AMH-24

It's been a long time since I have seen

you smile. The alabaster would

give to your will, the way your freckles

congregated when

your nose wrinkled, like the space, a blanket

scrunched. I could see forever

in that face – even if you couldn't.

The things yesterday made

have broken into fragments

and spilled across time.

You and I were the same

as clay, shape-deprived, and we molded

along rivulets in the deep earth, to crack

in each other’s mouths.

Like a channel through a

light tunnel:

I felt your years as I flowed

beside you.

Anonymously vague – the tangible

breath of you flew away

from my hands, though I held the warmth.

You were a sky to me. And I held my kite on a string.

Memories of Chicago, 1933

Here we go around the world
Our little lives like a dream of carousels
And on that island we spin around
In circles traced through the hours spent in ourselves

All the lights are sighing their last breath
How did we end up here?
There’s still some wrong
And if only we awake we can make it right
Away we’ll go so please don’t sleep too long

Tell me all about it, then
When we meet among the laughter of the crowds
Light and silver as rain
We shall then fall together from the clouds

Where are all the young and glad
Whose hearts are full of the deepest creations?
Don’t forget, you’re not the only one
As we fold by the wayside and way stations

Don’t forget that it’s not everyone
So take us upwards to your star
And there’s still some wrong
If only we awake then we can make it right
Away we’ll go so please don’t sleep too long

Now we are in caravan
And I move around among the dreamers who create
Here we are, all once again
A million miles from the turnstiles we animate

Ego revolts against nature

A lot of it was growing up.
The tension of one person finding his voice.
There just wasn't enough room in the house for a new ego.
I mean, when you're a kid,
you don't realize sometimes
how much room your ego takes up,
'cause you've only just discovered it.
So you don't have a clue what the normal size is.

You blumber around,
saying this and that,
and don't realize
that other people's egos have adjusted to the headspace.
Which is why so many people with huge egos
need to speak to stadiums
because those are the only places with enough headspace.

And you know,
I'm not knocking ego:
there is a difference between ego and pride.
But a young person's ego,
when he first discovers it,
is like his first car, and
he wants to see what it can do.
And it can do a lot:
of damage or of good.

If it's true,
that pride is what we think of ourselves,
vanity is what is we would like others to think of us,
then ego is simply
what we would like to think of ourselves.

And that's a lot.