Letters They’ll Never Read

(February 1, 2023)

Just fine sitting in the in-between 

At peace with the state of unknowing

Writing letters they will never see

This knowledge brings you practical ease

Frank words you know they’ll never read

Freedom to write in full honesty

And these the ones you let your heart cling

With no chance of failure or dying thing

No other involved, affecting dreams

You alone, power to tip feelings

Snap of the finger, heart is retrieved

Dropping all trace of affectionate glee

Or, if wishes desire to be,

Love held for stubborn eternity

Unrequited love, alright with thee

They, no knowledge, like took no seed

And so, just a past of imagining

You move back on to reality

Snap of the finger, awoke from the sleep

But still you slip in and out of the dream

Grocery Store Man

(December 31,2021)

I first noticed your energy and spirit. You were a personable human, no doubt. Asking me about my day, smiling during the whole bit. And when I asked if your grocery-store-day was busy, you raised your eyebrows, and then your eyes, and dared me to look into them and judge what I thought based on how crazed they were. We both laughed, and you carried on with your bagging.

You had pink hair, and when I looked into your eyes, I noticed your eyebrows were shaved a bit back and purposely thinned out and plucked in odd places. I wondered if it was style that made you take that choice, a desire to be different, or maybe it was nervous habit, or a moment of panic that you had the night before when you were alone. I did not know. But it made me care about you all the more. 

We all are alone at times. It’s never an if but a when. And I wondered who you were when you were alone. Were you as spirited and enthusiastic? Or were you lonely, scared, sad? We put on fronts with people, but we all look quite the same when we’re by ourselves and quiet. When it’s just us and our thoughts. 

Whoever you are, grocery store man, I wondered who you were when no one was watching, when you weren’t commenting on my nail polish and putting on an energetic show of care and interest. Know that I am quite similar to you when I’m all alone, though we might seem quite different at a party. You silently making a meal, sitting on your bed, watching your favorite show at night, reading a book, scrolling on your phone, doesn’t look much different from me when I’m silently making a meal, sitting on my bed, watching my favorite show, reading a book, and scrolling on my phone.

Know that though you may be alone at times, you have a person or two thinking about you when you’re alone, so you’re not quite alone after all, are you? And I guess I’m not either.

A Gloom I Can’t Defeat

(Started: December 31, 2019 | Finished: September 03, 2022)

I want to be hopeful 

Not dogmatic or sad

So tired of being tired 

I want rest at last

Each moment of joy 

Seems threaded with pain

I just want the laughter 

Without a blemish of shame

Each time I conquer it

It seems to come back 

I could be peaceful 

But then I hear it laugh

Won’t this cloud of heaviness

Relent or go away

‘Cause no matter where I run

It’s still biting at my legs

It’s a weight I can’t wrestle

And a gloom I can’t defeat 

But then light tears the curtain

And love again speaks

I guess You heard me calling 

When I was wailing in my car

Gave me purpose for living

Eyes to find light in the dark

Things, again given meaning

No longer objects of scorn

A gift to just be breathing

Thinking began to reform

Life became less about doing 

More about looking around

Each piece was undeserved

Down to my next heart pound

There’s always hope to be had

No matter what future brews

‘Cause the future has purpose

It’s never absent of You

Sing Your Sweet Song, Dear Bird

(April 14th, 2022)

Sing your sweet song again, dear bird

I think you feel you’ve lost your voice

And the sound you make hurts you more than silence

But oh, how I miss that sweet noise

I realized it’s been years since I heard it

The melody would echo through our home

It used to make you so delighted to sing

Your eyes lit up as you thought on days of old

That sweet vibrato was our first teacher 

Giving us those childhood songs we know

I wish you would stay ever confident 

Knowing your old voice still holds the power of hope

Sing, sing again, my dear bird 

Even if you think you’ve lost your voice

It will again make children out of us 

Remembering our mother and her heart’s sweet noise

The Sound Of A Clock

(March 1, 2022)

There are a few things in life that always sound the same; a clock, for example, is one of them. No matter where you are or what type of clock it is, a clock is a clock, and so it sounds as such. Cars passing on the street at night is another, and the same goes for the sound of people shuffling through an airport, or the dishes being done in the kitchen while another sits in the living room. 

Some sounds, some feelings, will always stay the same no matter where you are, or who you’ve become, or what season of life you’re in. They are good old friends (but too often, they are forgotten as we grow up because their sound is not deemed important enough to notice). But I am trying to remember, and because a clock always sounds the same, it reminds me of 15 years ago when I was a child at a sleepover, noticing that I and the clock seemed to be the only ones still awake. And though it kept me up, I always felt peace because I knew that the clock’s consistency would not change based on mine.

