world is large
boy is small
life is long
day is short
hurt widespread
hope hidden
compassion meets despair
vision focused on what is not
reality
reality
is
this moment
hurt here
hope here
enemy is neighbor
is friend
is family
is I
am not
all we are is
one
true family
body
this world
losing all illusions
of distance
separateness
and finding hope in self, other and being
this moment

i drew a picture tonight
it reminded me of home
not a particular place designated by life experience
home
in that moment we can see it
we can feel it in the air
it is content
not a place or a feeling, thought or stance
the simplicity of being
not i or you, it or them
it is this breathe
not only this but those countless taken each day from here to there
you can be reminded in senses
but you are never home until you find it
when you realize it needn't be found

there was a boy too proud to breathe. i know myself he thought. i don't need air. the boy was god. he brought among himself many followers. believing that their teacher needed no air, they believed they too could be like him. the boy suffocated himself. his followers also suffocated. the boy was god. he didnt realize air too was god. air passed through bodies and trees without a thought.

Rain falls down to the earth. How many in their homes actually take notice?

Might I take the eyes of another? One I've passed in a crowd, meeting eyes for but a fleeting moment of indifferent acknowledgment. Yes, what might I see through those eyes?

To read by candlelight
surrounded by silence
no nagging discontent
to lose time and breathe
as there is
nothing else
to only sit and watch a candle flame
till it fades
and know it will only be born again
a million times
and know a similar passing

I am that I am not
that we are and again not
how to know
other than to be silent
and leave words
as idolatry
if taken seriously

We used to be smaller. Different tongues were an oddity, something unfamiliar and mysterious. Have we lost our sense for mystery... that now we know these tongues and minds? These shades of skin have been observed, identified and classified. The world is no longer small. We travel it, know it and can thus shape it?

But did we ever understand our neighbor? Did we ever see their face? Or was it only through CNN? These are our neighbors...those we meet via Your World Today. Have we walked down our own streets to know these surburban dwellers we call familiar? Or have we ever spoken to them outside the Super Bowl and politician hating?

Have we lost contact with human beings...ourselves through human touch? The ability to be changed by interaction with other human beings? The ability to be surprised or surprise?

Rolling hills of green
or covered in snow
just take what is here
relax it will always be beautiful
so long as it is
and you can help that
with yourself
thank you for being here
we all need you