Hashtag YOLO

Quite a pathetic motto, really, but at the same time, I can relate. Now, humorously, I’ve said that whenever I use a school bathroom, I’ll mutter “YOLO” to get over the fears and disgust of the school toilets, but that’s only half true. In all honesty, certain school restrooms have decent stalls which are actually quite peaceful. But I’ll save those stories for myself. When referring to living only once, it takes on a matter quite different than the norm. Partylife, wildlife, crazylife. All of these things are synonymous with “Hashtag YOLO”. But then again, living life to its full potential doesn’t necessarily mean going ham at parties all the time, right? You can look at it both ways. I’m not arguing for or against, I’m just mentioning that YOLO can be going the hardest in many aspects of life. Be it parties or working to change the world.

With this unfriendly sting in my eye, it’s just a friendly reminder that the world and many of its friends aren’t exactly totally straightforward. A lot of the times, life just doesn’t make complete sense. But once again, that’s alright. It’s alright because regardless, the world is left here before me, ready for molding. I’m reading to get started, but unfortunately, I’m not entirely equipped. So where I get to isn’t too much of a worry for me, how I get there doesn’t pose much of a problem either. I know my life, held in Greater Hands, hold much more than just my own. Even with those gaping holes, he still manages to manage, somehow. How, I can’t even fathom it, but once again, that’s alright too.

So yes, I do only live once here on lonely planet Earth, but that’s okay. I just need one lifetime to change the world, no more and no less.

And so I leave with a renewed readiness and eagerness to let the world know that it’s time for change, to make a change, to be the change. The path awaits. And allow me to apologize for writing something as shallow as YOLO, but there is actually a nice weight in there. I just need to take care that the little lies won’t penetrate my mind because all they’ll happen to do is fester and rot. And that I can’t have happen. So, adieu, and allow yourself to be one who makes the change, rather than just witnessing it. There are close to just as many hands to work as there are eyes to see. May your work prove fruitful and cast a light for others to see.

Once You Understand…

What happens when, what happens then. Oh silly, silly silliness. When you uncover the riddle, even riddled in deep, you begin to see the details especially those meant to be discreet. If you can see what I say, and hear what I appear, then maybe you’ll understand. But really, my point is quite clear, it’s just those glasses you where that clouds what I mean.

-7

speaker, o speaker! let out your lofty thoughts
give me a glimpse, a peek
but if only a moment, this i seek
and not the drifting which it wrought

a moon’s kiss upon the glistened teal
once and twice upon the fools’ brow
left unnoticed amongst the wind’s howl
and left a question if it’s real

speaker, o speaker! lend me your ears
i hear what naught, is only left
to imperceptible lament
and growing, raging, darkening fears

and see, see! for what it is to see
tragic, broken, what’s left to be

and remind ye this, for the speaker has spoke!
to listen true to a quiet man’s joke.

Honest Thoughts While Sitting Quietly at a Desk

Sometimes I look at all the chaos running amok around the world and think to myself if I’m awake. I sometimes wonder if the life I’m living now is real, if I actually exist. I think to the atrocities of underground sex trafficking and child labor. I think to the children firing Ak-47s and stepping on hidden mines. I think of America and the huge spectrum spanning  all of the impoverished and elite lifestyles. How can any of this be real?

I wonder to myself, in times like these, if any of my memories actually happened. If maybe my thoughts really aren’t there and maybe, in some odd, inconceivable way, I’m not really here. When I think of these things around the world, maybe believing none of it exists is the easy way out. I, essentially, could care less for the children in Uganda, for the girls in Asia sold in the sex trade, for the homeless men and women struggling to eat in the great melting pot of the US, but I don’t. It’s hard to not care about these things. It’s difficult to look and see the image of a starving child, orphaned and alone, and not be moved. It would be a tragic thing for me to sit in my comfort in front of my little computer in a nicely air conditioned room and to skim over it without regard. Where would my compassion be if I did that?

The world is an odd place. It’s not all the time I question reality and existence and things like that. It’s just sometimes I sit back and my mind goes down a road where I end up in a wooded place where the leaves cover the ground in a blanket of red and orange and the wind nips my nose and my ears with a gentle sting. I simply come to new places and today I’m here. Wondering if things are real, guessing if the laws of science could have been different, if reality is actually real. But then I remember where I am. I remember the pain of this world. I remember the joys, the accomplishments, the achievements, the spectacles, the road-makers, the reachers, the settlers, the tyrants, the peace-makers, the soldiers, the politicians, the friends, the family. I remember these things and I remember. Yes, this world is real. Quite real in fact and very real indeed. At least, so it seems.

Sore

My muscles ache, my back is tight, my legs hardly lift when I want them too. I still stink of outside and the wind is still nestled in my hair. I’m disgusting. But that’s okay because I feel so good. This pain, is a pain that I enjoy. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a masochist. I’m not mentally unstable. Well… maybe just a little of the latter.

But anyways, this soreness is good. It’s good because it’s the pain of progress. I’m going somewhere and that’s usually where I like to be. Not stationary, but mobile.

Morning Twilight

Peer through the ridges and peek through the holes, O seeker of lights!

—

—

A quiet hum of a child’s hushed breaths move the air in and out in the slightest ways. He lies there deep in his dreams completely oblivious to the fact that his world may not be as it seems. It’s still dark out, with a few strokes of the morning sun, nothing more. And all he can do is lie on his back, chest rising gently and lowering again with each little breath. A serene forgetting of the world as it seems and a simple slumber into a realm where that fact doesn’t even appear to matter. While the sun inches closer to the horizon, it brings with it the hope that night will not last forever. Darkness, in its immensity becomes nothing but empty space while the rising light scatters to fill these gaps, these deficiencies.

—
What is there to disturb his peace? What is there to hinder his rest?
—

Unaware, the foreboding day creeps in as night leaves her shift. The sun stretches its rigid fingers through the sky and pierces the heart of all waiting in dark. Now the sun’s gaze has poked through the fabric of a lightened day, but not yet enough to stir the souls of the many. Still, the child sleeps. Unawakened, unstirred. He sleeps for now. For now away from the dreams. For now he evades the cloak of day, lost in his unconscious thought. Like a veil he rests on solemn comfort atop a throne of springs and cushions. His hair is scattered across his slender forehead and while he lies motionless, the world begins to stir. Away from the chaos, from the strive he stays. Away from the perverted ways of man sitting atop his throne of lies and contorted truths.

He rests, rests in peace amidst a dreary, ever waking world. Why wake him?

How long before I can give my own personalized State of the Union address?!

Just so much on my mind.