Category: Short Stories (Page 36 of 46)

I Once Believed

May 21, 2013 / Tom

There was a time when I believed in something.

I believed that they were my family. I believed that I was their son. I believed that I meant something to them. I believed their words. I believed who I was to them. I was more than just some guy brought into their family. I believed I was loved. I found importance there, and I found meaning.

I believed that they were my friends. I believed that they liked me. I believed that they laughed with me and at my jokes. I believed they saw something in me even if I had not yet seen it in myself. I believed they had faith, that their smiles were genuine, and that their friendship was based on who I was. I found peace there, and I found importance.

I believed that she was forever. I believed that the scars would heal, that I would be “fixed” and she would forever be there. I believed in the power of love even if I had no real idea of what love was, and I believed in the imminence of forgiveness even if I was uncertain of how to forgive. I believed she could make the pieces whole, and that the power I had found in the beauty of her smile would make the dream real and the nightmare over.

I believed that I was broken. I believed that I needed them to fix me. I believed in the guilt that I felt with every breath, and the surety of failure that was my constant companion. I believed I needed them to show me strength, to prove my value, and to make me something more than I felt I was.

Yes, I believed. I believed I was nothing. I believe I was something the ground would tread on. I believed in the darkness and I only dreamed of the light. I repeated the mantra of weakness as I gave others power over me. I abdicated the throne given to me at birth, and I let others control the kingdom of my life.

I believed in them because I did not believe in myself. I needed them because I did not know who I was. I feared being alone because I did not know the awesome company I keep in myself.

Now, in their absence, in their denial, in their outright rejection I find a beautiful sunrise. I find health. I find peace. I find a strength unimaginable yesterday. I realize they are not gods, and that it is patently unfair to expect others to give me what I cannot give to myself.

Most of all, I find a love for me. I find a joy in being with me, and I find those things make me able to love those in my life without need for definitions, of roles, and of a commitment that neither feels right nor feels necessary. I find the power to be honest not only with those in my life, but with myself. I find a great acceptance of my flaws, of my strengths and of my humanness. I find my center easily because my focus is not diverted out there.

And I am happy. For the first time in my life I feel truly happy.

So, in some respects I am grateful their words were meaningless and their devotion unreal. I am grateful for the tremendous loss that has brought me here. “For I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see.” I am happy to have sunk to the bedrock of my life so that I could find the truth there. I am grateful for the climb out of the pit, and for the fact that she was nothing more than a hollow promise that did not exist outside of a fantasy. I needed the loss, and I needed the pain in order to discover something far greater than I have ever known in my life.

So, in letting go I have found nothing to hold on to. I have found surety in the bedrock on which I once stood that showed me the beauty around me. The hug of my children. The truth in their words that come in the hallowed words “Daddy, I love you.” The ability to stand up for my truth regardless of what others would say or do. The indescribable feeling of sitting with my children in a “family sandwich” telling silly jokes until we simply can’t think of another word to say. Then we are still, as if on cue, the three of us simply listening to whatever direction the Universe sends us in. We can find great joy in our sandwich, and we can find great joy in our aloneness because we are not defined by any of it.

I have discovered that I am whole, and that I am a perfect being even in my imperfectness. I need not be fixed for there is nothing broken. Yes, I laugh out loud at the thought that I needed anyone to be fixed. Now my choices are mine and mine alone. I no longer need have faith in anyone even though I have found faith in many. I no longer need pretend and fake a smile in the storm of false accusations and innuendo. Let them throw their stones, for my choice is to smile purely into the heart of their anger and speak my own truth regardless of what they do.

There is love here…much love, and it is now directed in the right place. Yes, there is great promise here.

Removing the Shackle

May 11, 2013 / Tom

Ever just want to scream something so ridiculously crazy that the world would just have to sit up and take notice (I was thinking “I love you” would do the trick)? Ever just want to hug the stranger next to you in such a way that they had to hug you back?

Ever just want to not eat until some idiotic wrong was righted in the world? Ever just want to stop alongside the open highway and climb that rock face that is taunting you as you drive past?

Ever wonder where the shells that you hide under were created? Ever wonder why you say “I’ll start tomorrow” the very thing you want to do now?

Who the fuck put this shackle around my leg?

Right. I did. Sure, someone else may have handed it to me. Someone else may have even taught me how to put it on. Yet the fact that I am still wearing it is all my choice. If there is a lock on it, I put it there and I can remove it. All it takes is resolve and the simple choice that I will not be tied to this place any longer. Then I have to actually bend down, remove the chains, and freaking fly.

Put down your chemical weapons, the ones you use to assault your mind and body daily, and dance freely in your insanity. Throw away your bricks and mortar, the very means you use to defend yourself against shadows, and actually risk being free. Stop seeking protection from the “powerful” and realize your own power. Stop giving others the power that you were granted as a birthright into this physical world. Make them responsible for themselves and give yourself the choice to live. Hug your lover. Make love in the rain and don’t stop until you simply cannot move. Kiss your lover in the middle of a city. Hug her in the throes of an argument. Do the unexpected. “Be notorious!”

