You are currently browsing the monthly archive for January 2014.
Sitting alone in a loud and crowded cafe;
walking through a park and being blinded
for a second by a bright light;
standing on a packed train,
waiting for a bus, or just coming to work
on a normal day that doesn’t at first seem out of the ordinary-
you can see someone, you can meet someone,
you can catch the eye of someone,
and you can start talking to someone you may have seen before
but until the right time came for you both
you never felt the need to reach out and discover
something about yourselves that goes beyond commonality.
You can feel something, perhaps even the signature beat
of someone’s heart that may sound the same as everyone else’s,
but which you know and you hear is different from everyone else’s
because their heart beats for you
as your heart beats for theirs.
You can be anywhere, anytime.
You can be somewhere, and you can be the only person
who knows that you have seen, met, the right person for you,
and that this is the right place and the right time.
You can’t fake it, you just know it;
you can’t shake the feeling, you just know you have found
what you need, and what you have been searching for for so long,
and you can’t get enough of it and them,
because everything about them is unlike anything
and like no one you have ever seen before,
and all you want to know is who they are,
but you already know that what you could be together
is amazing, and that is what is incredible,
that is what is exciting.
The first time you see each other is so powerful;
the first time you feel each other’s stare in unmistakable;
the first time you say something to each other is incredible;
the first time you know and don’t have to be told who someone is,
something that could never be rehearsed,
it is what feels right in the moment,
and what you don’t have to think about,
because it is something instinctive and natural.
Watching the bubbles rising.
Watching the bubbles uniting.
Watching the bubbles becoming.
Watching the bubbles forming
and reaching the surface, and then existing
for a fraction of a second before bursting.
The air that rises from a tall glass of beer.
The swirl that turns in a cup of cappuccino.
The drops of rain that fall in a puddle,
like the build up of emotion that generates a tear.
The spray from a wave that hits your face
when you are standing at the edge of an ocean,
on a beach, and the still excited energy
from the constant pull of the moon
keeps you swimming in the moment
that seemed to have been short-lived,
but still continues to flow.
Watching a cloud appear and grow as if from nothing.
Watching a river transition from a trickle,
to a stream, and then to a raging torrent.
Watching a sandstorm in a desert sweep and collect
infinite grains of dust that are all that remains
of a land that was once lush, living, and thriving.
Watching an entire forrest grow from a single acorn
is like seeing a new world grow, and it is so great.
Many faces, races, colours, and beliefs,
make up the natural, needed, diversity of a country and a nation.
A bucket of a billion granules of sand can build a castle
that you can easily rebuild after it inevitably crumbles.
Many nuts and bolts make up and run a machine,
and work so well in-unison, that defy explanation,
and can be a source of fascination.
A head full of troubles can feel lightened and enlightened
by a glass or a cup full of bubbles.
A red pencil left on a counter.
A takeaway coffee cup with my name written on it
and written in red ink.
Coincidence? I think not!
A much needed intake of inspiration
and a sign for me that could not be more blatant,
nor more louder.
A question to ponder;
a truth to muse about;
a rhyme to write while I am enjoying my favourite drink.
It always amazes me and invigorates me
when I see things of meaning and clues of a great mystery-
and believe me, when I do look, I see a lot.
Every day is different.
Even when you come back to the same place
you have been countless times before,
you and it are always different-
as if the experience, the sound, the smell,
the air, the feeling, the taste,
but what never changes and only feels even more amazing every time
is the return of energy that you get back
for all the time and the currency of thought
and meditation that you have spent.
A heart beats to be heard.
A mind thinks to be stretched.
A voice speaks to be the outward expression
of a vastly deeper reality of what we see around us
than can ever be said completely, concisely, and clearly,
with any combination or any length of words.
An imagination formulates, constructs,
and imagines infinite worlds of wonder
than life, as beautiful, surprising, and random,
sometimes as it is could ever match.
I am seeing red.
This ‘red effect’ happens to me from time to time.
I start seeing this strong and vibrant of all the colours
worn by almost everyone and I see it for the first time
in and on things I look at all the time,
but for some reason I missed the red before-
like when you hear something said by someone
and you say to yourself: ‘Did I hear correctly?
Is that really what they said?’
Colours have meaning.
Colours show mood.
Colours are revealing.
Colours are an important clue.
