precious human life

 

 

 

What if the purpose of our rare and 

precious human lives

is to make others happy

No, not that wimpy terror of upsetting, 

not fitting in, hiding ourselves inside, 

denying true connection

But using our time to develop and expand 

our gifts, to become ever more aware of our 

power to uplift, to delight -- 

what a wonderful world we would share.

 

 

 

 

Let's admit childhood

is no idyllic state

Bullied, abused, so much

more than loved and safe.

Give up your fantasies

of irresponsibilities,

that time to be young, free, alive.

"Wouldn't that be nice?"

spake each traumatized child.

 

 

 

As long as you vilify people

you are inviting violence.

 

 

 

Teenchild begging coins

for a slice from the corner

pizza stand.  People watching

to use that sparkle magic of

imagination -- better than cinema

or pricey stage.  Serious days,

nights captured in enchanted

awareness.  I know you couldn't

care less.  That's why I don't deign

to say, to try to share,

what would thrill me to ecstasy,

to immerse in freedom, being,

reliving, having meaning beyond my

mere memory.

 

 

 

Isn't the essential point of democracy

-- rule by the people --

to create and maintain a social structure

that provides for all citizens' needs?

 

 

 

I may not be clever,

but I am intelligent and persistent.

Over time I figure out what to do --

if I get the pertinent information.

 

 

 

Randomly firing scenes

my past -- stories like cinema

5D -- every sense re-assembled.

Quick and gone to another or

modern time for a brief return,

interim, clarity, distraction,

stochastic dance, ecstatic ride.

 

 

 

That's people for you -- caught up

in their little games

where nothing real matters.

 

 

 

If only it could be enough that it is

clearly the right thing to do without

needing fiscal approbation.

 

 

 

We keep hearing that rage makes us

engaged -- thus invigorated by algorithms

trying to maintain addicted participants

for profit.  I considered this common trope

and noticed -- rage does not engage me.

It exhausts me.  Yeah, a dopamine charge

for a bit, but then I NEED to disengage,

to rest.

What actually engages me is new ideas

or ways of understanding, and, of course,

being liked, feeling good with friends.

This can't be just me, having these natural

reactions.  Rather, rage only seems to engage

us when we've been so conditioned.

 

 

 

I know these things because I was there --

direct experience, along with the kind of

intellectual nature that studies and has

awareness of what I am experiencing.

 

 

 

3/17-24/23

sink swim float dream

 

 

 

scared people retreat into mobs

tear apart scapegoats to appease angry gods

 

 

 

 

it's not the medium -- it's the savage messages

 

we could, if we were so constructed, use social media,

society, social interaction generally, to make us all feel

better about ourselves, each other, and our power

to make a better world.

 

 

 

 

so we can't (won't) house and feed our people

-- what kind of an economy is that?

 

 

 

 

Critique?  Criticism? 

Are you being critical to

enhance, or deflate?

 

 

 

Thrown through silent tantrum

over denied specific reward

Calm! Find desired reward

in self-kindness

 

 

 

Why do so-called neuronormals

get to make the rules?

Clearly not because they're better suited.

 

 

 

We so want to believe

"I'm a good person!"

What does that mean?

To do what is needed

in each moment

to survive

to stay alive "to fight

another day"?

Learn each painful lesson,

and prevail.

 

 

 

Pallid Aquarius

bearing waterr along the great

North plains

from sea to sea

moistenin mouths parched

by icy winds.

There again, softly singing

these barren evenings

imagining

sparkle of twilight.

 

 

 

Not carousels and colored lights

softer, quieter, shining beauty

twilight from dark Winter

sifting into early sprays of Spring.

 

 

 

Tucker Carlson, playing his little joke

on the world

How he must chortle and guffaw

behind his pallid eyes.

 

 

 

We come up with schemes

to separate people

from their money.

Why is it theirs?  What is this

money we pretend to need?

Only what we collectively

agree to agree to.

Magical thinking on the Grand Scale.

(How dare you tell me the world's

not run on magic?)

We sacrifice our lives on butcher's knives

striking from some mage's spell

while mislabeling reality.

Open your senses.  Don't depend

on the spin taking you

anywhere you want to be.

 

 

 

If we all were in this together

we could keep everyone afloat

and find our ways to better days.

But none of us are together,

we sink or swim to exhaustion

or find our private islands to

parch and starve

believing the myth of independence.

 

 

 

Earth is not a never emptying cup

Ever demanding more, faster

expecting supply to meet

manufactured demand.

 

 

 

3/5-15/23

days of haze

 

everyone loves to hate our Congress

and they prove deserve it by refusing to enact

 one law that would be loved by all -- do away 

with these insane yearly time changes

;

it just occurred to me that anti-government 

types like to say people are like sheep

but we are much more like dogs -- pack animals 

eager to please our leader. clinging to our 

pack for security and purpose

;

It seems to me that the issue of student loan 

forgiveness is more complicated than yes or no

It doesn't matter ultimately (except to those

directly affected) if the debt is forgiven,

if such debts continue to arise. What is

needed are real and abundant opportunities

for education for free or reasonable cost.

Yes, people who are currently overburdened

by debts need relief. Perhaps allowing bankruptcy

would help, as well as forgiveness programs

for certain kinds of desired employment and for

those in or near poverty. Contracts entered in

good faith ought to be honored, but there are

different ways to do so with good sense and compassion.

and something like a corollary:

I have been advocating forever

for no financial blockage to

medical education. We need as

many MDs and nurses as we can

encourage from low income

backgrounds who understand those

challenges to health.