I, frankly, am sick of being my own version of the status quo. I’m sick of the rules. I’m sick of being told fucking is a dirty word and that there is a process to everything. I’m tired of walking in the direction the signs tell me to, and I’m sick of being told where to stand and where I am permitted to stop. I’m fed up with borders and nationalities. I see much more order in chaos than I do in the mundane assimilation of my soul to someone else’s way of life.

I will live in honesty and truth not because it is expected of me, but rather because it is who I am. I will live debt free because to owe is to be enslaved. Once I have filled in a hole it will never be dug into again. I will relish life in its simplicity, and I will love hard and die when the time is right. You will not scare me. You will not deter me. You may hate me but you will never change me.

I will not fly a flag or worship a statue. I will not follow your silly superstitions and I will not fear the tales you tell. Demand I bend to your lash and I will stick it up your ass. I will not honor the manly creation of God or the Godly creation of man. I will simply experience, and I will climb the rocks I choose and hike the trails that call my name.

There, shackle removed. Your turn.

The Fragrance of Love

May 11, 2013 / Tom

He could smell her still in the depths of each breath he took. The sweet fragrance would cause his eyes to close, bringing her into view in the only place she could exist for him. There he could not touch her, or speak to her, or see the tiny chills run up her back when he touched her but he could feel her presence just as he always had. She was there even though she wasn’t, and he could feel her even though he couldn’t.

The fragrance of love never changes even if the flower that gives it life is born anew. You open your heart like a flared nostril and fill yourself with life, exhaling only with the sheer anticipation of being caressed by that fragrance once again. You hold her tightly to your chest to take her in. You gently brush the hair from her face as you draw the lines on her body that her soul commands you to draw. You are as free as you can be even in the gentle strength of her embrace and you know. Her flesh was made for you as surely as yours was made for her. There you smile and bask in that wondrous paradise we call ecstasy, and you reside in that glorious place we call Heaven.

For those of us who have smelled the fragrance of love we know we shall never forget it. We may never find the flower again that sets our racing minds to rest, but we are purely grateful for once watching the flower bloom and sharing in its beauty. We can still find awe in the rising of the Sun. We can still bathe in the beautiful river whose currents once took us to the very fields of Eden. We can still have the fragrance of love wrap around our hearts and bring us to the greatest joys even in the smallest events. That is the thing about such a flower. It is better to have held it and let it go then to have never held it at all.

Our experiences bring us to different places in our present moment. We may find the greatest of strength in the depths of weakness. We may find the wonders of success in the bleakness of failure. Regardless of where we are, we are all blessed in having the choice of creation, and we are free to make the choice as to which blessing we want to have. I stare at the hand that once held the flower and I hear her voice in the deepness of my sleep; my choice being to appreciate that summer moment as well the winter that froze the pedals in my fingers. Spring is here, and with it a new promise of finding that flower once again.

Some seedlings will blossom and others will not. I am but a searcher in those fields of possibility, dancing among the springtime sprouts and laying on the fertile soil where I have chosen to rest. I cannot pretend, and I cannot be any less than who I am because I carry with me the fragrance of love never forgotten and never washed away. I have known this, and I cannot close my eyes to this truth and pretend it never was. Like the brightest star in the evening sky that fragrance guides me, and although I do not know what I am looking for, I will know when I find it.

For now I whisper a solemn oath only the butterflies will hear as I marvel at the power of the truth I have found. The deafness of the caterpillars who have not yet tasted the flower contrasts with the miracle of flight in those transformed; the worms themselves searching for a place where they, too, may take flight to the heavens above.

There is one truth that remains in a life lived in a dream. My potential lies in the realization of what is possible. What is possible lives in the realization of my potential. You must, my friends, find a sturdy branch on which to place your chrysalis. You must make the holy choice to follow your experience to that place where it sets your heart to beating. You must see yourself as the only obstacle to your greatness, and know that fragrance within you for all of its worth. Dance forever in the fields of possibility and realize that you will never know the limits of your potential until you have created them.

Good night, my love. I will find your shortly in my dreams.

A Terminal Lesson: Air Travel Gurus

May 1, 2013 / Tom

I feel myself involuntarily exhaling as I enter the parking garage at Philadelphia International Airport for yet another flight and another set hassles that will test the very fiber of my existence. Air travel is a remarkable adventure where we are somehow convinced to exercise the abnormal as a means of normalcy.

Where else would we actually pay hundreds of dollars for inconvenience after inconvenience? Air travel sees us pay a high price to, at least in Philadelphia, struggle to find decent parking. Imagine if a salesperson told you, “if you pay me, I will make you drive all over the place for that one treasured spot that may or may not exist anywhere near where you need it to.” Would you give him your money? Or would you slam the door in his face and never answer a call from him again?

Then imagine I, as that remarkable sales person who tried to sell you a parking spot that did not exist where you needed it to, also said to you, “If you pay me hundreds of dollars, I will make you get to my place of business hours before you need to, and then I will make you stand in a long line for the privilege of being searched. For your business, I will not guarantee happy employees, or courteous service anywhere along the line. You will, most likely, be faced with rude service people, bossy employees, and other patrons who are frustrated like you.” What would you say to me as that salesperson?

I’m still not done with you though as this wonderful experience is not yet over. After you deal with those wonderful long lines, I then had you hike a mighty hike just to get to the product you paid for. Once there, you would likely have to face even more discourteous employees just to stand in another line that will end with your ass being crammed into a rather uncomfortable seat that was likely installed before you first voted. What would your impression of my product be? Would you deem it as something you’d want to buy?

