Sunday, September 15, 2019

It Starts and Ends With You


For years, I have worked alongside many activists and advocates on the path of bringing peace, love and freedom, helping to heal any abuse or violence that exists in our society. However I want to make sure we don't overlook something important in our pursuit. 

You say you know just what to do
You share your vision, sparkling new
Impassioned to make a difference now
There's only one catch ... but how ... but how?
Peace is on the radar; peace is the goal
Everyone line up for your honorable role
The public is calling; the people are in need
You seek to plant the righteous seed
But where can you start on a path that's true?
Could it be ... it starts and ends with you?

Dinners and awards ceremonies with settings so fine
Your activism has arrived just in time
Studying and analyzing collective mores and norms
The target is to end violence and abuse in all its forms
No more domestic terrors, the bites that sting
But we may be forgetting one small thing
The attacks, the leverage, the bitter blows
A hidden experience the victims do not know
The mystery to be ultimately solved, in time due
Yes, it starts and ends with you

Not just the political plans and the helping hands
Nor the parades led by marching bands
Not just the counseling that uplifts the trodden-down
Not just the clothing, toothpaste, handouts passed around
Not the speeches, public screeches, and promotional platitudes
Not the outer giving to the causes counting into the multitudes
No, we commence and complete with a stand for the one
The place where we always could have begun
The source of violence and abuse to which we now attend
Those inner voices and beliefs – the start and the end

Those places within lacking the light and the love
Those times you tell yourself, “I am not good enough”
I’m just an imposter here, pretending, a fake, a crook
I hate myself, I hate my hair, I hate my looks
Reflections in mirror reveal that which we do not like
Battling ourselves, we take on the dishonorable fight
The monkeys causing mayhem in the cages of our mind
Bodies that are clenched, hearts that are closed, eyes that are blind
Going through the motions, everything going numb
Until we completely beat ourselves up – “How could I be so dumb?”
Our past emerges like monsters surfacing from the sea
A hungry fiend unleashed on our present-day reality

But is this how it really has to be?
Or is there another pathway for the free?
What would happen if the wars ended, from within?
At this cease-fire, could we then begin again?
Could we un-cage the monkeys, dissolve the angry fiend?
Waive the surrender flag, and then start fresh and clean
For the public is calling; people are in need of peace
We must find the key for their, and our, release
We can begin anew, taking a path that is true
As we discover right now ... it starts and ends with you

Saturday, September 14, 2019

The Tops of Trees




It’s all happening down here
The dance of destruction, dismay and fear
Landing, standing on the ground
Look at what we’ve found
Spinning, spinning, spinning around
The Earth, for what it’s worth
Is your home of mayhem or mirth
We often perceive the darkness, downtrodden and disease
When we forget the view from the tops of trees

The roots crawl deep as we fall asleep
Bypassing the blessing and bliss
And an angel’s everlasting kiss
The feathers blow, chaotic, to the wind
Losses overshadow every win
Can we please begin?
Not just seeing what the devil and demon sees
But rather that which nests in the tops of trees

The tops of trees
Will we ever see?
What must we believe?
And who must we be?
To finally see
The tops of trees

Yes, our opportunity is here
Disengaging from the taste and temptation of fear
We start a new and fanciful dance
We climb up … like a kid … branch by branch by branch
Like a kite or a bird
Or the truth found in word
Nothing too absurd
To take us to the very tippy top
Needing more than a skip, a jump or a hop
Above the roots, up the trunk
Distractions and delusions – all have shrunk
We ascend the tree, higher ever higher
Embracing the courage of performers atop high wire
A belly full of fire
To the supreme pinnacle, we now can perceive
And fly ever skyward over the tops of trees

The tops of trees
We rarely ever see
Not from our vantage view
Stuck in what we do
The tops of trees
We rarely see
A higher point above
A landscape of light and love
The tops of trees
We can finally see
We can finally see