When I was young I so believed

the fairytales the matrons weaved.

Tales of woe and crimes of plight,

ended with love and might as right.

 

I thought the earth belonged to all,

for each and every one to call.

My land, my world, my place to be,

and there, in the tales, lies the veracity.

 

Stories created in the beginning of times,

yet still told as nursery rhymes.

To children across the world so wide,

a world rife with such divide.

 

And over time what have we learned,

that hope, that right, those tales churned?

Or, have we brought those tales to life,

made them true, through our earthly strife.

 

Magic beans

Cups of gold

Slaying giants

Princes bold.

 

Elixirs brewed for all our cares,

Gold-lined signals in our airs.

Hulking ogres fill our screens

and fill our minds with horror scenes.

All the while princes spare

Smiling in their selfish lair.

 

For what I’ve learned of tales of hope

is that they’re shared to help us cope.

In darkest hour we recite,

while clasping hands in dawning light,

to get us through our manmade plight.

 

The Earth is not for you,

Or me,

The Earth belongs to few, you see.

 

The coffee this morning looks deep in its tiny tea cup. 

And as the holidays begin…

I’m spending this quiet time of morning before it all begins,

Listening to these ‘old’ Christmas songs.

And I go back to that more simple time

When I was young

and listening to my father play Christmas songs on the piano.

And I didn’t know how people were in the world.

I didn’t know there was sad,

I didn’t know there was bad

And I didn’t know there was ugly and mean.

All I knew was the peaceful sheen

of the stars on snowy hills as we sang the nights away

and looked so forward to the next day.

And I learned the way it feels

to dance and twirl to the sounds of the season.

And I learned to celebrate life and be thankful for all,

no matter what.

All I knew was laughter and love

And life

In such a big way…

Always as the holidays begin.

The coffee is sweet today.

And today is dawning, the same day that dawned in my world when it began over a half century ago. And I watch the sun squint at me as it raises its sleepy head.

And I refuse to be rushed on this day, to hurry away from its realness.

I refuse to skip over the beauty and life this day has offered me so many years.

 

I think about what has been lost and re-found,

those things, those places, those people.

I consider what I find still, each new morning brings a gift.

I think about what the world is telling me to be in it.

I think about how so many years I spent running over it,

through it, around it.

 

And I watch the sun wink at me as it opens the new day with its light.

And I know the realness of this life.

And I am thankful for another year of having lived it.

and, the coffee is house blend today

And I watch as sister moon sits down for the night,

the ground bathed golden in her light.

Then out step those too shy for the bright daylight,

but in the darkness feel their might.

 

Eyes downcast with thoughts divine,

ever more the need to shine.

Their light to cast for all to see

and feel their thoughts and pain should be.

 

Their dark, dark deeds sow chaos here

and leave behind not care but fear.

Why do your lives mean more than mine,

more than those who’ve lived so fine?

 

How can you feel in golden light

that your dark feats could ever bring right?

 

The coffee this morning is stirred…

The sun is sleepy raising its head this morning.
The bows are tied and the packages shiny wrapped.
All racing around in anticipation of seeing what the sunset will bring
on this most special of Eves.
But I no longer see the miracle of it all here.
I do not see that wonder in their eyes so young,
as it was when we were such.
I do not see eyes shining bright with hope.
I do not hear that merriment in their laughter,
I do not hear their laughter,
easy as ours used to be.
I do not feel that amazement in their gaze,
for just that walk down main street,
with its bright lights and tinsel sparkle.

What gift have we given the children of our world this Christmas?
If not the wonder and amazement that is this life,
then what?

The coffee is nostalgic this morning….merry Christmas Eve.

drink free coffee…

“passenger jet felled over Ukraine”
“surface-to-air missile launched”
“from rebel-held territory.”
“pro-Moscow separatists, …
….officials said on Friday.”

“Donetsk Separatists Embrace
Referendum, …
Drink Free Coffee.”

the coffee is cold today,
but free.
…if only the lives were.

Well, it’s been a year now,
or so it seems,
since I have walked here,
sat here
and watched the world come and go.
Nothing old,
always something new.
But what is really different now
from then,
and tomorrow
and forever.
This is how we do life.
This is how we choose it.
Do we really grab it by the tail,
or does it grab us and never let go.
Never until it exhausts us
and wrings itself out of us,
leaving us feeling
we’ve never lived enough of it.
Leaving us thinking we’ve become wiser.
Never really understanding
we’ve become smaller in it,
than the day we came into it
so big.

The coffee is so dark in the clear glass mug, I can’t see the bottom today.

The wind blows through your hair as I watch from here. Standing in your shadow,
I wipe the strands from your brow.
I watch as you run through the sunshine and find the rain.
Your heart pulsing like the blowing wind.
Life runs past us, through us,
like a bubbling, spitting brook.
A quiet stream and it is done.
Suddenly, we are teetering on the tip of the falls.
Suddenly, we can see the bottom.
And we slide down, down,
the cold water rushing in our faces,
our eyes, our mouths.
Water flooding everywhere,
silence underneath.
Like at the beginning.
Life blows through your hair as I watch in your shadow.
I wipe the strands from your brow.
I watch as you run in the wind.
Never knowing the rain is coming.

The coffee is poured.

Today we wonder
what kind of world are we giving our children?
and
What kind of children are we giving the world?

The coffee is dark this morning.

The coffee this morning is murky.
As I sit here in this quiet place waiting for my lifelong girlfriends to join me for our weekly “over coffee” talk…I think about the morning talk show I was listening to as I dressed; about the Earth’s 24 hour spin that is our day.
Our President appears on talk shows now to deliver the real “state of the union” details. A retired ball player met with the leader of the most closed, Communist state in the world; and promptly declared him a “good guy.” Our idea of entertainment is watching the plight and unfortunateness of others.
And as I sit here, I can’t help but think about how the world has turned since we’ve been in it, the four of us, each marking at least a half century of holding on and riding the rotation of what we have made to be our existence here.
I can’t help but think about the significance of small lives like our own. And I begin to wonder just how many public toilets we’ve visited between the four of us over the years. I can’t help but think that maybe murky coffee is all that can stand up to mornings in a world so recherché.