As we age, life pushes us to shed layers and put on others. But sometimes, we find that we have shed some layers that we didn’t actually mean to lose. We made a radical decision to rip layers off because they didn’t fit with our new understanding of the world—as a matter of fact, life wasn’t as kind and beautiful as we imagined. And so we threw those layers aside, because they had felt like lies amidst our new felt pain. And besides, we seemed to be judged by our peers for those whimsical layers anyway, so it was good to throw them off.

But I have become quite hard and sharp on the edges now. So I’m trying to remember again. I’m scavenging the floor to find some of those old layers, some of those old jackets. They may be worn and frayed, but they raised me through much of my childhood. And though, at times, the glasses were a little too rose-colored, that was sometimes a good thing because it further brought out the colors that were already there in the world (and without them, I would have been too oblivious to notice).  

So now, I’m listening to old songs I used to love in 2015 and 2016. I am taking the time to feel them all over again; I remember why I loved them. I’m re-hiking old mountains and taking the time to sit silent where I used to sit for hours, only hearing the cars bustle below. I’m thinking about memories of my younger sister when she was just 16, belting her favorite songs with her eyes closed and her mouth turned up in a smile. I’m once again driving, looking out at the trees, the clouds, the sun, the road in front of me, seeing them for what they are and what they were, symbols of hope and endless possibility. I am beginning to dream again.

I found some of my old layers (and I’m still looking for others). I missed them, I have changed, but they haven’t. They still feel like home. And now they seem to fit even better than before because now I know how to wear them. And so I write this as I lay on my couch in my living room, staring up at my ceiling, noticing once again that it’s just me and the clock who are still awake tonight.

And so it’s true, life isn’t as beautiful and kind as we imagined, and yet it is. We just have to choose to see what those rose-colored layers were trying to show us all along.

A Good Person

(February 27, 2022)

Remember that a good person was never made without another having pity on them in their state of evil and rebellion. And they most often first appeared very hostile and unapproachable. To create better people, one must always push into the darkness first to pull another out into the light. Separation will do nothing of the sort. 

In efforts of security and preservation, those who think they’re good isolate themselves because they cannot get the mess of the world on their hands. They forget that this most often accomplishes the opposite of their desire. They are not making the world a better place but only their world— a world that will grow smaller and smaller as they isolate to wash the dirt and disorder of others off their clothing. And then, the greater outer world will nevertheless grow and encroach upon their “place of safety” by taking it over and consuming it, and then it will be too late for any hopes of changing an evil and rebellious world to be good.

Till My Hope Is Sparked

Ukraine 2022 (February 26, 2022)

Though my eyes will close

When I think of pain

When I hear the news

Of violent way

Though my fear grows strong

And my heart gives way

At final moment

Will confidence fade?

The tears that run

As loved ones part

To see them again

Not known in heart

Will you be my hope

Will you be my strength?

When soul feels alone

And suffers at length?

The power of iron

And the strength of steels

Hold no great power

To the One that heals

Though my heart doubts it

And my mind grows dark

I will shout these truths

Till my hope is sparked

A Small Breath released

Has power to take

A fortress to knees

And solve this at stake

For A Mighty Arm

And All-Present Stare

Can remove our harm

And restore what’s fair

He fights for what's good

And never backs down

He is not pressured

By pain or war’s sound

He, louder than booms

That ring in our ear

Yet still more gentle

Than a mother near

To Him, we belong

With eternal fame

Who has seen it all

Experienced each pain

Been broken and torn

He too knows it well

Yet maintained His good

Though pressures of hell

He is not heartless

His love is not cold

Let evils of men

Yet, make us be bold

He could have kept secret

His kindness and truth

But instead reveals

And love, He proves

Breaks not a promise

Supplies each our needs

He, our strong fortress

Conquest of good deeds

They may hurt and harm

But we, loved and kept

For goodness will win

Hope, not go unmet

Love

(November 1, 2021)

I have come to realize that most terrible people are so because they have had little love shown to them in life, so they know not what it means to love. Either that, or if they were shown love, their heart was never made soft enough to receive it and let it change them. For it does take a bit of humility to accept real, honest love.

When you let love in, it will break your heart. It will find every crack in that hard, calloused rock and seep in. And from the inside out, it will tear open the stone and pull it apart piece by piece.

But then, it will reclothe the naked, crying thing, with a thick and comforting blanket full of protection, made with wrapped presents, warm drinks, and a fireplace in a hospitable home. And your heart feels seen for once. 

