Untitled Poem

With a few miles behind my tires
we tread on.
We’ve many more highways and bi-ways to travel.
The flashing lights signal me to slow down;
the speed limit signs entice me to go faster.
I watch the needle on the dash edge toward the red,
and I close my eyes and clasp my hands
and pray to avoid disaster.
The road signs teach me that these are the days
to make mistakes;
that these are the ways
to keep my soul awake;
that I am young and have the luxury of time.
But what is time when it’s wasted inside lonely cubicles
or with your nose hidden inside dusty books,
while your real desires gather dust in your mind’s crannies and nooks.
I drink cup after cup of coffee,
draining my veins of blood and injecting them with syringes of caffeine,
but that only works for the body,
and only until we become immune to the sleeplessness of in between.
So how do I keep my life from drifting off into a deep sleep?
We try to smile often; we rarely weep.
We figure that just one more heavy paycheck could get us through this week.
But our bodies grow restless and our minds become bleak,
windswept expanses of shadowy dreams.

In heaven

I hope heaven is something like the Jersey Shore.
The Jersey Shore that’s like Long Beach Island
with the surfboards and the seagulls
and with the little curly-haired kids in their tiny swimsuits running with excited fear from the shore break;
but not the Jersey Shore that is like Seaside with the greasy fries and drunken parties.
I have nothing against Seaside though, don't think that.
Watching Ferris wheels and half naked girls and guys stroll down the boardwalk is hilarious.

I hope heaven is like a cool breeze on a hot summer’s day
that sends chills down your spine when you’ve been sweating for the past three hours.
And I hope there will be soft-serve chocolate ice cream in heaven. And I better be able to get extra chocolate sprinkles
every
single
time.

I hope Jesus likes me in heaven,
that all my selfish desires and pride can finally disappear when I am standing my his side
so close
that I can see the wrinkles in his forehead from years of worrying about me
and the crows feet at the corners of his eyes from years of laughing at all the stupid things I’ve done.
I hope that when I stand in front of Jesus I can
for the first time
be confident that he loves me
all of me.
I can see in the reflection of his wide pupils that he cares more for me than I can imagine.
And that it’s real.
That it’s always been real.
And he will just smile
and listen
when I tell him how sorry I am for having doubted so often and for so long.

I hope in heaven I get to have dance parties with Jesus.
I’ll do the Twist and he’ll do the Macarena and we’ll laugh for hours at how horribly our dance moves are.
And we’ll have tears in our eyes that glisten in the golden sun
for all eternity.

"With the wild wolves around you, in the morning I'll call you" (Bon Iver)

Bon Iver's music video for The Wolves (Act I and II)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9lrVZdaluk

Definitely worth taking the few minutes to watch.

Makes me miss winter, bonfires, and the playing for hours in the woods.

A Panoramic life

Sometimes the world just needs to be seen through completely open eyes. Why does society insist on its members to wink and squint, to distort and enlarge, to cover one or both eyes with a blindfold, when the world seems to have been created to be seen fully and wholly. Our eyes were created with peripheral vision, with the ability to see near and far. We can turn our necks to span from left to right and up and down, creating the widest possible panoramic view we can. And we can even twist our hips and step in circles to get a completely 360 degree view of our surroundings.

We are meant to see every detail the world and the fabric of life can offer us.

Therefore I refuse to give in to the whims of society and be restricted in my world views. I will not be wronged by pressures of my peers and tradition. The world we live in deserves to be absorbed by our minds in an all-encompassing fashion.

What I'm getting at is this: why allow myself to be consumed by society's iron cage, to say "This is what I'm going to do with my life" or "That is the job I am going to get when I graduate" when there are SO many paths that my life could take and so many directions I could turn. I don't want to live encumbered by a fixed mindset, but rather keep my options open wide to let the universe breathe into my breath and gently guide me in the direction of my fate, bobbing up and down with the rising tides of today and tomorrow.