Category: Short Stories (Page 42 of 46)

An Old Man’s Poem (made me cry)

August 14, 2012 / Tom

Got this from Facebook, and it moved me to tears. Perhaps because I am not getting any younger, and I can see my life thus far following this man’s description. I wish he was around so that I could give him a hug and let him know he is loved, but alas he has passed. Maybe another lesson here is to share that Love with others while they are around to accept it? To steal a line from one of my favorite Pearl Jam lyrics (to Love Boat Captain):

“And the young, they can lose hope cause they can’t see beyond today,…
The wisdom that the old can’t give away”

Man, if we’d only listen from time to time! Anyway, I hope this has an effect on you as well.

♥

“When an old man died in the geriatric ward of a nursing home in an Australian country town, it was believed that he had nothing left of any value.

Later, when the nurses were going through his meagre possessions, They found this poem. Its quality and content so impressed the staff that copies were made and distributed to every nurse in the hospital.

One nurse took her copy to Melbourne. The old man’s sole bequest to posterity has since appeared in the Christmas editions of magazines around the country and appearing in mags for Mental Health. A slide presentation has also been made based on his simple, but eloquent, poem.

And this old man, with nothing left to give to the world, is now the author of this ‘anonymous’ poem winging across the Internet.” ~Scott Sonnon (Facebook)

Cranky Old Man

What do you see nurses? . . .. . .What do you see?
What are you thinking .. . when you’re looking at me?
A cranky old man, . . . . . .not very wise,
Uncertain of habit .. . . . . . . .. with faraway eyes?
Who dribbles his food .. . … . . and makes no reply.
When you say in a loud voice . .’I do wish you’d try!’
Who seems not to notice . . .the things that you do.
And forever is losing . . . . . .. . . A sock or shoe?
Who, resisting or not . . . … lets you do as you will,
With bathing and feeding . . . .The long day to fill?
Is that what you’re thinking?. .Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurse .you’re not looking at me.
I’ll tell you who I am . . . . .. As I sit here so still,
As I do at your bidding, .. . . . as I eat at your will.
I’m a small child of Ten . .with a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters .. . . .. . who love one another
A young boy of Sixteen . . . .. with wings on his feet
Dreaming that soon now . . .. . . a lover he’ll meet.
A groom soon at Twenty . . . ..my heart gives a leap.
Remembering, the vows .. .. .that I promised to keep.
At Twenty-Five, now . . . . .I have young of my own.
Who need me to guide . . . And a secure happy home.
A man of Thirty . .. . . . . My young now grown fast,
Bound to each other . . .. With ties that should last.
At Forty, my young sons .. .have grown and are gone,
But my woman is beside me . . to see I don’t mourn.
At Fifty, once more, .. …Babies play ’round my knee,
Again, we know children . . . . My loved one and me.
Dark days are upon me . . . . My wife is now dead.
I look at the future … . . . . I shudder with dread.
For my young are all rearing .. . . young of their own.
And I think of the years . . . And the love that I’ve known.
I’m now an old man . . . . . . .. and nature is cruel.
It’s jest to make old age . . . . . . . look like a fool.
The body, it crumbles .. .. . grace and vigour, depart.
There is now a stone . . . where I once had a heart.
But inside this old carcass . A young man still dwells,
And now and again . . . . . my battered heart swells
I remember the joys . . . . .. . I remember the pain.
And I’m loving and living . . . . . . . life over again.
I think of the years, all too few . . .. gone too fast.
And accept the stark fact . . . that nothing can last.
So open your eyes, people .. . . . .. . . open and see.
Not a cranky old man .
Look closer . . . . see .. .. . .. …. . ME!!

Pass the tissues and learn the lesson Tom!

∞

Story Two ~ Hidden Love (Love’s Warrior Series)

August 14, 2012 / Tom

♥

“You’re fucking this up!”

Her words hit him like a knife in the chest. He blinked slowly, deliberately trying to absorb what she was saying. He didn’t want to defend his position, he just wanted her to understand it. He wanted her to hear him, and to for once make a decision based on how he felt and what mattered to him. That’s all his statements had been about.

He loved her dearly, and she him. Each had their own crosses to bear, and while he so wanted to shoulder hers as they walked across the desert she demanded he leave her be. It was her desert; not his, not theirs, but hers and he was not welcome here.

