2008


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Happiness is a time when the world agrees
And countervailing arguments hold no sway.
Happiness is a voiced love that clearly sees
A warm embrace, a sunny kiss, a whole new day.

Bill Purdin: 7318

YOU ARE SO BEAUTIFUL (2)

What others may not see in their rush
I see every day, I see every time, you walk by.
The scars, the bruises, the broken dreams
Only refining, defining moments
That deepened and deepen you
Like a writer enriching a character
Or a painter mixing new colors
Or a conductor digging out a
More vibrant performance from one who
Might be holding back.
It's like an athlete calling for more effort,
Or a teacher drawing out a student's best,
Or a friend standing by no matter what.
I see all of those in just you looking at a menu
Wondering what to order.

Your beauty is so astounding,
So amazing, so astonishing
It's brightness takes concentration
To see clearly, not through smoke and mirrors,
But through a clarity with such a sharp focus
That some are confused and some are dazed
Seeing something like that.

The years have given me
A proficiency,
In seeing your beauty.
And I would share it with others
If you would let me.

If you would believe me.

Bill Purdin: 7168


She Said, "It's My Life."

Striving to be always good is futility.
It is impossible for a human being to achieve.
At every turn we are tempted and succomb.
It happens over and and over and over.

The dream of perfection is a false hope.
It deludes us into thinking that we will grow.
But then when it comes we always go down.
It's the way we are, unsettled, never sure, so weak.

We kid ourselves with religions and political reform.
But in the final moments we always screw it up.
There are no reasons other than the selfish ones.
And, if you doubt, just look in the mirror.

It's the darkness that always wins.
It's the curse of Adam and Eve.
Just when you think a bright day comes,
You stand there watching it leave.

Bill Purdin: 758


SWILLING SOFTENERS

It's tough to be alone:
A terrible self-deception.

If running from one thing to another
Changes anything, let me know.

Stick with one thing,
Until you exhaust it,
Drain it,
Beat it to the ground,
Take it apart to its basic elements
Put it back together twice:
First, the way you think it should be
Second, as it was before you wrecked it.
(And that might not be enough.)

Always be ready for the harsh
That it was perfect before you.
Before you saw its flaws,
Before you saw the fix,
Before you strolled in and took charge,
Before you screwed it all up.

Remember you.
Remember how you are:
Looking at the world through your eyes
You see the world through your despise
Your experiences, your disguise,
Your hiding-in-the-corner truths
That may have stopped the real truths
From ever getting past your filters,
Your devices,
Your walls that look like doors
Your emptiness that looks like windows.

As you sit there alone, diffusing the world
Swilling in your softeners,
Remember that putting it back together
Is harder and harder the longer you wait.
And you will have to do it at least twice.

It's tough to be alone
When you are not
And never were.

It's tough to be alone.

Bill Purdin: 6288

ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE

You were one of those people.
Those people, so many of them,
Who I have never really understood
In their dark corners watching
Who said things but behind the words
Were those small ripples that linger
For years and years and years and years
Vibrating around some hidden definition
That my dictionary could not confine.

You were one of those people
I always knew where you were, kept track,
If you were home or not, when
You were coming home, or not,
And I always wondered why about you
Why did you liked that or this,
Why did you do something or not
Why did you say want to come along with me?
Or why you said nothing at all.

You were one of those people
Who haunt my moments of doubt
Who make me always worry that I missed
Something important, who always make
A question of every motive, every thought
And everything I've done on the
Dark nights when the sheets are tangled
And I drift in and out of twisting fettered
Thoughts as though you are still nearby.

Maybe it was because you are so shallow
So without real reason or true rhyme
So vapid and tepid that the pulse missing now
Was missing then too. Maybe it's because
You were too deep for me, too rich in reason
And in those textures of life and rhythm
That I missed it all. I missed the affection
I missed the devotion, I missed it all.
You were one of those people.

