Fork in the Road

Feels like I've been awake for all of it.  One day you're three, swaying about the beginners ballet floor, or popping around the corner off the sidewalk into the driveway on your green machine big-wheel, and the next you're...I don't know, hurting with experience and wisdom.

I'm in this meadow.  I remember arriving but I don't remember the fork in the road.  There must've been one, For some of those that I remember aren't here.

I sometimes can't remember if I travelled in the interstate or the back gravel, or which way was most unique to me.  I think people laughed a bit, warmed by fire and wine.  But then why does skin yellow and flowers die?  Eventually what's left is a pot and a coffin.

I don't remember the fork in the road.  I walked through the forest, and even hiked a few.  I wonder if the cliff-sides turned me away or was it the fear?  When difficult choices slithered into my sphere of influence, I feel as if I opted for different modes of transportation.  One only recognizes the path against the sky where there seems to be none were it not for life up there tracking one through the sky.

Do we lack imagination?  Emotional philanthropy means a willingness to emote by either rote, note, vote, or remote.  But the mechanical, the anecdotal, the confidence, and the distant good intentions will taunt me and you.  only that the life between tutus and tardives proved that I trusted something, and that others are here.

Once I reached the place called "roots" I turned.  I had not wondered what I missed until then.  I'd eaten the golden fruit, and remembered the taste but little else.  God had given me secrets I dared never to share, for fear of tears spilt onto rocky soil.  So I buried them, and could fairly say, hid them surreptitiously.  It seems I even left my memory there.

Until someone shook my hand and thanked me. The job wasn't difficult, but I was there.  And then another, and another.  I turned toward a path I thought had been a hike into the uncharted and unnoticed.  I looked at cartographer's record and compared them with the man I'd helped.  His map was similar to mine, to my chagrin.  Oh, there were differences, and there were territories I had discovered.  Turns out I showed others my own territory, and even allowed them to till my land.  There had been moments of terror, and others of joy.

I remembered.  I remembered more of the path.  I remembered animals, and flowers, and stuff that was unnameable, and became nothing more than lollygags and dooperbugs.

I named my own star.  But I still don't remember the fork in the road.  I just remember how many footprints I saw on my path tread.  I remembered more.  Forbidden fruit made me sick.  Made me look at myself without the forest and the road.  I thought I was the capacitor for my own light.  I shook someone's hand, and thanked them.  I thought about that.  Maybe I had chosen something, but my path seemed a series of planned accidentals.

Ah, faith.  Accidents are really no more than a stubbed toe that probably led to something significant.  Anything seemingly worse arose as no accident at all, but periods of growth and anger.

I named a star, I think I told you that once before.  I remember the name, "Narciss" I called it, because it always forced me to look at myself.  I can't remember where the star is anymore, I've moved on.  An arrogant star with a name shines somewhere, just as it always has.

Maybe looking up, into the infinite was a way to avoid the fork in the road.  I learned that the infinite includes up and out.  Prayer works I suppose, and sometimes wishes on my star wojuld come true.

Prayer is a fork in the road.  It proves that God is still faithful either way.  Prayer keeps us looking out and up.  Is the capacitor and the light. I know that now.

I looked for the golden fruit, and realized it was gone.  My bag was empty.  How could this be? What's mine is mine!  But another shook my hand, and I happened to notice his bag was empty.  I failed to understand then what I know now.  I worried about the fruit because it sustained my own pursuits.  But the reason we were all so happy upon that meadow at the end of the path was the realization that they, we could not have foreseen this meadow, and therefore could not have foreseen any of it.

I realized my name.  Narciss.  I had become a fire that had been consumed within itself, and threatened its life.  But I could not have foreseen the path and a I smiled.  I wondered how we all had come to this meadow, with laughing daffodils, and whispering grass.  My muscles were taut and painful.  Man, I'm tired.  Man I'm tired.  It's been a hell of a thing.  I just want to sit down.

Problem is I believed my story mattered to me and those I could persuade to see me.

I felt a hug, and a rub.  Someone behind me, I tried to turn, but was prevented.  I simply enjoyed this holy massage.  I smiled again.  There were forks in the road, but I was never alone.

I wished upon another star.  "Grace."  The star shone bright, but it's illumination turned out to be her.  My star was again not of my own devices, but an adoption gift.  She stepped outside the tendrils of a star and took my hand.

Faith and meadows, a marriage of love and salvation.  She took my hand, and as always the meadow winds changed and a new path emerged.

We now tread, sometimes carefully.  But suddenly there is a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night.  I can look around and stretch my hand to the wonder along the path.  My skin has softened, joined by grace, and my eyes are opened, brushed by the holy.  Her hair is now my constant meadow, her hands my security, and our our faith is our hope, and is His confidence and his promise.

I now look to the stars, the hills, and the path.  I can hear my feet scratch the dirt worn by a new path.  Our breath.  Our breath.  Others are there too.  A calling perhaps.