An Unusual Love

Their’s had been a love unusual from the start. They had fallen in love before they met physically, sharing intimate details about themselves long before they had ever touched. They had walked through gardens together before they had held each other’s hand. They had forged a romance that was only solidified by their meeting.

This meeting was short but intense. Each had seemed to have found their Twin Flame in the other. They saw it in their first glance, found it in their first embrace and knew it in their first kiss. When he first entered her they found Paradise; finding that which binds the Universe and sets galaxies ablaze. They seemed to be on their way to perfection until the mind took over and the war began.

His battlefield was often set in his own mind. He knew how he felt, but he had this belief of what he wanted. He wanted a relationship that touted love beyond all measure, where he could be the man of a woman who so loved him as to set the world to destruction to defend him. He would, in turn, die for this woman in the blink of an eye if need be. They would support, defend, and love each other beyond measure and without question.

She had a different idea. She wanted a relationship absent of existence outside of it. She didn’t want him involved in the minutia of her life and didn’t want him mix with her life outside of the time they shared together. She would do battle with the world around her without him, and when she turned to him he would be an island untainted by the wars waged and battles fought. Each had their own crosses to bear, and while he so wanted to carry hers whenever possible she wanted nothing to do with the sharing of either hers with him or his with hers.

He wanted to share his life with her, and she wanted no part of it. She didn’t want to know his circle of friends or the roles he played within them. She had no desire to know or be with those he loved. She didn’t see a value in getting to know his world or to journey there with him. He, however, wanted to share his world and dive into hers. He wanted to share her joy with those she loved, be the one she reached out to in the crowded moments of her life. He wanted to know those who made her enjoy her life away from him. He simply wanted their lives to meld into one another’s like the day melds into the night. Each are separate while each are the same.

A Mindful Battle

There is no making sense to pretense of the mind. He could hear her fear and anxiety when they discussed the topic. He just wanted to cuddle her and pretend the world around them did not exist even as the winds of change blew around him. God he loved this women, and yes he would stretch his comfort zone to new limits in love with her. He would cope with not talking to her for days and not knowing a thing about her life outside of what she felt necessary to share. He would deal with the unsteady moments of anxiety and doubt because he trusted her beyond all reason. He would stand like a rock beside her even when his mind spoke words he never wanted to hear. He could close his eyes and see her even in her absence and know that at some place at some time she was living her life in the way she needed to.

There seemed to be no option. He had checked his ego at the door many times in their past. He didn’t mind, he didn’t want to have much use for his ego anyway. He could not fathom what he would need it for. There was no need for protection here, no need for selfishness beyond that which would make her smile. He fought back the voices of ego in a mindful battle waged each and every time he wanted to be a part of her life “beyond the bubble” (what he called the boundaries of their relationship). They had a glorious bubble indeed, but he so wanted to know what it was like outside of it.

Yes, the mindful battle he waged was worth it. Yet, there were times when he would sound the retreat and he would need to know. He wanted to know why he couldn’t step outside the bubble. What was wrong with the minutia of her life? What was wrong with him being a part of it? Couldn’t he be her island and still walk the world by her side?

He heard her say “no, I can’t live that way.” He heard her say forcibly that what is “normal” is not always what is right. “If you are happy and I am happy why ruin it? You’re only thinking and analyzing without feeling a thing,” she would protest in the heat of battle.

He knew she was right, but he knew he was right too. He didn’t want to live in a bubble devoid of outside contact with her world. He loved the bubble but he wanted it to be so much more. He wanted to be her man here, there and everywhere, not just in the solitude they had created for the “them” he so loved.

“Should I Forget It?”

He could hear himself asking the question. He asked it in the context of forgetting his own needs in favor of meeting hers, but soon found himself wondering if he should forget the bubble instead. It pained him greatly to even consider such an option. He simply loved this woman, but knew that in the very human way he lived he needed to be open in the world whether his, hers or theirs. He needed to walk with her wherever possible regardless of the terrain and continent they were on.

Still, how could he forget the way he felt in her arms? How could he move beyond the ecstasy of the moments they had shared? How could he forget the promise he made to himself; the one where his heart openly swore to be her Rock, her Mountain, her steady Lion? He couldn’t forget, and he knew that he could not cave to her fear. He could not walk away from her in her moment of need. Yes, it seemed to him that she needed him if for nothing else than to prove that there was a man in this world who could love her without control and who could stand by her even when she was the force driving him away.