I haven’t even gotten to the part where, after you’ve paid me hundreds of dollars, I make you walk into eternity to get a bag you’ve entrusted me to get to your destination. I’ve also forgotten to read to you the disclaimer that says your bag may not even arrive as I told you it would. You’ll stand there for an interminable amount of time waiting for something that did not arrive as promised. Do not fret though, I will deliver it to you once (and if) it actually shows up. Just please don’t forget to tip the guy who made it all perfect by dropping off the bad at some ungodly hour of the night.

Yet despite it all here I sit on that uncomfortable seat yet again wondering if the executives at US Airways actually fly their own airline. If they do, I doubt that they have our experience while doing so. I was wondering aloud while waiting in the first long line of the day if the people who run Philadelphia International Airport actually use their own airport. I wondered if they actually have to use the same parking as the rest of us do. I wondered if they had to wait in line like the rest of us have to. I wondered if they had to deal with the same angry-acting employees that we all seem to run into.

I really doubt that any conscientious employee could use this service they sell and actually think it is worth what they charge. I sincerely doubt that anyone who runs the airport believes they are doing the best that they can. I really could not fathom that the executives at US Airways believe they are providing the best service they can for the price. In fact, I had this funny thought that the people who run PHL must use a small airport when traveling or, at the very least, have some special privileges that get them from having to experience their product like the average traveler does. It’s why nothing really changes, similar to the reason our Congress is the fucked up delusion is has turned out to be.

I even had this rather humorous vision (to me anyway) that the executives at US Airways charter flights in order to avoid having to use a competitive airline. They certainly don’t use their own airline or, at the very least, they don’t get to experience it the way the rest of us do. I’m sure the same asshole at the gate counter I saw this morning smiles and acts all kinds of wonderful when his boss goes to the front of the line and sits in first class. I’m sure that rude, disgruntled employee who treated the woman in front of me with such utter disrespect is all polite when a boss is around. Obviously that employee is being rude to the wrong people, he needs to be rude to his bosses that make his life so miserable and nicer to those who are using his airline and sharing in his misery.

There is one saving grace though. The flight attendants are awesome. I imagine they have the same misery the rest of their company shares (except, of course, the executives) but they seem to find a way to smile through it. They do what they can to make up for the experience we are having, and I have always applauded them. I’ve always believed that if any employee of an airline should be miserable it is the flight attendants, yet here is another in a long line of crews I have met smiling, serving, and trying to make this experience one that I won’t totally dislike. Yes, I will take a bottle of water. Thanks for asking politely. Thanks for smiling. Thanks for serving.

That leads me to the real point I am trying to get to here. There is a reason I am sitting in a seat that won’t recline after dealing with rudeness, inconvenience and having my atmosphere invaded, smiling and happy. Although it may seem I’ve focused on the issues of air travel I promise you I am merely describing the reality of air travel as I’ve experienced it. What I’ve chosen to focus on is the practice of keeping “who I am” during the challenges of the day. I choose to stick with my higher vibrations while standing in the first long line. I even told a few jokes to people around me that got some laughs even from those who seemed miserable before I decided to humor myself. The line moved along and I moved along with it. That happy mood followed me into the other long line and into the actual security area where I again went with the flow. As I approached the place where my privacy was to be invaded, I took off my shoes and stood there barefoot. I decided to focus on the feel of my feet on the carpet, then the tile. Yes, I believe I can create the place where I stand into a happy place, and that I did. I even caught myself smiling as I walked into the scanner. I focused on the fact that this process is there to make me as safe as can be expected miles above the planet, so I was happy to go through it. More importantly, I was happy all those around me had to go through it. So, yes, I smiled.

I guess my penis, rectum and everything else checked out safe because I breezed on through. Now, I am sitting on my uncomfortable seat listening to the flight attendant telling jokes. He’s really quite funny, and although most of the people around us have chosen to sit in their misery and ignore his attempts and humor, I’m laughing as I try to decide between water or coffee. I’ve chosen water, and he suggested ice. Thank you, funny man, in so many ways.

I’m also happy I’m writing. Sure, in this cramped space it looks like I have forearms coming out of my rib cage, but I am writing. So, do I want to focus on the cramped space or do I want to focus on the fact that I am writing? I’ve chosen to focus on the fact that I am writing and, yes, that has made me smile. I’m sure I will find happiness in this as long as I choose to, or at least until my hands become numb. That may change my focus, at least for a little while.

The beautiful thing about free will is that it allows us to make choices that directly impact our experience. We are free to see things as we choose and free to change our minds at any time. When my hands grow numb I will see that as a bad thing. Maybe. Perhaps I will see it as a signal that it’s time for me to read, or do some other variance of work-related things. Perhaps I won’t see it as bad at all but rather another in a long line of experiences that influence my present moment. Maybe I won’t judge it. Whichever I choose, it is a choice that I am free to make regardless of what mom and dad taught me about it. I am free to see things as I want, in the way I want. How awesome and powerful is that??!!

