I opened my ears. 
I opened my mind.
I opened my emotions.
I opened my heart.
I opened my head.
I opened my sorrows.
I opened my joys.
I opened my soul.
And finally I opened my eyes.
So I opened my hand.....
And I watched you fly away.

I'll play the part assigned
I'll be what you design
I'll step into your hell
I'll take the role you tell
I'll fill the gap in what you carved
I'll shut my eyes and harden my heart
I'll stuff my feelings into a drawer
I'll smile at you and say no more
I'll put my roundness into your square
And pretty soon...."I" wont be there.

********an original poem by me.....please do not steal********

In Sleep You Are Mine

2/23/15

I watched you sleep last night.
You didn't know at all
I stayed long after you drifted off
Your silence was my home.

I watched your face last night.
The light within you glowed
And gave your features boyhood grace
Revealing purest soul.
I watched you breathe last night.
Saw your chest rise and fall.
Felt myself be one with you
And it never hurt at all.
I watched your heart last night
Sing words to me you'd never say
I folded hands and whispered prayers
Asked God to keep you safe.

You showed me the deepest part of you
And I am blessed.

My Gift: I Am Here

For my ekara........


He suffers.
I feel it a phusical twist of my heart, as I look at him.
He suffers, and it matters not from what, or the why.
I know much about him by now and this is rare
For rarely do I know about the ones I am assigned to.
It is only for me to see the suffering.
Acknowledge it.
Give voice to it. Name it.  Point to it.
Perhaps stand beside and help confront, if I am asked.
But this one is different.
I care that it is there in him.
I care and I do that by being present.
By showing up.
By taking the risk that what I feel in my heart is what I shoud acknowledge.
Experience has taught me this is so.  Experience, and....the Protectors whom I serve.
We don't often take this deep a risk. 
We are too vulnerable, too cautious, too protective of ourselves.
Fear.
That is why.
I have not counted, but I have heard it said, that in His Book, over two hundred times man is advised to fear not.
It is easier said than done.
But it is easier done with help, with others, even with one other, who stands by your side with no other word than.....
....I am here.
That is the gift of compassion.....the gift of presence.

The gift once given becomes the possession of the receiver, from the moment that is given, and going forth and forever.
Different things can happen to a gift but it is all in the hands of the receiver.
The gift may be set upon a shelf, to look at, to cherish, and maybe to be used only in the event that company comes and we decide to be something that we are not, but once it is set upon a shelf it is never really used.
Set upon a shelf without attention, slowly its warmth leaves, its value leeches out, until it is useless.
In the effort to preserve it, actually it fades away.
The only way to save it is to use it.

I see him, wounded, but in silence.
I see that he carries that war wound like a crown.
We all will wear crowns one day.
But isn't it ironic, that on that day, when we receive what it is we think we want most, we will nto care about it.
We will not sit it upon the shelf where it will only get dusty and tarnished,
we will not save it for when company comes.
We will not count the jewels in it nor compare it to anyone else's for it will not matter.

What will matter most is presence.

I am here.

Take my hand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tB24d--KzAs

Song:  Hands
Artist:  Jewel

If I could tell the world just one thing
It would be that we're all OK
And not to worry 'cause worry is wasteful
And useless in times like these
I won't be made useless
I won't be idle with despair
I will gather myself around my faith
For light does the darkness most fear
My hands are small, I know
But they're not yours, they are my own
But they're not yours, they are my own
And I am never broken
Poverty stole your golden shoes
It didn't steal your laughter
And heartache came to visit me
But I knew it wasn't ever after
We'll fight, not out of spite
For someone must stand up for what's right
'Cause where there's a man who has no voice
There ours shall go singing
My hands are small I know
But they're not yours, they are my own
But they're not yours, they are my own
I am never broken
In the end only kindness matters
In the end only kindness matters
I will get down on my knees, and I will pray
I will get down on my knees, and I will pray
I will get down on my knees, and I will pray
My hands are small I know
But they're not yours, they are my own
But they're not yours, they are my own
And I am never broken
My hands are small I know
But they're not yours, they are my own
But they're not yours, they are my own
And I am never broken
We are never broken
We are God's eyes
God's hands
God's mind
We are God's eyes
God's hands
God's heart
We are God's eyes
God's hands
God's eyes
We are God's hands
We are God's hands

Happy Birthday

Your birthday comes again, as it always does.  I have no words.  Life moves on and has taken me with it, even if I didn't want to go.  But there are days I cannot move past without remembering you.  October 21, your birthday, is one.  This November when your anniversary comes it will be six years and that is another.  At any rate, you should know, wherever you are now, that no matter what you told me before you left, I just can't do it.  You are my forever love.  And I simply cannot move past that.  I love you the most.  Now and forever.  Totally.