So it seemed. Love’s own vow demanded he return to her when she was ready. It felt right to be by her side even if it were only in a bubble. It felt perfectly necessary to move onward even if that direction took him only a few inches from where he stood many moons ago. He was her King, she his Queen, and such a bond created by the gods could not be usurped by the bastard thief called his mind. He would stand by her; bloodied and wilted by the battle but standing tall all the same. Her hand in his he would face the demons, accept the reckless abandon of his Soul’s mission, and move on toward the place where they would meet in utter and complete ecstasy.

They had met where the Sun met the Earth at the dawning of the New Day. They had walked from there to here, and they could not be defeated by the momentary illusions of the ego. They were home. They were the island. They were one, and that was his choice and his vow. He would follow Love’s promise toward wherever that oath would take him and as he looked at his now empty hand he would wait patiently for hers to once again fill it. That was what the stars and the moons and the tides demanded, and that was the way it would be.

∞

Story One ~ Onward Ho! (Love’s Warrior series)

August 12, 2012 / Tom

♥

I gaze upon the Eastern way, looking for that spot where the Sun meets the Earth and a brand new day has dawned. Slowly I inch my way forward toward my life’s horizon, looking at my empty hand and feeling awash in the empty feeling that suggests that such a place does not exist. Not for me anyway.

The sands on which I stand are hot to my bare feet. The sands give way to the weight I carry and the burden I have no choice but to shoulder. Together we gazed upon the orange-crescent moon and shared the laughs of Lovers so caught up in the moment as to not know that this one could ever exist. Yet, the barren landscape on which I know gaze has come. A famine now exists where once stood fertile land, and the Sun’s once-loving gaze now draws the very life from all around me. The cloudless sky allows the radiation to drive deep within the soil and burrow deep within my skin as I struggle to move onward. I began this journey a gallant vestige of strength, able to stand tall among the trees and walk steadily through the grasslands. Slowly a slouch became evident in my gait as the summer winds grew hotter, and the grasses dried to sharp pins that hardened my feet to thick pads of skin unable to feel much of anything. Then came the sands as the dead grass blew away in the now brutal desert winds, and the brothel of mirages began their onslaught on my mind. Even my feet with their thickness found a hell in the terrain they now were forced to endure.

There would be many oases in this journey, each giving me pause to believe that such a place as Eden did, in fact, exist. I’d sheath my sword and drop my guard in each one; bathing in the springs and eating the nectar of the fruit each one had to offer. Ultimately I’d eat the wrong apple and be cast aside. In some I had to fight my way out, others I had fought to stay in. Invariably though in each I’d become an exiled warrior, and in each I could never return through some form of Divine curse, or promise, or a mixture of both.

Time would judge the battles waged as rarely worth the effort. Even with this wisdom tucked safely in my mind I would always fight. I loved the fruits; their sweet, supple nature as their flesh met my own. I loved basking in the glow of the morning Sun as It shined through the trees, the birds singing loudly as distant bells tolled the hour’s arrival. I loved inching my way into the crystal clear and cool waters freely provided as my body was caressed by Love’s great giving. Such things would often wear out their welcome, either in me or in them and I would be forced to flee or escorted to the gates unwillingly. My feet would always touch the desert sands, my brow would endure the desert Sun, my mind would battle the mirages set to ego’s great design.

In each experience, in each drop of blood and sweat, I would seek the understanding of the moment itself. The scars would not endure, the voices would not win, the mirages would not create my reality. No amount of false idolatry could replace the sweet caress of my Queen regardless of how many times the mirages would suggest such a caress was nothing more than a mirage itself. It must exist, it must be real or this journey would be for naught. Each distorted footprint left in the desert sands would be meaningless. Each moment in the grips of pleasure would have no meaning. I knew, if I just kept walking a moment more, that my Queen waited patiently for her King at that spot where the morning Sun kissed the Earth and conceived a new day. The Divine conceived this new day, my mind gave birth to it, and my body would live it indeed.

