Numbly

December 2, 2017. 2:00 PM
Starbucks on Robinhood Road
~*~*~

Sitting at a table by the window
View of asphalt and CVS
Planted trees in medians

I feel slight tremors in my body
Non-visible to others
My muscles feel weak
Because they are

A healthy body
With well-functioning communication
Might feel this shakiness and weakness
After a hard workout

All I did was get dressed
Drive to Starbucks
Enter the shop
Order and sit down

Life takes a lot of effort
In the weeks two-away from my epidural

Remember when you used to describe your sensations
As you and John would sit conversing?
Those sensations were really bizarre.
How do you feel at this moment, Carol?
Can you describe the sensations?

Shakiness in my left arm
Because I'm using the muscles
Propping my left elbow on the table
Supporting my head which rests in my left palm
Which is spread across my forehead
As I look down at my journal
In which I write with a pen
Using my right hand
In which my fourth and pinky fingers
Always feel asleep

Why do I have to support my head?
Maybe it too is tired.

While sitting
My legs feel only a little weak
With the non-visible shakiness
But once I stand
I'll feel a very tiny earthquake
In my legs

But when I ride my bike
My legs don't tremble
Except when I mount and dismount
While riding my muscles relax
Yet they are working
Pedaling, propelling me forward
Which sounds contradictory
But that is the way it is

My jaws feel slack
As I sit at this table
My brain is sloppy

Maybe this can be a poem?
Or a poemish

Last night and early this morning
As I lay in bed
I felt the ever-present tenderness
In the soles of my feet
In the palms of my hands
I felt the humm-buzzzz
From my knees to my toes
A touch-of-an-ache
Not an ache-ache

I don't feel much emotion
That's what happens in my rough weeks
I will feel blue, frustrated, fatigued
But little passion

Energy is expended upon survival
As the body-mind goes
From one calculated self-care task
To another
There are no energy reserves
To trade for passion

perhaps an autonomic
energy-conservation
strategy

Will There Be?

Every individual
that ever drew a breath
had someone who loved them.

No matter the committed crime,
no matter any grave atrocity,
no matter which unpardonable sin...
someone, somewhere
loved her, loved him.

As naive as it may be
as childish as it seems
my great hope is
that somehow, someway
even the heinous soul
shall one day be redeemed.

Will there be an hour
with every soul united
to a mother's love?

Will there be a time
with every soul united
to a father's hope?

Whether right or wrong,
I want to believe 'tis so.
For now I'll continue to dream;
for now I'll continue to hope.


september 16, 2oo7
jpiper

Inspired by Tom Talbott, specifically some of his thoughts regarding Hitler.

Carousel Sphere

I dwelt among the trees today
From sunrise through the night
All the while senses keen
Songbirds, breezes, streaming light

Wildwood pageant stirs my soul
Mourning dove coos her tune
Sun sinks behind horizon
Wind whistles 'neath the moon

I stand upon the mountain's edge
Across the valley sails a hum
Leaves roll their chant o'er the crests
My cheeks kissed by zephyr's strum

Lilies close their petal doors
Fireflies light their mating dance
Dogs bay their warning calls
Shooting stars draw their final glance

Night after night this story echoes
The same display as ages past
I stand in awe, majestic beauty
Witnessing eons, spinning so fast

june 10, 2007
jpiper

~*~

I think I wrote this after a day at The Saddle.

High Tide

The ocean pulls debris
from across the sea
landing it upon the shore
lying before me

Then the mighty waves
pull debris from me
carry it across the sea
to the shore of another's door

O deep sea I pray...
Take from me my heart's debris!
Engulf it within your belly's depths!
To fully feel your violent fury!

Energized by your abysmal currents...
Engaged in your stream of life...
Seize the bitterness, rage, and anger!
Spawned from the womb of lies and strife

If a cyclone it stirs to roar...
Let her dance upon your expanse!
Spewing her venom far from shore
So not to poison another's door

Once the ravaged vortex ceases...
Let it soak its wearied course...
Purified with sun and salt...
To inherit a new life force....

