a creativity goal, I'm not sure. The areas are:

Spiritual
Health
People (Family and Friends)
Work
Creativity

This is sort of the order they will be in, but I think Health and People are on about the same level.
Creativity will have to be last and work, well that is in the mix pretty well because I am there about 9 or 10 hours a day.

I want this year to be more intentional than last year. I feel like I was being blown to and fro last year and at the mercy of everything in my life, and that led to feeling powerless. Now, I realize there will be many things that will be out of my control, but the things that are in my control, I want to be more intentional. I don't think I can plan out every aspect of my life, I just want to have things to shoot for.

I would like to maybe come up with a verse for the year that I can focus on, but that may take a little time. Maybe I can tie creativity into all of the goals, like a thread weaving through them, thinking of creativity more broadly that just writing.

I know that I can sometimes make some grand plans and not a lot comes from them. I think that it is better to have plans than not planning anything at all, and nothing will sure come about from no plans.

I'm not sure if I will journal on paper or online. Maybe it should be in a paper journal because there are less distractions. Maybe I will track my goals via this blog and journal in my paper journal. I wonder if I should get a new journal....that is probably not necessary....we'll see.

I think this is a really good start.

Update: Possible verses: Jeremiah 29:11-14 and/or Jeremiah 31:31-34, Isaiah 61

2009 Goals: Pre-Goal Thoughts

2008-12-31T12:58:00.000-08:00

I need some goals this year. "Increase your chances of success by choosing “process goals” such as walking 30 minutes daily over “outcome goals” such as losing 50 pounds or dropping two sizes. Write your goals down. Research shows that writing down goals increases their effectiveness."
So, I need to write down my goals, and they should be process goals instead of outcome goals.

From my previous post, here are some areas I should include: Spiritual, Physical, Emotional, Family, Friends and Work should be touched on in my goals.

Fitness: I have the workout center at work and my co-worker is looking in that direction so we can plan to take classes that are not at the same time, and cover for one another when something comes up for work. There is one that meets on Wednesdays at 12 called the Boot Camp: "An all-levels training class featuring strength exercises and interval cardio drills that will whip you into shape." That could cover one day. Now I need to decide how many other days and what and when. There are some good online resources through work that I can get ideas from for this goal.

Spiritual: I have started going to BSF and will continue. I can incorporate the homework into my times with God. I would like to also Journal more. Do I commit to Journaling everyday, no matter what? When I am journaling good things happen for me spiritually....This definately a possibility.

Emotional/Mental Health: I will have to give that some thought. Maybe talking to a counselor through my work's EAP program. There are some good online resources through work that I can get ideas from for this goal.

Family: This needs some attention. We need my middle son to be more stable than he has been and that will help things...but I think we need more than this....this needs more thought, and also some talking over with my wife.

Friends: Well that is something I want more of, close friends locally. Maybe the BSF group will help. I also have to be intentional in this area. I need to pray for this as well. I have a deficit in this area and it will need more brainstorming.

Work: I have some goals from my recent review:
1. Continue your develop with the PBX software and grow in regards to BSR/LAI applications and overall ACD routing on the Avaya. You went to training in April at Avaya for ACD. You will need to own and complete a full routing project for call center. Q309
2. Provide trunking calculations on an ongoing basis for all global call center locations. Look to improve existing format and input drivers. Continue to work with forecasting team to efficiently deliver capacity plans for the PBXs. Q109 - Ongoing
3. Quarterly visits to HQ to review current architecture and routing design projects with HQ staff. Ongoing
4. Establish yourself as the lead engineer in at your location by working all issues with your business partners, your peers, directing techs and projects for the site. Q209

I will have to schedule things for these work goals and make it so they are measurable so I can track my progress.

Well, these seems like a really good start. A lot less daunting than I thought it would be. If feels good to get something in writing.

Here's to a great 2009! Carpe Diem!

2009 is coming

2008-12-29T23:32:00.000-08:00

2008 is about to come to a close in less than 2 days. What will 2009 have in store for me? What kind of goals will have for the year? I have been pensive the past several days thinking about things. I want to have some goals. I hope to have some goals: Spiritual, Physical, Emotional, Family, Friends and Work should be touched on in my goals. It feels a little daunting thinking about goals. I don't think I had any goals last year. I would like this year to be different. I will ponder over the next couple days to week or so.