;

understand:  "capitalism" is merely an

 economic theory, used and abused (weaponized) 

over time

it is human beings who do these things

;

why rather give a finger than a hand?

is it because you think yourself too grand

to care

or is it that you fear a biting pain if you try again

to be a friend?

;

Those people don't believe in right

like decent folk.

They flaunt their sinful lives,

not hiding shamefully abased in guilt

for even thinking of condoning.

We can't have them near our children,

influencing through common media,

having say to make demands in our

common rule.

They must be made to suffer for

not denying such disgusting ways, 

as we do.

2/26-3/4/23

voice of inspiration

 

This long-running soap opera

we call human life

 

;

 

Random acts of sharing

I would like to be a kindness

but I don't know if a gift

or an inconvenience

in the eye of the receiver

 

;

 

Authentic me is a big of an enigma

I never know what to say

until I do

 

;

 

 

Who is out there expressing

the people's rage?

Feeds on grievance to shit out

propagations of hate, to

make the case, raise up the energy

pushed down from shame

we refuse to face?

Who aspires to be that voice

that inspires?

 

;

 

If we could let ourselves be

easily, naturally kind to ourselves

and each other, the vast miasma

that plagues us

would dissipate, disappear

 

;

 

Carter was always being criticized

for not somehow being omnipotent,

as if after Nixon we expected perfection. 

Reagan was lauded far and wide,

for ruining our burgeoning democracy

in favor of creeping plutocracy. 

It's all in the spin.

 

;

 

kind of like that idea of needing attention,

any attention, so bad attention is good --

needing human connection,

so connecting through hate

 

;

 

the vast lack of value given in our consumer

society to social bonds, which is killing us

 

 

;

 

two warring parties can not possibly

represent the complexity of the American electorate

yes, we need civil and constructive debate --

involving all of the stakeholders

we need to start that habit from our earliest educations,

including the habit of respect for ourselves

and each of our others

 

;

 

 

So very many ruined lives

so some very wealthy people

can accumulate a few pennies more

 

 

2/12-24/23

less pressure more exploration

 

Everyone loves to complain about the government.  

Yet, who really takes an interest and 

does the work to make it ours?

Government as your enemy is a myth

propagaged by people who get elected

to profitable positions and create

a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Government is what we choose

it to be as humans working out society.

People living our little lives

as if it mattered --

as if it weren't the only thing

that truly matters

I am antiracist in that I don't accept

the myth of human races.

A race is a contest of speed.

I sadly understand that we live in a world

stained by racism -- because people so

love to divide into warring camps

bound by hate.

Perhaps one major result of our

social media concerns needs to be

a requirement to effectively teach

critical thinking in all public schools.

Not "All Men Are Brothers" --

All humans are family.

Less pressure

more exploration

listen for the stories

2/6-11/23

above the waves

 

 

 

Government is not a business, and

ought not be run like one.

It's mandate is not profit, but the

well-being of the people it serves.

 

 

 

There was a group of queens who hung out

on MacDougal Street when I was a teenage

runaway in the late '60s.

They looked after, protected me, gave

me safe haven, a motherly influence.

There was nothing wrong, and everything

good about those women.

 

 

 

Ignore the Republican what abouts and

other obfuscations.  Realize their goal is

not to do better for us, but to obstruct

Democrats from useful work to make

them look inept.

 

 

 

Artist's Essence:  inner vision that needs

to be expressed

 

 

 

Oh Man, your arrogance

ever more destroys

the essence of well-being.

 

 

 

When thrown into the deep

to sink or swim (never having been

taught how)

you struggle bravely to dog paddle

yourself above the waves

You sometimes fail, sink

scared and alone,

yet bravely struggle to emerge,

continue.

Unable to shoulder your share of

the load, to advance, please know:

It's not your fault.

You did nothing wrong.

Practice floating, breath management.

Learn to feel at home

above and below the waves.

 

 

 

You know those myriad of movies.

Aliens invade to take our Earth

because their world is dying.

We have yet to find another world

to invade -- so we turn that fearfed

violence on ourselves.

 

 

 

1/28-2/2/23

our human pursuits

 

They trap us in a zero sum game

because it's all about them winning.

 

 

 

Difficulty finding employees?

Hire ex-convicts

disabled

old

Don't lower your standards.

Lose your labels.

 

 

 

Why do we love our government?

Because it is our creation --

of, by, for us.

Like a well-planned system of

roads and bridges to ease our work

and play, our human pursuits.

 

 

 

How many terrible events in our world

are results of children who grew up

unwanted, unloved?

 

 

 

The road is forever part of me

From childhood yearning to become

one with the rush hour highway,

so calm, constant motion

below the setting Sun.

Onward, forward

No time to indulge, to be afraid,

to be alive.

Mesmorized by constancy of motionn

Road songs drown out hurtful noise,

screams from the aching loneliness

of fresh betrayal.

Why is life?  Fulfillment of

unquenchable need?  Hellish

grasping for Paradise, just beyond

our reach?  Recompense for

what immortal sin?  Payment for

what sacrificial debt?

Certainly no boon,

unless

some sacred, oh so precious

dear vision to attain, to make appear.

Life as a quest to find, to realize,

so much better than our oh so common

existensial despair

beyond repair

I see you there

but what is your reason

to stay?

 

 

 

People have different privileges

based on our vast diversity of attributes.

Thus, people lacking privileges based

on attitudes toward color may enjoy

privileges unavailable to those with

other handicaps.

In any case, privilege is based on

social perceptions -- given, not intrinsic.

 

 

 

it seems to me that we could all benefit

from a kind of AA-like sponsorship (or maybe

 mentorship, or just friendship) program of people

with mental issues (and don't we all have those

sometimes) giving each other supportive listening,

being with

 

 

 

 

1/20-26/23