What Adventurers Do

I want to do what adventurers do
and travel by canoe to Timbuktu.

I want to be a sailor on the sea
on a wooden ship called the Annabelle Lee.

I want leaves to slap my face
as I blaze the way to some exotic place.

I want one more chance for a last great romance
where she and I dance on a moonlit street in France.

But instead I spend my days locked inside a box
watching seconds die as they race across the clocks
and I find myself wondering why people say
that doing that is what makes a productive day.

The Whippoorwill's Call

Evening has really just now begun.
I hear the haunting calls of whippoorwills
boasting that they have found another one
as the setting sun slides behind the hills.

But there's still time to dream before the night.
The whippoorwill will call another time.
Before it takes off on its homeward flight,
there's time still to think of another rhyme.

When the whippoorwill finally calls me
I'll put down my paper and my pen.
I'll grab my hat, lock the door, leave the key
and answer the whippoorwill with amen.

Someday, I will follow the whippoorwill -
when my eyes are closed and my pen is still.

Missing

There is no "You and I".
That crawled off long ago
and found a lonely place to die.

Instead there is a "You"
and then there is an "I"...
not together, but separate - not one, but two.

I imagine I should be sad
there should be some sense of loss
some emotion, some hurt, even just feeling bad...

But when I look deep in my heart
there is nothing there - it is empty, cold, and bare.

You can't miss that of which you were never a part.

To Refudiate or Not To Refudiate...

I wrote this many months ago, but decided to post it now.

I normally don't make comments on political figures. My Dad taught me that a gentleman does not discuss his politics, his relationship to his God or the merits of a young lady in public. But when a modern political figure tries to cover a gaffe (Sarah Palin Refudiate tweet) by comparing themselves to William Shakespeare, I have to do something...

So I took the immortal bard's Sonnet Number 18:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate;
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

and changed a few things to ask the question if we should compare Sarah to William:

Shall I compare thee to Sarah Palin?

Thou art more liberal and eloquent;
Rough words do make plain her every failing,
And summer's tweets show her demented bent;
Sometimes too hot the lights of Fox news shine,
And often is her intellect questioned;
And every rant shows her so out of line,
Yet by her followers is unquestioned;
But thy eternal prose shall never fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall time deny all that you have made,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
Long after Sarah and I cease to be,
your words shall live on through eternity.

And with that I think I've said all I need to say...

The Name of Eve

I find it very hard to believe
that all this sin is the fault of Eve.
Plagues and pestilence and death and war -
should these really be laid at her door?


So when we lie and cheat and decieve
why is Eve the one that should recieve
the scorn and hate and all of the blame
for what is really our deepest shame?


Isn't it time that we moved beyond
all the hate that this fable has spawned?
Shouldn't we make an effort to relieve
the stain we've placed on the name of Eve?