Free will is not really “free” though when viewing it in the “currency” mindset. It comes at the direct price of your experience. Believe me, if you choose to be miserable and to focus on the negatives of this experience there is a price. You will be negative and you will be miserable, and that will attract misery and negative experiences into your life. If you choose to focus on the positives and choose to be happy in this experience the price you pay is that you will have a positive and happy experience while attracting positivity and happiness into your life. You are completely and utterly free to make that choice, and either one is the perfect one for you until you’ve decided it isn’t Then, you are free to make another. You are free to go through this life mindlessly or you are free to go through it mindfully again regardless of what mom and dad taught you or what some preacher says from a pulpit. You are free to write your own book in any way you wish just as you are free to live your life according the book someone else has written. Either one is a valid and perfect choice, even if you have no idea of the power you have when you make it. And yes, you have that power in each and every aspect of your life’s experience.

With that in mind I’ve chosen to make experience my religion and I work daily to experience this life through my own “eyes” and not the experiences of others (like living religiously through a bible which is, in essence, a written experience of someone else). I’ve chosen to make action my prayer. I never ask for anything when praying despite what my past conditioning has taught me. Instead, I either state an intention (as in praying for someone else’s well-being) or do something. I don’t ask for peace, I become peaceful. I don’t ask for an end to hunger, I feed someone. I realize to some that asking is, in fact, an action, but to me asking is nothing more than trying to get someone (or something) to act for us.

It has been said that experience is the best teacher. If that is true, then it must be the best religion. Look at my experience today. I’ve found that I want to be happy, so I did things to make me happy. I didn’t ask for happiness, I acted in ways that made me happy. Even as I just looked outside my window to the ocean miles below me I didn’t ask for safety. Why? Because I have no control over it, and I doubt highly that there is something out there who views my safety as either necessary or something of concern. If I am to plummet to Earth then so be it; it must be an experience I need to have before I have the experience of leaving this place, so maybe it would be the ultimate practice of surrender and choice. Hhhhhmmmm.

Well, my hands are starting to cramp. I hope you’ve chosen to enjoy this sharing as I have enjoyed my choice to write it.

Feel Me

April 24, 2013 / Tom

“Imagine,” she says, “my arms around you, my tongue tasting you, my heart beating next to yours. Imagine the wildness in my eyes, the beast escaping my parted lips as we embrace in the wilderness of love’s sweet creation. Imagine the calm roughness of it all, the sweat pouring from our brows and mixing there, in that infinite field of pleasure we call “us”.

I can feel your body in my arms, my love. I can hear your sweet breath in my ears as you whisper those sacred passages uttered from the deepest parts of your soul. It is not my ears that hear, or my fingers the feel, or my eyes that see. Something else is guiding me toward that part of you no one else can see.

Give that to me, my love. Discard the burrs and thorns you have collected as you made your way here. Throw away the shields you have created to keep yourself basking in the illusion of wholeness. Open up those once-closed arms and let me nestle beside you, in you, around you. Feel that warmth of the Sun rising within you and the waves rushing around you. Feel the sudden coolness as my touch inspires you to find new heights and seek new pleasures. Do not think, but feel. Know your thoughts as passing clouds and realize your feelings are the breeze that pushes them away. Experience this and make it your religion. Know this and worship at the altar of Love.

Forget your body as the water flows out of you. Let go of your senses and know them to be the essence of Heaven making Itself known. Bathe me in who you are, and let me kiss away the scars as you drop your guard forever. Be true to that thing called “us”, and know that there is truth in what you feel in your Mindfulness Reach out for my hands and they will answer you. Claw at my back and hear me beg you for more. Let me taste you in your moment of glory and let me forever be found in those enlightened spaces. It is there that I will shine, and it is there that you will know who I am.

Your Warrior has come for you, and in the bare nakedness of our Beings we have found each other. It is not the flesh that beckons us to climb. It is not the mind that begs us onward. There is no spoken word where we stand. Rather, you will know me in the chills that run up your spine as I trace the contours of your breasts. You will know me when you feel the hardness of my desire enter you. You will know me when you close your eyes and feel the tingle starting as I beg to take a drink.

Truth is found in those moments where body, mind and soul dance together in perfect harmony. Imagine that moment when our bodies scream in pleasure as our souls splash and dance in the puddle our melting minds have created. Imagine the perfect synchronicity of our rhythm as we move together. Imagine the throbbing of our flesh in the moment we see the sparkle in each other’s eye. Then feel it. Feel it with all of your heart and make it known that feeling is the truth. Then the fog will lift and we will see each other, as the there and then become the here and now.

I am waiting for you, my love. With impatient patience I am waiting for you to crest the summit and smile in my direction. I am waiting for the lust you inspire in my heart to become the truth of our souls. I love the journey I have taken and the place I stand now because it all is leading to you. I honor the health and the scars, the wins and the losses, as words written leading to that chapter where you are waiting. I read my story with a smile because you are in it even if I haven’t gotten to that part yet. When I do, the words will flow like beads of sweat from our enraptured skin. We will find it all in that space we call “us” and in that moment we call “now”.