Until a new meadow, I have my grace.

Aging: Prose and Perspicuity whatever that means.

We all age right?  Well, it was my Brother-in-law's 40th birthday and I wrote him a little ditty about turning 40.  I thought I might share it with you how's that sound?  I removed some of the more brother-in-law-ey stuff which means I added and subtracted a bit here and there so that now it's a poem about anyone who might be getting anywhere in age.  This ditty is my Ode To Forty but just put your age in there and see how it works?

Ode to Forty (Good Luck With That One!)

Some people like pork, some people like peas. Some people like land, some people like seas. But nobody likes Forty it’s time to say why. The one who likes forty is the one who’s brain tied. The one who likes forty is the one who just lied.

It’s like drinking the river when all you wanted was tea. It’s like shootin’ your leg off to be all you can be. It’s suckin the prunes before ridin’ the dunes. It’s like a half-cup o’coffee or trees without leaves. It’s like freezing cold winds on a white summer beach.

But wait! Wait wait! I’m starting to sway. Forty’s not bad I’m willing to say. Senility’s helpful when your spouse says “NO WAY!” Senility works when the bed must get made.

Senility rocks when having some fun, when you’re riding the coasters, maybe backwards on one. Senility works when you’re surfing the sun. Senility’s fun when you’re trying to run.

Ok I really can’t talk, I’ll be there soon. I think forty’s the best and it’s worth a short swoon. While to some Forty may feel a lot like you’ve lost it, like vegetable candy or farts in the closet. Instead forty’s the best, to that point I won’t rest! At forty you’ll test some small youngster’s strength. You’ll out think him, out talk him and debate him at length! The poor little tyke will surely not last. You’ll think harder and won’t jump your boundaries so fast.

You’ll lose your stupidity and eat your breakfast. It’s simply a shame that forty won’t last.

I can’t wait till I’m there, an envious place. Isn’t it sad now I’ve lost the forty’s race? So for me it’s boo-hoo but congrats to you. I hope forty’s to you a lot like the loo. Newspaper in hand and something to do.

I’m sure you’re the best and the top of the chart. A good mid-life stop made to look like fine art. You’re mettle’s not spent and your wisdom won’t flee. You turn on your heels a slight giggle of glee. What’s directly in front of you, a shiny green tree. And up at the tree-top your delighted to see. The doe-doe bird in the tree-top is a man of twenty.

Rhyming Game...Fun Fun Fun! Win 1000 Points!

Ok...since I've recently been purged from real thoughts, I have the freedom to be completely ridiculous again. I even have the freedom to spell ridiculous wrong, for instance rediculus...but I won't do that. I've been working and have been writing the yearly Christmas poem. Every year I attempt to put a good Rhyme together until nothing rhymes and all I have is a Christmas poem.

So I'm going to force the issue.

I've chosen a good holiday word. The word is "bell." I'm going to make up as many rhymes as I possibly can on the word bell! I am going to try and put together an exhaustive list. However...here's the rub. The first person that can give me a rhyme for bell that isn't already on my list (do it from my comments page), will win 1000 points on your next purchase!

How much money is 1000 points? I don't know. Where can you use the points? I don't know. Just tell any retailer that I have given you 1000 points and see what happens. So...without further ado...excited?...want to win?...ok...1...2...3...here we goooooo!!!



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AOL, avenel, bell morel, black morel, breathing spell, bubble shell, cancer cell, carrasquel, clientele, collar cell, cup morel, danielle, driven well, esquibel, esquivel, false morel, fuel cell, gabriele, goblet cell, golgi cell, heavy swell, holding cell, isabell, Anne Michell, Jean michele, lyondell, magic spell, marcantel, mirabel, montiel, mother cell, muscle cell, n. f. l., orabel, oyster shell, patty shell, personnel, plasma cell, prison cell, racing shell, Rafael, raising hell, raphael, red blood cell, riopel, san miguel, say farewell, scallop shell, sense of smell, shotgun shell, sickle cell, single shell, sinking spell, solar cell, sponge morel, standard cell, storage cell, sugar shell, u. a. l., unit cell, very well, weston cell, white blood cell, wildcat well, William tell, tinkerbell...adipose cell, aix-la-chapelle, artesian well, beefsteak morel, cadmium cell, clark standard cell, common morel, conic morel, detention cell, early morel, electric cell, fertilized cell, formative cell, galvanic cell, gambling hell, industrielle, line personnel, mademoiselle, mercury cell, motor hotel, petty morel, primary cell, resort hotel, scorpion shell, silica gel, smooth muscle cell, thomson's gazelle, visual cell, word of farewell, anfal, antipersonell, embryonic cell, epidermal cell, epithelial cell, flagellated cell, reproductive cell, secondary cell, selenium cell, suppressor t cell


management personnel, Margarete gertrud zelle, photoelectric cell, photovoltaic cell

military personnel



Good luck.