Astray

October 26, 2014

The soft air kissed my cheeks

As I stroll here this cold morning

In late October, the end of season

As haunting as Halloween,

Filled with ghosts and goblins

Of a life I never meant to lead

The misdirection of misplaced steps

We take when we meant to go

In another direction, and yet

No so misguided as we believe

As we are shaken from those

Early morning dreams when we

Imagine the worst and come to realize

That our steps lead us not so much

Astray but rather where

We were meant to be,

And accepting the path

We find ourselves on

Is the hardest part of being alive

And yet, the most fulfilling.

In the silence

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Rain drips down the wooden fence

Leaving dark scars on its face

As the trees lean over waiting to change

This pre-color time of year

When we ache for change to come

Cool air swirling around us

With just enough hint of summer

To remember it

I hear the voice of winter

In the distant rumble of surf

And in the altered sound of traffic

And the sudden quiet

Of end of season brings to the seashore,

These things stand out against

The usually hectic soundscape

So that they seem loud

When they are not,

Our lives are like that,

Loudest in the lulls,

When we can hear ourselves thinking

The way we hear the tick of a clock

Always there, but never obvious

As we search for meaning,

No more nor less than they ever were,

The ghost in the machine

The moving parts

We do not wish to know about

But get consumed with

When all else falls silent.

Echoes

Saturday, October 25, 2014

History repeats itself inside my head

Like echoes in a canyon

Long after the initial shout

Losing at last what the shout was about

And so we read into what we hear

Imagining what it is we felt

When we let the fell words fall,

And translate that which we thought

We said into what we need said now

Feeling from it what we need to feel,

Not exactly what we felt at the start,

Thinking the whole time

How nothing has changed

When everything always does,

And when we shout again

Our new shout falls on ears

We know might never hear

What is we actually said.

Sea Side Asbury Park

Sunday, October 19, 2014

I dip my fingers in this salty foam,

This sea side slick water beach

Stretched out before m

Timeless until I glimpse

Over my shoulder at the shore

And the grin of a boardwalk

With its missing teeth

And the sense that it

Can never smile again

Air thick with the recalled screeches

Of kids on rides long gone,

The tilt-a-whirl with caught shirt

And the kid who never thought

The ride would vanish

Before the people did,

Or that the decay

Would strike so deep
or leave holes no one could fill

With only the sea itself the same

Coming and going,

In and out,

With perpetual sighs

And the salty residue

Of some love vanquished

The end of the world

As we know it,

The roar of engines

Mere echoes of a past

We can barely hear

Over the snores of the tides

And we caught

In the mists wondering

Where to dip our fingers next.