Take this place we are in now and cherish it as the path that leads us to that first real embrace. See the Phoenix rising above the once burning pages of this experience, and see me, the Lion, smile forever adoring the time he has spent with you. Know that as I wrote this your voice was in my mind and your essence was swirling around in the green-hued center of my Soul. Know that I do not know your name but I do know who you are and I will recognize you when the time is right. Know that as the pages turn to that place where our stories combine that we are not writing fiction. Know that I am smiling right now as I can feel you, that unknown hand outstretched as a respite from a journey hard-fought and well-taken. As you read this at some time in some place not yet seen know that I am as sure of you as you are of me even in the throes of complete uncertainty.

Perhaps we have met. Perhaps we have gazed into the starry sky together and felt the pulse of life around us. Perhaps we have never seen each other. Neither of us can be sure, but certainty will be the gift we receive the moment it becomes available. There we will float hand-in-hand in the River of Life, eating of the same fruit and dancing in the wilderness among the trees we have planted.

Be well, my Lover, I am here. There is little doubt when hope becomes real, or when a prayer is echoed in our footfalls and answered in the intertwining of our fingers. Be there, even now, and find me there. Be still and find focus for the mist will burn away in the glow of destiny. Find your truth and stick to it even when the lightning and thunder of a world gone mad distracts you, and when the winds steer you off course know that you can always look within and find that star that will guide you home.

Walk well, and in the most still of moments hear the rush of the ocean beyond what you can see. Rise up and pick the fruit off the trees that bend their branches to you. Take off your shoes and feel the Earth hug your feet. Slowly drop the threads that hide you from me until, as our paths cross, we both stand naked to no one but each other. You will, there, find great pleasure in the tip of my tongue, the movement of my fingers, and the hardness you crave as the ecstasy seems too much to bear. We will bathe in the torrents as the rains bathe the dust from our skin and clothe us in a new reality. Come, know it all and be prepared to scream your prayer as unintelligible words to an unknown god. They will be answered.

That is Love

April 7, 2013 / Tom

The beads of sweat stung his eyes as his breath tried mightily to meet his demand. He was exhausted, the pain in his body screaming in utter delight, the strain on his mind battling his will like a champion slayer.

Then he heard it. Her voice entered the furthest reaches of his Universe. That whispered breath breathed life where none could be found, and gave him strength when he thought for sure he had been beaten.

That is love.

We drag ourselves through thicket and thorn, through peril and pain, through hell and high water at the beck and call of an indescribable spark that is not created by us, but in us. We scale tall mountains, overcome deep-seated fears, and battle demons that once appeared invincible and merciless in search of that cool whispered voice that reminds us of who we never thought we could be. We find ways to overcome and to bear the weight of the crosses of our own design just to spend a moment in the cool spring sunlight or to feel the refreshing rain upon our skin.

That spark, that whisper, that rain; that is love.

Ask what we feel when we are in the presence of our Lover and words escape us. Ask what it is that truly inspires us to rush by her side when she calls, or to face our fears with such reckless abandon and we will sit in silence trying to find the answer. Ask what it is that truly turns us on about our Lover and we will stutter and stammer our way to something that only makes sense to an idiot.

That absence of language, that silence, that inability to think; that is love.

Nothing reminds you of the beauty of your Lover than her absence. Nothing reminds you of the awesome taste of love than those periods of separation from it. Nothing reminds you of the comfort of your Lover’s hand in yours then when your hand is empty. Nothing reminds you of the refreshing breeze of love then when that air is stagnant.

That is the love of aloneness. It is a time when you can remember, a time when you can truly cherish the Lover who is waiting for you. Be patient and she will come. Be honest and she will see your truth. Be real and she will know your reality. Find peace in your aloneness and you will find peace in your Lover’s embrace.

That truth, that reality; that is love.

We often focus on what love is not. We focus on the fear of our loneliness. We focus on the absence of another. We focus on the loss. We focus so much on the weeds that we begin to hate our own beautiful, bountiful garden. We seek to fill the void with such devotion that we only deepen it. We forget who we are because we lose sight of our Selves and, in turn, only remember who we are not.

That aloneness, that garden, that focus; that is love.

When she comes we are not ready. When she arrives we are unkempt, unprepared and unfocused. We will love false prophets in our mess, and we will lose sight of her. Gone off into the fog she disappears, and often we never knew how close she was. We get lost in the sea of desire, of false needs, of bitter fruit and forget the sweet taste of the nectar that is truth. A false hand in our own does not make it full. A bitter taste in our mouths will not satisfy our true hunger. We will cry out in the night for her but she will not come; our heart is already full even if we feel its emptiness.

She will come when you are ready. Prepare now as if you are preparing for a guest of your highest importance. Pick up the trash that is in your mind. Sweep clean the dust and debris that clutters your heart. Bring sweet fragrance into each corner of your Being. Sit still in patience enjoying the space you have created in what you are, and wait. She is coming and she is looking for that place you have created.

That cleanliness, that space, that sweet fragrance; that is love.

Your work now is in preparing. Close the doors of the rooms that are clean and do not return. Free yourself from the bars and chains of your own design and fly free through the air. Dance readily in the open fields and find the absolute truth within you. Do not look outside, stay inside. Do not fear companionship but do not need it either. That is when you know you are free, when the need vanishes. Do not fear your empty hand but rather fill it with a tool of creation. If you are a sculptor then sculpt. If you are a carpenter then build. If you are a writer then write. If you are a Lover then love until your truth is revealed to you in the glory of a tingle that invades your spine.

