Daily Archives: October 5, 2026

A Bit Of Advice

It is folly to believe
that when you close your eyes
you will remember
all names you’ve heard
in your life.
Some are gone, as are
faces, voices; even
their scents cannot be
connected to them.

Of course
you couldn’t be bothered
to learn them back then so
you will not know them now.
They are not water and
did not stain your memory.
But once in a while
a scrap will jog free of its darkness
and then you will come to think
that a whole piece of your past
survived, but
you will have failed, or rather
your past stayed stubborn
and refused its shelter.

If you shut your eyes,
cover your ears, keep
a tight hold on what you have,
and be a little silent in its
chattering face;
you instead choose to watch
a mourning dove strut by
and notice how it does not seem
perturbed at all by wind,

you will be fine.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T


Parable

If you thought
about something at one time
then let it go, coming back to it
some years
or even decades later, found yourself
wandering about between poles
as if they were real,

then find yourself thinking
about it again
trying to decide
how much of what you were told
is fact, how much is a lie — or perhaps
truth and falsehood depend
on where you stand —

listen, you don’t even know
what I am speaking of, do you?
It could be about anything.

Go then into the world just as you are;
go into the world confused
and uncertain of anything;
delight in being right and wrong
and subject to conditions as it may be.
Take it
as it comes to you. Don’t decide.

Sit quietly (for example) and feast
on the native grasses of the planet
and fill up upon them, fill yourself
to bursting upon them, then lie down
quietly and end up as a grass-bed
on the face of the earth; imagine
yourself as a complex human
reduced to peace.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T