All works here are adaptations from journal writings mostly 2016-present.
Sparkling Inside
Intention is the broadband
Its the width apart that is encouraging the fire to smolder
How do you let go/salt over the shoulder
Here in the temple time quietly suggests
Why you'd rather not figure out '
What is to blame
Or who is that singing on the broken, spinning record
But even as we let go a little
Yes, clearly there is more to it than that
Finding a wish meters from the well
Coin another, flip sides whatever
Just what is it that keeps disturbing the air?
Windows are pressed open
To move and let the dust retire
Sparkling inside
Maybe your heart's in it this year
You Could Change My Mind
I am out on an Island
But you don't need to call me again
To tell me where we are going
Or even where we have been
The cost keeps getting multiplied
Staring out at a sheet of ice
There are things I keep running from
The more I embrace ancient history
And the roles I keep averting
Are the things that have stopped me cold
But you could change my mind
It's what you said so simple
Of my heart you've captured again
To teach me the fullness of life
All that I built so yearning for answers
I let go tonight
And if I could fly above this storm
To cure what we bore
I'd pay for that flight with the years that ran on
But now relent
You could change my mind
I am with you, again
Sunflowers on a Pine Tar Bench
Maybe all this dust
Runs away being scared
Complacent that it would find some other host
Islands build geography
Holding on is lost in memory
If you were the one I'm all in for,
Better that be myself?
If the sediment held down
Sentiments loosely defined as forgiven
In that decision, how is it that we're marked by frames?
Lenses have a way of feeling, detached
Willingness is the temperance
I want to run away
Into more of substance that sticks
The digest from digestion
Hulling away seeds
The Freedom to Be
I am lost in this freedom
Of ways I could spend
And not enough would find me
I look around but you are not awake
I figure out soon I have to turn the page
But soon is not tomorrow
Or a million years to borrow
For now we are in tune
Sleep falls into predictable slumber
I step around you
I see the obvious
You challenge me to be more of myself
You gave me that freedom
Every time I wait for something more
When you are awake
But there climbs this joy
A never-ending consolation ups its game
Softness merges into voice
Its nothing complicated.
This rustling broadens us
To let us merge into light
When all else confuses the waking in-between
I love you just the same
A Waltz
I feel along the bridge
A waltz with time
Feeling footprints light
Patterns of ease, obvious intention
The music enters the space
and shifts the voids of distraction
Just observing
In and out of bounds
Clearing the surface
Reaching deeper
Where the pain softens
Where the healing is something the world cannot infringe upon
Into the breath, willing
Expecting communion
Resting our eyes
Being all that I ask for
Abiding in You
Begging For More Light
Your breath is feathered
Flickering between the flame
And the backdrop
I hold on, then let go
Am I still standing on quicksand?
Your thoughts are always above me
This current, this space, this undertow
I ask; Can you give me a straight answer?
You chide, so amused with riddles
Everything in time settles the dust
It sparkles near you
Getting caught on the surface
If my thoughts could align
I'd be there
Begging for more light
Mirror, Mirror
There is a light
That closes the distance
A patience that is still friends with time
I never knew how to speak with you
So that is why I ran away
It doesn't work in front of a mirror
The heir apparent
Twists electric
Finding a span of concentration
Beg truth from an iris
To pull islands held together
Something is affront
That should be behind us
What is through me
Is decided past this sheet of glass
But Your Voice
When you are raised
We are going somewhere
Your pursuit has blinded me to direction
Your purpose separates
My flesh from my spirit
Markings of time
Unraveled
I lost count
Suffer the thoughts between
Twixt the sublimated, buried form
What is left to deny?
What vision is left balanced, forged in your direction?
In any dimension, what are you offering?
Tired breath
Still calls out your name
By default
Give me something
Whatever I release will catapult me forward
In every realm
Lighter, determined
Consumed with passion
That knows nothing else but your voice
Deadline
When I am floating away
I need a ceiling
In everything loose
That need to be bound
I am still reeling
Draw me in
I need a deadline
Something to frame this space
I want a finish line
A marker to say I have won something?
I live to know
That I thrive on the stress
Of not knowing I can make it
And a panic that ensues
When I am not sure of myself
Give me a test that shows me
So much more
Than a run-on sentence
And the liberty that as the best of me
Blog: Somewhere In between
One of the hardest things to achieve with a mental illness is to have a healthy perspective. No matter where you are in your life your experience at the extreme poles can really define your life in between them. Seasonal variations all have a way of revisiting these crisis points along your life journey.
For me it has been just as difficult navigating through the depression as it has been the mania end of things. I can just as easily remember the seasons where I was left in traction due to depression, when I could not cope at school, work home or anywhere in between. Those times remind me when I start slipping into destructive thought patterns and when I need to seek help when things are veering of course. Whenever find myself withdrawing and not interested in my hobbies and social things I put myself on guard and try to get to the root my thoughts, emotions and behavior.
Mania is something that is very different for me. Most of the times when I have not been medicated properly I have swung to the manic side of life. It is during these times when my thoughts race, my sleep is lessened, and my mood is elevated.
