Your Light

You have to figure out,
What it is you have left,
Once ev-erything that can be taken,
Is completely bereft,

Your money removed with no more income,
Possessions disappear,
Naked, friendless, your family all gone,
Along with anyone else you hold dear,

Tortured into revealing deep secrets,
Still your limbs are removed,
Even light is extinguished, then touch, too,
All else that might yet soothe,

So what is left,
That you may call your own?
Whatever ‘tis you must nurture it now,
For it’s what makes you unique ‘mongst the clones.

Life’s Make-Up

Your life isn’t one thing,
Nor is ev’rything one,
It is one thing happ’ning one at a time,
In linyar succession,

They can pass quickly, then so too does time,
Depending on your mood,
To make the most out of ev’erything,
Then you must give each thing it’s proper due,

Experience each thing for what it asks,
Both your feelings and thoughts,
Isolate those that are doing no good,
And revisit them not,

The choice is yours,
Don’t be in denial,
Consider all that life has to offer,
Reject all you find sick’ning and vial.

When We’re Apart

Just give me a smidgen,
Of the love that we share,
Enough to prime my pipes of confidence,
So’s I succeed out there,

So’s I can flow right back into your arms,
You who were primed also,
United as better individ’als,
So’s we are alright when one of us goes,

A condition of life you can’t avoid,
At least no one has, yet,
The only fact that gets me through the day,
So it’s not filled with fret,

At losing you,
Or fearing for your heart,
Knowing we’re happy and the other’s fine,
When our circumstances keep us apart.

Logic Games

There are seven swimmers,
Each will have their own lane,
Bobby, Chris, Dana, Flo, Guy, Hen and Joe,
There are rules to explain,

Chris will e’er be in a lane after Flo,
But not before Bobby,
If Dana is third, then Guy will be fifth,
In the first or seventh lane will Joe be,

Bobby will wear one of the three red caps,
There’s two green and two blue,
If you’re fifth, you’re green, but not if you slept,
Underneath the blue moon.

Now a question,
If Hen wakes up Thursday,
Decides he’ll stop swimming to study law,
Which swimmer will end up in the fourth lane?

Projections

Let me see your hist’ry,
Resting atop your head,
All the things you’ve done one could never guess,
Looking at how you’re dressed,

Or meeting you through a mutual friend,
Then dating for a while,
Spending hours a day getting to know you,
Helping you through a trag’dy to a smile,

Arguing at length ‘bout important things,
Like god and the future,
None of these things show all the nasty stuff,
To which you’ve been inured,

That surprise me,
Plus ev’ryone you know,
Perhaps if we were all an open book,
Our lives would not be filled with so much woe.

This Face

This face I’m sleeping on,
I’ve slept on it before,
Over fifteen thousand, five hundred nights,
P’haps fifteen thousand more,

Nights of fear for what the day might then bring,
Nights of unbridled joy,
Nights when my brain didn’t know where it was,
Preoccupied with the thoughts of a boy,

Nights that my eyes saw more than they should have,
Forever now in me,
Nights I wished my head would ne’er rise again,
Oh, human self-pity.

Look at this face,
Tell me, what do you see?
There are hours ‘pon hours when it lay alone,
Time etching marks of impermanency.

Above the Clouds

In a hot air balloon,
Least five in a straight line,
Moving swiftly over a sheet of clouds,
Where the sun always shines,

Then one-by-one they’re caught in tree branches,
Stood impossibly high,
My feet dangling over the basket’s side,
Clouds so wet, pants get soaked up to the thigh,

I climb out onto a near tree platform,
With the rest of the fleet,
To watch a drummer a few trees away,
Starting us on a beat,

Completely new,
For the new life we found,
I’m not sure what, but that dream said something,
Meant for the me set firmly on the ground.

Plus Formatting

It is one eleven,
Now it’s twelve minutes past,
How much time do these things take me to do,
At fourteen you do ask,

It depends if I have something to say,
Now I am at fifteen,
Or if I’m just writing for writing’s sake,
‘cause when I don’t I feel it’s a failing,

Then seventeen pops up its ugly head,
I’m not against a clock,
But how hard do you have to think sometimes,
To feel that you have talked?