And once you have experienced this, you cannot help but hope to be that love-breaking, love-ripping, love-changing thing in someone else’s life.

A Word To My Favorite Artist—Responding To Your Whiteout

(April 27, 2021)

Recommended Song: anything from his “Whiteout”

When’d you stop making things that were beautiful?

Your scratching on the wall sounds more like screams in a void.

Did you lose hope in thinking you were saying something important?

Or maybe it’s the scratches that say something deeper than what I’d say I saw on the surface. 

You were singing of something I couldn’t understand,

I couldn’t figure out if it was genius or if it was mad.

Was it the exploring that you talked about years ago that you’re doing now?

Carving out a new avenue for expression, a new vein for thinking and imagination?

Groundbreakers always feel a bit strange in the beginning.

After all, they’re breaking ground, and so maybe that’s what you’re creating.

The things you used to sing and say used to move me,

But now, the only thing I hear that resembles old is your latest “Rookery.”

But I guess you’re still doing something right,

Because I wrote this while listening to Richard Russell’s “Strange Last Flight.”

We Are Insects

(September 4, 2019)

We are insects, small creatures that live and move and walk on this blue and green dust ball.

We pick our battles, collect our food, bring our portions forward. We shake our fists towards the heavens, start fights we can’t finish, “for ourselves, for humanity... for ourselves.”

We have little legs, little mouths, little heads, bodies, little emotions, little thoughts—at least when you’re at a bird's eye view, or how about a satellite view. One wonders how big we must look from the sun’s view, or another galaxy.

We are insects, tiny creatures that live and move and walk on this blue and green dust ball.

He sees.

There is one who watches these creatures in their everyday living. Yet they pretend to be quite busy and unaware of Him. Their paper piling, food collecting, world-changing, as well as fighting and yelling, are a little too great at the present moment to notice Him.

He sees.

But He is kind.

He is kind to not retrieve His very breath back to Himself, sucking it from our frail lungs.

He is patient to not untwine or crush our feeble legs that run so rapidly away from Him.

He is gracious to hear our pathetic mouths curse Him hourly, yet restrain from filling them with clay and closing them shut.

How His ears must burn, and His eyes become filled with fire as He stares at the small beings who ignore Him daily and claim to be the masters of their own lives.

“I created myself”... “I can find my path in the dark with my all-seeing eyes, unmuddled feelings, and infinite knowledge.”

For truly, who would need such a God if this were true? What freedom, what blissful self-actualization and independent triumph.

But if such a claim were wrong, or even the slightest bit off, what a tragic disaster might these little creatures find themselves running towards. They beg Him for their ruin. They beg Him to be damned. Anything, oh anything, but to trust and submit themselves to such a cruel creator who gave them the very legs they use to run from Him with. Anything, oh anything, but to thank the One who gifted them the mouths they use to curse Him with. Anything, oh anything, but to acknowledge the one who granted them the very eyes they refuse to look at Him with.

Anything, oh anything, but to love the One who originated such a beautiful thing as love and demonstrated it so nobly by coming in such little form and dying for a creation that would not—no matter the gift or the warning—recognize Him to be their God.

Coming of Age, A Subtle Thing

(August 30, 2020)

I was happy to hear you battling another great dragon again in the next room over. From the sound of it, it seemed to be quite a tough sword fight. 

I saw you in the dark room swinging your sword at the shadows as I walked up the stairs, and by the looks of your actions, exhaustion, and the level of energy expended, they were no doubt quite glorious dragons and horrific foes. 

You didn’t know it, but this was one of the last times you would play that way. I’m sure you hadn’t noticed, but over the last couple of years (as all kids do), you had fought these imaginary dragons less and less, and at this point, I hadn’t seen you battling any furious enemy since half a year ago. It is certainly happening less and less, and as we grow older, we notice less and less how little we imagine and how much time has gone by since the last time we joined the battle.

And so I sat and just listened, smiling with fondness, knowing that this fictional battle, though seeming childish, held a deeper richness that would no doubt help shape you into the courageous and heroic man you would one day become.

Silhouettes

(August 12, 2020)

I kind of have an obsession with silhouettes. When hanging out with me past 6 o’clock, you’ll usually find my eyes drifting onto the edges of mountains, to the arms of trees, or to the top points of buildings. I’ll stare at humans in the distance jumping and playing, and I swear I can hear the laughter and shouts coming from them though I’m a mile away. I know not their name or life, but I know them to be the timeless spirits of human beings living their beautiful life.

