An experience of Oneness

I join their families for moments

as I walk behind them on the boardwalk.

I can smell her shampoo, his aftershave I

could reach out and hold their daughter’s

hand.

I become linked to them for a small duration

of their lives, I listen to their inside

conversations, unnoticed. I am so close I

could pose with them for their family

portraits.

We affect each other as we stand,

side-by-side, unassuming.

They have no idea how closely I

watch as they come and go on the

boardwalk.

Or how strongly they smell of last nights

dinner. I am apart of their existence for

instances, brushing up against their rain

jackets, not bothering to say, “Excuse

me.”

For the moment we’re enmeshed. 

Manganese, 25

I just read The Joy of Old Age by Oliver Sacks and reflect upon what my "elemental age" is — I am Manganese: 25, Mn, a hard gray metal of the transition series. Manganese is an important component of special steels and magnetic alloys. The black dioxide of this as an industrial raw material or additive, esp. in glassmaking. ORIGIN late Middle English (referring to a mineral said to be an ingredient of the philosopher's stone). "A transition metal" they say. Yes, hard, grey, an element to add in the production of something else... Sitting behind a glass window at 5:39 in the afternoon I am roasting under in the sun and being worked by the flames of interpersonal communication, navigating the throws of my quarter-life crisis. 

The Periodic Table of Elements 

Rebirth by Fire

Is it any coincidence that both articles use "fast-moving" as their catch phrase? Fast-moving is the name of the game when I think about my life — the habit of a 25-year-old existing in the 21st century. Since the turn of the millennia I've been catapulted into adulthood; learning to make "wise" decisions and attempting to navigate the fact that life moves. This state of constant change, everyone knows it, everyone quotes it, but do we understand the reality of this particular condition? Change is a verb, it's an action, it's the opposite of static.

Fire is a great catalyst for change and my home town has been burning down. With the Yarnell Fire and the Doce Fire on Granite Mountain occurring within one week of each other, I've spent a significant amount of time pondering impermanence. The implications being, if we want to transform, heat and pressure are key, AND transformation requires impermanence. To change is to not carry on any filament of the past. In the past year I've moved out of my child-hood one, the house I was born in was bulldozed, I've lived in a dozen different locations, I've packed up most of my belongings and find myself, my computer, my folding bike, and my guitar outside Yellowstone National Park at the Tumbleweed Bookstore in Gardener, Montana.

I'm beginning to realize that Life is about not freaking out every time something doesn't go according to my plan. Not hating myself when my worst nightmare comes true. Not blaming others for the experience I have. Not knowing the answers is perfectly ok. And knowing what I don't want is half the form.

Trans-form. ORIGIN from Latin trans ‘across.’ ORIGIN verb, from Latin formare ‘to form.’ 

Observation of a Need for Touch

The need to be acknowledged —

Like a child,

The necessity for touch never diminishes.

Craving intimate affection

Like a fly on shit;

We cannot help ourselves.

As I meet them, eye-to-eye

We sit across the table,

Not saying a word.

BE WITH ME!

Their language screams.

Palms face up

My phone in my pocket,

Senses alert,

Unfazed by the barking dog.

I hold them,

In the roundness of my heart,

With the firmness of my eyes.

LISTEN TO ME!

Their language urges.

I’m here,

I whisper

To their sensibility.

I listen with my mouth shut. 

Roses For Kate

At the top of Mt. Pisgah

I came upon roses

waiting for “Kate.”

They lay there on the rock

lit up by the sun

like a tiny red fire.

My heart surged—

they were not for me

but they might as well

have been.

Because the presence

of a simple,

handwritten note

is not lost

on the living;

no matter how hardened

our hearts.

The wind combed its fingers

through my hair

and made my skin prickle.

Black clouds in the distance

spoke of rain

and I felt as though

I had intruded

on an intimate

exchange.

Thin blades of grass

danced

and waved their tiny arms

as a rainbow

formed below me

in the valley—

That vivid arch

reflecting prisms of color

through the meeting

of water and light.

Longing is absolutely

necessary.

Yet we must stand

in the presence of another

to fully know

ourselves.

As I descended,

those cardinal colored

petals lay untouched,

in a simple gesture

of remembering—

I wonder,

had Kate ever come?