You are a force to reckon with
Yet you feel so deeply
You’re a soul of confident strength
Yet you love so sweetly
Strength is in the weakness
A lifeboat in a sea
I’ve known you at your lowest
And you inspire me
Your days are whirlwinds of struggle
Yet you face rainstorms by my side
Building new cities from this rubble
We invite each other inside
Success is in the failure
A phoenix born of ash
It’s a flight into the future
Holding hands to face the past
It’s a tiny world out there
30,000 over 4 billion
A speck over a dot
I’m a passing face down there
Feeling with severity
A vapor in the wind
We thought we were the center
In a cosmos that gives no care
To our importance
Time has shown we’re small
A rowboat in a sea of time
Tossed about in dark matter
Yet we’re the universe given thought
The conscious birthed by change
The children of the stars
It’s our insignificance that gives us meaning
It’s finality that defines memory
Mortality that gives meaning to life
Earth is beautiful in its fragility
Hanging from an orbital thread
Suspended in a sunbeam
This small existence is a gift
Our marble in a sea of black
Our momentary lives
You’re like rain on a sunny day
Like the sunshine on my parade
More than I could ever say
That’s how much I need you
A home a continent away
I’ve found a place that I can stay
You make my heart and mind feel safe
That’s how much I need you
It’s in your eyes
It’s in your smile
It’s in your laughs
It’s in your musings
It’s you
I pledge allegiance not to a flag
But to the liberties that wove it together
I pledge allegiance not to a republic
But to the unity for which it should stand
I pledge allegiance not to a nation under one god
But to one where faith and faithlessness live in harmony
I pledge allegiance not to a country indivisible in words alone
But to one where the outcast and wandering are given a home
Where those who are free are not bound by their skin
Where those who flee are not barred from a refuge
Where love defines law and diversity drives policy
I pledge allegiance not to the idea of liberty
But to its manifestation in the real and the corporal
To its existence in the presence, not its legacy from the past
I pledge allegiance not to the justice we comfortably believe exists
But to righting the wrongs against the struggling
To freeing those enslaved by poverty
To valuing lives more than profit
I pledge allegiance to equality – the “for all” we repeat
For lives lost to weapons
For lovers degraded
For visitors in our shared home
For natives who are cheated
For black lives that matter
Three miles down the road
is a long way for the eye to see.
Some say they have the vision;
that’s something I can’t say I believe.
You find a peace living in the moment
with no goals or dreams to tie you down.
It’s the pleasantry of uncertainty.
Knowing ahead isn’t where life is found.
Fate takes your collar and pulls you along
Regardless of your plans or expectations.
Let go and feel the ground rush beneath.
Replace loneliness and fear with anticipation.
If the moments are known the joy is missed.
If all is certain there’s never surprise.
Love ignites with no plan or permission,
and the future you want is the stars in her eyes.
The future has no lifetime warranty.
There’s no guaranteeing where it will turn.
It’s that finality that gives memory meaning.
There’s no ember if the wood doesn’t burn.
Turning wheels to signify time
Layer on layer, under and above
Balance of nature and equilibrium
The mystery of beauty and wonder of love
Mysticism that kept us grounded
Caught up in the magic of it all
Replaced with certainty of truth
A death, a rising, an ancient fall
We live encapsuled in the knowledge
Of spinning worlds and fleeing stars
Formulas are far from contemplation
The consideration of who or what we are
There are many paradoxes to be found around us. They are frequently discussed, in a poor man’s philosophy kind of way. Everyone and their uncle can sound well-versed in philosophical discussion when conversing about paradoxes and binary thinking.
There is one that hits close to home with me, though, during this period of struggle and change that I am in the midst of. It’s one that I hold onto as being true.
It’s this: that the situations and experiences that we would call our worst moments while we are trudging through them are often the same motivations that drive us forward to better things. The darkest moments are often the stories that we laugh about with family and friends months or years down the road.
J.R.R. Tolkien once said that there is a phrase in the English language that could be called incredibly beautiful. Not for its meaning or content, but for the sound it makes coming off the tongue. That phrase? “Cellar door.” That’s a great illustration of the paradox I’m describing. Have you ever seen a cellar door, then walked away thinking that it was the best feature of the house? Quite the contrary, in my experience. The cellar door is typically the most unkempt, beat up, disregarded fixture in a house. It leads to a dark, damp place, so no one prioritizes it as being of great importance. Yet its name stands out as one of the most beautiful in our language.
This same paradox is described in the New Testament: “when I am weak, then I am strong.” That’s an expression of truth that I carry with me every day. There is more depth to that statement than a photo quote or highlighter can reach. To me, it describes a situation of raw honesty with oneself. A place where you have reached the edge of who you are, and you allow the spiritual to step in. Moments where you set aside an empirical mind and embrace the impalpable. Life is given to those who lose themselves, Jesus taught. That’s incredibly counter-intuitive, but somehow always holds true.
Like any good writing, these words on this page are words that I need to hear. Knowing with a mind and trusting with a heart are polar opposites that need to meet in the middle. Do I really believe and press ahead with the confidence that the place I find myself in will launch me into something beautiful? That the lessons learned will be invaluable, and that one day I will be thankful for them?
Do I have faith in the paradox? Do you? Or will we ever be able to, regardless of how often and obviously it proves itself to be true?
Is that where spirituality and hope is best found: in the opposite outcomes?
A grip on the soul
It’s got quite a hold
A clench to the fist
There’s so much we miss
A squeeze in the chest
When can we just rest?
A pound in the heart
Our shakes off the charts
Awake in the night
Like darkness is light
When we fight there’s no violence
From this side of the ring
We destroy with serenity
In tune with vibrations of strings
Like a river entrapped
That breaks through with force
We exhale the poison
When we inhale the source
Memories are fluid.
They often begin solid at the foundation,
becoming thinner and more fragile as they are layered.
Stones stacked atop one another.
Some can be swayed by the slightest wind
without our realization.
The smallest stones plummeting unnoticed.
Lost forever in the shifting sands.
We work to preserve them;
cementing with photographs and film.
Yet these only capture the visual,
leaving the words and feelings unpreserved.
Are our efforts futile
if remembrance can so quickly come unglued?
If recollection is ever a victim of time?
I think not.
My heart says the memories that last
are not the specific or the tangible.
They are the beautiful generalities.
The constant and repeated knowledge
of those things that are and will always be there.
Child’s hands,
tiny or wrinkled.
Grandfather’s words,
ageless and wise.
Breathing.
God.
Smiles.
Melodies.
Butterflies.
You.
Me.
The monuments of meaning and hope.
A huge shout out to Angel Hansen for the killer artwork.
I hope this thing here does it justice!
Could this be it?
The summation of your searching?
The rewards of the fight?
Can it be here?
The answer in the trembling?
The electric in the night?
Is it just human?
To die for explanations
And waste away to find the “why”?
What if we found it?
Is there joy in the discovery?
Would the heart be satisfied?
Would we accept it?
When it’s not the silver lining?
When the end’s more black than white?
Do we hunt for truth?
Or simply lust for pleasant exits?
An easy shock into peace of mind?
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