Really, I feel pretty worn out and beaten down by life. I'm down and discouraged about some things. I think I'm probably still depressed. A goal should also be to take care of my mental health.

I will ponder on my life and what I want to do for goals.
I like this section of the Bible as I ponder my goals:

Isaiah 61

The Year of the LORD's Favor

1 The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me,
because the LORD has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners, ^[a]

2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,

3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the LORD
for the display of his splendor.

4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins
and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
that have been devastated for generations.

Also,

Jeremiah 29:11-14

11 For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity. ^[a]

I want some new beginnings, new growth, and new perspective for 2009.

Broken still, after all these years

2008-12-21T00:47:00.000-08:00

I was reading through some old blog entries on this blog and there still is a theme running through my life: Brokenness, lack of friends. I have been depressed lately. I take an herbal supplement called St. John's Wort, but it is not really helping that much. A long time ago I used to be on Prozac but did not like the way it made me feel, so I switched to St. John's Wort....that's just some of what is going on. There has been a lot of stress in my life with both work and my son, who has bipolar disorder, and some financial stress. But a big thing in my life as been my distance from God. I've been hiding in anything I can: work, Facebook, busyness. I'm hurting and want to move on but I am still very broken.

When it was time to set up the outside Christmas lights I really didn't want to do it. My wife pointed out that I never want to do it and just asked is there some reason I don't like to do it. Immediately I remembered an incident with this horrible step father named Tommy. Tommy was a drinker and abusive to my mom when I was in 9th and 10th grade. Something happened while he was drunk and I was angry and I came upstairs from our garage with a baseball bat trying to go after Tommy with it. Suddenly as I came after him with it he grabbed it and I still had it then before you knew it, my sister, my mom,Tommy and me all had our hands on the bat and everyone was screaming and we were on the ground struggling with the bat.

All of this flashed through my head in an instant when my wife asked me if there was some reason I didn't like putting up the Christmas lights. I had to go into the house and I just laid down on the bed for 10 minutes or so pondering the brokenness that had bubbled up from the past, from over 25 years ago, when my wife asked a simple question.

I have had a growing dislike, almost hatred of Christmas time over the past several years. I want to attribute it to the commercialization of Christmas, but after the Christmas Lights and the memories it triggered I would have to say it is more, it is deeper than that.

I read through my other blog entries from 2004 and 2005 and I regularly wanted to grow in my relationship with Jesus and was writing in my journal and reading my Bible. I just haven't been that way. I think I hardened over and have been numb, on auto-pilot. I don't want it to be this way. I need the Living water of Jesus to help me. He didn't not come for the healthy but the sick. I feel sick, I feel broken and I need the healing touch of Jesus to help me. I may also need to speak to a counselor and may need prescription medication and not just St. John's Wort.

I look back to a poem that I wrote on April of 2005 and need to hang onto Jesus:

Resting Place

I write out the dark night of my soul
Jesus, only in you am I truly whole.
Fenced in and pinned down,
I only want to fight the pain
That wants to consume me.
Free me from the prison I’m in,
Give me your freedom.
Make my yoke easy
Make my burden light.
For I am so weary,
So very wear.
I need you.
Free me

Here’s my heart,
My heavy, heavy heart
I cast my cares on you, Jesus.
Transcend may anxiousness with peace
That exceeds all my understandings.
Release me from captivity
Into your freedom.
Brake the chains that bind
Satisfy me for I am so faint.
Please restore my soul,
Help me only find rest in you.
Fortify me,
Cover me in your wings
Protect me from the arrows
That fly by day.
Help me sing for joy.
Be my Resting place.

Written April 19, 2005

Matthew 11:28-30
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Psalm 62:5-6
Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him.He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.
Isaiah 61:1-6

Isaiah 61

The Year of the LORD's Favor

2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,

4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins
and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
that have been devastated for generations.

Psalm 91:4-5
He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day,

Bittersweet

2008-12-08T22:54:00.000-08:00

Seeing what I had,
makes me realized what
I don’t have
Friendships far away,
not many
nearby.

Almost 9 years

in the wasteland,
where loneliness
has been my companion.
Makes me wonder if it’s
more than busyness,
more than station in life,
more than unlucky breaks,
and would-have-could-have-beens.

But I can’t go there.