A moment’s pause, a deep breath, a quick exhale and I am ready to walk some more. The desire to be a Queen’s King so enthralled in Love with one another sets my feet in motion. Imagine being carried by a Queen who I can carry. Imagine being held by a Lover’s embrace so intensely as to never want to part. Imagine being the first thought of a woman who shares her victories and her defeats with her man immediately upon the determination of either. Imagine being the only desire of a woman regardless of how many options she may have. Imagine being so important as to be the focus despite the distance, time, or thoughts that separate you. Imagine such designs to be mutual creations of the human love shared by two Divine Lover’s in an eternal dance created by the Universe Itself.

Those thoughts make the miles fly by and ease the discomfort of each lonely footstep. She’s there, I know it. I’ve tasted her kiss, felt her move beneath me, felt her passion atop of me, and I’ve seen her beauty a million times with each blink of his eye. I will not find her by sitting still even if the stillness has helped me know her. I must continue on. I must not falter. She is looking for me as surely as I am searching for her. She is calling out my name as I echo her cries in the valleys and peaks of this path. She, too, is looking at her empty hand wanting mine to fill it. We both gaze upon another orange crescent moon peaking above the horizon and know we share this moment and that place. It keeps us pressing on, it keeps us wanting, and it keeps us knowing our destiny.

So, we move onward toward that destiny. Separated by time and space made irrelevant by the knowledge that we live within each other’s heart and soul. We close our eyes and see each other. We make love in each other’s nightly visions as our song is sung loudly through the mist of our slumber. We hold each other closely with the strong embrace of what must be. Our cells merge, our minds replaced by Something more as our hearts beat in rhythmic harmony. We are one even as we are separated, and our search will find us together at last in the eternal promise of Love. One day…

So, onward ho we go, each footstep a prayer, each moment defined in the narrowing of the desert between us.

∞

I Miss You

August 11, 2012 / Tom

My Lover,

I lay and stare at the place where you woke up this morning. I can still see the indent of your body on the sheets, and I move over to seek your scent in the spot where you were. A tear wells up in my eye as I can smell you as if you were still there, stroking my arm and holding my head in your hand; our lips locked in a lover’s embrace. I close my eyes as that tear rolls down my cheek, burning into my Soul the memories that Love Itself has created. A tear born by Love yet shed by a Soul who is completely missing its mate; a tear that speaks loudly your name in the silence of a man staring at the place where he only wishes he could find you.

There are no words, my Lover, that I can create to describe this moment. There are no methods born that would describe the emotion of your parting. Your absence is the focus of this moment created only because of the absolute beauty of your presence. Like the warm waters spilling onto a sandy beach you are missed in the chill of a summer’s breeze. I have left these waters walking tall only to find myself kneeling in solitude hugging the sand longing for the sea. I cry out your name into empty air with only an echo in reply. So I lie in bed, seeking your scent in the hopes that, as the waves break in the shores of my mind, the waters will spray my soul and comfort me. If only for a moment.

I close my eyes in that moment. I remember it all. As sleep invades my weary mind I see you clearly, looking at me intensely. I can feel your hands cupping my face, drawing me closer to your own. I can feel the instant our lips touch and we began to move to a drumbeat not heard outside our hearts. I can feel you reach for me, drawing me closer to the edge of ecstasy before pulling me back in for more. I can sense it all, the sweat, the sounds, the way your soul speaks to me. I want nothing more than to never wake, to stay asleep in this dream for eternity. Dear Lord please…

~

Yet I awake, those prayers unanswered as were the ones that could keep us together until the sunset of the last day. I looked over at where you woke up yesterday morning, praying that your leaving was nothing more than some cruel nightmarish trick my mind was playing on me. Yet there I was, alone, staring once again at that spot where you were, seeking your scent if just for one more minute, one more moment of physical remembrance.

I will await your return, my Lover, and hold these moments as a sacred testament to that magic we call Love. This empty hand will be filled once more as the Oceans of our Being will again merge in ecstatic remembrance. Our eyes will meet, our lips will touch, our bodies will merge in that sweet harmony. Until then I will close my eyes and find that spot within me where you reside; where your imprint has been etched forever and your scent shall never fade. The tears that roll down my cheeks and spill onto my open Heart will only serve to water the flowers of my Love for you. I can sense you…you are here, forevermore.

Your Lover

Shavasana

August 7, 2012 / Tom

A slight breeze swept across the flow of sweat that had covered my body.