Colour is something to take notice of.
Colour is deliberate.
Colour is something that can tell you what you need to know-
whether you are looking at or reading the patterns of the stars
that are always there- even when there is blue sky,
or cloud in the sky above.
Colour is more than colour.
And seeing red, for me-
coincidence? I think not!
I smell burning.
I feel the world turning.
I see the sun setting.
I witness the light fading.
I walk the roads that are flooding.
I feel the cold wind blowing.
I see the trees swaying.
I need to make my homecoming.
I feel my heart aching and breaking.
I feel the air and I see my breath in front of me
because it is so freezing.
I wonder if it again will start sleeting,
or even start snowing.
I have this sense of something impending.
I believe hope for me is being carried on the wind,
but like with everything in life there is no telling what
and no way of knowing or saying.
Every second we are transmitting;
every minute we are all broadcasting;
every hour we are all receiving;
every day we all sharing and revealing.
Every morning I feel something I have never felt before
and I reach out;
every morning I write something I might have said
a thousand times before,
but every time I say it again I mean it even more than before,
and to me it is like an ice cube that will never melt.
I have a tendency to repeat myself,
to watch something, and read something, over and over,
and to listen to a song continuously on its own
or part of a playlist;
I love seeing, hearing, and remembering,
things, music, people, places, memories, song-lyrics-
especially when all those wonderful things
combine into one perfect moment-
like the time you are listening to one of your favourite songs
while looking into the eyes of the one you love,
and sharing your first kiss.
I am addicted to communication, and sharing a connection.
If I think, read, see, or hear something
I feel other people would respond to, love,
like, and share too, I get so much pleasure in writing,
tagging, re-blogging, texting, and tweeting, messaging,
a link, a quote, a photo, a picture,
or writing a poem about it,
and seeing the ripple-effect of reactions.
I could talk for hours about hundreds of different things
and have a myriad of opinions about everything-
from religion to literature, from music to television;
I could talk for days about who I have met in my life,
what happened, and what I have seen, where I have been,
and what I heard, and why I was inspired,
because I chose to stop and listen.
Everyone and every thing has a story.
Every life, every love, every heart-break,
every inspirational, magic moment is a song, a musical,
a novel, a poem, a piece of art,
waiting in the wings to be released.
Every person, every leaf, every animal, every coffee bean,
every planet, every cloud, every fish, every grain of sand,
is on a journey, and that shared journey is a journey
of growth, motivation, reflection, impression, disconnection,
reconnection, intuition, in infinite ways,
and with infinite gifts of communication.
“So what are you thinking and feeling right now
whilst you’re out there amongst Nature?”
I feel free! I feel open! I feel hopeful! I feel me!
I feel like I could touch the sky with my finger
just like I am touching the muddy ground with my booted feet.
I feel warm! I feel energized!
I feel home! I feel blessed
as the beautiful and golden sunlight touches my eyes!
As I walk through the forest though it is cooler
because the sun is radiating and being absorbed by the surrounding trees.
I can hear birds and the rustling of unseen animals all around me,
but they are so high and fast they are the dwellers
of this fertile land and sky that I cannot see.
Coming back here brings back so many memories!
Coming back here reminds me of so many happy times,
and it is like they are still there to be remembered
and felt by the touch of the cool but magical breeze.
Walking the fields, walking over the crisp brown leaves
and sumptuous green grass,
I have this sensation of feeling like an animal feels,
I have this urge to walk and run and forge my own path.
Everything is bright, everything looks new.
Everything I see is bathed in light,
and even that which is in the shadow cast by something else
retains it’s beautiful natural colour and hue.
The country lanes I walk have no natural footpath,
so I must walk on the road.
Cars and 4×4’s race past me and create a splash
as they drive through the puddles I too pass through-
out here there is no such thing as a Highway Code.
Out here where I walk there are little oasis’s
of rarely seen and hardly touched patches of Earth
that resemble my kind of heaven.
Out here you can hear nothing but your own heart beating in your chest,
sweet birdsong in the trees, and the faint sound of an airplane
flying high above in the sky that is skirting and almost touching
the atmosphere and making dreams a reality
and the passengers on it feel as if they are light as a feather.
Sometimes you think you know the beginning of something
before you know the end;
sometimes you think you know with every certainty
what you are going to do with your life.
