Driving

Friday, December 13, 1996

I should have known it was going to be the day from hell.

“What the hell?” I said to myself,

First thing when I woke up that morning.

(Everyone has said that at some time in their lives.)

I got dressed and walked outside,

Forgetting and deciding not to shave again.

(I was on a mission unknown to myself and everyone around me.)

I got in my car and drove northwest,

Although I really didn’t know where I wanted to go.

(I was escaping to an area I needed to escape from.)

“What the hell?” I said to myself again,

As it had started to downpour heavily.

(Everyone has said that everything comes in threes.)

But I kept on driving,

Drive on!  Drive, drive, drive!

(I was driving to a Christmas party.)

The music was driving,

The rain was driving.

(I felt a dagger drive straight into my heart.)

“What the hell?” I said again.

I looked at the clock, and the time was 0:13PM.

(0 o’clock?)

A streak of lightning hit the road in front of me.

I swerved left and right at the same time.

(The phrase “What the hell?” along with other choice phrases, ran loops in my mind)

I ended up on the side of the highway,

My car was unscratched.

(I had gotten out of the warm, bright car and stood in the cold, wet, dark night.)

I wanted to continue driving.

I wanted to continue driving.

(But something was holding me back.)

I had begun a new train of thought,

            My eyes had begun to blink,

                        The raindrops and my tears had begun to mix in

                                    Sub-conscious fear,

                                    Sub-conscious confusion,

                                    Sub-conscious disillusion

(That dagger killed my Christmas spirit.)

I was soaked by those rains.

I was soaked by those emotions.

            Failure?

            Lost?

Lonely?

Drowning?

Eternal darkness?

Hell?

(What the hell?)

I couldn’t tell what it was.

I wouldn’t tell what it was.

(I wouldn’t be able to tell what I couldn’t tell.)

“What a hell?” I said to myself,

At the stroke of midnight.

(I had climbed back into my car, since there was noting better to do.)

And so now I’m still

On a mission which is STILL

Unknown (?) to myself and even STILL

Unknown (!) to everyone around me.

(... ... ... ... ... ...)

Walking

Walking...

Somewhere stands the giant oak tree.

The leaves have all but fallen off,

One by one, but all at the same time.

And i’m walking...

Through woods i’ve never been before

Forging a new trail

Making turns without warning or reason

And it’s useless to turn back

Mind boggling

Delirious

Insane and crazy

Water flows and i’m still moving forward eternally towards the light of day never stopping for any clueless reason

speaking opposites?

Life.

Death.

Life in death.

Who knows?  Who cares?

Alone i stand

tall and proud but shortness remains

vertically challenged?  suppose so.  (Cynicism)...

*sigh* The Grand Finale:

The Light At The End Of The Tunnel,

the Home Stretch.

sike!  not yet!

(talent is still unrefined.)

Walking...

Through the woods and over fallen trees

and around boulders

and through small streams

and by crickets

with no roads

no chores to do (except chopping firewood)

it’s getting colder and colder

But the tree i chose was too tall to cut.

Walking...

Suddenly i’m in a small town

The eyes of people sitting on street-side benches

(and the eyes of people no longer there)

are staring at me (or through me)

i’m feeling cold

i’m walking with my head down

starting at the dirt on the ground

i’m not in town anymore (as i look up for a moment)

What is going on here?

Mind blowing

Hallucinating

Insane and crazy

Wind blows and i’m still moving forward to the...

...dark of night?

Oh my...

Walking...

The skyscrapers hide all in their eternal shadow

Creating a mood of a mysterious and impatient

yet hectic excitement

And now i’m feeling dwarfed,

but feel like i’ve been here before...

There’s an unusually Bright and Tall Flower across the street.

And from behind a steam vent (mist) there’s a woman

She’s selling her Self-Produced Jazz Sax Album titled “Patterns In The Rain”...

...and all of a sudden, the past came flying from the dusty recesses of my brain, racing to the more conscious front

(actually, it was an acorn from the giant oak tree)

It’s snowing.

Night has fallen.

I’m finished walking.

The firewood has been lit.

This is the only bright and warm spot in these dark and cold woods.

It is time to fall asleep.

Sleeping...