The sweet torture of the work magnified even the slightest movement of air across my skin, highlighting the beauty of nature’s hand in every corner of my Being. Inhaling deeply I set myself to another set, another round, and the sweetness of the work my body was doing to cleanse my mind and renew the understanding of this, my physical self.

No judgments beset me as the sweat poured off of me to the ground below. Surely the grass beneath me found the salty taste of my work not to its liking. Surely the Earth would reject the bitter effect of my labor even as the Universe within embraced each and every moment. Surely as my muscles strained and my body shook in the heat of the Sun all that is in this moment would see a value to it all. The Universe knows Itself in such a challenge; when utter devastation wreaks creation, where utter chaos offers itself to the beautiful order of things.

Chaos is nothing more than the mind playing tricks with what it cannot understand.

Beyond the human mind chaos does not exist. This I see in the effort I am in as my mind creates havoc in the burn and the stretch while the Universe simply allows it to be. It is as it must be everywhere but in my mind, and as the Soul’s river works there flows a beautiful sound that suggests I am alive. The stillness after the effort allows me to hear that river flow majestically through the forest of my mind into the valley of my Soul. Out of chaos comes order, and out of experience we find there is no chaos at all.

As I gazed upon the Earth in this pose I noticed everything. I saw a tick crawling toward my firmly stationed hands as my sweat rains down all around it. My mind screamed “get away!” as I focused on this predator. It’s hungry. It needed nourishment just as I do. It smelled the sweetness of my blood through the air and it thirsted for a bountiful meal. My mind suggested that I was too good to be this lowly being’s meal. It could hurt me, it can could me pain. Who taught me that? Certainly not the Universe. Certainly not the tick. No, someone somewhere along the way taught me that ticks were horrible beings, that they must starve if we are to survive. Maybe it was through them that I learned the same thing about people.

I can remember having ticks pulled off me as a child, and burned. I remember wondering if they felt pain as the flame enveloped their tiny being. They looked so ugly, yet so delicate as they perished, my blood still coursing through the body I saw. Somehow I was one with them, and they one with me. We were inseparable, and as they vanished from this place a part of me vanished with them. Yes, there was a remorse in this cycle of nature that only a being who could see it would feel. This tick was just doing what the Universe demanded. It had no choice, it had no alternative. I did.

I raised my head and look at the trees in front of me, the approaching tick no longer a concern. If it could get me it could have me, and is I should see it I would remove it and let it go on its way. Yes, I had a choice, and my choice would be to not harm anything in this moment, not even the grass now supporting my weight. The Universe had decided to challenge me in many ways during this asana, and in one challenge it was to push the envelope of my mind toward acceptance; to make order out of the chaos. I smiled as I changed poses in time with my breath, the sweat now heading in the same direction but from a different place. I looked up at the cloudless sky and felt myself go there, following my outstretched hands to the very ends of my understanding.

“I am alive.”

I noticed birds soaring high overhead as I melt into the pose. A hawk circled high above me, perhaps believing I am nothing but a next meal. What did it see? A man working to hold a pose in the high heat of a summer day? A man struggling to understand himself in the valley of his life? A dead man not quite in the knowledge of his end? I wondered as I wished I could talk to this magnificent bird of prey. Tell me, my friend, what do you see when you look at me from your perch in the sky? What do you see when you see any of us men scurrying aimlessly about? How could you help me be more like you and less like me?

I switched back in time with my breath. My mind seemed to be screaming at me that there must have been a million ticks now aiming for various part of my body. In the pose I settled the drunken monkey back to more meaningful tasks. I could feel the sweat run down my head and drip off my face. I could feel it run like a morning dew down my arms which were now supporting all of me. I could sense nearly ever stream, every drop, every bead of me run down like water from a stone. My mind suggested that the grass was screaming at me to get away from it. How it hated the stringent taste of my work. How it despised holding my weight where I deemed it must. My Soul suggested something different. The grass beneath me loved me more than my mind did. It accepted my sweat with joy. It took on the weight of my struggle with an acceptance my mind could never fully comprehend. The grass wanted the experience of me even as much as my mind seemed to reject it. Yes, the yoga here wasn’t just me and my body, or me and my Soul, or me and my mind. It was a simple understanding that everything is yoga, everything is united and only separated by the drunken monkey those who killed ticks taught me was the only thing that mattered.

“I am alive.”