I won’t go there.

Friendships are waiting

out there,
somewhere for me.
I won’t be a victim,
I’ll be proactive.
Join a group,
meet for coffee,
go to a poker party.

The taste of Facebook friendships
from the past,
makes it bittersweet.
People who have known me,
on my “Friends” list.
I’m up to 158,

yet I’m still yearning.

Yearning for the friend down the road,
a short walk or drive away,
instead of
a million miles away

at the end a computer click.

Bittersweet,
Friendships on Facebook,
remind me of what I had,
back there,

before I moved away.

December 20, 2008

Wordle of a Post

2008-11-10T17:53:00.000-08:00

I found a cool thing and I made one of my posts into a collage:
Still_Broken...

The Note

2008-05-10T21:20:00.000-07:00

A plastic bottle of Coke exploded, spilling
all over an important crumpled note,
making it completely unreadable.

The old man pulls out
his dirty handkerchief to clean up
tearing the note to shreds.

The unhinged door of my mind opened,
snow fell as the hockey puck hit my head,
knocking me out cold.
I’ll never remember

what happened to the note.

May 10, 2008

This is for the Friday Five prompt over at Poefusion.

Old Poem

2008-05-06T15:43:00.001-07:00

Trees Embracing People

I’ve heard of tree huggers,
but can a tree embrace people?
Down in the meadow, I can see it now:

Bob the Oak and Sally the Maple talk,
sharing the latest gossip by the pond cooler.
“Did you hear about Frank?” Bob asks.
“Oh yeah, I heard that he’s taken up with them,
those ‘People Huggers,’ that’s weird,” said Sally.
“Soon he’ll want to demonstrate and wave
some signs, ‘Save The People,’” quipped Bob.
Yeah, it starts out small, wanting to embrace humans,
before you know it he’ll be a card-carrying member
of some whacko humanitarian group!”
“Yeah, Bob I agree. Let the people
blow themselves up, there’s plenty of them left,
we don’t need them anyway, we’ll be
around long after they’re extinct.
2 words: Giant Sequoias,” laughed Sally.
“Yeah. Well that’s too bad about Frank, though….did
you hear about those new worms in the soil?”

May 25, 2004

In My Backyard

2008-05-05T19:48:00.000-07:00

Grass seedlings, left untouched
go rotten.
Weeds crowd out the important.
Urgent junk fills in the empty spots.

When leaves fall in Autumn
I just keep trimming the bushes
and weeds overtake me.
Overwhelmed, I do nothing,
taking a nap instead.

In Winter I wake only
to find my backyard filled
with dead trees, brown grass
an old Chevy pickup with a rusted out bed,
jacked up on cinder blocks

Another Deep-Space Transmission

2008-05-05T13:19:00.000-07:00

He sends me deep-space transmissions,
my video mail screen flashes daily.
“Master, my new doghouse is fantastic.
you’ve out done yourself again. My voice
has lost all American-dog accent
thanks to the voice modulation treatments,
the modified iPhone you sent has done wonders.”

Fido is loyal.
His multiple daily video emails,
do seem excessive.
Reminds me of his younger days.
He would follow me,
laying at my feet in
whatever room I was in.

Fido has been living in space
fourteen years this past January,
as loyal as the day I brought him home.

May 5, 2008
This poem was motivated by a prompt over at ReadWritePoem.

NaPoWriMo Completed

2008-05-03T12:29:00.000-07:00

I wrote 27 poems during the month of April for National Poetry Writing Month. I wanted to get 30 done but I couldn't quite make it. I have written almost 40 poems since mid March so I feel good about this.

NaPoWriMo # 22 (Make up for day 22)

2008-04-30T16:26:00.000-07:00

Urban Prairie Dogs

Cubicles are lined up in rows,
like on a farm of prairie dogs.
Working away, taking many calls,
in the call center, with low walls.

Occasionally a prairie dog pops his head
above the cube wall,
between calls,
seen by the supervisor.

“Get back in your burrow,
we have callers waiting,”
The pale prairie dog agent
plugs back in his headset,
digging into the cubicle,
“Thank you for call,
my name is….”

Dilbert is laughing,
more material for his comic strip.

