My heart performs a tune so few may hear,

A quiet violin whispering passionately in the ear.

The trees sing along but even they are distant,

Myself, alone, the only thing that’s consistent.

The piano keys quicken, giving way to the night,

As the stars lay dying, falling from light,

and darkness beckons me forward in fright.

The harp strikes harshly showing all that’s infected,

Harmonizing a tune of what’s self-neglected,

Myself, the cause for what self-abandoning affected.

As the silence falls, encapsulating my soul,

I collapse under the weight of my own black hole.

I try to see the shadows that make me whole,

But with each thump of the bass, my demons rush forward.

Left all alone, panicked, and cornered,

Myself, exposing how I feel tortured.

Deeper I dig into an eternal abyss,

Listening for the lessons of all that‘s amiss.

The symphony mellows, the thundering dismissed.

Myself, the conductor, of all I remiss.

With each epiphany that I unearth,

Alone is the place I learn my worth,

Accept myself, and with it rebirth.

There's a lot of baggage behind the idea of forgiveness. If you're to believe the many Oprahisms, forgiveness is universally healing. Well, that's a mile high pile of horse shit. Let the punishment fit the crime.

Granting forgiveness should only be done when the person in question is truly sorry, the wrong was done without malice, and lastly, when the offender is going to prove themselves worthy of forgiveness by striving to never commit the offense again. Truly evil acts don't deserve forgiveness. Instead of offering undeserved forgiveness, the wronged party should strive to understand what happened, mourn the loss, and commit themselves to making sure that others don't suffer from the same wrong inflicted on them.

I'm sure many of the Nazis at the Nuremberg Trials begged for forgiveness as they faced justice. Of course, many would argue that they were following orders. However, participating in the systematic murdering of 7 million plus innocent men, women, and children doesn't deserve forgiveness. It deserves a noose. Forgiveness is born of compassion. Where the FUCK was the Nazis compassion when they turned on the gas chambers, opened fire on unarmed people, and stacked the bodies of human beings like cord wood in the concentration camp ovens? True compassion is saying, "No" to the command to butcher human beings. I'd rather recognize the innocent humanity of others and take a bullet than turn the knob on the gas that killed innocent people who were promised a shower. This level of evil goes beyond any reasonable expectation for forgiveness. All any victim can do is honor their dead and fight to make sure that this never happens again. One can accept reality and heal without offering forgiveness to those who don't deserve it.

My wife would say that my views on forgiveness were born from my childhood. My parents asked for forgiveness for exposing me to drugs, poverty, physical, emotional, and psychological abuse. The problem is that there's always a, "But" thrown in providing them with a get out of the consequences of irresponsibility free card. Adults have a choice, children don't. My mom suffered as a child from abuse and mental illness. That didn't give her license to have children she would then neglect, fail to take care of, and expose to abuse. There is no excuse for an adult to inflict harm or allow harm to be inflicted on their children. None. So, both of my parents have been told that they're not forgiven. However, I have accepted their fatal flaws and refuse to let their failures as human beings to permanently color my life beyond my childhood. Sorry, not sorry they're not forgiven. You reap what you fucking sow. Needless to say, warm, fuzzy Hallmark moments don't happen for me and my parents.

As a substance abuse counselor I saw a lot of guys who were truly sorry and committed to leaving addiction and all the hurt that goes with it behind them. Many of these guys would achieve solid recovery. However, sometimes the damage done to their family relationships was irreparable. Changed or not, their family was done with them. Ultimately, the recovering addict's attempt to make amends didn't have to be accepted by those the addicts had wronged in their addiction. As hard as it is this was, it was a possibility they had to face. A big part of my job was helping them to see that their loved ones have the right to deal with the wounds the addict's addiction caused the best they can in the way that works for them. If that meant a forever closed door, so be it. The addict could quietly make amends by leading the best life they can in recovery while helping other addicts avoid the permanent loss of their families.

Forgiveness is a precious gift that not everyone deserves to receive. True evil is unforgivable and sometimes no amount of forgiveness can heal wounds. I would argue that we shouldn't strive to forgive everyone, just those whose actions are born of one human mistake. Even the drunk driver whose one mistake kills an innocent might be worthy of forgiveness, but it's not for them to ask for or assume that it'll be granted. All they can do is never repeat the wrong. The consequences of ignored human frailty and irresponsibility when visited on innocents who don't have a say in the matter are just as unforgivable as a cold blooded murder. In short, no one should weigh themselves down with the priestly obligation to blindly offer forgiveness for any and all sins that are confessed to them. In fact, many wrongs don't deserve forgiveness, they deserve Old Testament level wrath. Now, if I could just figure out the whole fire and brimstone thing before the next family reunion.

I do not do well locked inside,

Away from sun, mountains, sky,

I do not do well stuck in bed,

The relentless pressure picks up in my head,

While I do well all alone,

Bed rest never feels like home.

I do not do well motionless,

It only leads to restlessness,

So I will climb a mountain in my mind,

So I may leave this stale bedroom behind.

