Should I be grateful to be this awake?
Should I be thankful for the other’s sake?
Should I be happy to realize
The depth of despair
I see in one’s eyes?
Should I be glad
To notice the
Lies?
And what about those with no alibi?
Copyright 2017. L.L. Shelton
Empathy is a form of genius
Though is easily seen,
In reflections of W. H. Auden,
It surely takes its toll.
Furrowed etched into his brow
Resembling ravines,
Lines formed as he was wondering,
All nature he extolls.
Now notice please Her Majesty,
Victoria the queen,
Though many keen abilities,
Love was her finest role.
As for Professor Doctor Saks,
Empathy he has been,
Patients seem as his own arm and then,
He tells us of their souls.
Copyright 2014. L.L. Shelton.
Motions of the stars
Indicate the matter
Outlying gravity,
Holds us all together
Knows our destiny.
Necessarily,
Ever carefully design
Prepare your life
To escape confines,
Devised for you
By a narrow mind.
Copyright 2017. L.L. Shelton.
When my mother-in-law passed away, her two sons were by her side, along with my precious niece and me. It was a long miserable night of morphine and labored breathing and careful observation of a soul lingering in a worn out mind and body until… until what? I don’t know. Nor do you. What happens beyond the science, that calls a person at just that precise moment to vacate the earthly shell inhabited for so many years? To finally spiritually abandon the worn out body, brain, and mind so inextricably intertwined?
It was an extraordinary and tremendously difficult moment to witness- that instant when another human being drew her final breath. Final. The end. There was to be no other. An immediate stunning silence followed.
I’m not sure how it happened but my niece and I suddenly found ourselves alone in the room. I climbed onto the bed beside my mother-in-law and held her. I stroked her furrowed brow, something I would never have felt comfortable doing when she was in her body. She was most independent and certainly not demonstrative with her affection. My niece watched this thoughtfully and kept her notions of it to herself.
My petite spirited niece who is herself healthily independent, is on the quiet side until she warms up to people and generally optimistic. As we made our way to the parking lot together, she looked to me and volunteered that she could now check this off her bucket list. This was on your bucket list, I inquired to be sure I had heard correctly. Yes, she said, to watch someone die was on her list. I mused a moment. Well, she is entering the military, and she could one day find herself on a battlefield… and in all of two seconds her reasoning was decided.
On the drive home, it occurred to me that I didn’t even have a bucket list. This young woman less than half my age not only had a bucket list but had successfully managed to check something off of it! Though this seemed of some mild importance, on that memorable day I had no further time to devote to the subject.
Today, it has been nearly two years since and recently it occurred to me that I still hadn’t assembled that bucket list. It is now or never.
Bucket List:
Item one- Stand in Poetry, Texas on some lovely day, at what was originally known as Turner’s Point and breathe deeply, purposefully, and appreciatively.
Copyright 2017. L.L. Shelton.
Don’t wanta be cloned
Call God on the phone
Don’t wanta choose gender
Little hearts needn’t render
Such things
Don’t wanta live forever
Immortally together
Here among the ashes
In the dark where the trash is
Piled up
Some things shouldn’t be
Shouldn’t be…
Copyright 2017. L.L. Shelton.
I’m partial to humanity,
I hope we all will trust,
I’m attached to our dirt
And bound to our dust.
I don’t have to know you,
To know what you’re worth,
You’re the very reason
God moves upon the earth.
Copyright 2016. L.L. Shelton.
In the shelter of the storm grew I,
Angry curses framed each lullaby,
Raucous rumblings rolling through the sky,
Of Mama’s brightly glistening gray-blue eyes.
Wrapped in roaring rage for blanket soft,
Mother’s heart and hands held me aloft,
The swollen river rushing ‘round her pain,
There on its banks her own childhood lay slain.
Copyright 2010. L.L. Shelton.
Brown and white huddled
On floor between seats
Sharing secrets and giggling
‘Neath numerous feet,
Blending hearts- tempus fugit!
By His Good
Don’t refuse it,
Despite all who wished it,
We wouldn’t lose it.
Friendship extended,
We don’t ruin or bruise it.
Let us like The Child
Though Hell-bent won’t regret,
Readily accept,
Not abuse it.
Copyright 2011. L.L. Shelton.
Pornography for you and me!
Junk food heaven obesity!
Alcohol to lift us high!
Methamphetamine to help us fly!
Give it to our greedy hearts!
We demand to have a part!
Obviously these things will be,
So long as desired by you and me.
Copyright 2017. L.L. Shelton.
I ran across this recently. I had forgotten writing it. I was approaching my fiftieth birthday and consciously assessing the situation- not for simply who I was but for who I wanted to be, and hoped I would continue to be. I wonder now, was I unwittingly issuing the enemy a challenge? No matter… For God has set his King on Zion!
A Self-Portrait of One Alive
Approaching half a century,
Brazen red,
Cheering domesticity
Shattering complicity
Conquering adversity
Loving ferociously
Demanding humility
Reaching incessantly
Avoiding mediocrity
Wondering inadvertently
Thinking objectively
Caring compassionately
Hoping magnanimously
Living outrageously;
Blessed Undead.
Copyright 2012. L.L. Shelton.