Eddie's Bench

I sat on Eddie’s bench yesterday afternoon. He was there. And it could not have been more perfect.

Shortly after Eddie died, an opportunity came to participate in the creation and building of the Hospice

facility of the greater Raleigh area. Amazingly, this geographical region did not have its own free-

standing Hospice facility. When Eddie became a Hospice patient, since the pain issues associated

with his terminal stage four melanoma could not be successfully managed at home, he needed to be in a setting where professional medical personnel could administer the medication and the means to ease his pain. Without an in-patient Hospice facility, that meant a hospital. A completely appropriate place for  getting well and living through life-saving methods and measures, a hospital is not meant to be a place for living out the end of a life in final comfort, dignity and peace. So, I made a financial pledge to  Hospice of Wake County to help them build their house, and in return, they would give me a bench outside in a garden area near a water feature, with a small plaque designating it as a gift in memory of my beloved.

I stepped out of work into a beautiful afternoon, not too humid or hot, sunny and with a slight breeze, 

and since I had nothing better to do, I decided to see if I could find . . . Eddie’s bench. I had been

thinking of doing it for a while, driving over to see if it was actually there, and if so, to sit upon it

and think of him. It seemed like as good a time as any.

The new Hospice House building is huge and built, roughly, in the shape of a spread-apart U. It is set

in the midst of a large piece of land; probably at one time it was part of the pasture that surrounds it still, so by its very setting, it is tranquil and bucolic, filled with the serenity of nature, ideal for finding peace. One wing houses all the administration offices, the other houses the actual in-patient suites. They are connected by outside covered breezeways and anchored in the center of the U with a small spiritual sanctuary, or chapel. The driveway out front is a circular one and has off to one side a garden area with a fountain in its center space. Since I had requested that Eddie’s bench be near the water, this is where I expected to find it.

There must have been ten or more benches placed upon the stone pathways ringing that fountain, but

not one of them was marked with Eddie’s name. I paused, disappointed, but then I remembered from

the website architectural drawings I had scrutinized, there were to be at least two water features. His

bench must be at the other one. 

Question was, just where was that? I walked past the small sanctuary going toward the left, my steps

would take me behind the administration wing, where the stone pathway led to other benches placed

in pristinely manicured settings….but none of these were Eddie’s either.  I wondered for a moment if

perhaps he had  been omitted, maybe forgotten, but I pushed that thought away, for there was yet

another side to investigate behind the length of building that housed the individual apartments for
the residents.  I walked around the end of the red-bricked building to behold an intimate courtyard,

small and sheltered from the late afternoon sun by the shadow cast over it by the building.  It was

cozy, protected and private. Central to this garden area was a half-moon shaped concrete pool

from which sprang three gentle geysers of water plumes, their heights constantly fluctuating,

the droplets falling back into the pool only to be resurrected and live again, accompanied by that

comfortingly hissing sound of water rushing.  Two curve-backed, carved ash benches were

placed on the other side of this pool,  flanking the private patio doors of the apartments where

people would be living their last days, where families would be gathering to give their last

expressions of love to one another. I paused before the first bench. It was not Eddie’s. 

I knew before I got close enough to read the small gray plastic sign on the back of the second 

bench that it was his. It was the very last bench I found. And it was the very best.  I bent

forward to run my fingers gently over the sparkling white script of the words…words that I

had written for him……

                                                In loving memory of Eddie
                                                       Given by his wife
                                For every life that passes . . . something beautiful remains.

Only a few words could be allowed in such a small space, so they had to be exact and without

embellishment, something so hard for me to accomplish! I can be so wordy! But, there they were, 

exactly as I had written, what I had finally chosen to say to the world as his perfect legacy. I had

read the inscriptions on all the other benches, and perhaps that was why I found his at the very last,
so that I could. And these words, I thought, were by far the most meaningful, the most beautiful,

the ones that conveyed so succinctly the essence of the man they were chosen to honor.

I sat down.

Before me was the half-moon pool, rimmed in river rocks, so like the rock wall and the hearth he had

built in the cabin where we lived, of which he was so proud. The sound of the water rushing skyward

in a trinity of plumes was reminiscent of the sound of the beach, and if I closed my eyes I could

pretend that was where I was . . . where we were . . . sitting on our front deck . . . where we had a

bench . . . Eddie’s bench . . . from where he would watch the boats come and go up the canal that

was right in front of our house. He would sit there for hours. Sometimes people would come by

and talk to him, sometimes he would sit quietly, reverently, and gaze in contentment at the water

in front and to the left (the Intracoastal waterway). I thought of him as I looked beyond the spewing

fountain now to the emerald lawn, so green and lush, and just beyond that, in all their blooming

perfection,  a long hedge of deep pink roses finished off the scene.

