I speak as I write
My thoughts to myself
I’ll convey to you
If that’s alright

I speak in words
No one hears
Except maybe you
Who recognize my tears

I speak in rhyme
That’s what I do
I compose each line
Just for you

I speak a language
Only you know
For you the reader
To translate so

I speak in themes
That only you understand
You follow my thoughts
You know where I stand

I speak what I see
I write this way
Black and white
Few shades of gray

I speak no pattern
You follow my reasoning
Wherever it leads
Wherever it goes

You are my audience
I need no one else
I speak only to you
So you can follow
For you know that my words
Are sometimes hard to swallow
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“Better to write for yourself and have no public
Then to write for the public and have no self”

Cyril Connolly (1933)

Does it matter…?
How much money you make
How many friends you have
How many possessions you own
How successful you are
If you obtained fame
If you win the game
How many matters really matter

You labor each day
For things you think truly matter
In your struggles and strife
Have you ever considered
What’s the real point of your life?

They’ve asked me to forgive you
Do what you think is right
Rise above the norm they say
They want me to show compassion
To their satisfaction

Yet, you do not confess
You show no emotion
You express no words
You remain silent
You want my forgiveness
Yet, you prefer to stand and choose to
Argue in silence

But I know that
Forgiveness is the gateway to freedom
It frees you from the bitterness and indignation
That you’ve stored in your heart
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“To err is human;
To forgive divine.”
Alexander Pope
(1688-1744)

He reaps what he does not sow
He takes what he does not need
He exchanges lies for truth
He never satisfies his greed

On a downward spiral
A one-way direction
Burning his conscience
Knowing all the while
He’ll never change his style

Chasing after rainbow colored bubbles
Until they burst
Leaving him no better than worse
Blames everyone but himself
For somewhere in his life
He flunked the test
It was never supposed to be
Bad better best
************************
“And yet to every bad
There is worse”

Thomas Hardy

Whom do you see when there’s no one to see?
What do you say when there’s nothing to say?
You meditate on thoughts that you don’t have
And listen to the silence that resonates

You linger and wait for an answer to a question you never asked
While you bask in the solitude that continues to ruminate
You attempt to step out of your stare
But find it hard to bare

You wonder where your dreams have gone
Your ambitions and desires number but a few
Hope against hope you find yourself lost in you
But that’s what loneliness can do
*****************************
“You’re only lonely if you’re not there for you”

Dr.Phil Mc Graw

He follows phantom shadows
Like a child at play
Hiding among  the shadows
Avoiding life as he may

He chases after shadows
Phantoms of delight
An internal struggle
To keep from the light

Living in Shadows
Listening to echoes
Drawing the shade
Where blind darkness abodes
Never letting light into the
Dark corners of his mind

Staying in character
Not a word to say
Behind the curtain
A shadow play

Walking in shadows
Never to  know
Why he stays close to
Forever incessant
To hug the shadows
*********************

There is no shadow without reality

Yesterday’s a shadow
Tomorrow’s forever
Today’s a standstill

Life is but a day
When day is gone
I cannot hold the future
Try as I may
Yet
Life is but a compass
Directing my days
My conscience
My pilot
Leads the way

When the light of my youth
The spark of my being reminds me
That life is ever fleeing
The years quietly slip away
They never last
Leaving me to reflect on memories
From my past

Although life may escape me
Placing my soul at rest
I attempt to catch a vision
Of the future
I try my best to foresee
But I cannot fathom eternity
**************************
“Eternity is said not to be an extension of time
But an absence of time”

Graham Greene

Don’t tell me you wish me well
Don’t tell me things will work out
Don’t tell me good luck
Don’t tell me there are better days ahead

Keep your magical solutions
Keep your superstitious acts
Those leave me helpless and powerless
Keep your
Charms
Rituals
Omens
Spells
Where fear and ignorance always dwell

I know
That my faith and my hope will join
That my life is not left to chance
That my life is worth a lot more
Then just a flip of a coin
*********************
“What is faith? It is the confident assurance
that what we hope for is going to happen.
It is the evidence of things we cannot see.”
Hebrews (11:1)

I have yet to reveal
The whispers in my heart
Never revealed
Forever concealed
Private thoughts I have hidden from sight
Reflections of my life yet to come to light
Never to disclose
Only if I chose
If they were to be exposed
It would tear me apart
Only to betray my secret heart
******************************
“Every man has his secret sorrows
Which the world knows not”
Longfellow

To be told
Your poems don’t rhyme
To hear it said
There is no pattern
They ask
What’s a poem
Without a rhyme?
What’s a story
Without a plot?
What’s a writer
Without a word?
But
Who’s to judge?
Who’s to criticize?
Who’s to blame?
Who’s to censure?
For
They will never understand
That a good poet’s thoughts always rhyme
********************************
“A poem is true if it hangs together
Information points to something else
A poem points to nothing but itself”

E.M. Forster