Switching to the other side and gazing back up at the sky I noticed the hawk had flew away. Or perhaps he never existed to begin with? All I knew is that he was no longer there. Maybe he had decided that I was not among the dead or dying yet, and that there were easier things to munch on. Perhaps in his yoga he had seen that his needs could be met elsewhere, or everywhere, or nowhere. Either way, I followed my outstretched hand once again beyond the bright blue sky into the space. I could almost see the light come out of my fingertips and flow freely out there, toward a place I so wanted to visit. I wanted to see what the Sun saw, but I also wanted to see the Sun as just another dot in the horizon.

I wanted to know the entirety of this place and the smallness I could see that allowed me to understand the enormity of who I was.

Someday, but for now my body screamed at me to end my practice, and to find peace in the work I had done.

Shavasana.

Police attempting to talk man down from railing on bridge

August 2, 2012 / Tom

Police attempting to talk man down from railing on Delaware Memorial Bridge

For nearly five hours, police have been attempting to talk a man down from his perch on a railing of the Delaware Memorial Bridge.

I’ve been on this bridge at least a thousand times in my life, both literally and figuratively. I actually saw a man jump from one of our area bridges one morning when I was a teenager. We were coming home from some work in Philadelphia when a man stopped his car in front of us, got out, and jumped over the railing of the Walt Whitman Bridge. They dredged the Delaware River and found his body later that day.

I remember wondering what would drive someone to kill themselves. I faced many bouts of despair in my youth and I could not imagine the depths one needed to sink into in order to end his or her own life. Not only end their life, but do so in such a way that for seconds after they made the leap they knew there was no return, no chance for survival, and no remorse until they finally hit the water. It was dramatic in that they knew they were dead for seconds before they died. I often wondered what that man thought as he sailed through the air to his end.

Life would, invariably, provide me an insight into the very depths of despair I once questioned. Now I have some idea, and I am happy to have survived to know such a thing.

Today it appears a man has reached his limit. He is the face of countless others who, today, have reached their limit. Some will end their lives. Others will fake a smile at continue on. Still others will seek comfort in alcohol or some other drug of choice. Yes, some will recognize their condition and make a choice to change it.

*Warning: Soapbox is out and I’m stepping on it. You have been warned!*

I know some who have said “pray for this man”. I say “to hell with the prayer” unless your prayer is one of action. Display compassion and Love to everyone you meet. Empathize with them to the best of your ability. Don’t be so mindless and unconscious in your daily interactions with others. Work to come from a place of service and offer whatever you can of yourself to others in the best way you can. I wonder how many people interacted with this man before he decided to sit on the ledge, and I wonder if even one random act of compassion could have kept him from it. Even if it did so for just another day.

I believe as a culture we have to either change the definition of prayer or stop praying.

Why?

Well because we seem to rely on some self-serving idea that talking to whatever we talk to is somehow us doing our part for humanity. Imagine if Mother Teresa adopted this attitude and simply muttered a few phrases to her God for the poor and hungry. Imagine if Gandhi has simply uttered a few phrases to his God for the independence and equality of his people. Imagine if Martin Luther King, Jr. had simply closed his eyes as asked his God for equality of the races.

Imagine if Jesus himself did nothing but spew off a few sentences about saving mankind from sin. Imagine if Moses simply recited some proverb about freedom for the Israelites. Imagine if Buddha has just “prayed” for enlightenment. Imagine the gifts this world would have never seen.

Honestly, prayer to me is more about walking and less about talking. Rather than utter a “dear Lord, please feed the hungry” why not simply feed the hungry? Which is the more effective prayer, the talking or the doing?

Exactly.

If I want world peace, how about I be peaceful? Does it not make sense that this glorious Universe we experience communicates much more efficiently in action then it ever could in words? If the story in Genesis is true, did God actually utter those words, or did He DO those words? Did He create the Universe or talk about it?

Exactly.

I certainly understand that the feeling behind the prayer is important. I understand that we send out a vibration in our prayerful intention. Yet, I see a much better statement of intention can be found in our action. Yes, a hug is better than a prayer of love to me. In fact, a hug is probably the most effective prayer of love we can utter for all of humanity. Give hugs, not words. That should be our new mantra.

Or at least it should be mine. I can’t tell you what to make yours. And so it is.