Yes, take from me my heart's debris!
Yet let it fulfill its passage
So when it beaches the opposite shore
Its toxic waste betides no more...

may 19, 2007

Photo by a Canadian friend

Today, 11/05/17, I searched for his poem on my blogs. I could have sworn I had posted it along with the context at the time it was written.

But, I couldn't find it on any of my blogs, in draft or already published. I located it in a different archive, not on one of my blogs, but without the context.

Short context:
My daughter and I went on vacation for a week to Florida. We stayed on the Gulf Coast for most of the week and spent one or two nights in Jacksonville and some time in Daytona. On the Daytona stay, we visited the Boardwalk at night.

The ocean tide was really high, verging on violent as it slammed the side of the Boardwalk covering the bottom steps of the stairs that descended from the Boardwalk to the beach. Daytona has a wide beach on which cars daily drive, weather allowing. I asked a local if this was normal, this ferocious high tide against the Boardwalk. He responded, "No. Only occasionally." He said there was a Nor'easter at work.

At the time I was dealing with anger and rage regarding hypocrisy and false accusations, or at least mistaken ones.

The fury of the tide expressed the rage I felt at the time, a rage I was containing.
That night, I penned the poem.

The whole process helped...

Feeling the sea receive from me, my rage.

The rage did get purified...

Eventually, into another form...

Tunnels

Monday, 10/30/17

Another day
In my ho-hum life

I'm in the hole
No
It's not a hole
It's a tunnel
Half-way into the tunnel

I can see the other end
A lighted oval hole
With the bottom of the oval cut off
I'm standing
As I stare
At this mirage in my mind

I know if I just keep moving
Forward
I'll arrive
At the oval-that's-not-a-complete-oval
And I will exit
Into the sunlight
Until the next tunnel

I have walked
Not ridden my bike
To this half-way location
In the tunnel
I have no trekking poles or walker
I wish that were true
In real life

I trudge forward
Slowly
Painstakingly

When I exit
Into the sunlight
My bike Olivia
Is waiting for me
I feel happiness
But also a sense of dread
Knowing there are
More tunnels
Wondering if these tunnels
Will ever cease

I get weary
On this continual path
That leads only to
The same-old same-old
I feel I make no headway
To anywhere specific
That I'm forever stuck
On this repetitive path

What if I am stuck
How can I learn to appreciate
What surrounds me
In spite of the constant trudge

Is that all life is
One long constant trudge
From one tunnel
To the next

In my image
I am alone
Very alone
A single human
Along a gravel trail
By a river

On the left side of the trail
A rocky cliff rises
Eight stories high
On the right are trees
Lots of trees
And a bank that goes down
Eight stories to the river
The river stretches
Eight flatbed trucks wide

What is my purpose
Out here alone
Trudging along
Alone

I feel so
Alone
And I don't feel
Hopeful

I have three more days off work
Until my six-week pet-sitting marathon
Starts again

Focus not on the marathon
Focus not on what you can't do
Because of your physical and cognitive
Limitations

For these three days
Choose that which makes you
Happy
Choose things that
Rejuvenate
That might even inspire
Hope

When others share their simple accomplishments
In daily tasks
Organizing, cleaning, errand running, socializing
Be gentle with yourself
It's understandable to feel
Envy

Counter the envy 
With joy in their joy
Remind yourself of things
You can do
Of which others would 
Envy
Cycling, driving, making your bed, dressing, pet-sitting
And your material needs are met

The dark days always
Cease
The light always
Shines again
As long as I am
Breathing

I hope my injections today
Help
They will
They always do

I've just got to hang on until
Tomorrow
When they kick in
And I feel 
Better

I prefer
Tunnels to
Holes

Lately, the bastard

I seldom poetry anymore
I used to poetry a lot

What happened?
Why is my muse so distant?