You will know your Lover because her language will not be in words. Your heart will beat her song. Your skin will rise in her presence. Your breath will be stolen from your chest. Her lips will taste like the juices of heaven. Her embrace will embolden you. Her touch will show you to the gates of Heaven until you finally enter that paradise. There, you will need for nothing, ask for everything, and receive all that you have asked for.

That song, that taste, that sweet place of God; that is Love. Stay in that place, and let not Earth or hell steal it from you. Melt into her, and allow her into you. Stay there, always, and find no place you else you need be. Be present and remember. Love your Self and remain free.

That is Love, and that is where you belong.

“LIVE”

April 3, 2013 / Tom

In the end, none of this will matter.

I will be some old, decrepit shell of who I am now laying on some tomb of cloth and comfort looking back and wondering why any of this mattered to me at all. I will look at my frail arms and wrinkled skin and wonder what I was working toward. I will think about the hours working out, the time spent with my mind buried in a book somewhere and I will ask “why?”. I will look at the coldness of the room around me and remember the memories of making love and of the feelings created in those moments, wondering if it was all worth it.

And then I will smile, and that smile will be the answer.

I will know in the end that God does not exist.

I will see in the end that whatever I thought God was simply was a dream conjured up by the minds of men who simply could not help but try to name the unnamable. I will see that while I was busy worshiping a figment of man’s imagination I missed what God was. I missed Her in the trees as I walked. I missed Her in the songs of the birds and in the sounds of a stream rushing to the ocean. I missed Her in the autumn’s unforgiving coldness and the warm renewal of spring.

In the end I will find that I was so busy looking for life out there that I missed the life in here. I will see that the reason I closed my eyes in prayer was so that I would not look anywhere but within me for the answer. I will find that I am, and always was, the Creator, and that anything and everything was possible had I only sought to make it so. I had the power to heal. I had the power to live. I had the power to be.

I will struggle to move my head enough to see around me, only seeing walls; the same walls I’ve always had around me. I’ve built them, carefully laying block after block until I finally found myself bedridden and without the strength to lay another. I will shed a tear at the meaningless of these stones, suddenly realizing that I simply did not love myself enough to be free. I will remember my many protestations of freedom, but as the end slowly casts its light upon me I will realize how imprisoned I was. I will see my chains in the many “should haves” and “what ifs” my mind sends forward in the stark realization that I never truly lived.

Then I will silence my mind as the walls disappear around me.

I will know then that I was never the body, or the mind, or the beliefs, or the faith, or the failures, or the successes. I was never a husband, or a son, or a brother, or a father. I was what created, and experienced, all of those things.

I will then begin to see what I never knew as God in my body, in my heart and in the way I viewed things. A woman will come in my room to help prop up my weakened head, and ask me if I need anything. I will see what I never knew as God in her, in her smile and in her actions of care and compassion. I will see God in the pillow that now supports my head and in the woven fabrics that now cradle my aged body. In fact, I will see God in everything and realize that there is nothing I am not.

I will see God in the aloneness that I feel, in the waiting and in the moment. I will remember God in the strength I once had and in the strength I now possess. I will hear God in my breaths and in the gaps between them. Again I will smile.

There will be a chuckle as I see that I have experienced the Universe and that, yes, the Universe has experienced me. That laugh will come with a sigh in the realization that it was all so perfect even as my mind now finds fault in what I did not do.

Had my religion been experience I would have been in church every moment of my existence. Had my faith been in “what is” I would have not needed faith at all. Had my mind been focused on that practice I would have easily kept God’s day holy. Each and every moment is God’s day, and presence is the way we keep it sacred.

In the end I will see it all, and in the end I will shout out to me now and say, “LIVE” and beg for a baptism into experience where a priest is found in everyone and everything and the truth is found in each and every step of my life. As my head sinks into the chilly waters of doubt I close my eyes to save them from the sight. There, I feel my heartbeat loudly, and feel the tug of the surface pull at me.

Then I am raised, as if from the dead. As my head breaks the rippled surface my eyes open and I am born. Not born again, but continuing the process of birth that will end the moment my eyes close for the final time. I give thanks for the dream sent back in time by me at the end. I give thanks for the voice echoing in my head commanding me to LIVE. I give thanks for the uncovered truth of who I really am. Then I take a step toward…

How Beautiful You Are

March 31, 2013 / Tom

I wonder if you realize how beautiful you are.

How the gray, mundane world bursts alive with color at the dawn of your smile. How the bored silence of the routine jumps to life with the sound of your voice. Can you see the cracking dawn within your soul? Do you know what your very existence does to a man only half of who he is without you? I sit, and I stare, and I remember.

I wonder if you realize how beautiful you are.

Naturally, without the fine tuning of an artist’s pen upon your skin, you are beautiful. Found in the subtle power of your touch, of the simple yet overwhelming grip of your gaze, is the defined knowledge of beauty born in the chills that run down my spine. Seen in the calm pools of your eyes and known in the sure intelligence of your voice, it is there. It begs me forward to a better part of me. It asks nothing more than the best of who I am, and I in return, often fail in the quest to get there.

I wonder if you realize how beautiful you are.