Bill Purdin: 6158
To my dad on Father's Day


NEVER CHANGES

She was nineteen and I was twenty
I had orders to Vietnam
She was planning a life.
No future she said to me.
The years have gone by that's for sure.
Life has been good to me.
I remember how it made me cry.
How so many years later,
Still I think of her, so young and pure.
In my panethon her place
Is untouchable, unchangable and perhaps
Untrue. Who knows these things anyway?
Of all the events that have ploughed
Through my time are all there for sure;
Each one is right where I put it.
Hers is no greater or lesser ... except
T
hat I remember it so vividly
Always in the exact same way.
It never changes.
Never anything new, anything different.
Always the same: she's unique that way.
Old memories are projects to fix, sanding them
And shaping them into something
Just a little bit better.
I fuss with everything until I'm happy.
Reality's not real.
I've added some stones around one of my gardens.
Every day I push them and worry them around,
Adjusting unseen imperfections.
To anyone else they are fine.
To me they are a mess.
I do that in everything.
Everything gets adjusted.
Over and over and over.
Except for her.
She was nineteen and I was twenty.
I had orders to Vietnam
She was planning a life.
No future she said to me.

Bill Purdin: 668

MEMORIAL DAY AGAIN

War and war's remembrance:
A dedication of those who know not
What war really is.
Marching up and down America's streets
And streets everywhere to patriotic music
Immortalizing how we killed each other
When all we wanted to do was just go home
Seems obviously improper to some who do.

Innocent people watch as the parade goes by
But bloody hands are everywhere under the sky.

Those who've never done it go so unnoted.
Better that there be a Kindness Day for them,
But who would stick out their chest and march for that?
Who would get up on a holiday and beat that drum?
Who would grab a lawn chair at 8:00 a.m.
And head down to Main Street to be sure
To have a great spot as that parade goes by?
Oh look, here comes little Johnny, he's nice to his sister.
Here comes Mr. and Mrs. Arno who were married for 60
Years and lived lives of faith and forgiveness.
Here comes that grocery clerk at the supermarket
Who always smiled. And ... look, look!
There's the old teacher everyone loved.

But today, all over, the other drum beats
For medals of war on soldiers sent to fight
Who wanted to just go home.

Those dead lie still and yonder;
That Day, again, to ponder
.

Bill Purdin: 5/26/08


Lonely and faced with a tough, tough day
The human race walks out the door.
From China to Chelsea,
From Daytona to Hobart Island
We walk together in our strange suffering.
The horn of plenty blows empty.
The promise of love is broken.
"Why me?" is a universal prayer.
And head-down we droop in dispair.
Bridges collapse and the whole world shakes
In a Seismic reading off the scale.
Politicians tireless and profits soaring,
No one hears the mouse's roaring.
We rush into gridlocked traffic,
We hurry to meetings that never end.
We stir and stir but nothing mixes
We try and try but nothing fixes.
I met a little boy hiding under a bush
He was staying out of the parent's eye.
He said to me to go away,
But he meant he wanted me to stay.
He cried as he tried to smile
And he was mad as hell, he laughed as well.
I took his hand and we walked back.
He said later he wanted to return to the bush.
It is trust we want, but can't imagine a way.
We live in a world-wide thesaurus
Of words that change from one thing to another
So we no longer know what to say.
The true words are forgotten in a buzz blitz
Of color and commercials and sexy glitz.
Lonely and faced with a tough, tough day
The human race walks in the door.
Exhausted, and drained, we throw ourselves
On the futile couch and exhale a sigh
Like a gut punch would require.
Or a nail driven into a tire.

Bill Purdin: 5/22/08


THOSE POEMS

Difference from a live one to a dead one
Is easy to see in poetry
Because it just happened.
Because it just happened.
Right in front of you.

I saw poems die all the time once.
They were rhyming along
Swaggering with dusty rhythm
And then they stopped moving.
And then they stopped moving.
And then they stopped, moving.

A few, even as they were still and unrestless,
Torn from a book and tossed to the ground,
Dead for sure, still moved, still moved.