Ok, so my rant is nearly over. I will send out prayerful intentions of love, peace, harmony and hope to this man. I will also make it more of my daily work to say many “prayers” each and every day that involve absolutely no words whatsoever. Who knows, that anonymous stranger I share myself with along my daily journey may be heading for a bridge of their own somewhere. Maybe my prayer reaches them before they get there. Maybe theirs soothes me before I reach mine.

Amen.

The Liberation of Me

July 27, 2012 / Tom

From the glass door I watch.

The lightning crashes and thunder roars all around while I stand protected by this thin piece of fired sand. I want to step out into the darkness, to feel nature’s fury and take a chance that this life is not yet done with me. I want to leave this place where I feel secure and protected into venture the wild unknown; to get that sense of freedom and knowing that I am alive.

The voice calls and beckons me to step outside. A bolt sears through the sky illuminating what cannot be seen in the darkness. I can see the highlights of the trees in front of this door as the thunder asks for my answer. I raise my hand to the glass and can see the outline of my hand reflected as if a part of me is outside trying to get in. Is the other me frightened? It the other me asking for me to protect him? Or is he asking me to come with him, to venture into the great unknown where the only certainty was uncertainty?

Whichever, I stand alone looking at myself in the glass unsure of the steps I am about to take. I am here, now…not there, then. The reflection of the self I see disappears with each flash of light as the Self I wish to be beckons, knowing that whether I am here or there I am seeking that call of the wild I have heard since the day I was born.

I look around in my box, this place I have built for myself that somehow feels safe.

As the storm rages out there I see the beginnings of truth.

This box is painful. Each piece of timber laid, each window set, each nail driven a testament to pain. In pain I sought relief; I sought security and I built this place to give me a sense of that. Yet, in a storm such as this we begin to see that each piece of timber, each nail, and each shard of broken glass is a weapon against us in the winds of time. Each link of the chain we wrap around ourselves becomes a testament to a lie, and we begin to strangle the very thing we want to be. We weigh ourselves down with a false sense of everything, never knowing what we are because of the boxes and chains we have forced ourselves into.

I cannot play in the rain if I am chained to this place. I cannot see the stars with this roof blocking my view. I cannot see the world from the summit of a mountain if I keep myself locked behind these doors.

Somehow the wind, rain, lightning and thunder don’t seem as dangerous as this place that is giving me the illusion of peace and safety. Dying free is better than living under the burden of these things. I want to be free and enjoy this lightness of being. I want to dance in her arms with the rain drenching us. I want to hear her song in the wind, feel her power in the natural state we are in. I need to break free if I am ever going to get those things I want the most; those things I see when my mind is still and my heart is open. I need to shatter the glass door so the storm can envelop all of this so that I can never return here.

I pick up the hammer I have used so many times before in building this place. It brings back memories I don’t wish to have. I stare at it, wondering where I ever found such a tool, and can’t remember when I ever picked it up. I don’t want it anymore. It needs to be lost in the storm. I look around and smile. I can’t wait to be free of this place and walking into the unknown. I walk up to the door. I feel a sense of trepidation and relief mixed together in this moment. Soon I will be without shelter. Or will it be the sky is my roof? I chuckle at the thought, somehow knowing…

I believe I will have to dodge the wreckage of my illusions, the debris of my mind as it is consumed by out there.

I look up, seeing the other me slowly raise the hammer with a look of fear in his eyes and determination in his grip. He hurls the hammer both toward me and away from me at the same time. I hear the sounds of glass shattering along with the rush of wind and crack of thunder. One of us ceases to be in that moment of great liberation. I am free as the orange tinted clouds betray the dawning of a new day on the horizon. I cry, I laugh, and I dance…

I am born.

As I Walked Along the Beach

July 26, 2012 / Tom

Ah, these moments of inspiration and where they come from! I can only sit, smile, and surrender.

I see you running along the beach, your hair cascading backward like flames of pure fire. The sand gives to your feet as this space gives way to the determination in your face. The waves kiss you where your body meets the Earth, both embracing the permanence of this moment and the impermanence of the past as they wipe away any evidence of where you were. You are frozen in this moment in my mind, and the painting – the picture – is but a frame in the movie that was and is yet to come. It is now, this frame, that is our life.