But at its core mania is a awesome experience that is always short-lived. During mania, you just feel great, you sense you are "one" with the world, everything is bright and positive. But mania always morphs itself into anxiety and other thought patterns that can be destructive and out of control.
Mania in its purest form is the pinnacle of life experience. You feel close to God, and you have this endless source of energy. For me this always manifests itself into periods of great creativity, and social freedom.
Experiencing mania however can have you question life when it is good. Somewhere in the back of your mind you question how long can this good thing last. Just as depression leaves scars the after effects of a manic episode can last a long time as well. There are times when I questioned moments of clarity or direction, or motivation. Because in the back of my mind I don't know what is next. Because when things where looking up and positive they crashed. You always have those thoughts lingering even in the best of times.
Its really hard to take life at face value when you start gaining years of experience and seasons of thought patterns to your memory.
But you cannot sort this stuff out in isolation. You cannot rely totally on yourself, you need to share your life with someone (friends, family, counselor, doctor, all the above) because you have to gain an objective perspective on your life that transcends just your thoughts and feelings.
It is possible to love your life and not let your life experience at the poles scare you from living your life to the fullest in between. Just because you crashed before doesn't mean you are not wiser and better equipped to deal with that stressor or that season now. You can live stronger and more aware because of your past, stay on your path, you are not alone.
Reality
I need you
When I am floating away
Dancing hypothetically
The dream doesn't end with you
It just changes shape
When you are around
Ground me
Tell me what there is to work with
I love you
Even when I don't understand you
You are the control
The necessity
In the shadows of fantasy
Lend me your ear
Your lease, your portion
Certainly I wait
Whatever it is your patience
Hold me close
Speak to me softly
Be near
Your Own
Beyond the seed of expectation
I redefine myself
What is it that you remind me of?
Colors lock into a prism
My thoughts keep me at bay
Held in this process
My trust is that I trust something greater
My hope grows within patience
Into a vision of clarity, of peace
Pursues the life beheld as your own
Corralled
Pulling, guiding
This is where the will meets the way
And there is no alternative
Finding what is clear
From the path that goes from here
I press, I stress upon the outcome
And surrender myself to the process
What is the next step?
You have to persist to insist
My attitude is worn under pressure
Feelings wane, relax
I cannot go back from purpose
I've been bought
To graze on a different plane
Is it So Easy to Forget?
I miss you,
Have you made up your mind?
The soft light fools you, mellows and hides
Everything has a purpose;
You're speaking barely
No, those are not words:
Establish what it is to recover the faith to move on
To stop seeing all the trees in the forest clump into one
I will delight when I see something I recognize
Can I be around you?
Can you remember what it meant,
Sundays sung till our hearts content?
We walked down walls;
Something inside me gave in when you asked me;
Where have you been?
Do you love me now,
Now as in always, dear?
This is growing old I am reminded
But there is no wandering back
I said " I love you", once, not sometimes, forever
This Poem was originally published in 2013, in the book Golden Leaves
The Girl in the Photos
In a fog
Dancing with precision
All the effort that binds
There is a careful lingering
That is tomorrow's patience
Can it all be for good,
This standing by?
This mind courses on edge
A long time, a short space
Something is a symptom
Upon the thought relied upon
I have spoken this world into existence
I have stayed ready
For the dawn to reach the pixels
Forming her eyes
There are dreams
Photos I have taken
There is a current, developing
Pulling this stream
And The sands
So close, in my hands
The Dance
There is a joy I know when we dance:
Something that knows the journey
Something that frames the moment
I remember loosely when I didn't care
Where me alone, just the music
It was worship, it was freedom
Now when I look at you and hold you
Its sacred, this dance
It has a way of both grounding and releasing our spirit
With each step
Awe, and inspiration
Nothing greater, now together
The dance
Grace
Is it too late?
I stare at the playground
And all at once it has changed
Through a portal of clarity
Through a shift in the pattern
I have awoken
Enough to see the matrix
To see how I have twisted and turned
The axis of concentration
But while I see life fresh for the first time
I realize I am just as clueless to proceed
To make amends
To make an end
From proper means
I don't know how long patience will pursue me as a friend
Are you here?
I am sorry for what has taken me this long
Forgiveness is the love I know as grace
Speak Up
In precision, so given
Through a thousand nights
The same questions
Let go, take hold of your whispers
If you could in this season
Speak up
The wind distracts me
Your creation speaks loud
And I cannot decipher
Your voice from their vibrations
As I listen and lean in
My thoughts collect
To a still pond
Like a watershed easing its way
To the ocean of Your becoming
And your ceaseless amazement
Frequency
I found your wavelength
On the fringe of desire
Between promises I breathe
This is your life/my life
Proceed
One day as I am aware
You shook me:
Maybe all of this wanting
Is getting me somewhere
But I am not listening to you
Through the baseline of peril
I tend to what is holding me back:
The reason I left
Somehow I trust the space between us
Is but imagined
An amplitude above
Hearts on course
Ready