I remember every one, those poems.
They were structured like Housman,
Or free like Sandberg. Or long like Vachel Lindsay.
They were cryptic like Dickinson, or too brief
Like Yeats. They still move. They still move.
They, still, move.

But then, there were those other poems, too
The ones the winds blew away.
Many more of them.
They were well written but unremembered.
I watched them drifting away, carried off.
What's the difference: the living and the dead?
When a poem dies, it dies right in front of you.
When a poem lives, it lives because of you.

They were all written in different hands
They are all there for us to see,
They all had their wonder plans
Some are, some will never be.

Seems a shame all those dead poems.
Seems a shame all those dead poems.
But for the living, would've all been a waste,
It's something that must be faced.

-- Bill Purdin, 5/6/08


A ZUEGMA MYSTERY

Can't spend a life not saying things
Can't spend a life just wanting
Can't spend a life just screaming
Can't spend a life just run run running.

Part of me wants to please everyone
Part of me wants to tear it all up
Part of me drifts into sad sad things
Part of me just sings sings sings.

People say I remember all wrong
(I do get paid to make stuff up)
Memory's just a lonely love song
Life's an unfilled overflowing cup.

The things I like are not for everyone
(That's that way it should be)
When I like something or someone
It's a deep diving zeugma mystery.

The rythme of the strings is air I breathe
The frets of are worlds to play on
My sword goes back into the sheathe
Can't remember why it was drawn.

Bill Purdin: 4/28/08



THE TRUE SONG COMES

People love a love song and they always have.
Imagine a young woman, sifting through
Her memories of failed love and saddness
Who meets a man who seems to be perfect
But she knows he's not. She wants him to be
And marries him and lives with him
For years and years, always hoping, but never
Really happy because reality is never
What we want it to be. In her last days she
Knows that she has lived longer with this man
Than her parents, than her daughters, than any friend.
He has been her companion of a lifetime.
Did she ever really love him?
Was he just a category filled in the album of life?
She sees him there across the room and wonders
Do I really know him? Does he really know me?
Even after all the years there is no clarity.
Even as she closes her eyes, one last time,
She does not know.
Her last vision is his face, eyes awash with tears.
His hand on hers holding tight as she goes.
Her last thought: who am I?
All the years simmer down to questions.
All the moments leave us uncertain.
Never comes that moment of revelation,
Except in loving with no conditions.
Once we love like that, answers are not needed.
It's then that the true song comes.

Bill Purdin: 4/22/08


SQUINTING INTO THE SUNSET.

Watching the long nail bite
Into the wood, and watching
The wood accept it so painfully,
Then sanding the wound, smoothing
The puncture crater and filling it
Then sanding again, and softly stroking
The satin paint over it as if nothing happened.
Now joined, the two pieces have new meaning.
They didn't ask for it, but there it is.
A shelf four and a half feet off the floor.
From the scrap heap to a purpose.
But it began with that piecing, that pain
That attack on things as they were,
An assault of the status quo.
If I were that piece of wood I would have
Hidden further down in the heap, she said.
I would have tried to be useless appearing.
In the pile of wood scrap, she said, I would
Not have stood out. It would have been
Hard to find me. I would have seen to that.
She smiled. Her lips seemed soft and her
Face radiant. What a shame that would be,
I thought. Down there in the depths of
Useless forgotten scraps that smile,
That determination. That humor and all those
Thoughts of how things are and should be.
We were looking at all the scrap wood
Still in the pile.
They look happy she said.
I took her hand, turned off the light and
We walked outside. We were both squinting
Into the sunset when she said,
Let's stay home tonight.