A silhouette is a meek yet bold sort of thing. It is as if the spirit of the object is humbly saying, “here I am in my truest form.” My eyes notice no color or discolor, no rip or mend, no living or dead leaf, no broken or fixed window, but simply the spirit of the object itself: the spirit of the building, the spirit of the tree, the spirit of a human. The silhouette does not ask to be looked at, it does not flicker any light at your eye, and yet, when you notice it (the edges, the bold points against the backdrop of blue and yellow hues), it’s as if the object rewards you for noticing. It shows you its truest, most basic form, a timeless form, that will be taken on again by another tree, another building, or another human after it. It no longer stands as a colorful dot on the horizon, but it becomes a part of the bigger shape of this earth; it becomes an edge to this universe.

Hope Is Greater Than Fear

(July 28, 2020)

I must remember that hope is greater than fear. For every one that desires the harm of another, there is also one who desires their protection. For every one that believes the first word on the street, there is also a critical thinker challenging it behind closed doors. For every one who schemes to take advantage of the lowly, there is one who wishes to support them in their growth and rise to glory. For every one who spreads lies for their own gain, there is also one who will seek truth even at their own loss.  And with each yelling match witnessed in media, there are also constructive conversations happening between loved ones in homes.

I do not trust the hearts of man, and yet, I trust the hearts of man. 

With every group of sheep that starts being swept away, hope still remains; sheep can think for themselves, and there are some who hear a voice of challenge and questioning. For there is always a discussion happening in the unseen, an inner dialogue within the minds of every man, between himself and himself—heart and mind. And God is also found there, and He, a part of the conversation.

The race of man is never entirely lost. Hope is greater than fear. 

But hope stays alive in our hearts only as long as we choose to have it.

Chess Pieces

(July 16, 2020)

Are we just chess pieces to the Heavenly Beings?

A game between God and Satan over who will win? And who will get the most glory? 

I am a pawn, and you, the bishop. I run into you, we speak, you say something quite profound, but expected, which makes me switch directions or jump to another square, and you likewise. 

Is life made up of different pointless encounters? Encounters that only matter in relation to the Almighty in order to bring about his victory, but in relation to us, mean and matter very little?

Has my value been forgotten, or did it ever actually exist outside of someone else’s victorious purposes? Am I valued because I was created to move from this square to that, in order to help bring the match to a fine conclusion? But once used or destroyed, taken off the board and placed back in the box to either never be played again or to be used for another's purposes?

And do I look any different from that of the other pawns? Or am I just one in the number of cheap wood pieces that sit and move within the confines and rules of the game? I am made of dust, after all.  

I wonder, above all, if I am cared for. Or if I am loved. 

I resolved to make my conclusions until a response from outside invaded my dialogue. It pierced through each and every question, straight and clear. It prevailed over all other thoughts, as a sword slaying all in its way.

“A Chess player does not die for his chess pieces.”

And there was the answer to my questions. This thought was not of me. It was an answer from the Almighty.

Summer Days

(May 2020)

I crave the summer days when we were always together

If you were to ask me about it I would say I miss the weather

Let's go to the beach, let's go and surf out in the waves

Ventura's got my heart forever and I hope it's there to stay

Tight skin and bloodshot eyes, and a sun that sets at eight

Grab a sweatshirt and a jacket cause you know we're gonna be out late

The smell of sunscreen and my hair is turning blonde

I hope this summer feeling will last all year long

Oooooooo oooooooo

I'm in love with the summer, love with summer

Oooooooo oooooooo

I'm in love with the summer, love with summer

Grab some wood, let's start a fire, and we'll huddle up nice and close

A group of us will talk all night, and our clothes will smell like smoke

We'll lift our heads up towards the sky and count the stars

I'll take a picture with my mind and hold it in my heart

Oooooooo oooooooo

I'm in love with the summer, love with summer

Oooooooo oooooooo

I'm in love with the Summer, love with summer

Oooooooo oooooooo

I'm in love with the summer, love with summer

Oooooooo oooooooo

I'm in love with the Summer, love with summer

Your Love Has Been Felt

(March 2020)

Know that you have always meant the world to me

And I've felt your presence as you've watched so tenderly

Though I'm not your own, you've always helped me untangle my knots

I won't forget the books you've given or the time you held me in the parking lot

Your love has been felt

Talking at the table or on the porch out back

We slowly sipped coffee and we shared many of laughs

Not many of things can compare to your sweet company

But when you spoke of our God was when you truly gleamed

Your love has been felt

Your love, your love has been felt

I'm not so good at saying it in person

But Your love has been felt

I walk into a room and see your faces light up

There ain't a thing I swear like a Judys' hug

The time you spent talking through theories or over chords

With a pen in hand next to that fateful drawing board

Your love has been felt

Your love, your love has been felt

I'm not so good at saying it in person

But your love has been felt

Winter And Fall

(November 14, 2019)

Would you think I was crazy if I told you

I thought there was more life in the winter?

