Maybe Poetry

Some folks can accept accolades with aplomb. They carry it with dignity and become a shining light – or not. It would seem to me that when I was younger yet much older than today, I craved the spotlight and got it, good or bad. Perhaps today I am more comfortable for any light I may have to be shone through another. But I had a moment of pride the other day that I shared with my sons. “Get over it Dad, no one cares if you are on an ego trip”. “Maybe you should be, now kick the ball”. And our beat goes on.

A strange feeling came to pass

One that did not seem to last

How lucky it is to others

That they can call us Brothers

How self centered and conceited

But I give out what is needed

I love without any condition

With you and me no contrition

Call me up with problems deep

In your life my love will seep

Not my doing I do suppose

Advice maybe I propose

Oh how prideful I became

But now all back to the same

Not my calling to rise above

Just return to unvarnished love

We must wonder, I may think

Who I have saved from the brink

My son says don’t you be dumb

Think of all you have become

Shrinks say I self-deprecate

This my friends seem to hate

Maybe I shy in a normal way

Keep vainglory off and at bay

But my Sensai says it straight

To your goodness you must relate

Hiding your flame beneath a pot

Will not help those who cannot

Oh what an ego I must possess

Better to sit still in ease recess

Do not judge me all the bitter

I will try to do better

Puffing my chest out is not my thing

But perhaps a light for others bring

For these things I can’t reconcile

Why self-loathing all the while

To toot my own horn I cannot do

It must rest and be subdued

Friends and family send love my way

Maybe I can accept it some distant day

Some were given gift of love

And others prophesy from above

Perhaps sleep is warranted now

To find answers maybe somehow

In our small hamlet of our home we refuse to do well. We check up on each other. If one of us is not thriving we do some synergism and get the Joy-Gene working again. Call that a huge group hug. Then we tackle the issue. Italian/Irish second generation and Vietnamese first generation things get rough and tumble. My ego gets smashed to hell and then back for more. Life is good when there is love.

So the beauty of the most basic poem kind of gives us pause. Kind of a “time out” from life. I have many mentors in the area of poetry/prose and I hope I never equal their work. What fun would it be without a goal to attempt, a mountain to climb or a situation to overcome? My mentors set the bar mighty high. Thank you to them.

A depressed and sad feeling hit me today

One I could not melt away

Some days are like that I suppose

It is then I turn to prose

No one every taught me the rules of life

Conflict here and there and full of strife

Seems to me that our body flows

In and out and nobody knows

Yesterday on top of the world

Today emotions all in a whirl

A strange feeling hit me today

That it is fine in old way

If I were happy all of my day

For what then there is to pray

Up and down like a big jet plane

Perhaps that is what proves I’m not insane

The best ride that could be around

Is the one where you touch not the ground

Over here and over there and there

It is all to the good my life does declare

Smooth sailing is a fine fine term

Truth be told it makes me squirm

Give something that I can overcome

And I will show you so much fun

Someone told me that this was childish poetry. Just rhyming is not poetry. It needs a perfect rhythm and flow and structure just so. So I thought to myself that this may be true. And so I wrote one that the critic could not do. How fun is that.

All temperatures

Let Winter in Summer too

Let Fall in Springtime

Fallen angels are never dead

Reason not know it is said

Eerie sounds are there to hear

Each of us demons to fear

Simple sights look as though not there

Try as we might we cannot bear

You and I will be just fine and dandy

Like a child with hard rock candy

Eric does not care for form ;-)

Heat melts the mid day

But not of summer today

Heat just simply melts

So Western Haikus sandwiching an Acrostic Angels and seasons I reckon. Maybe seasons of our heart and not of the earth.

That last line in the Acrostic could be rejected by a snob. The Haikus perhaps do not have enough of a cut to the quick in it. Maybe the notion of freestyle really is and yet we steal the portfolios of the structured notions. Around here poetry is like cooking from scratch. Fine that the recipe calls for a teaspoon of cinnamon but I really like cinnamon so two it gets. My cooking, my rules. If you don’t like cinnamon go eat Joe’s apple pie.

But all of this about poetry is a faint. I am really talking about me. So self-centered. Get over it. I ain’t never met a rule that didn’t look better broken as I look back. Oh please do not get me wrong here. I love to make rules and you had better follow them ;-)

This article was broken up a whole lot. Cooking, working, bike riding, water fight, (thank goodness no chess) catch and etc. etc.

Funny thing came to pass. I realized that my writing reflects my life. I only get a couple of hours a day of solo time. If a critic said I was eclectic I would hug him and so would my son. Eclectic would be a suggestion of at least something compared to normalcy. That is a bump up from “out there crazy”.

I told my wife that if she is making me feel uncomfortable she must be uncomfortable. And then I dove onto the nearest safe place as the hand blew wind across my face. I still got that retreat down baby, shuck and jive. Come in and float like a butterfly but sting like a bee!

Let us just say goodbye with this.

Hold me closer as you can do

No I love you ever true

No not lovers in a certain way

Lovers of love every day

But I am looking for a snitch. Snitches get stitches. Someone reported that I violated that poetry laws.

I sure love this stuff. Does England have a 4^th of July?