Waiting

Waiting...
how long do i wait?

Waiting...

i am surrounded by walls of darkness

my little whispered questions go unanswered

i’m crying inside, and no one knows it but me

the answers will come in time

so i’m told by those who have been down this path before

“Good things come to those who wait.”

but how do i know that their good things are my kind of good?

Waiting...

my patience is about as tall as i am short

have i not done all that has been asked of me?

“Patience is a virtue.”

but i’m not feeling very virtuous today

nor was i yesterday

nor will i tomorrow (at least that is my decision today.)

Waiting...

“Wow, what a mean and nasty mood,”

the onlookers remark from the third row of the theater

they were expecting an epic tale of happiness

instead they receive a flop

they demand their money back, but then rent the video

Waiting...

a riot starts

(has this turned into a classic tragic comedy?)

pipe bombs go off as innocent bystanders try to run and save themselves,

but instead trip over their sense of urgency

get away!  for this is no place for the weak-at-heart

(excuse me, but today, i need to leave this place)

Waiting...

for this poem to make any sense

(a satire?  a textbook case of cynical satire?)

Waiting...

to get what i want or to change what i think i want to match what i am getting

if i can’t jump over a 50-foot ditch, how can i jump over the Grand Canyon?

but first, i have to climb the highest mountain,

and swim the deepest sea

and travel through the darkest valleys

but again, that is what someone is telling me

Waiting...

for the right answers to all the questions i haven’t thought of yet

keep looking; don’t let your weakness overcome you

never stop walking towards the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel

(are those walls of darkness the walls of the proverbial tunnel?)

(did i just find an ANSWER to a QUESTION which i did not realize needed answering?)

Waiting...

and somehow, that last surprise called an answer

the one i just stumbled on as if in complete darkness

(and in actuality was in almost, but not complete, darkness)

gave a growth spurt to my once short patience

(and I feel myself growing as well!)

Waiting...

and as my patience is growing along with myself,

I have returned to the now silent scene of the riot

there I have found a haunting sense of peace

and that peace has given my heart some strength it never realized it had.

Waiting...

and the strength that I’ve found in my heart

has pumped the new, fresh blood through my body

and I sprint and leap for joy, and find myself

soaring over the 50-foot ditch AND the Grand Canyon!

Waiting...

and now it feels good to fly

(is that the good they were talking about before?)

and I, feeling virtuous and carefree

(overruling yesterday’s decision)

and as the curtain closes

the audience rises for the well-deserved standing ovation

a fitting ending for the long-awaited talk of happiness

Waited...

Long enough...

and as I fly above the mountains

and over the seas

and spread light into the valley,

my tale of happiness has turned into an epic

and I have received everything I have waited for

(and the audience received what they were waiting for as well)

Waited...

and now I have reached the end of the path which so many have passed before...

and many more will pass through as well.

Lighthouse

It was quickly becoming

a dark and stormy Tuesday night...

There is a man,

a keeper of a lighthouse

who regards that lighthouse as his castle.

He holds a deep passion for the sea,

both it’s stunning beauty

and it’s mysterious darkness.

He has given up on the land

which he had once called home.

“Angry,” said the man to himself.

“Why is my keeper so angry tonight?”

The darkening clouds towered overheard

as if to silence his question,

and their angry faces kept being revealed by

each jagged streak of lightning.

The gusting wind howled from every direction,

as if to answer his question,

yet that howl held no spoken words,

just timeless emotion.

The hammering waves crashed from all around,

as if to punish him for asking the question

by lashing out at the coast

scratching and scraping as much as they could.

The thunder roared

screaming furiously

as though he were in charge of the storm

directing the anger at

anything and everything in it’s path.

Most men would have fled the lighthouse

at this sign of anger.

But the man just picked up a violin and

patiently,

methodically,

understandingly,

passionately,

and even stubbornly

began to play hard and heavy with

dis-

jointed

notes.

The rains fell instantly,

hard and fierce.

Trees were snapped in half

in their unsuccessful attempt

at standing up to the jagged streaks of lightning.

The man inside was playing with a fury

not unlike the raging storm outside;

his harsh sounds blending in with the noise of the storm.