Breathing the cold air is like smoking a peppermint breeze.

Would you think I was weird if I felt

There were more dimensions in the fall?

Between the shadows of the clouds and the colors in the leaves.

Would you think it strange if it brought me joy,

Because I had an excuse to be melancholy,

And no matter my sadness, I was at least happier than the weather?

Maybe it’s because the cold gives excuses for comfort

And the need for someone’s warmth?

It allows for slow-paced living

And no guilt in “wasted opportunities.”

An Analysis on Communication

(June 2019)

We speak in codes and metaphors, Both to hide things and reveal them. To speak so frankly could be either too brash or too cheap. For most treasured things are quite tender and “worthy of some sort of protection.” To hide a meaning in hopes of one discovering.  To speak about things deeply in order for one to dig deep to understand. There is value brought in an answer that must be unearthed. For a jewel hidden in the dark is given more weight and more value when searched for all night and finally found.

The rarity of a feeling, when two feel them so rarely.  To dig and find, to uncover that feeling conceded by another, makes one cherish.   There is no tarnish. Once brushed off, it is but one of the purest and most sacred of all.  For the decoder took just as much effort to seek the matter out as the one who had sought out those rarities found within their own heart first... and then, in efforts to be known by the most daring, resolved to speak about them with such cipher, hiding it while also revealing the slightest corner, as if to send out an invitation to the most meek, yet bold, to venture forward in expedition to understand their words of code and metaphor.

I Envy Her Freedom

(May 7, 2019)

I’ve always wanted to travel. To fly with the wind and blow with the sand. To wear boots that crunch and have tough hands that climb. To have dirt on my pants and clothes that withstand. 

I watch her life. She is not tied down. Her hair is always a little tangled, and her face looks wrinkled and freckled by the sun. Her naked eyes dance because of the things she’s seen. 

I want to be her, and yet, I don’t. She’s always traveling. In fact, I don’t know if she’s ever stopped, settled, been faithful. They say she’s flighty. She’s unreliable. She wants to be where things are happening, not where things have happened. She has no roots. She’s never stayed anywhere long enough to let them grow. I’ve always kind of envied her in a sense. No obligations, no expectations, no one waiting up for you, no need to “follow through.”... freedom.

Is that freedom? Freedom from what? People?

She has people around her, but only when she wants—she finds them when they will get her from point A to point B. They have become her trains, her cars, her roads. 

She has seen many things. I have longed to have her eyes, her ears, her nose. I wish to have seen those same scenes, heard those same sounds, sniffed those same scents. She has hungry eyes that are never quite satisfied.

But maybe it’s not so much about the quantity of what you see but the quality? I am not entirely convinced, but maybe I’m onto something. To see every type of terrain and culture must be something quite breathtaking and informing... but at the same time, to have the eye quickly pass over something must also mean that you missed the hidden nuances of both beauty and ugliness found within those things.

One might be informed from their experience, but to be changed and enlightened is entirely different—this requires immersion. This requires roots to grow. This requires quality of experience; it requires time, obligation, dependency, reliability. To learn and be learned from, requires commitment and hardship. You have to sit amongst a culture to understand it; you have to participate in a community to grow from it. Observing from afar can give us an impression too easily manipulated by our own lens of interpretation. The same goes for a place. A person who walks every street will know the crevices of a city and the stones that make it strong. The one who flies over that same city will know it, but only to a certain degree—by the tops of its buildings.

So I guess establishing roots and settling in one place for a while, doesn’t mean you see less, it just means you see different. You may not see the layer of dirt that covers the mountains in the west to the valleys in the east, but instead, you see every grain of sand that reaches down far below the surface. You know each rock and pebble that tightly pushes and faithfully holds your roots. And you see and feel the water under the surface that fills those roots, making them satisfied and thriving. And these are the things that are missed when she doesn’t stay long enough to let herself settle in and grow with her surroundings. And these “pebbles” and “rocks” and “water,” are people and obligations and hardship.

But I guess a person is always giving up something at the cost of another. Quality versus quantity, and to each their own.

The Privilege of Getting to Know Someone

(March 21, 2019)

May we not forget the privilege of getting to know someone. They do not get that same privilege, being trapped inside their own mind. They don’t know how unique they are. The influence they have. The ways they impress and amuse others. They are unaware of how many people look up to them and why. They are used to themselves and don’t recognize their brilliance and originality.

But we get to experience that, something they never will. I wish my favorite of people could experience that privilege of getting to know themselves.