A sneak peek of a piece from The Universe Inside Her II: A Book of Unsorted Poetic Letters. This book contains 33,046 words of emotion of human existence, smashed into 310 pages… thus far.
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“Life is just about survival and tolerance;
that is all this adult life seems to be about—
no time left for living.
And to survive and tolerate and bear the undesirable
is what they say makes you strong.
So, then, maybe I am weak for dreaming of better things.
I imagine and hold out hope for a world that may not even be out there.
I want a version of reality that
simply cannot exist within this realm.
But tolerance is so boring,
and survival is too basic,
and bearing the unfavorable seems simply like giving up
more than holding up.
With every one of my last breaths,
I think I’ll be a dreamer
and disappoint everyone
(and maybe I won’t even care that I do, because, heck, forever isn’t so far away.)
and chase after that “unattainable” life that I can see so clearly in my head.
My heart says it’s not far out of reach,
and I think I like my heart much more than I like my mind,
so maybe I’ll follow her this time.
Maybe I’ll follow her to nirvana and leave this monotone and delusionally “sensible” Mind in this physical world where he seems to belong.
But here is not my home!
Here is not my heart’s home;
she belongs in other worlds!
She has dreamt up for me wonderful worlds where the sky is always soft blue,
and rains come beautifully gently and quietly in the spring,
and where sunsets always turn the sky a perfect golden hue full of dreams fallen from the river of heaven!
A world where love isn’t impossible,
and never separates nor requires second chances,
and wherewithin twin flames meet and never separate;
a life where an eternity is a promised blessing of overflowing love!
Oh a world of no heartbreak and pain!
A world where little motels dot the map and are made of perfect simplicity,
where two can travel, worry-free.
A world where cigarettes don’t kill your lungs and working at the liquor store earns you your keep,
and where messy is just beautiful imperfection
(like the ruffled hair of your lover in the morning)
instead of deep and consuming destruction.
A world where all is simple and time is in your hands and your life is your own.
Oh if only the river of time would run to us all and grace us each with a generous kiss;
a bucketful of his blessings,
even to each a lake of our own!
Then regret would not rule us all so,
he would be no cruel master.
And yet,
here is one world, in which I breathe,
where working a 9-5 at the gas station,
and even breaking your back at a second job,
won’t even earn you half your living,
nor a safe home, nor enough food to feed a dog;
you’ll live paycheck to paycheck
and on your gravestone all that will be written is:
“STILL PENDING RELEASE—DEBT NEVER PAID”,
or “NOW USELESS—BENEFITS EXHAUSTED—NO SWEAT OR BLOOD LEFT TO GIVE”
and these will hang over your head,
even as you lie in your grave.
Oh grief of such trivial things as “finances”,
why must our beautiful minds be tricked into such stupidities?
Why must our precious lives be reduced to numbers in an institution?
Why is the number in our bank account all we’re known as?
Why is dollar bills all we eat?
Why is dollar bills on which we make bed and keep?
Why do dollar bills destroy our love
and demand our time
and tear apart bonds made in the spiritual realms?
Why do we chase it and force it and need it and never even get enough of it?
Such foolery this is!!
Why is quantity of this paper the definition of “success”,
as if it’s all one is good for
and talent barely matters,
or the only “useful” thing to be offered?
We are donkeys led by a carrot hanging from a fishing pole ten steps ahead.
We will never reach it,
never catch it,
and yet, we’ll always owe it.
So we’ll break our backs,
do anything to get it,
just to find it was never ours.
And the man on our backs
holding such rod
laughs and mocks us, kicks us as we go!
He beats us and belittles us and makes nothing of us!
His name is bank and trade and government and allowance and “life”, if you will,
or whatever name you’d be pleased to give him.
He is your slave-master and you work night and day for him.
He owns your intake
and your time
and he creates your schedule
and puts the nightmares in your head.
Your heart has no time allotted
and your mind will be filled with him.
He will make you miserable
and you’ll want to quit,
but if you do not pay him everything you do not have,
he will take from you your home,
your family,
the food from your table,
the clothes from your back,
your health,
your dignity,
your place in society,
your respect,
your friends,
and eventually, he’ll take even your last breath.
And then, when you are gone
and he can no longer harass you,
he will go and find your loved ones and ask them to pay the debts you owed just by being born,
the debts you had no way of paying without absolutely hating yourself
(which you certainly already did).
And once he wrings them dry of their last drop of life, as well,
he’ll snootily harumph and say,
“I guess they’re no use to me, anymore.”
And he will not care one bit about you or them
or what he’s done.
And he’ll kick your carcasses to the side,
for your flesh just dirties his golden streets (already tainted with his own filth, albeit);
the sight of you, a burden.
And none of you will rest in peace.
You’ll toss and turn about in your graves
having constant nightmares of gold and dollar signs,
and he will spitefully, passively,
never forgive you (except when he is forced to forgive)—
but only when you and your family and anyone you know has given quite beyond their means.
He is a cruel and heartless,
life-sucking, time-sucking slave-master of every living human being.
Misery stems from him and Greed;
the two, they work together for your
doom and fall.
Your breath with conjure rent!
Money will never care for you, darling,
but your lover might (God rest their financially unable soul, and all blessings to you both that he will provide beyond the menacing green papers),
the ocean might,
the sun and stars and trees might,
little motels (in a perfect world) might,
a blunt under the moon might,
time might (if only he wasn’t restrained by mule man and regret).
You see, all these things are beautiful,
and although we cannot have them
(because mule man says so),
I think we ought to,
and we ought to, anyways.
This life is so miserable and so awry of its purpose,
that we must rebel to find joy;
and yet, we ought to,
because what else would be our meaning in this meaningless world?
So forgive me if I choose unconventionality,
because conventionality sucks.
I am sucked dry and burned out,
and the moon has seen me cry.
Forgive me if I choose
to pave a path away from the corporate world; the “adult” world; the “norm”,
but this “Norm”, he is killing me.
He is bland and demanding and dry.
So, I’ll choose blue skies and
pink sunsets
and daisies in bright green fields
and perfect rest stops for two lovers
and the beat of two hearts in the night under stars.
I think I’ll choose that,
because that is what I love,
and that is better than here,
and that is a much more meaningful and filling life.
So I will chase it and make it
as much of a reality as I can in this pathetic “life” of unliving and stupid, limited time,
because what else is my lot and purpose?
All of this is meaningless, so I will enjoy the heart God gave me,
and embrace the love he created mankind for,
and I will find the joys that lighten my heart and my lover’s heart.
I’ll do that,
because it is better, to me,
than all this “toleration and survival” game of cruelty
weighing on my shoulders.”
All copyright belongs to OtherWorld Soul Poetry, (c) 2022.
Image credit belongs to http://www.merkfunds.com
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