Roses.

I had no idea they would be there, but I should not have been surprised. I had asked about the

landscaping that might be placed around Eddie’s bench when I pledged the money, but no one 

was sure what would be there. So, I had asked if perhaps I could plant a few rose bushes around

his bench and I was told I could.

I smiled.

Roses had become Eddie’s sign to me. Shortly after he died, two months in fact, I had a vision of 
him, a re-playing of an event that truly happened, and in my mind’s eye that day I saw him coming

in the back door of the cabin, with a bouquet of roses in his hands for me. The actual day that the

scene took place was a Valentine’s Day a few years before he had been diagnosed and he had

brought me roses. They meant a lot to me on the day he actually gave them to me. What I would

never have suspected is how much they would come to mean when he brought them to me again

after he died. For that day and almost every day since -- yes, until this very one -- Eddie has

brought me roses, one way or another . . . in a picture, in an email, on a woman’s skirt, on a

billboard at an airport, a bouquet sent by a friend to me on a special occasion, on a card. And

now I had only to sit upon his bench and see them, yet again.

Eddie’s bench was perfect.

Someone . . . got it so right . . . for as I sat there, I could so remember all of my wonderful life with

him, how much we had, how much we loved.

I didn’t want to leave.   I felt so at home there.

At last, I ran my fingers over the words one final time, stood up, and told him goodbye.

I walked around the side of the building to the parking lot. Odd, as I walked toward my car, I noticed

there were a couple of Corvettes parked nearby. They had not been there when I arrived for surely I

would have noticed.  I had the thought that they probably belonged to doctors attending to the
Patients in the Hospice house. I almost dismissed them as coincidence. 

But, wait. There were more than a couple here….three….four….I kept counting….bright red ones, 

yellow ones, a black one. In all, I counted eight Corvettes in that parking lot. Oh my God! I was 

really  laughing hard as I pointed my car out of the drive. Eddie’s presence could not have been

clearer, it was almost as if he was putting an exclamation point on the afternoon for me!

Corvettes. He loved them so, loved the one we had, that still sat in my garage. That car was his 

pride and joy and forever I will remember the smile it gave him when he drove it.

I didn’t need to see him in a vision to know he was smiling now…smiling at me for thinking of him,

maybe even sitting on his bench nestled among the roses by the water fountain near a parking lot

full of Corvettes!

It won’t be hard to come back, again and again, to this place which already holds so much meaning

for me. I look forward eagerly to the next visit.

And I know I won’t be there alone.

Closer

"Be close to the person who makes you happy but closer to the person who cannot be happy without you."...from the Internet...



It is nothing
    Oh please don't believe me
It is nothing
    Oh please don't you feel me
Not important
Not like your life

Turn away
    Oh please don't believe me
It'll be ok
    Oh please don't you feel me
Not tonight
Not until its light

Need to move over
    Let me in
Need to be closer
   Let me in there
What are you afraid of
   Let me in there with you

Walked the wire
Crossed the stars
For one moment
Of where you are
And this is it?  You shut down?
Not on my watch.
     Closer....
    Come closer....

I'll face you, fight you, fuck you or forgive you
But I'll never turn my back on you
No matter what.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_aC5xPQ2f4

He Said Three Words To Me

He said three words to me.
He has done it more than once by now.
Every time he does my heart lurches inside of my chest, wanting to jump out of me and into him.
I can't believe it and yet I know what it means.
I can't believe it and yet those are THE three words in all the universe that might make me believe.
Waiting to be with him again to see if he will say them again and he rarely disappoints.
Its like he looked into my heart and found them there,
pulled them out and used them on me.
How else could he know?
Its like the means justifies the end, but what end?
That's the question and he is different than anyone I have ever met because of the answer.
He said three words to me,
a reflection of a life that has ended,
yet a sign that there is but one thing that matters about it all,
the very thing he told me before he left,
the very thing that's been so hard for me to implement without him.
He knew it would be because he'd walked the road before me.
He knew and all along he gave me signs, like a bouquet of roses whose petals drop as they are carried along,
leaving yet a trail to follow,
like a foreshadowed Hansel and Gretel, trying to make their way back home.
This is the way, walk in it.
He said three words to me as he lay dying,
His last words,
And I didn't want them to be,
I wanted something more, something profound, something so full of love
that they would burst inside my heart and keep me warm for all the long lonely winter nights yet to come.
Yet they were perfect and only looking through the glass darkly can I see.
He said three words to me before he went.
And he....he said three words to me the first time we met,
Echoes of a heart held within a heart, a love tucked safely in its corner, yet a love whose time has yet to blossom,
three perfect words that only I would understand.
"Take my hand."