As the morning light gently caresses your form the breath is drawn out of me. My heart beats to that spot where your hand touches my face and your mouth reaches for mine. The hardest parts of me dance in the soft, moist pools of promise as the sanity in which I once believed vanishes as if it were some gifted hallucination of gods who could have only hoped to have been here, now. I smell you as your hair tickles my face as you climb on top of me. I look “up” although I’ve lost all sense of direction as gravity loses its grip upon my soul. And…

I wonder if you know how beautiful you are.

How the moment I enter you all things cease, how our bodies disappear and how time and space cease to exist. I wonder if you feel the waves of pleasure as I do, if you are hearing the same song as I reach for you, never getting deep enough in this endless pool but always trying. I gasp for air I do not need, and I search for things found the moment of this union. Then I feel the puddle we have created, and like a vast river on which I ride I know I will one day find the ocean. We will find the ocean.

I wonder if you know how beautiful you are.

I seek to show you the gift you are to me. I stretch my arms out wide as if some sacrifice upon an altar, grasping at the fabric on which I lay but not wanting to feel any part of it. I’m not holding on, I’m letting go despite what my hands would cling to. I give all of me to you in this moment. Every bead of sweat, every sound, every breath, every beat of my heart is yours. Take it, my love, and hold in gently in that space where your deepest treasure can be found. Take it, my love, and forget the moment before and do not seek the moment after. Be with me here, now, and never let me go.

In the orange flicker of Heaven’s great candle we lay. Out beyond the veiled glass doors of our space resides a place where our minds will go even as our souls remain. You turn to me, and in the glow of love and of the morning light you say,

“Do you realize how beautiful you are?”

I kiss you gently as the angel’s wings surround us both. In the mirror it is I see, and it is in the silent surface of our river that I know. Sing to me, my heart, and bless this moment in eternal memory! We close our eyes, embraced to sleep awakened in love’s sweet harmony.

To You, The Unknown

March 19, 2013 / Tom

Somewhere in the warming spring breeze I can hear her. Like a whisper she moves through my soul, into my heart, slowly caressing my mind with loving verbs while embracing my lips with her own. Somewhere beyond the mountain in front me she must be there, looking at the elevation and wondering if I, too, am there.

I am, my love. I am here. I am waiting. I am listening and I am seeing. The scars you see have prepared me for you. The wounds you see bleeding are not wounds at all, they are openings for the light to enter. See that bandaged place? See me remove those barriers to the light and watch me shine. See the untouched parts of me, those vestiges of a future only seen in the present moment. Protect those sacred spaces so that I may stand there naked, without armor or a veil of any kind, as your man without a question in a space where there are only answers.

That mountain in front of us must me climbed and at the summit we will meet. There we, those two blocks of ice, will begin to melt into one another as our sweat, our souls, and our tears merge into that one puddle of Being we were destined to become. We will walk together through the hottest fires, the coldest winter storms, in both shear bliss and utter despair. We will walk together through the white and the black, the light and the darkness, both of us drawing swords against those dark demons that would devour us in the fractured corners of our minds; both embracing those moments where there is no battle to be fought. We will touch the sky and dust the white clouds from the blueness while kissing the stars; making love in the moonlit glow of the dream we have allowed to be.

There, a kiss will bring a smile, a laugh, and a beginning. A new Universe born in each embrace, in each caress, and in each challenge our humanity will offer. I will enter all of you as you embrace all of me, and I will hear your heart beat through different ears, see your smile though different eyes, and feel you through different senses unblanketed fear but shrouded in love.

Yes, my Unknown Love, the climb is worth it. The bumps and bruises you will feel as you climb, as you stumble, and as you begin your climb anew will heal as my arms hold you tightly to my chest once you reach the summit. If you get there first, wait for me, I am coming. If I get there first you will find me sitting still, smiling, as you find renewed strength and life just at the sight of me. You will come, yes you will, and you will never leave.

No vows will be necessary as our lips speak the only words necessary. No promises will need be issued as our dance will speak the only truth we will ever need to know. We will have found ourselves, our moment, and our testament to the journey we have made. We will try to keep the Sunrise in our eyes as we remove the barriers to our Now, to our moment, to our dance. Laugh, smile, and know we are here.

Now, I look for another handhold on that mountains face and honor the mountain. With each pull upward I hear that whisper in the wind. “Your soulmate is out there, struggling as you struggle, seeking as you seek. At the top of this mountain you then realize that ‘what you are seeking is also seeking you.'”

When Love comes suddenly and taps
on your window, run and let it in but first
shut the door of your reason.
Even the smallest hint chases love away
like smoke that drowns the freshness
of the morning breeze.
To reason Love can only say,
the way is barred, you can’t pass through
but to the lover it offers a hundred blessings.
Before the mind decides to take a step
Love has reached the seventh heaven.
Before the mind can figure how
Love has climbed the Holy Mountain.
I must stop this talk now and let
Love speak from its nest of silence. ~Rumi

The Space Between (Songs of Inspiration #2)

February 22, 2013 / Tom

The space between

The tears we cry is the laughter that keeps us coming back for more

The space between

The wicked lies we tell to keep us safe from the pain

I sit in my car at a stop light with the laughter of my little ones behind me, tears streaming down my face. Tears sometimes are the echo of the heart not specifically pointing in any direction but somehow facing inward, reminding us that there is something warm beating within us. Tears are not always tales of sadness or remorse but are sometimes stories of healing, of potential, of a glorious birth that is about to take place.

