Little Love Bug

                                                                                                   O

                Love bug likes the light
                Reaches up, eyes shining bright
                His hands proclaim, all must behold
                This wondrous spot of glowing gold
        Feel his smile, few-toothed grin
        Chubby cheeks and dimples in,
        Happiness so pure it shakes
        You to the core and breaks
Your heart and seeps through every pore
Until your teeth are clenched
And wanting more,
To hug, the need to squeeze
Upswells  from all that love
In your eyes and his,   clear as bells.

Self-sufficient

Living one direction
Making decisions
That are contested

When the persuasions
and hopes
of others drive you
more than your own

When
"I miss you" sounds
like a reproach

It's hard to see
the true course
Around the rocks
When the river bends and splits

Listening, waiting
And striking
Always at the right time
Not missing

When it feels like failure
To just be
And moving feels like sickness
While hiding rips and deadens

Living independent
While supporting others
And finding support
Is the rotating balance
That challenges
and keeps you alive.

Stagnant

Thinking too much
Of What Could Be
Creates the regret
For the waste of Now
And Loss of the Past
Without seizing the Future
Leaves wishing and wanting
Without vitality

Momentary Colours

The snow is blue
With evening hue
Reflected from the sky
The inky trees
Like knobby knees
Jutting from the crust
This light lasts for
Just minutes more
As sun slips farther by
Azure turns darker
Past some marker
Night takes over dusk

Pass Word

The greatness in
A moment when you
Were pretty sure you couldn't help
But a thrown out word
Prompted a thought
That you could have quieted
But shared aloud
Just in case
And then
Sudden success!
Brilliance through luck
And the good timing
The thinking to say it
For help or annoyance
And so much undoable
Becomes managed

Painted Hollows

Unsure of technique
Every move a first time
Fearing cracks or worse
And unable to do
But wait
And then release the mold
Or try to

Experiencing Now

It can be freeing
To stop in a moment of remembering
Catch yourself at it
And label it for what it is
Then return to the present.
This remembering, imagining
Can relive the good
Or dwell in bad and build unease
Like sickness
And both can hurt

Dreams and possibilities
Built without intention or action
Lack foundation so completely
And yet wrap layers of trappings
Insulation that mutes reality
Diluting life

Guilt, regret, embarrassment,
Pain, longing, sadness
Anxiety and dread
Can serve a purpose, But beyond this point
Serve only to degrade and poison
Binding with hesitation, worry,
Self - hating, doubting,
Circling and sickening

Dwelling in fantasy
Or punishing thoughts repeating
Trap and separate, stall, pulling down
When we'd flourish with a little pruning
And a lot of light

Care is more complex than that
And growth takes many paths
But living is necessary
To find the worth in more
Than an experience of stasis

Presence of Mind

Peace lies in quiet moments
And in dynamic joy
In contentment and fulfillment
And acceptance
Embracing the present
And the wisps of future and past
Without suffocation from either
Peace is happiness
Without hysteria or fear,
Success in being.

Concentration

Learning from my other self
Both helps and keeps me
Farther from a focus
That is unifying
Mind and body, feeling one
And passion, dreams, and duty, too
When two are three or more
Thinking wraps and winds
It binds and loosens from the moor
And draws in many different
Directions that only
One could not go.
So I must pull inward and together
Dancing and striding
On the planks I lay myself
And the path I pick out
In my imaginings

Sleepy

Drooping eyes
And a sweeping exhaustion
Draining the energy
From muscle and bones
The mind pulls you down

A Job

Just doing
Feels like success
Validation
And keeps you doing
Instead of thinking

Lies

I've got it all figured out
Just shred your doubt
Because I'm on my own
And I've got to be bold

I'll plan, and move
With strength always - forward
Driving onward oncoming
To the darkness of the light.

Endless Day of Snow

Continuous legions of fluff
Ice crystals so soft and airy
Slanting down in the wind
Billowing, blowing
Across sight, pressing horizontal
And puffing upward,
Dancing, slowly down
And rushing fast, so fast
Gusts layering in droves
Pillowing deep

Connecting

Finding motivation
In a smile
From a voice through the phone
Beside one ocean
While on the other coast

Hearing love
That wraps your beating heart
In a squeeze of warmth
Flushing
A smile of your own

And brightness in your eyes
More in every breath
Active posture in your step
And a clearer mind

A Roving Road

The road rolls out
A ball of yarn
Crossing and winding
Tangled, or doubling back upon itself

Soft, itchy, ticklish
Rough, or burned to hardness
Knotted, or frayed
and broken

Tied together, ends dangling
Knitted in patterns
For strength, and flexibility
Designs for beauty,
fulfilling some aesthetic

Sludge in a Chrysalis

Indecisiveness holds a line
behind the counter
Hesitates
                      in what to do

It makes planning and ideas
flow at sluggish, unsure pace
And stumps the process of becoming
Wrapped in muzz.

Not just in decisions
presented day to day,
Activating choices
Driving forward on your own
is what makes the most
of what you mean to be.

Patterns on the Glass

The frost on my window
is beautiful
A sky of icy feathered wings
taking flight