When you are a child it is so simple to imagine,
to anticipate, and see the good things that you want to happen to you,
and to you they are not just thoughts that you write in a diary
or a journal, and they are not just the dreams that you share
with your best friend.
When you are a child every first step that you take is an adventure,
and you just do what you feel in the moment,
and you say what you think in an instant,
and everything is possible,
because you haven’t yet been told that the most important thing
to do in everything you do is to try.
There are no disappointments,
at least there shouldn’t be as long as you remember,
even though you are a child, that as long as you still have yourself,
your mind, and your heart, and something to believe in,
and someone to believe in you;
and as you grow older, if you stay true to what feels right
and what your first instincts tell you,
you will one day look back with a smile,
and wonder how unbelievable it is that the moments of your life,
like the years, have gone by so fast-
so much so they feel like they have flew.
I am always fascinated by what the first thought is
that someone remembers of their lives.
My first clear and recognizable memory
is of my first day of primary school,
and being late that morning for some reason.
I am always in awe by what a child says,
no matter what it is, because they never have no end of things
to say about everything, and because they are surprisingly
articulate, knowledgeable, open, and right.
My first day at school was when I first said ‘I’m sorry’
and I gave my first gift to my teacher for being late-
it was only a box of chocolates,
but I do remember her telling me that is was alright,
and her saying thank you to me and to my Mom-
it’s so strange, because even though that happened so long ago
it feels like yesterday,
and at that moment, and at that time,
my mind, body, and senses, raced and lived truly and wholly
in the moment, and I didn’t fixate or even realize
there was such a thing as a horizon.
As we get older, we unfortunately do forget.
In this day and age our lives seem to revolve around numbers
that we feel compelled to constantly remember,
so we can do what we have to do,
and so we can get what we want to get.
The world has changed so much since I was a boy.
I have seen technology, opinions, countries,
cities, sky-lines, people, language,
and what children and adults are constantly being told
what they need in their lives and what they should think-
whether it is an expectation, or an image,
because it is what everyone else has in the form of a
new disposable and unimportant,
but seemingly vital new toy.
But the world is change. Change is the nature of life,
and the life-blood of the entire universe.
When things change everyone know that they must adapt to survive,
and to me that is why change is a gift to be cherished
and relished, not a problem or a curse.
The more we live and the more we experience,
the more our lives blossom in ways that know
and don’t have to imagine when we are a child,
because we feel it in ourselves-
just as we know and feel the change within us,
and sometimes that can make us want to break free
and run wild, unrestricted and unconfined,
and because we are still discovering who we are
and who everyone and what everything is,
nothing is out of reach or not aloud.
What I rediscover and realize more and more day by day
is that I don’t see myself the way I sometimes feel
I am supposed to see myself,
because I see how others my age look at me
and look at themselves,
and because most people these days are so used to
being told what they should think, feel, like, dislike, say, and do;
I suppose I am the opposite of that and I recognize
that same freedom of expression and identity in so many others that I see-
people who just want to be a person and not a number,
even if that number is their age.
I find that if you live free and embrace every hopeful moment
it shows in every part of you,
and to everyone around you it really tells.
As birthdays come and go;
as the days begin earlier, but feel shorter;
as I realize that life is more about who you know
sometimes more so that it is about what you know;
as I realize, what I used to not ever think about
and simply act upon when I was child,
that the feeling of the moment is more important
than worrying about what hasn’t happened yet,
and may never happen.
I realize that even though in counting the years
that I have been alive, breathing, thinking,
and feeling on this planet,
I may appear or seem to be getting older,
I am in fact in spirit doing the opposite of that-
because I truly feel that I am growing younger.
When I first began on the path
I was like the statue that I was standing next to;
when I first looked at what I could see before me,
I couldn’t see anything or anyone-
but at the same time I felt this draw,
I felt the edge of this wave coming towards me,
as if the path were a river,
or like the wind outside an open door;
I felt something in the cold air that took my breath away from me-
like the chill that you feel from a draft.
I knew that I either had to close the door or walk through it,
or perhaps turn back and walk away;
and then, right then, I heard you, I saw you,
I knew I had to be where you were,
but I knew you were not at the end of the path- you couldn’t be-
because that would be impossible;
but I have never believed anything is truly impossible,
and I have never, and will never, give up hope on anything or anybody ever;
and that was when all my answers came to me.