April 30, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 18 (Make up for day 18)

2008-04-30T15:47:00.000-07:00

We Are Down

Administering the PBX ,
I mean phone system, I found 19 T1s down,
I check the by 24-line phones lines
and find nothing wrong on our end.
I put a ticket in to check the carrier, AT&T
While all this is going on
supervisors call my cell phone, repeatedly.
The 10 voicemails on my phone tell me,
in no uncertain terms, there are
no calls in queue, the agents are
sitting idle.

Trying the outside toll free #, 800-Buy Stuff,
and I am getting a fast busy signal.
Oh no, Service Levels
Take a dive,
customer satisfaction
down the tubes, when they can’t
get through.

AT&T calls,
“Does your equipment have power?”
“Is your line coding b8zs?”
“Can we do intrusive testing”

Yes,
Yes and
Yes….we are not getting any calls, Intrusively test away.
All T1s are back up, now!
AT&T did nothing, they say.
Likely story.
What, now the queues are flooded with calls?!

Just another day in the call center.

April 30, 2008

Written from the prompt on Jargon at Read Write Poem.

NaPoWriMo # 17 (Make Up)

2008-04-30T12:25:00.000-07:00

Lead Balloons

My energy is low.
Lead balloons hang on my shoulders.

I’m stuck in my seat,
clicking away on my computer.

Can’t seem to shake the tiredness
that hangs over me like fog
covering San Francisco Bay.

Zombi-like I make it through my workday.

Emotions take me down a track,
to a tunnel deep within.

Introspection and silence overwhelm me.

Fear and paralysis lead me to wonder if
depression has grabbed me,
or am I just over-tired

maybe it’s some of both.

April 30, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 30

2008-04-30T10:06:00.000-07:00

News In My Email

My friend is sick, only 42,
needs a liver transplant,
after his gall bladder was removed,
two days before,
after a pace maker was put in,
four months before,
after he fainted several times,
two months before
after he found his job may be ending,
six months before.

Email updates for prayer,
sent out twice daily,
50 people on the list,
a chain of phone calls behind
the email list ,
keeps me informed,
almost in a clinical way,
reading news of a dear friend’s peril.

Life can be fragile,
not old, but no longer young.
I feel powerless,
as reading a news article detailing
events of a man in Australia but my
friends name was inserted in the article.
More such emails will come about
news of friends and loved ones.
Our invincibility has made
way for fragility.
Value time with family and friends.
Tragedy and hospital visits,
late calls and unexpected emails,
may change everything,
as life goes on....

I keep checking my email
hoping the next update
brings better news of my friend.

April 30, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 26

2008-04-26T23:38:00.000-07:00

Digital Natives

My kids are digital natives.
They don’t know a time,
Without the internet, email and cell phones.
They can watch “TV”
on the TV or on the Disneychannel.com.
Club Penguin, Webkins, and other virtual
worlds for kids are their play grounds.
When my son was 3 he could
out-mouse his grandmother

They think it novel,
when we talk of the old days.
I wrote letters,
with pen and paper,
to their mom when she
was away at college.

Cell phones now ubiquitous,
once we used pay phones.
4 out of 5 us have a cell phone,
sharing minutes, keeping linked together.

Reality is we are all becoming more digital:
More with each email,
more with each cell call,
more with each mouse click.

We are digital immigrants,
traveling further and further
from an analog, snail-mail, world,

Into the natural digital world
our kids inhabit as naturally as
drinking a glass of water.

April 26, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 24

2008-04-24T23:43:00.000-07:00

Get Back Quickly

I rode my bike 5 miles to the ATM,
my mother told me to get
as much cash as allowed.
We needed to get to a hotel,
before he got back from his drunken rage.

A thirteen year old on an adult's errand,
I just did what I was told.
So I pedaled quickly in the dark,
across town with my
mother's ATM card and PIN number
in my pocket.

NaPoWriMo # 23

2008-04-23T23:24:00.000-07:00

Roller Coaster Ride

The stock market is emotional,
at times a basket case. It’s like
a legal gambling playground,
for grown-ups.
Wild ups and downs, turning
on the words of men like
Bernanke now, and Greenspan before.
One day the Bulls run,
the next the Bears growl.
Boys listening to stories of
Chicken Little and Humpty Dumpty
show more control.

The roller coaster ride grabs
the attention of many big kids,
who lose their marbles,
at the thought of a thrilling ride.

