lost books

sometimes i feel like i've read all my favorite books already. this can't be true...can it? sometimes i feel like i'll never get excited about any new music, as if all the good stuff is already been made. this can't be true either. i walked to the goodwill today with my own permission to buy two books. the rules were that i had to buy two just based on gut instinct and i couldn't spend more than six dollars for both. as i scoured the admittedly amazing selection at my local goodwill, my eye kept resting on certain titles and my heart would skip a beat because of how much i loved those particular books. just seeing the spine of a much loved story took me to the time i read whichever it was and i became momentarily transported to that content, magical place that only a book can provide. i saw at least ten books that are all time favorites of mine. for a moment i wished for amnesia so that i could read them again for the first time. i spied a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird and almost propped it up in a more prominent location so that a shopper who hadn't had the magical experience of falling into that story would be able to find it. i had to stop myself from picking out my little friends and placing them all in a little stack with a note from me resting on top.  "please do yourself a favor and read these books!" it might say. or simply "please read". the thing that kept me from doing something of this nature was the knowledge that, much like other things in life, a good book has to be found.  i found my two books and now they wait for me to finish up the two i'm reading. it's reassuring knowing they're here now. i found them. 

random thought: i'm fairly certain that if each hotel room had a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird in the bedside drawer instead of the Bible the world would improve at a much faster pace. 

the manor

     

     She lives in an apartment building with a fancy name: Hepburn Manor. Katherine not Audrey. Although, depending on her mood, she does change which leading lady must be haunting the halls.  Number three-oh-five is on the west side and three flights up.  Thirty-two units, both one bedroom and studio, mean no fewer than thirty-two people reside there and yet she catches barely a glimpse of one or two a week. Usually it's of the same two guys who obviously don't have nine to fives as is the case for her. One of them has hipster facial hair and always does laundry on the same day she tries to. This clearly means they own the same amount of underwear.  The other has a punk attitude with strangely shaven and yet longish hair, no color in his wardrobe, and a certain pained look at having to nod or say hello. She sees very few, but she hears the sounds of their day to day lives. Footsteps one floor up, a door closing after a jangle of keys, late night laughter through the wall. She can smell their soup and burnt popcorn. She hears when they practice guitar or have loud parties. She know's how often the people overhead have sex. But for all that, she feels as though she could be living in a building of silent film ghosts.  

scenes from the road

new socks

old friends

motel advice

instant fire

M.A.S.H.

off on an adventure into the santa monica mountains...just out for a nice hike to get away from the cars and the crowds. only here would that mean we stumble upon the filming location for M.A.S.H. 

time travel

inside out

i kept wondering why the inside of my tea box looked so pretty and then realized i could turn the box inside out and re-glue it. the lesson here is: it really is what's on the inside that counts!

forest for the trees

damp dawn filled day

stumbling over rocks and road blocks

whispering prayers of disbelief

to walls holding back silence

fingers of doubt and death

the tenrils, clinging dew drops

seep into cracks and creased edges

beauty found where life is lost 

smoke in my eyes

(looking out instead of looking in

impatiently waiting for a sign to begin)

star light

star bright

first star i see tonight

i wish i may

i wish i might

have this wish i wish tonight

...T...

proof that beauty can be found even in dried up old tea bags.

 i'm sure there's a life lesson in here if i dig deep enough. 

something about time and age and faded colors being the prettiest. 

if morning must come

                                                    

 For the Artist at the Start of the Day

~ John O'Donohue ~

May morning be astir with the harvest of night;
Your mind quickening to the eros of a new question,
Your eyes seduced by some unintended glimpse
That cut right through the surface to a source.

May this be a morning of innocent beginning,
When the gift within you slips clear
Of the sticky web of the personal
With its hurt and its hauntings,

And fixed fortress corners,

A Morning when you become a pure vessel
For what wants to ascend from silence,

May your imagination know
The grace of perfect danger,

To reach beyond imitation,
And the wheel of repetition,

Deep into the call of all
The unfinished and unsolved

Until the veil of the unknown yields
And something original begins
 
To stir toward your senses
And grow stronger in your heart

In order to come to birth
 
In a clean line of form,
That claims from time
 
A rhythm not yet heard,
That calls space to
A different shape.

May it be its own force field
And dwell uniquely
Between the heart and the light

To surprise the hungry eye
By how deftly it fits
About its secret loss.