It took a while,
To think of that last one,
Now you know what I’m able to produce,
From one eleven to one twenty-one.

Not Me

What will you learn from me?
The tricks of a canine,
Yes, useful when you want to roll over,
You know, just tow the line,

Leave all your dreams and desires back of mind,
They’re not important,
Do not fight for something so selfishly,
You garble what the opposition meant,

Don’t get angry at my supplication,
Rebel with fortitude,
Look at me with disdain for my weakness,
However you construe,

Your place midst me,
Make me your nemesis,
Better you hate what I have become t’you,
Than become what I’d hate on my conscience.

Numbness

My skin is not ticklish,
Not like it used to be,
There’s been a numbing to the nerves below,
That reward touch with glee,

This lack of feeling can be extended,
To my spiritu’l self,
We only know what we learn from the world,
My joy’s not tied to the physical realm,

Better it wasn’t beaten out of me,
As an innocent child,
Or drubbed due to a life of hard labor,
Or love from pedophiles,

Or self imposed,
It’s just the way I be,
Insensitivity rooted in flesh,
Transposed to my spirituality.

Before The Show

They say time goes by fast,
I think they may be right,
You’ve a small window to know who you are,
Babe, let’s stay out tonight,

Look away into the air thinking hard,
Guilty a thousand times,
If only all your dreams came true right now,
Oh man, if only you could see the signs,

You’re on your knees yelling something ‘bout you,
Your failings and missed boats,
Just lie down and hold onto my hand, love,
For now, that’s all she wrote,

’til the next day,
Lament after lament,
‘nother morning after a wasted night,,
Dreaming of renting a new apartment.

Day 8

Had to get out early,
My life was in danger,
I was in the path of Typhoon Mangkhut,
Just me and no other,

Not three mill Chinese with no place to go,
But flimsy apartments,
Or ex-pats whose flights left three hours past mine,
After the airport shut down in Shenzhen,

Oh, what a story I can tell my kids,
Their dad's near brush with death,
The sixty that died in the Philippines,
Proves that I should have left.

Happy ending!
Now we can laugh about,
How I was back in bed two hours after,
My thirteen hour plane ride had made it out.

Day 7

Know what you don’t see here?
Those figures of fam’lies,
The white stick drawings on the back of cars,
Explaining who they be,

You also don't see many harnesses,
Even fifty feet up,
It's representative of the freedom,
Enjoyed within China's repressive gov,

It is hard to see the ones beaten down,
'til you talk recklessly,
Their eyes widen as they look around them,
For the authorities.

But that's not odd,
Anywhere you might go,
We all try not to live in the margins,
To not bring attention from overlords.

Day 6

Here’s something I’ve noticed,
Real east west difference,
Not the food, the language or traffic norms,
Not even politics,

It’s what the men do on really hot days,
Least Beijing and Shenzhen,
To cool the body they roll up their shirt,
Letting the heat escape through belly skin,

They tie it off somehow or let it sit,
Propped up by a round gut,
Mine is so hairy that would not do much,
Same story with my butt,

Too much info?
‘T’s’in the name of research,
How will we ever bridge our differences,
‘fwe hide things ‘cause they make our egos hurt?

Day 5

It’s hard to remember,
Just what I did, really,
Tired from being up all night previously,
Then passing out early,

Heat so humid,  back of my shorts were wet,
Got tired of Chinese food,
Saying xie xie no longer gives me joy,
Yet I feel saying thank you would be rude,

The PSB keeps demanding changes,
You can’t argue with them,
Government opinion will e’er come first,
Before good opinion,

But that’s not new,
It’s the same where I’m from,
Meeting diff’rent people in foreign lands,
Highlights this common human condition.

Day 4

He is not unhappy,
He loves his two children,
His parents teach them things about the past,
He says did not happen,

But they’re from a diff’rent generation,
They still love Chairman Mao,
They will never accept the new China,
With its freedoms that he says it has now,

Not that the government doesn’t control,
Or at least it tries to,
But he would not give it all up to move,
‘Cause China’s not bad, too,

He’s got his friends,
Family and his work,
He likes the Beatles, Bob Dylan and Trump,
But he’s not missing out on any perks.