April 23, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 21

2008-04-21T17:08:00.000-07:00

Purpose

Poetry-- is it
high end journaling or more
message for masses?

NaPoWriMo # 20

2008-04-20T23:48:00.000-07:00

A Blessing At Ground Zero

Fire and Ground Zero,
the lives of many of New York’s
finest were lost.

The Pope spoke with and
prayed for 24 today.
A brother of a man from Ladder
114 met with the Pope.

He stood for Jimmy,
who was found by him
and his father 6 years ago.
The brother spoke to the Pope,
selected out of many, hopefully
healing will come

4 Brothers, and a father
before, them wore the uniform.
“God bless you ,”
said the pope.
3 brothers remain
in the uniform,
fighting fires,
for Jimmy.

Ground Zero,
In memory of the ,
fallen heroes, sacred
resting place for many souls.

April 20, 2008

Inspired by an article in the New York Times

NaPoWriMo # 19

2008-04-19T23:54:00.000-07:00

Broken Heart

Collateral damage,
brings the sober truth
after
lives torn apart
The heartbreaking trauma of

Divorce

Illness

Emotional pain

Death
of emotion,
of trust,
of love,
of life.

“Sorry I meant to say”,

Falls so flat.

The heart is just an organ
But so fragile in emotion,
In life.

I carry your heart
in my heart.

April 19, 2008

Missed a day for NaPoWriMo

2008-04-18T12:27:00.000-07:00

I missed a day. I didn't write a poem yesterday. I could blame it on traveling home from Denver, but I had time to write a poem, but was doing other things. I will keep going and post one today and try to come back with one for the 17th.

Poem In Your Pocket Day (poem on my blog instead)

2008-04-17T14:22:00.000-07:00

Today is Poem in your pocket day, as mentioned by Michelle over at Poefusion To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time
by Robert Herrick

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying; And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying. The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun, The higher he's a-getting, The sooner will his race be run, And nearer he's to setting. That age is best which is the first, When youth and blood are warmer; But being spent, the worse, and worst Times still succeed the former. Then be not coy, but use your time, And while ye may, go marry; For having lost but once your prime, You may forever tarry.

NaPoWriMo # 16

2008-04-16T22:27:00.000-07:00

Other Lawns

Snow falls in Denver while I
think about the Subway in New York
Wanderlust captures my thoughts,
when I go somewhere new. The grass
is so green in these new places.
Visiting Dallas, Atlanta, Knoxville, green
grew as it did in Knoxville and San Antonio.
After 2 weeks in Scottsdale for work, the color
faded for me.

I can’t be happy where I am,
always wanting to be on a different lawn.
Those other lawns might end be brown and
burnt or even we and swampy. I still am wherever
I go, my problems come along .
In the morning
I’d still have to mow the grass.

April 16, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 15

2008-04-15T22:51:00.000-07:00

Who am I Made to Be?

I want to try,
If I could fly,
But my feet are on the ground,
So often not making a sound.
If I would fight, I could
with all my might,
Find myself,
Find myself,
To be someone else,
Other that the facade I wear,
But could I dare,
to risk all my insecurities
getting rid of all my vanities,
and be the man, God made me to be.

April 15, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 14

2008-04-14T22:45:00.000-07:00

Day Fourteen in Denver

Dead tired after
a plane ride to Denver.
Parking was bad in Downtown
but didn’t get the “Denver Boot”,
just fed the meters lots of quarters.
Took pictures
of two different Starbucks,
I’m a bit of a coffee addict & fanatic,
while taking in the Denver atmosphere.
Back at my hotel,
I laughed out loud alone,
as I watched a Youtube video
of an elephant in Burma,
painting a self portrait.
How profound.

I’m dead tired.

April 14, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 13

2008-04-13T23:35:00.000-07:00

Perfect Day

On a planet far away,
a talking dog has a perfect day.
Rex got up, as usual,
read the paper.
He drank his Sumatra Coffee,
while riding the bullet tube to work.
His boss sauntered in after him,
never asking about the report,
three weeks overdue.

Work day done,
tube ride back to his section of town,
met Lulu at the dog park.
Ooh there were some good smells today.
Another quick tube ride across town with Lulu.
Met the guys at the Dogotorium.
Puffed a few excellent Martian cigars,
and had an excellent dinner.
They make the best bone filet there.