Life--hard and cursed and cruel

Mysoft--oblivious, and self-blundering

When they, two, meet and imbue the fuel

To send what's unburnt, self-wondering

The abyss of what-ifs and ashen what-nows

Seals me over with what-nots of why-me

I surmise that's just life in its fashion and how

I look up, when lowest, to ruin's ceiling so highly

What rises is a refusal to settle; a gumption:

To awaken, stir, deny conventional wisdom

Mitigate limitation, decry intentional assumption

That ablates stagnation, that I am formerly, viz., from

I tread new footsteps onto pitch-blackened past

Storm toward futures that beckon me in

Against paths of resistance, witch-patterned vast

To close the mighty doors where many begin

To live and to die--just to break even

Is the so-what of life that divides by zero

For an imaginary number, an unoccupied life to recede in

And subtraction stops short my well-meaning hero

Refusal is addition of wings that torque 'gainst the thick

The bulwarks of surrender, the mark of the beast

The dive, into the deep end, snaps angst's training stick

And rails affirmation against abiding the least

You used to say we should start a revolution.

Now you're covered in ambition, blindfolded in submission, flaunting your cheap suit of wolverine, infused with denial to the extreme.

This brand of you

does not fit me,

I'm into hope;

you're into murdering

my dreams.

Clawing at your layers,

but the grime from your wasted integrity

gets under my nails,

and I'm tired of scrubbing them clean.

I keep my bags packed,

full of possibilities,

But I keep missing my opportunities,

fused to you and who

you used to be.

Remember when we used to want to start a revolution?

America is burning out

Because it aims too hard please...

Bald distraction...No interaction...

Scrounge around on hands and knees...

Fitting in

Skin to skin...

It's a hive mentality...

Buzz buzz buzz!...

And there we was...

Taking pollen to the source...

Not too often,

Once or twice

Ask myself in funny voice...

Don't this feel like something's wrong...

Singing someone else's song?...

Makes my two heads start to throb...

Back into the mob we go!...

Noises, warmth...The ebb and flow...

No one asks me what's inside...

Work to sleep...No self to hide...

Look at faces

That don't fit...

Those who'll never

Make the grade...

We determine a fixed path...

Seeking out our epitaph...

Drop the swagger!...

Drop the sting!...

Every synchronistic swing

Like a dead skin

Peeling free...

Other people I must flee!...

Fitting in

Skin to skin...

It's a hive mentality...

Buzz buzz buzz!...

Moving in gangs...Tearing down...

These shopping lanes...

America is burning out

Because it aims too hard please...

Bald distraction...No interaction...

Scrounge around on hands and knees...

5/30/24

Bunny Villaire

I step into a thunderstorm of autumn, warm colors lighting the landscape. Setting fire to the giant cathedral of trees whispering of their life. Petrichor engulfs my olfactory senses and I feel a settling begin. With each inhale I’m brought closer to the taste of saplings and spice brewing within my cup. The heat radiating from my tea is a welcome break from the winds cool, biting hug. The precipitation picks up building with speed. Closing my eyes I imagine the thumping crash of water upon my heart, soothing its beating drums. With each strike of the my footsteps the fallen leaves crunch, crunch, crunch, beneath my feet. Diffused light from the rain clouds highlights the grass in the kisses of dew upon its skin. All at once, with the howl of the wind, I am transported home again. Present in a land of vast mountains and crashing thunder I welcome the decay; lost in the perfection of another ending day.

I tether you, dear, with a pleasure so near

so deeply within it can’t be ignored

a treasure that weathers all that I fear

I never buy treasure with anything mere

and bury my hope with passions restored

I tether you, dear, with a pleasure so near

I measure my pleasure in how I adhere

to a life that I live while hoping to hoard

a treasure that weathers all that I fear

but whether that treasure for me is right here

there’s much that I find that I cannot afford

I tether you, dear, with a pleasure so near

my pleasure is feathered by what I revere

and haunted by all I haven’t explored

a treasure that weathers all that I fear

in my leisure I treasure your every tear

and wonder, my love, if you’re my reward

I tether you, dear, with a pleasure so near

a treasure that weathers all that I fear

Take a lover before you’re physically frail

However linear time may interfere

Send blood to the cheeks before permanently pale

Eventually bones, joints, and ligaments fail

Oh to bask in the sweet carnal veneer

Take a lover before you’re physically frail

The body’s a temple and then it’s a jail

A waterlogged vessel difficult to steer

Send blood to the cheeks before permanently pale

Don’t wait until the end of your tale

For smiles and temptations in nursing gear

Take a lover before you’re physically frail

As your coffin lies waiting for that final nail

Tortured missed chances year after year

Send blood to the cheeks before permanently pale

The blunderbuss is loaded and you are the quail

Life barely lived and this is the fear

Take a lover before you’re physically frail

Send blood to the cheeks before permanently pale

To hang my honor in shame.

See the unworn cap, left nigh?

the hallway hook calls my name.

It's a silence most profane,

tilt of brim, half to deny...

To hang my honor in shame.

Of all good deeds, most mundane

sits the pillbox by, and bye—

The hallway hook calls my name.

And calls the dark like a Dame,

to our dust that now doth fly,

"To hang my honor in shame!"

One fine gesture might remain,

to yet beg the conscience, why:

the hallway hook calls my name?

As all the worlds' stage proclaim

indecision's plateau's high—

To hang my honor in shame...

the hallway hook calls my name.