Every Day is a Gift

is a sign we should hang above our beds

or doors to see it as we come and go.

Sometimes we can remember it on our own, but

the constant knowledge of what really is happiness

(and how we can have as much of it as we want)

is something worth pursuing. Maybe the biggest thing.

 

Most days start and end unremarkably

in terms of events, but there was no guarantee

that we would be amazed beyond the reach of our

hearts and minds in the first place. 

We cannot wait for life to happen.

And so, our State of Mind is the space we realize,

and where we engineer our paths.

Heart rides shotgun,

and controls the radio.

 

When that song plays and the rush comes over us,

the real build begins. It can happen any moment, or every day.

We need playlists, not maps.

 

Your melody is the sunrise for which I have waited.

I don’t know much that is finer than people learning from one another

–the kind of genuine curiosity that slows judgment and increases

awareness of something beyond ourselves.

Every year I wave a net into the ether, and I usually find someone

who is willing to share something that made life better.

Why isn’t this something we do every day?

We forget that our failures can be erased by others’ successes.

 

 

Half day earlier, and three Burning Rivers with lunch

followed by an afternoon nap.

 

The rain moved out, and warm breezes moved in:

perfect weather to people-watch while I plot a nightcap

 

The smokers by the entrance look bored, tilting their heads

and staring at plants.

 

Kids tug the fingers of worn-out parents pushing

shopping carts full of necessities.

 

The days of the week don’t matter just yet,

but they sure as hell will soon.

 

Right now, midweek isn’t really halfway there,

since the weekend isn’t a victory.

 

August has always been strange that way.

 

As a different summer comes to an informal close,

autumn promises more than other seasons deliver.

By the time I realized what was happening

I was already going too fast

 

Such a temporal disruption

And the final understanding

Of what was left

(Of what was lost)

 

Yet all I could think was

 

Please let me hold her one more time

 

I closed my eyes and

burned in your atmosphere for

 

The Last Time

My best friend got married last weekend, so I drove up to West Virginia to attend.This steel mill was once the water that quenched the masses of Hancock and Brooke Counties. It is was also where almost everyone worked and where everyone else wanted to work. It meant security. It meant a good life for you and your family. I sat countless years on that very sidewalk for Christmas and Fourth of July parades. I wonder if they do that still?

Sold to China in the early 2000s, they began to close off parts of the mill, people were laid off and families were hungry. With nothing else and no other trades to work, the people were lost and turned to easy money, things like drugs and gambling cafés. 

I feel sad most of the time when I’m back in Hancock County. I miss my people. But, what I remember about my childhood isn’t that when the mill closed it took my home with it.

No, I remember the sweet smell of the country air as my friends and I drove the back roads. I remember going out into the woods for hours and not having to worry about strangers hurting me. I remember sitting on that sidewalk with my grandparents waiting for the fire truck to throw my favorite fruit flavored tootsie rolls.

What feels like fumbling is more of an eternal return

With progress so gradual that it is almost imperceptible

 

Let’s stay awake in dreams

To see sunsets through waves

And feel the mountain rains far from cities

 

Annexing lost highways

That used to be divisions

Of heart and soul

 

 

I’m the open book in which you lost interest

Abandoned before resolution, and

Shelved to gather dust

You had all the time in the world

To figure out what was written

Patiently waiting for your discovery (and mine)

 

Sometimes a drastic falling action dictates

A different direction, though

And I understand that

But oh, how I wish to feel your fingers

On the pages again

 

I will sit quietly on the shelf

Until the day your heart determines

The denouement