This timidness in my psyche
I do not like
I hide
afraid to feel
until lately

I know, I know
But do not want to admit
The damage that bastard wrought upon
my soul

Lately I've felt anger
Lately I've felt hatred
toward
the bastard

Then wondered if
maybe it's toward myself
for allowing the bastard influence
even after seven years

Fuck you bastard
I spit on the ground you walk
I curse your supposed righteous causes

I pray my soul can be freed
from this entrapment
and the muse can again
give voice

A New Place

Every day,
I'm in a new place.

I awake to the sunshine,
for that day.

The bright beams
dispersed from over 92,000,000 miles away,
make landfall to each blade of grass
upon this rock of earth and water
crawling, streaming, galloping

with life.

Everywhere,
there is life.
Some still undiscovered by us human creatures
who roam this rock.

The giant star 

warms our skins.
It lights our paths.
Our bodies and the earth
respond to its life-giving pulses.

As I move through the day,
I am in a new place
each second.
That space is new
only
for that momentary ruffle
in time.
All the ruffles
then cascade and ripple
making a river of time,
gorging renewed
places in history.

If I had a door
through which I could pass back and forth through time,
would I change the past
and thus the present and the future?

Or would I be like the sun?
Simply rise and set,
observe,
indifferent;
yet sustaining the life that is present
in that moment.

I know the sun can be deadly too.
Its indifference is austere,
like the rest of nature.
Stark.
Naked.
Raw.

Science estimates that Sun will burn out
in another five billion years.

Unless our indifference
kills Sun sooner.

I think though,
we would be the first to go.


cwelch
october 8, 2014

~*~

~giant star,  roan highlands, december's end, 2013~

~roan highlands, december's end, 2013, photo by elijah & friends~

Tribe: The Abled-Differently

We are the

abled-differently.

It takes much effort to perform simple daily

tasks.

That fact is a given. It is not the

exception.

We know it well. So, we

adapt.

We don't have to explain or justify our

limitations.

We know we are each doing the best we can on any given

day.

We find humor in our circumstances. And together we

laugh.

We get tired of the struggle. And together we

cry.

Together, we honor each

tear.

We don't try to make the tears go

away.

We don't try to fix each

other.

We don't offer each other unsolicited

advice.

We are well acquainted with

isolation.

We have each become our own best

friend.

We have learned to give in without giving

up.

We don't feel sorry for each

other.

We feel an unspoken bond that goes beyond understanding - it is a

knowing.

We are the

abled-differently.

7/01/2017

~*~
At times I envision myself living with others
Who physically move as I do
The smallest tasks are undertaken
With deliberate concentration and effort

That image of living with these 'others' is a fantasy
Most of my tribes are fantasies 
And I'm okay with that 
But parts of them are realities
~*~

~*~
In a sense...
Are not we all abled-differently?
In various hats and contexts?
~*~

Enlightenment

Two years shy of sixty
I feel I should have words of wisdom
To share?

And maybe I do
But then again
What has not been shared already?

Yet those words would not be mine
But words of the ancients
Of those more enlightened than I?

Surely not
I too have survived the onslaughts of life
Have I not yet reached enlightenment?

En the ment of light
Light to more clearly see outlines of shadows
And the inside curves of reality


me
may 24, 2017

Bareback

I despise this heinous place
Pulled like steel to magnet
Into the self drama
From which I had escaped

A rope begins to bind
The expressions of my heart
I grimace and I writhe
Deny this bond its prize

Who controls this cord
Stealthily creeping in
Invisible yet strong
Strangling my passion

Invisible to the the eye
I see it with my heart
I feel its grip within
Tightening the cinch

Deny this girth its access!
Cast it to the ground!
Hurl this bit and rein!
My heart will not be bound!

I know 'twill by back
Its tricks to try again
One more time I'll cast it
And make my soul my friend


~ 03/26/2007 ~