Friday, October 28, 2016

"Beware of the Nice "

Beware of the Nice

She said, "I'm actually not a nice person. My specialty is in observing and telling it how I see and feel it. "

I said, " I know you're not nice. I think that's why I trust you so much and like you so much."

You, on the other hand, were always very, very, nice.

Too bad I didn't know enough to beware of the nice.

October 28, 2016

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

"God(s)"

God(s)

To be with all the gods there are and to see them and hear them and feel them everywhere, in everyone and everything,

To sit with the self until the god inside answers whatever it is you might be asking,

To see the angry god in your enemy, and hear the friendly god in your friend's kind words,

To see the love god in the ones you love, and feel the fuck god in whoever you are fucking,

To be with the death god when you kill an insect, or go to a funeral, or eat a hamburger,

To hear the god in the wind, feel the god in the stones and the sand and the water and the earth and the air,

To see the fire god in the fire, hear the music god in song,

To see god in the art, in the artist, in the art lovers looking at the art; to see we are all creators and consumers and destroyers every day,

To feel the god of pain in your breaking heart, and see the god of sadness and compassion in the one who is breaking your heart, to know the god that you are in your broken heart,

To see that the gods do not exist in some supernatural realm, because there's no such thing as the supernatural--gods can only exist in what there actually is, if gods or anything can be said to exist at all,

To look into the eyes of whoever is in front of you, anywhere, anytime, all the time, all the time, and see the god that is there, and know it, and know it, and be with it,

To know that god is everywhere and nowhere, everything and nothing,

To see god, to feel god, to know god, to love god, with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind.

October 25, 2016

Sunday, October 23, 2016

"Loss"

 Loss

The only happy thing
About how sad I've been
Is how much weight I've lost
I'm almost thin.

And that truly is a very happy thing
It makes me so happy, I could almost sing
So happy, that if I could only bring
This happiness to you, I would indeed

But only if I could bring it to you
Without the sadness too.

October 23, 2016

(I wrote this in the shower, after a surprisingly non-traumatic look in the mirror.)

Friday, October 21, 2016

"Bursting"

Bursting

I was on a shitty Citibike
So I
Docked it at the Stuyvesant High school Station
Just as well, as I was bursting:
The fog over the Hudson
The fog gently trailing past One World Trade
The joy of feeling like you're the only one on the bike path, 'cause you don't see anyone else
The feeling that most of the city will still be asleep by the time you get to the office
And that most of the city will still be at work
By the time you start biking back

Enjoying the feeling
Of being alone in the world
But still wishing someone were there
To marvel at it with you

I got on a new bike
And on this one
I could pedal as hard as I wanted to
And I wanted to pedal hard
Pedal out the hurt and the anger and the toxins
Pedal you out
Pedal furiously to Battery Park

I docked this bike in one of the usual places
And watched the Staten Islanders
Scatter out of the ferry for a while
And here I am

October 21, 2016

Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Right After the Recital


Right after the recital I realized
That I had forgotten to mute my phone
I was so relieved
That I hadn't gotten any calls, texts, or Facebook messages
In the past two hours
And then I was sad
That I hadn't gotten any calls, texts, or Facebook messages
In the past two hours.

September 18, 2016

Takbir

Takbir*

I got to work
so early this morning
that not only
could I see
the rosy fingers
of the
ancient Greek poet

I could hear
the ancient
Middle Eastern call
of someone praying
to the East

October 19, 2016

*composed in its (admittedly short) entirety on the one block walk from the Citibike station to the office building