20170630.0451

The road away does beckon,
Both that across the land
And that into the undiscovered country.
The latter is known as a one-way street.
I have to wonder how many of the former sort are, too.
The saying is that one can never go home again.
Seems it means the road goes one way only--
And the rear-view mirror is cracked.

20170629.0450

I find I'm walking in a daze,
Peering through a mental haze
That my waking mind delays
As I make myself ready.
I know it will pass in time,
That I shortly will be fine,
But I wonder at a sign
That I may be unsteady.

20170628.0644

Sometimes, I find myself behind.
Sometimes, I cannot seem to mind.
Most times, I look around and find
That I need to get more done.

20170627.0447

I work not just to make ends meet,
To keep my family off the street,
With clothes to wear and food to eat,
But also to ensure my wife
And my dear daughter have a life
A bit apart from certain strife.
I know that I can never keep
It all away, that some will creep
Into our lives, a straining seep
Of foulness. But I still try
To hold it back and buy
For them some respite.

20170626.0442

He liked to sing of mountain railways
Driven by brave engineers,
And now he has disembarked from that ride
On which he had been for some years.
Those of us who still ride yet
Are saddened to see him go,
And what he is seeing at his station stop
Is something we cannot yet know.
The track that we travel twists, and it turns,
And it dips, and it rises through hills,
And it's said that its passengers might meet again
As its brave engineer wills.

20170625.0907

Christmas is but six months away,
And we need to figure where to stay
So we can drink while children play
And revel in the gifting.
But first, we need to buy our stuff
And realize that it's not enough,
However much; it's all just fluff,
And we are with it drifting.
The realization made, we then
Work to drown it once again
So we don't remember when
It's time to do the gifting.

20170624.0524

Today could also be called 25. Just so you know...

I gave myself a little time,
But I cannot seem to mind,
For when I look, I again find
My loving wife's back with me.

20170624.0431

Today's another working day,
But at least I have my pay,
So I can look around and say
It might well have been worth it.

20170622.0432

I tried once again to early rise.
That I failed again is no surprise.
I can't seem to open up my eyes
Even when I found my bed before
The normal time I walk through waking's door
And opt against my usual o'er-word pore.
I worry that I have as much to do
As I know I have. I'll not get through
The many tasks, both extant and brand new,
To which I must attend with each new day.
It is from such a cause I seek a way
To early wake; I sometime hope to say
"The deed is done." Then I may be at ease
And turn to tasks determined as I please.

20170621.0446

I sometimes err, of course, as do we all,
Thinking that events are sure to fall
A certain way, but I do well recall
That they unfold full oft to my despite,
And come about in ways I think not right,
While others take in them no small delight.
Why it is so is all unclear to me,
And I question why I seem to be
Always on the losing side, to see
What I think is wrong often to rise.
I wonder why it me will still surprise.
The scene is often placed before my eyes.
I guess I am all unable to learn
That way in which the world is sure to turn.

20170620.0456

I tried to get up early,
But it didn't really work.
I lazed about for too long,
And now, I feel a jerk.
I have too much to do right now,
And many tasks me irk,
But I ought to attend to them.
It's time, again, to work.

20170619.0443

My sleep was several times interrupted.
It is not a normal thing.
I usually sleep the whole night through,
And I do not know why I did not.
But I did not.
I wonder what it will do to my day.

20170615.0459

I wake each day,
Soon to sit naked and brooding
Over what the day will bring for me to do.
Today, at least, I know.
Soon enough,
I will be about it.
But I will take a little longer
To dangle in the air a little bit.

20170614.0456

I sit upon the throne again
And think how she and I began
To do the things that we once planned
And how we can proceed.
Our starting is well underway,
And we make progress each day,
But I wonder what they say
Whose voices I would heed?

20170613.0442

I have to wonder
If I have been clinging
To a past that likely never was
Because I missed something
Through my own choices,
And now I feel
I have to fill in the gaps.

20170612.0450

The morning quiet is something I prize,
And because I do, I early rise,
Waking ere the sun surmounts the skies.
This time, I rose in the silver glow
The moon can cast on the earth below,
One I've known the hills often to know.
I smiled at looking on the light-washed trees--
Mesquite and oak, the cedars, cypress knees--
And on the chalk white hills bare to the breeze.
But though I smiled, I had to turn away,
For I must make me ready for the day.
Such, of course, is the expected way:
The work has ever to be done again,
Coming only slowly to an end.

20170611.0843

To watch the sun rise o'er the limestone hills
Clad in oak and cedar and mesquite
Is an act at which my heart yet thrills;
As I do it, I can keep no seat.
Yes, I have lived amid the cypress swamps
Where water stands and flows and bounty yields
And a people exiled twice now romps,
And I have lived where towers rise from fields,
The gridded buildings lined up to the sun,
Where legend in each street and brick inhere.
I have lived on wind-swept plains, where one
Convulsion of the earth did once cause fear
And now is commonplace. Withal,
I still would answer the Hill Country's call.

20170610.0458

Once again, I sit me down to write
As I arise from sleeping through the night
And ponder what all I may bring to light
In measured words arranged so as to rhyme
As they progress in regimented time.
It is no easy task that I've made mine.
The words I use long often to be free,
To run at length as they would have, not me,
And fall as many drops into the sea.
The ocean swells and ebbs with moon-drawn might,
But it is the river that runs right
Which makes a city its people's delight,
And so I trim the stream that I send forth,
Hoping that its levees prove its worth.

20170609.0455

When I woke today,
I did so from a dream,
And it was a good dream.
The memory fades,
As the few I have of dreams always quickly do,
But the impression that it was good,
That remains.
I suppose it will have to be enough.

20170608.0448

I seem to be awake this time.
I got up when I ought.
I rose and left my sleep behind,
And now I have got
To make me ready for a day
During which I will plot
To do somewhat to earn my pay--
Though it be not a lot.

20170606.0447

Thirty-six years
They've shared fears,
Shed their tears,
Held them near,
Held them dear,
Or so I hear.
And so here's
To many more!
Happy anniversary!

20170603.0501

I am having trouble remembering the day.
I know what day of the week it is,
Which castrated infantophagic god of old it honors,
But the number eludes me.
I am not much pleased by that.
I think it understandable.

20170602.0456

The rolling limestone hills
Clad in oak and cedar
Drink in the warmth
Of the kind Hill Country sun
That gives so much
So much
Of itself to all.
What they take in
They give back again
And again
And the mesquite shrouds
Are no insulation

20170601.0459

Another month has now begun,
And I am still at a run
To try to get the long race won,
Or one leg of it, at least.
I'll go again to work for pay,
As I do most every day,
Hoping thereby to out lay
Occasionally a feast.
But I face a daily grind,
Though I know I should not mind,
As it helps me be less behind,
But, damn, it is a beast.