Chances

First page from October 2016

Staring into the face of the day when the sun has risen or recently set may result in understanding the nature of things in a minor way. You may light your path with these occurrences. As the day changes so does the possibilities of each moment. Some walk an even path. I will do this and then that will happen is often the case. You may find yourself in a system you enjoy and all things can come to you in a generally tidy way. You are in this for the long haul. Acquisitions keep you satisfied. Life is linear. There are many comforts. Or you are frugal and slowly simmer from want. Others are the wandering type. Circuitous. They seek experience. Their curiosity puts them in another mold. The sun must be seen. The road must be moving. This is a somewhat unwieldy narrative. The harvest is at certain times of year. It may not be what you expected. Freedom is what you seek, often to the chagrin of others. No matter though. We all find the place we desire, the place we create, or slide about life in an off handed way.

There are many combinations to interpret, investigate, put forward, discover, analyze and rebuke. The turning world offers many permutations. A technicolor dream can disappear in an instant between the fence and your day job. We may allow for the limitless gyrations since sameness is too dangerous or unlikely. Rain runs downhill to east coast rivers. There may be solace in this phenomenon. We can easily be comforted into thinking, this way is the best, this journey is worth having. Turn around to see how wide the berth and how many rearrangements pepper the land. Too many tulips enact a bubbling market that will soon be scarce. In the three card Monty of investment the joker flashes the carrot. Many are duped into poverty of pocket and spirit. What shall you leave by the alley of your dispersal when all the chips are down? A magical plan tucked in your pocket. Open it and be relieved of the toil and critique on information systems.

When the fox screams in the distance after the city energy bounced from waterway to concrete canyon, a song is heard of ancient revels. Others came before you. The echo of their existence is carried by the wind. You can hear their voices if you try hard enough. What boundless joy or poignant tales breeze by when the biggest story was silenced next to the Brooklyn Bridge only to be resurrected centuries later. Do our dead poets, writers and artists participate in revival or are they disembodied from their task in evolutionary time. It cannot be known but such ideas make a marvel out of living regardless of the price paid now that you are dead. I see gray faces worn by time clocks and progress reports. They worry about retirement and grow old before their time. The color spectrum diminishes. In the end no one is safe. We mark our time in connection, location and spirit. If mirth is denied what could be the point, I wonder.

America

Photo by Yann Arthus-Bertrand from
New York from the Air

How long is the trail that lead you to this? No place to call home. No solid ground beneath your feet. The innards tremble noiselessly from the shock of the world you knew, now vanished. Adrift. The city points the way. Familiar habits reorient. You have the books to make all things possible. Now more than ever knowledge is important.

In the nation, controlling mechanisms of government slip round the country’s neck poised for an unpleasant end. You and your country are at one. Placeless, harborless, somewhat mute at the unreal occurrences over time. Unforeseen, unwanted, unexpected.

A gray mist floods the Hudson. You marvel at the luck of having a good friend to allow you respite. A helpful audience sending encouragement and money. As you teeter on the edge of a place you do not want to go, these sparks of kindness and hope push you forward. Nipping doldrums of freedom lost eat away at your heels. Shall you let circumstance gnaw at the effervescent day? You tell yourself the only answer is to dispel the sickening miasma of eternal enclosure. Disembark the ship of fools for matching like to like can only taint the soul, mar the patina of age. The American experiment, though faulty, developed from a taste for freedom. Righteous ideas of equanimity arose from a fetid past of gods and kings. The microcosm equates the macro.

During this time of times, when all seems grim, we must not forget who we are. What so many strived for. My people, oh my people, on the graves of the diminished immigrant and the bold reformer our country, ourselves is built. A place where anything is possible, even the improbable. Our Puritan forbearers, promising cleanliness and prosperity, remains evident in the infrastructure. We have comforts most of the third world does not know. Our diversity, constant and incurable, gave us abundant cuisine, culture and crossover. Light still shines in the land of all delights. Do not let fear, busted desire and the need to blame obstruct what ineffective, dangerous men do. They eat at our liberty in order to devour it whole.

We see the hogs at the trough. We allowed a monster to rise in the land, no sense in splitting hairs. Did the dead multitudes fight for our democracy only to have it snatched by the dogs of avarice, conceit and blindness? We must be stronger to maintain what took so long to arrive at. Our policies and laws are being dismantled link by link by the forgers of gold chains of bondage.

When all seems lost, we can begin by re-evaluating the meaning and history of our freedom. When the rudder is lost, the ship will head for the rocks. Move out from the comfort zone onto the thin ice of change that requires courage. What choice do we have when the forests of time, a people under siege, is under the gun of gilded foolishness? Stand up now or lose everything.