Later, when Lulu and he were alone,
drinking coffee with dessert at Barkbucks,
Rex was fearless
he popped the question.
Lulu said yes.
She would be his bride.

April 13, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 12

2008-04-12T22:18:00.000-07:00

Throw It Out With the Trash

Throw it out,
I can’t think.
Throw it out,
I just blink.
Throw it out,
not the baby.
Throw it out,
with the trash.
Throw it out,
empty egg cartons.
Throw it out,
empty promises.
Throw it out,
hollow words.
Throw it out,
writer’s block.
Throw it out,
can’t even talk.
Throw it out,
without your clout.
Throw it out,
In a pinch.
Throw it out,
life’s a cinch.
Throw it out,
old dirty sock.
Throw it out,
big red rock.
Throw it out,
what a rout.
Throw it out,
don’t you pout.
Throw it out,
old sour milk.
Throw it out,
moth-eaten silk.
Throw it out,
dirty diaper pail.
Throw it out,
piles of mail.
Throw it out,
lines not written.
Throw it out,
dreams not lived.
Throw it out,
trips not taken.
Throw it out,
chances passed by.
Throw it out,
days I’ve wasted.
Throw it out,
regrets of yesterday
Throw it out,
long carried grudges
Throw it out,
anger expressed hastily.
Throw it out,
my self- doubt.
Throw it out,
week old trout.

Throw it out,
without a doubt.

April 12, 2008

NaPoWriMo # 11

2008-04-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

Stuck On The Prairie

They mouth freedom,
So livid at the majesty,
Not seen in the garden.
They want to imagine a brilliant time
When their enterprise
Brings to fruition
Years of hard work.

Until then,
The are like immigrants
In a covered wagon
Stuck on the prairie,
Putting the comfort
Of their opinions away

April 11, 2008
Poem made started from randomly picking magnetic poetry words.

NaPoWriMo # 10: I am Captivated

2008-04-10T23:46:00.000-07:00

I am Captivated

I hear words play,
condensed, distilled,
large, rich and full.
Over and over,
new scenes unfold.
The clock ticks,
midnight looms.
The calendar page
is tipping while I hurry.
Robert Pinksy speaks,
Stanley Kunitz presents,
Louise Glück and others
I never met
hold my attention.

Recordings of poems
echo still, even
after my iPod stopped.

NaPoWriMo # 9.5

2008-04-10T12:09:00.001-07:00

I will post poem # 10 later, but thought this was really cool and can be found here. I saw this on Chicklegirl's site for her NaPoWriMo # 8.

NaPoWriMo # 9: Far From Home

2008-04-09T12:34:00.000-07:00

Far From Home

Friends are far away,
heart lonely
Many voicemails left.

Loyalty I have
for them, but
I need more friendships.

Virtual world can
be lonely,
Need more real contact.

Eight years of desert,
wilderness
is wearing on me.

Hundred miles away
doesn’t seem
as far as it feels.

Phone calls and email
Is often
not enough for me.

Should I return home,
is the grass,
as green as I hope?

Or is the story,
for me, you
can’t get there from here.

Friends are far away;
my time in
the desert prevails

April 9, 2008

This Poem is a Lune, and was a prompt at Poefusion Blog. The Lune was invented by poet Robert Kelly. It's a three line poem with a syllable count of 5/3/5.

NaPoWriMo # 8

2008-04-08T13:14:00.000-07:00

Former Wisconsin Beauty Queen

Flowered mesh captures hair floating above sun-glassed eyes
She sneaked the harsh Chinese cigarettes
Striking the match on the bottom of her shoe
Her cloyingly touch caused my brother to seethe
She changed her name and learned to swim
Rolled her hips and shimmied at a club on Calle Ocho.

She’s a bit of a strange old bird
With her nest of curly gray hair
So, three husbands and two dogs later,
she left Kenosha and
moved down to Ft. Lauderdale.

She’s making friends and breaking
hearts at the Royal Palms Retirement Community.
There she spikes the punch on bingo night,
and raises eyebrows and heartbeats with
her provocative, flamboyant shuffleboard style.
She may get kicked out,
once again,
If her chain-smoking
doesn’t finish her off first.

April 8, 2008
Finished from lines of a Chain Poem at ReadWritePoem.