In my mind I stop and look forward yet behind me. I see the desolation, the destruction, the wreckage of what could have been. I see the wisps of black smoke rising above the moments in my life where fear had sheltered me from one storm only to create a far more destructive one. I see the litter strewn about my life and the burned out shells of books that could have been so beautifully written and read. I see the partially burned out pages moving with the dust devils of my memories, roughly being jostled from one resting place and swirling upward violently before coming to rest in another.

These swaths of living hell are not all I see even if they are the first things that have captured my attention. Wounds will do that to you. Those pieces of yang will distract you from the pieces of yin that also lie in this path. In order to see them you must learn to look beyond what time and conditioning have taught you to see and then you must open your arms to embrace it all. This isn’t about rejecting the periods of darkness that have kept you company in your nights, it is about embracing the light that comes in the spaces between. It is then about realizing that the darkness truly comes only in the spaces between the light. It is then about accepting both as a part of your day, part of the moment that is you.

I then saw the fields of flowers interspersed in the charred remnants of my moment. I began to hear the singing of birds above the crackling of burning embers and the life dancing about in my story. I could begin to feel the love above the ashes, and smell the fragrance of the roses, the carnations and the orchids. I could feel Life in it all and I smiled through the tears as the laughter of my little ones echoed around a mind no longer dulled by the numbness of a dream only I could create.

I could see the black clouds adorning a full, blue sky and realized that yes, the moon does shine during the day too. The tides go high and then low just as life ebbs and it flows. We don’t measure the tides by the height of the sand yet I have chosen to measure my life by the abundance of sadness. What if I was to measure it by the presence of love; focusing on the area of flowers and of the mellow beauty in the songs of the nature around me? What if instead of seeing the patches of destruction I saw the vast areas of loving awesomeness that made them so noticeable? What if I changed my focus, changed what was the space between?

The space between

Where you smile and hide

That’s where you’ll find me if I get to go

What if I choose to let go? What if I chose to act on that feeling I have when I look into her eyes? What if I chose to smell the roses instead of running from the dying flames of a past that is no longer there? What if I simply held her hand instead of thinking about then? What if I decided to dive into her, to walk that distance that separates us and erase that space between? What if I kissed her into a smile, coaxed her from her hiding place or simply went there with her? What if I…

…acted a little less like a boy beaten and a young man faulted and more like the being I want to be?

The questions mount, filling up the space between the gaps in my breath. I look at my empty hand and I wonder what it would be like if her fingers filled the space between my own. I wonder what would happen if there was no space between our lips, our mouths, our bodies. I can imagine the beauty in the space between our footprints in the sand as we walk hand-in-hand kicking the foamy surf forward. I wonder about the beautiful realization that occurs in the space between our eyes as we look into each other’s soul, and in the space between the heartbeats we share in a long, loving embrace.

I wonder about the words we could write in the space between our story of now and our story of tomorrow and, yes, I wonder about the space between my story of then and the moment we are sharing. My mind circles around the space between the rising and the setting sun, and the darkness that comes in the space before the sun rises again. I also wonder if I would ever know the sun if it wasn’t for that darkness, or notice the beauty of my life without the ugliness. I wonder if I would ever know the beauty of a loving hand in my own if not for its absence.

We’re strange allies

With warring hearts

What a wild-eyed beast you be

I can hear the endless fights and the countless debates about things. Things. I can feel the intimacy slip through the spaces between wrong and right, of listening and talking. I can hear the striking of the arson’s match setting the artist’s canvas on fire and the writer’s book to flame. I can hear the tears as the breath escapes our very mouths, and hear the fingers part as our hands fall to our sides and our gazes turn from what could have been.

I can sense it coming. Isn’t the testament of devotion and of love the beginning of the storm? Isn’t the wounded mind wracked by what it has seen surely cursed to war with the very heart it seeks to know and to love? Isn’t a bruised heart like the broken mast of a floundering ship in a raging storm sure to sink in the sea of its own devices? Isn’t a tired body sure to burn in the fires the mind has set?

Or are those things the very beginning of rebirth we seek? Isn’t it just a matter of awareness, of seeing the opportunity to embrace the beauty and be reborn? Is it just a matter of seeking something different?

The space between the stories of my life gives me enough room to experience it just as the space between the sky and the ground gives us enough room to fly. A horn blows from a car behind me allowing me to realize that the space between the red and green light at this intersection has allowed me to find some clarity in an otherwise hectic morning. I look in my rear-view mirror at my little ones in the back seat and notice the space between the tear on my cheek and the smile on my lips.

Perhaps we find our greatest experiences in the space between. Perhaps we find our wisdom there. Maybe we begin to realize our own truths as we begin to realize the spaces between. Maybe the greatest parts of who we are resides in the spaces between the illusions and delusions we have created about who we are. Maybe my soul has always been singing the words I now hear in my mind spreading across my soul like the light from the Sun cresting above the morning horizon.

The space between

What’s wrong and right

Is where you’ll find me hiding

Waiting for you