Feelin’ Groovy Always I want To slow my life down. Even years ago Youngsters wrote The world was spinning Way too fast, but Mother Nature kept Plodding along, doing Her job, allowing Those seasonal shows Where everything Grows at a routine pace In sod or stream, On a blue-sky breeze. But I’ve grown Beyond my body’s Animal needs, Launched through onto This imagined pathway Existing inside, outside The home ground. It’s a place I make Up just seconds before The next curve, Inventing my truth In turns, new ways of Talking to myself And charging on, Chattering the keys To rattle a song, Manipulating the groove Of my digital reality, Keep lying to ignore My gnarled toes Still dangling over The maw of my grave. Mark Gibbons
I read one of those statements I’ve heard many times out of many different people about many different tasks: the maker of anything hasn’t made anything until it has been experienced by someone else. We all make things, do things, create, express, work to connect, to get a response, hope to spark a reaction, hear something back, maybe even start a conversation. If we’re lucky we might hear the story of another’s encounter with whatever it was we did, what we put out there, the shot in the dark we took. And even if that wasn’t our objective, it is what art does when it’s encountered. Our experience of it identifies it as “art.”
We do the things we do because we like doing them. It helps pass the time and distracts us, gives us something to focus on till we’re done here doing this—living. Whatever that is, our end and the next mystery. What else are we going to do? We know nothing other than what we take in over and over again until that day we don’t, when we disappear to those around us. As we do our thing while passing the time, we note the two major impulses we experience: love and fear. Both are choices we make to survive.
All of our philosophies, religions, social mores, exist to help us survive as long as possible as a tribe and species. Stayin’ alive! We’ve gotten better and better at it, On average we can expect to last till almost 80. That’s a long time to be here knowing we don’t know shit and could disappear at any time. So, we put our attention on something that interests us. That may be a deep dive into one or a few things, or it could be the pursuit of experiencing as many different things as possible. Whatever floats out boat if we’re lucky, and often it is a blend of all the options. One factor that affects our choices around filling our time here is economic. The majority of us have to find ways of securing food and shelter on a daily basis. That’s a job for many of us.
Given that work was going to fill a huge chunk of my time in this reality, I chose my employments based on the type of work and the people I worked with and for rather than money. Chasing money usually turned into laboring in Hell. Once I felt good about the people around me and the task at hand, even if it was exhausting repetition, I found ways to make it satisfying, by focusing on doing a good job, the satisfaction of Sarte’s Sisyphus reward. That metaphor is the perfect explanation for a working-class life. Focusing on being present in the experience, the day, your life, is the payoff—gratitude. By embracing the mystery and absurdity of this existence, it gave me plenty to write about when I got off work.
Everybody’s Workin’ for the Weekend! Right? So they can do whatever they want to do. If you were somebody like me who talked to themselves constantly and loved to read, you might have taken that time to write and eventually shared it with others. And when you did that, shared whatever you enjoyed making, it was magic. And if you got a positive response, I bet you were hooked. You had something to do that you loved, a way of making your time here entertaining. The perfect distraction! If you like it and others tell you they like it, then Just Do It! You could also become a songwriter or an adperson or whatever attracts you. I’m certain you could make more money at almost anything than you could by writing poetry. But money isn’t the point here. We’re talking about being as happy as we can for as long as we’re here.
We are creatures of habit, and the more we do something, the more satisfaction we get from it. And if the critics tell you that you really aren’t very good at whatever it is you love to do, all you gotta do is smile and let them enjoy what they love to do: criticizing whatever they need to criticize. After all, we’re just Passing Through, as our old pal Leonard scribbled down and sang about. Sometimes we’re informed that what we created “triggered” someone. While I don’t aim to hurt anyone save the motherfuckers busy hurting others as much as they can, if something I write triggers someone, it wasn’t intentional unless it was. The fact that something we did elicited a reaction is better than no response at all.
Yes, it would be fair to ask, “What the fuck was all that about?” Groundhog Day is a good metaphor for what I tend to write: the same old shit. All we can do is keep finding ways to entertain ourselves and don’t give in to irrational fears, bolster love in our life, and simply control what we can control, do what we can do. And above all, be kind. Help out when we can, when it’s needed. Let it out. Let it be. Pass it on. So, here are some poems to ponder while you’re filling up your time. Me? I’m even more aware that “the shadow” is closer than it’s ever been breathing down my neck. I feel it as I scribble away. I guess more than anything else this place is a chance to post some recent poems, beat my gums and chest! Have a great weekend celebrating old Dad. The poor bastard did or is doing the best they can. Peace
Shadow Up the Road The shape of a dark, featureless Man walks ahead of me fifty To a hundred yards or so up this Abandoned mountain road, but He moves quickly out of sight, Fading like a shadow or a ghost. It's curious, but I'm not afraid. Somehow I know that shade is me, Some future version of myself, As if I recognize my existence Beyond this body, this form. I Decide: my mind is ahead of me. My shadow man is my death, and I believe he's ready for me to move Into him, to reconvene some “we” I don't recall or fully understand. I guess my shadow man's a story I'm comfortable with, nimbly running In front of me up a gravel country road On a sunny spring day, patiently Dancing a distance away, waiting on The death of this dream, my body, This form of me, before I leap into My end, the next beginning with him.
HAPPY FATHER’S DAY!
FATHER'S DAY 55 years ago you found me and let me be the boy I needed to be until we were ready to raise babies— this day belongs to me they say, but I know all fathers concede mothers teach us how to love
AND TO ALL THOSE MOTHER’S WHO ARE FATHERS AND MOTHERS DOING IT ALL ASIDE FROM THE SPERM DONATION FROM SOME MOTHERFUCKER!
Mothers Grief is the ultimate Expression of humanity Those mixed-up feelings of Love and pain blossoming into A memorial bouquet Watered by sorrow By memories of joy Anger and regret That maternal array A soundtrack for all Those days we woke to find Her there watching over us Mothers love and teach How to care for life No one else will love you More than your mother A truth we don’t know Fully until she dies Then we cry our eyes red Now she’s dead yet we are More alive than ever before Knowing she has let us go To live our lives on our own Laughing in our blood still
for Susan Carlson, a mother, grandmother, friend, and artist who did it all with love, kindness, and humor.