NaPoWriMo # 7: Flight to Boston

2008-04-07T09:13:00.000-07:00

Flight to Boston

I had to get to the airport,
to catch a flight to Boston.
I thought it best
to get to the airport by bicycle.
I could not get the over-sized suitcase
onto the small bike rack,
that hangs over the back tire.

At the last minute had to catch a cab,
and somehow arrived at the airport
nine hours early for my flight to Boston.
I camped out in a tent city
at the airport, my stuff strewn about
everywhere, with all the other nomads.

The airport white phone,
kept calling my name,
interfering with my airport camp out.
Each time I got back from the
white courtesy phone, my campsite
became larger, more dispersed.

After hitting the snooze,
maybe a dozen times
I cancelled my flight,
packed up my suitcase,
moved out of the tent city,

And got dressed for work.

April 7, 2008

Blogging Through The Brokenness

Kicking the tires...

NaPoWriMo # 27: Outside the Delirium

NaPoWriMo # 24: REX Surveys the Damage

NaPoWriMo # 22: Old Enemies

NaPoWriMo # 21: My Sister's News

NaPoWriMo # 20: April is Hard

NaPoWriMo # 18: Cat and Dogs

NaPoWriMo #16: Running From Myself

NaPoWriMo #15: Flying Past Saturn

A bit of wonder,pieces of dreamscrept back upon me,when my two boys,asked for a telescope,after watching Nova:Hunting the Edge of Space.Magnificent pictures captured all of our imaginations.

“Jamie” may catch a spaceshipflying to his dreams again

NaPoWriMo #14: Poem Line

NaPoWriMo # 13: Paper Mache Monkeys

NaPoWriMo #12: Hack Attack

NaPoWriMo # 11: Click For Friends

NaPoWriMo # 10: Wedding Day

NaPoWriMo # 9: Connectedness

NaPoWriMo #8: Step Into Your Life

NaPoWriMo #7: He Comes Quietly

NaPoWriMo #6: Uncoiling

NaPoWriMo #: Breathe

NaPoWriMo #4: Held Back

Randomness: NaPoWriMo # 3

In My Mind: NaPoWriMo #2

Falling Down: NaPoWriMo #1

Goal Formation for 2010

I need some big hairy audacious goals this year.....I want to go for broke....I want a better story filled with passion and zeal. I want to strive and reach further than my grasp can reach. I don't want to settle; I don't want to shirk; I want to live abundantly!

Reading, Running, & Writing!

The Last Decade

Quote Surprises Me

Did my 5K and still going!!

I need to Be Healthy

The long, slow road to friendship in the desert

Health Goals with assistance from a Health Coach

Elegy For Mike

Can’t We Discuss It?

NaPoWriMo # 30

NaPoWriMo # 29

NaPoWriMo # 28

NaPoWriMo # 27

NaPoWriMo # 26

NaPoWriMo # 25

NaPoWriMo # 24

Pushing Beyond the Albatross (NaPoWriMo # 23)

NaPoWriMo # 22

Thoughts On The Year so far

NaPoWriMo # 21

NaPoWriMo # 20

NaPoWriMo # 19

NaPoWriMo # 18

NaPoWriMo #17

NaPoWriMo # 16

NaPoWriMo # 15

NaPoWriMo # 14: NaisaiKu

NaPoWriMo # 13

NaPoWriMo # 12

NaPoWriMo #11

NaPoWriMo # 10

NaPoWriMo # 9

NaPoWriMo # 8

NaPoWriMo # 7

NaPoWriMo # 6

NaPoWriMo # 5 Thunderbird

NaPoWriMo # 4

NaPoWriMo # 3: Perspectives

NaPoWriMo # 2: Egg Fiaso

NaPoWriMo #1: The Box

Wanting to Write vs. Actually Writing

Heavy Hearted Tonight

Update on Goals

2009: Goal Planning Continued

2009 Goals: Pre-Goal Thoughts

2009 is coming

Isaiah 61

The Year of the LORD's Favor

Jeremiah 29:11-14

Broken still, after all these years

Isaiah 61

The Year of the LORD's Favor

A bit of wonder,
pieces of dreams
crept back upon me,
when my two boys,
asked for a telescope,
after watching Nova:
Hunting the Edge of Space.
Magnificent pictures captured
all of our imaginations.

“Jamie” may catch a spaceship
flying to his dreams again