Day 3

Wasn’t going to do this,
Got nausea coming on,
Part jet lag, part haze, part Chinese pizza,
Part need television,

Saw a tree today that was a cell tow’r,
A clever invention,
Made, looks, without the proper procedures,
Like most everything else in Shenzhen,

Because here there is a lot of people,
With plenty more to spare,
When you have loads of a commodity,
You can build with no care,

For safety’s sake,
Sure makes for a great scene,
You have to do something, then go ahead,
Of course there’s lots of suffering not seen.

Day 2

The clothes theough the window,
Hang on the balcony,
As if there is no room for a closet,
In this entire country,

I saw the same when I was in Beijing,
Not ev’ry place for sure,
Just enough to make me think ‘bout the folks,
For whom this condition’s become inured,

The same people that I see in the streets,
How small must their lives be,
Shoulder to shoulder e’en out in the world,
A close-knit soci’ty,

Who’m I to say?
Space doesn’t mean a thing,
Certainly not a better living state,
For my own country’s vast majority.

Day 1

Much of the ads are white,
The subway is yellow,
The sky is grey, but I've an umbrella,
Unlike much other folk,

Riding their two-wheelers on the sidewalk,
Some motorized, some not,
The Oct-Loft neighbourhood's waiting for me,
Once I finish the short nitro I bought,

It's three thirty in the morning for me,
That will change in two days,
When my body catches up with my brain,
Then I may find my way,

Like we all want,
Travel broadens the mind,
It shows you things are the same ev'rywhere,
So there's really nothing you need to find.

Say That Again

Is this the end of it?
Don’t seem there’s much to say,
There’s no point to it if there is no point,
Time’s cost’s too much to pay,

To say the same thing over and over,
What? That’s already done?
Even repetion’s repetition,
In the human scope of communication,

But is it repeating when in the end,
We’re saying the same thing,
Diversified by the necessity,
That we’re diff’rent beings,

Wh’want to connect,
Why, no one really knows,
Maybe to see that we are all the same,
Something that language will ne’er ever show.

No Pressure

Here's what you have to do,
To be okay with you,
Remind yourself each moment what you love,
As each if moment's new,

But at the same time you must forget it,
You have to think things through,
Weigh each option before you make a choice,
You owe yourself consideration, too,

Then step back and think of the big picture,
What many folk eschew,
Knowing where you're and where you want to be,
Is the talent of few,

That's about it,
'fyou want to take my cue,
It's a lot to get done in a moment,
With no time to appreciate what ensues.

Thé Rollercoaster

Sometimes you must feel lost,
E’en on a well-known path,
When you really stop and think about it,
Your surety could not last,

There is too much you haven’t been told, yet,
Never mind understand,
Far too many contradicting reports,
For you to confidently make a stand,

Everything that you learned growing up,
Might actu’lly be false,
Not a reflection on those who taught you,
It is times changing pulse,

Or something else,
P’haps you’ll figure it out,
I’ll know when I see you walking around,
Despite the facts, as if you have no doubt.

Pink

Pink is in the future,
The color of tickles,
The juicy insides of a tasty steak,
Anxi’ty calming pills,

The color of the flesh of new born babes,
Destined to grow up white,
If there was a hue to the hope I feel,
It would be black as night,

Pink as the clothes that were run with the reds,
God, will I ever cry,
Watered down blood as I sob in the rain,
Knowing I’ll never die?

Don’t bet on it,

Each new day’s a new chance,
Do not ask me why my cheeks have turned pink,
It is what happens when my insides dance.

Get 'Er Done

This is just for content,
Then again, what is not?
Quantity over quality's the way,
The modern world is bought,

Thousands of acres of servers buried,
Sucking tons of gigawatts of power,
Storing internet junk,
'nough to fill thousands of CN Towers,

Or something, I haven't done the math, yet,
Who has the time for that?
While calculating others will produce,
The data bank podcast,

So get to it,
Overwhelm the audyence,
By the time they've the time to judge your work,
You'll make a million dollars off their hits.