on liberal guilt

Who am I, child of wealth and privledge who has never known pain or fear, child of an imperialist nation that thinks it knows best, that it has the right, the perspective, to police the world, I who has never wanted for food and shelter and adequate health care a day in my life, who has always known peace and prosperity and for whom war is and has always been something which occurs in far off, remote lands, something read abou or seen in films, but which never, ever comes to us, who am I, who has never fought or killed or brushed against death, never seen my loved ones suffer or die, never walked in anguish and despair and seen no hope for escape, for liberation, who am I, to whom guns are toys and bombs something which haunt my dream but are banished with the light of day, who am I to spak of war or death or pain? Rich white educated spoiled child of the most overindulgent, bloated nation on earth, what right do I think I have to say a word? I know nothing of which I speak.

But don't think that'll ever be enough to shut me up.

(if we don't speak, who will?)

careening though space and time, not a care in the world

I sort of don't have anything to say
except that I have everything to say
an entire universe of words spread before me
stretching out and away from my fingertips like pale firey diamonds
like distant stars spiraling into space
a galaxy of motes of shining, shrieking brilliance
and right now I can barely touch them
but for now, at least, I am content to look
to see them and watch them and smile
just at the mere fact of their being

they and I and the space between
we are all here, together
and what more could I ever wish?

a wish, a prayer upon the ocean

some days i want to cuddle my hope to my chest
tiny, she is, and frail, but blinding-white
stronger than she looks
able to punch out large fears with a single sneer
ok, maybe not quite
but wouldn't that be great?
anyway, some days I want to clutch her to me
pet her and baby her and spoil her rotten
and whisper to her, never change
never change

what keeps a sinking ship afloat?

I divide my mind into neat little compartments
blocking off section from section
like the titanic
oh, you only have tickets to be in third class?
well, I guess you'll never see the soaring heights I can reach
or the sinking depths I can fall to
punch your card, thank you ma'am
this is your stop
nope, no more, nothing to see here
pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

but much like the titanic, if we go down
we ALL go down
fill a compartment to the brim and watch the water run down the walls of the next
the next and the next
until all of me is full
holding steady out of sheer stubbornness
or possibly surface tension
holding desperately to the rails
if you pray hard enough, maybe this train won't careen off it's tracks

I like stories with happy endings
I think maybe because they remind me that the stories are just that
stories
not real life
because in real life there are no happy endings
nothing is neat and boxed up cleanly and tied with a big red bow
in real life, there are no endings

and after the prince kisses the princess, then what?
are we to believe that that's the end of the story?
that after that, their lives are perfect forevermoretheend?
what is "perfect"?
2.5 kids a white picket fence a golden retriever or maybe a beagle
a house in the burbs in the hills in the city near a lake in the mountains
a SUV or maybe a sports car, something flashy and flash or subtle and sophisticated
or maybe safe and reliable to take the kids to soccer practice
what is perfection and happiness if not single moments in time
strung together on bright flashes of insight
a brilliant thread stretching backwards and forwards (fore and aft)
endless and ending and blinding
life and fleeting instants like the flash of a falling star
winking as it goes out
happiness is meaningless if it is constant
you can't have happiness without a contrast
without misery, it stops looking any different from
the boring humdrum of day-to-day life
if happiness were eternal, you would never ever notice it

I'll take the highs and the lows, please
one serving of life at it's fullest
sold to the highest bidder for a price too dear to contemplate