Your body meshes with the distant horizon. Both serve as reminders of a limitless perfection defined by a finite boundary. I can see beyond the confines of your body, into the stars, moons, planets and space that make us One. They contrast with what I can see contained in the form. The beauty of your body up against the beauty of a bountiful Sunrise. The peace in your eyes set with a firm determination in your heart blending with the stillness of the ocean blending with the determination of the waves to crest upon your feet. The firm flexibility of your mind mirrored by the give of the sand until it reaches its firm foundation.

In this moment, the hammer hits…again. I know why I love you even if words cannot be found to explain it. I simply sit without question and without motivation to explain this moment. There you are, the Sunrise, the Ocean, the Sky, the Sand and all things indescribable beyond the Horizon all perfectly aligned to make this moment miraculous. There is no pressure in this place, no obligation, no expectation to live up to. You have nothing to prove here, nothing to explain, nothing to do except run freely in the water.

Run, you beautiful Angel, run. It is where I find you perfect.

Ah, these moments of inspiration and where they come from! I can only sit, smile, and surrender.

Is This the Forgotten Side of Aurora? A Firefighter’s Sacrifice

July 25, 2012 / Tom

Photo: Fire Rescue 1

Firefighter-EMT died shielding girlfriend in Colo. theater shooting

As a firefighter, I get to work next to some of the most amazing human beings I have ever met. I also get to work to assist some of the most amazing human beings I have ever met. I never met Jonathan Blunk, but I have met hundreds, if not thousands, of men and women just like him. It’s why most of us in Emergency Services shy away from the word “hero”. We know so many of them.

He saved his girlfriend’s life. He shielded her, he protected her, and he died for her. Many of us would do the same thing for someone we love. Yet, how many of us would do this for someone we don’t even know? I know hundreds, if not thousands, who would and some who have. I’ve lost friends and acquaintances; brothers and sisters who simply wanted to help another human being in their greatest time of need.

Jonathan’s girlfriend, Jansen Young, summed it up quite nicely.

Young said Blunk would have taken a bullet for anyone in the theater Friday.

“You know, the nearest person sitting next to him, he would have been like, ‘This person needs my help now,'” she said. “That just who he was and everybody knew it.”

Yes, that is just who he was and everybody knew it. Even those who have never met him. He’s part of an amazing brotherhood of sinners and saints who want nothing more than to save you; to help you, to be there when you need them the most.

You did us proud, my brother, and may you rest in peace having shown the greatness of Love in the most trying times of fear. May we have the courage, the ability and the discipline to do the same when called upon to act. Be humbled, my friends, because greatness like this doesn’t always shine from the darkness. If it did, we’d all be firefighters, policeman, EMT’s and in the military. I remain in awe of those I serve with, and of those who have paved the way before me.

So, while we get caught up in the mundane but necessary political debate over ways to keep us all safe, simple men and women are doing remarkable things to get us there. In my experience, tragedy happens in order that we may bring the best out of ourselves and in each other. Perhaps we need to focus on that “best of ourselves” in order to best honor those who have shown us the best of themselves. Maybe we need to focus a little more on the hero and a little less on the monster.

Peace.

Color My World

July 20, 2012 / tomgrasso

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZN-AyNsDtN0]

In my dream…

We danced to this song in the candlelight, your head nestled on my shoulder, our hands intertwined, our hearts matching rhythm as our minds drifted into the moment. The song itself is short, but in my dream it never ended; continuing into the ecstatic Dance our Souls have through the pleasures our bodies provide.

I awake…

Tears streaming down my face, my hand instinctively reaching for the spot where you should be, remembering that you are not there. You are here, in that place where my Mind, my Body, and my Soul meet. You are singing in that sweet voice to me, looking into my eyes, healing…

You caress my face, and lean in to kiss me. Heaven, this Kingdom of God, is here in my midst, and I feel fortunate to see it as I kiss you in return. In good time my Love, in good time. These moments apart only serve to highlight the greatness that is our togetherness, the box only serves to highlight our freedom, the mind only serves the experience of the Soul.

So here I sit, drawing a painting of Love with the written word hoping you feel it too…knowing that I’d step out of a plane without a chute just to wrap my arms around you and fly through the air with Love in, out and all around me. There is no beauty in safety here, the beauty is out there, daring us to embrace each other as we kiss the clouds and feel the wind in our Beings.

I am inspired this morning. What a gift you give this happy soul!