Birds appeared to be flying backwards

in their unsuccessful attempt

at flying against the power of the wind.

The man inside was still playing with an even greater fury

not unlike the raging storm outside;

as if to out-perform the display the rage occurring outside.

And the light of the lighthouse still remained unaffected.

A boat tipped over

in it’s unsuccessful attempt

at churning forward through the choppy seas.

A woman from that boat started swimming

towards a beam of light coming from her right.

She thought it might have been lightning.

(but she later reflected that the smallest ray of hope,

even if it turns out to be a ray of something else,

is sometimes better than not having a ray at all.)

so she kept on swimming

The seas were angry!

The waves paralyzed her strength to swim

The rains blinded her vision of the ray

The winds silenced her screams of terror

The thunder stole her train of thought

The lightning scarred her courage to cope.

The man inside was still playing

feeding off of and shutting out

the display of rage occurring

outside of his house of light.

(at this point, one might think the music of the violins would have reached some humpback whales, which would then carry the woman to safety.  not so.  the whales had previously fled to safer waters long before the storm arrived.)

Somehow,

an eternity later,

(but in reality only ten minutes later)

against all odds,

and against the forces working against her,

the woman half swam and half floated

onto the sand in front of the lighthouse.

Too exhausted to know what she had found

and too exhausted to comprehend what had just occurred

her instinct collapsed on the shore.

And the storm raged on.

And the violin played on.

And the light remained on.

And the woman’s instinct lingered on.

And the anger raced through every living thing

that lonely stormy night.

And it was some war:

The storm representing nature’s emotion;

The violin representing man’s emotion;

the emotions of a violent and vicious anger.

The war/storm/performance lasted 4 ½ days.

Finally,

On Sunday afternoon,

the storm ended suddenly.

The remaining echoes of the

wind and waves and thunder and violin

became nothing more than distant reminders

of the war which produced no winners

of the storm which produced no damage

of the performance which produced no applause.

And even the once-ominous clouds

were headed for the horizon

in a defeated march away form the light of the sun

which had regained control of the skies.

As consciousness replaced

the anger of the man

and the exhaustion of the woman,

they both headed to the door of the lighthouse

(the man from the inside,

the woman from the outside.)

And as if by coincidence

(although it wasn’t one at all)

they met at the door at the same time.

And as each person

looked into/looked out to

each other’s respective areas

of the stormy past,

they each began to discuss their pasts

under blue skies and above blue water,

in the light of the house and the light of the sun.

Alone

Alone i stand

on the side of a hill

waiting

as a few birds

(quite a few)

fly by

i remain Alone

with my thoughts

my jumbled sporadic thoughts

and time

which has done nothing for me

except to keep on pulling me away

from the good times

and bad times

and no times as well

and although the shadow of no one is moving constantly

i

remain

motionless

fixed

am i afraid to move?  too weak?  or indecisively content?

i have a pad and pen and i’m writing nothing periodically furiously

the words just seem to spill out of my pen like a flood rushing into thin air

my 8-track mind keeps running away from no one with no one

but there is one track

a track of a tear

a single

Lonely

tear,

running down my right cheek

falling straight to the ground,

Alone

what a place, i think out loud

to that someone called no one

just this hillside and i

and the track of that Lonely tear

now just a vapor in the air

and a slowly disappearing memory on the ground it landed on

and we stand tall

but not at all

we can’t fall

slammed back against the wall

and the rains are such a driving mist

that the sun has a moon-like darkness

Alone, and i wish i had that one Lonely tear back

i couldn’t hold on

it wanted to leave

so it left

left me Alone

all Alone

on that hillside

i fell asleep

the pencil is glued to my hand

and i am writing crazy thoughts

onto a non-existing piece of paper

trying to make sense of something i didn’t know i already had figured out that i didn’t know

whatever

it has left me confused

but i am not Alone in confusion

because that is where everyone exists

funny though,

when surrounded by crowds of someones in confusion

we still feel Alone

please find the slow wide river so that i can swim to shore

although the deep dark woods seem to be crying to me

to stay away

“that’s enough,” no one said to me, and i agreed, so i placed my pad and pencil down where the tear had fallen, and no one and i fell asleep standing on the side of a hill of thin air