The sun was above me and behind me,
and its light guided my way and made the path shimmer and glow.
The trees that lined the path on either side
moved and jostled in unison for a second,
and as they did, for an instant, I could have sworn
that I was somewhere else, in another place, at another time-
like I was reliving a memory,
but which I didn’t recognise as being mine,
it felt like someone else’s thought,
it felt like yours-
and that was when I knew I had to walk the path.
I could see the end that awaited me,
and I knew where I had to go.
It had been raining earlier,
and there was still a slight and fine mist in the air.
As the rays of golden light from the sun
bounced off the wet ground rainbows appeared
and veiled the path in every colour of the spectrum;
and that was when I felt caught and pulled,
as if by a current, or as if the very ground beneath me
was moving by itself and taking me along with it.
Walking the path as it appeared now made me think,
feel, and experience the sensation of walking
through a hall of mirrors at a fun fare.
I heard nothing but the sound of a slight breeze through the trees,
but there was also this faint echo
that seemed to be getting loauder and stronger
the farther I walked and the closer I got to there end of the path-
the echo was a voice, your voice;
the drumming I felt was my own heart beating.
As I passed the empty black painted benches with the brown wooden seats,
I thought for a second I could see someone sitting there
looking at me, or reading, or listening to their own music-
like impressions, echoes, or shadows in the sunlight,
left and preserved forever-
like a moment of emotion and contenment captured in time,
that may fade but wont ever be forgotten
and will draw back those who made those impressions
to this spot, time and again.
As I neared the end of the path,
I felt lost and consumed by the flow of energy all around me-
and like when you swim out to sea,
I felt compelled to turn back and look at the path behind me,
and in that moment that was when I literally felt your vibration,
because that was when I saw, realized, and then read
a message from you that you had just sent me-
and in that message was a picture of your smiling face
that you wanted to share with me,
and also a text from you telling me that you love me.
I instantly replied to you with a photo of me smiling
on the path in the park and a message from me
that ‘I love you too’, and as soon as I sent you that message
there was a blinding flash of light,
and as I turned around to look at the rest of the path in front of me
I saw that the path didn’t end as near or as soon as I originally thought,
and I suddenly had this epiphany that these next few steps
in the beautiful sunlight were not my, or our, last;
and I saw that there wasn’t an end or a definitive finish line
to where I was, where I am going, so that is why I kept going,
looking, feeling, and smiling, as I continued to walk the path.
Not every Father can be a Dad,
not every Dad can be a Father,
not every son can have a father,
or a dad to look up to,
not every son, no other son,
has a hero, a role-model, a giant,
a great, honest, kind-hearted, and caring,
man as their Father, like I do-
and that is why I am so lucky to have a Dad
who is as special as you.
You have always been there to hold my hand,
you have always been there to pick me up,
you have always been there to guide me home
like a plane coming in to land,
you have always been there for me,
and I have always looked at you and said to myself
‘that is and you are the man who I want to be
when I grow up’.
There is only one of each of us in this world, in this life,
and there can only be love and respect between two people
if it is proven time and again that what binds them
has been present since birth and will always be there.
I have always known that you and I were more
than just father and son;
I have always felt that you and I were like the Earth to the Sun,
and when I look at you I feel like I am looking at the best
and the most incredible man I have ever known in my entire life,
who has given me everything he could and more,
and who I sometimes look at when you are sleeping,
just like you used to look at me when I was a boy,
and I marvel in wonder at who you are,
and I remember all the places we have been to together,
and all the things we have shared.
I remember you teaching me how to ride a bike.
I remember you teaching me how to fire an arrow with a bow.
I remember you and I putting together a home-made glider
and spending an entire Saturday afternoon watching the glider
soar into the air and then return to Earth,
and then return to the air by your hand-
just as my imagination too became sky-bound and took flight.
I will never forget what you have taught me,
what you do for me every day,
and every moment with you has been the greatest gift a son,
a boy, a man, anyone and I have ever had.
I wouldn’t be the man I am, I wouldn’t have done what I have done,
nor seen what I have seen, or been where I have been, without you,
and that is why I am the luckiest son there has ever been,
because you are my Dad.
The Life, the Light, the Tears, of the Poet of the Sphere 