Bill Purdin: 4/11/08

GO IN PEACE

There is a thought that we all have sometimes:
Go your way in peace.
Even after an all-out argument you might have that thought
As your opponent walks away.
It's part of human nature, to see something
Valuable in allowing all to continue.
The difference between the dark revenge
And the willingness to forgive.
I could be wrong is a thought well placed.
He could be right it's possible, should be faced.
When we cut the cord, it's an ending.
Sure there are more to come, beginnings.
But still that bridge is burned, rebuilding is hard.
When we see ourselves in others we see.
When we see enemies in others, our eyes our closed.
The turned cheek still burns, I know.
But our hands are peaceful, our minds hopeful
When we do not eye for eye.
Go in peace. A wonderful parting.
Go in peace. We will meet again.
We can all bring hell to bear, it's sure in us.
But to wish well, well that's adventurous.

Bill Purdin: 438-5


PUSHING

Erasing the past. It's just a button you push.
Then it's gone. All those visuals, those memories
Slowly disappate, but it's a big file.
There are a lot of interlinks. You think it's all gone
But then, there you are at a stop light thinking
This is taking too long. One them reappears.
She was walking in the crosswalk, carry a Macy's bag;
Or he was climbing out of a cab, carrying my old briefcase;
Or it was a dog barking somewhere; or
A television show that I watched once, now on rerun;
Or there was this crack in the sidewalk that reminded me
Of Minnesota, or Kansas or maybe a small village
In the jungle where things were flying around;
But it was really just this shopping bag blowing
On the street, empty like a drunken balloon.
And then I was moving along and the breeze through
The window reminded me of my Dad smoking Luckies
In the car. Then I came to a stop sign that seemed
Like one in Indiana I saw every day. It was just a stop sign
Then but now I remember how I would just stay there
Looking at this cornfield growing from little seedlings
To tall stalks and then to harvest plunder everything
Shredded and strewn like a battlefield after.
But we do push the button. It takes months and months
Of planning and thinking and rethinking. Actually,
To erase the past I looked as far into the future as possible
For me to see what I could see there. I know the little
Things will grow and then they will be used up and then
Well... then what? That was as far as I could see.
Some memories have gone now, pushed out.
But some fight their way back in, pushing in.
Memories swirl like they are blown on a wind
That is going somewhere but the only way to find
Out where is to let it blow and just go
Along. You can't really wipe them off, or
Efface them in any true way. Some things are there forever.
Dead people walk in our thoughts; mistakes take
Their toll over and over. Weaknesses reemerge
Jack-in-the-box-like. Good deeds done drift away
As they should. We wander in a hinterland of doubt
And hope. The past and the future are like a slow fog
We are walking through. It's always before us.
It's always behind us. We can see around us but not
With clarity or definition. It takes a lot of faith
To be alive. Imagine the things we do foggy-bound.
So many things that we forget some of them.
So many things that we can never do them all.
The past walks with us, the future holds our hand.
We are in the moment no matter how hard we fight it,
No matter how many buttons we push.
There's no erasing. There's no procrastinating.
It's all happening: the central revelation.
The stop signs are not really stop signs.
Go.

Bill Purdin: 418-5


Watching things change is fun
When it's other people's things.
When it's you, it's like a spray gun
Over all your accountings.

It's always the things not showing:
What's really going on in your life.
It takes assumptions to real knowing:
When it's you, you can feel the knife.

But watching others cope with change
We encourage them to accept what's due.
It may be something rich or strange:
We tell them ... "It's up to you."

Bill Purdin: 3318-5



He can look at a room and calculate the framing
In his head down to a sixteenth of an inch.
He can look at a house and rightly judge
It's weight and force integrity. Always on the money.
He drives a broken down Chevy truck 100 miles a day.
He says it's the most dependable vehicle ever.
He has a story for every topic and will talk and talk.
He charges a lot of money, but gives more than he takes.
He always returns his calls, volunteers to do pickups,
And never complains about hard work no matter
How far off-plan things go. He once worked for four hours
To bore a hole through the sill of this house and
Talks about it as if it were the best day ever.
He charged me for one hour.
He doesn't really have any money.
He doesn't really have any future.
He does, however, have today in the fullest measure.
It's his heaven. It's his hell. It's his dream. His wishing well.
He exists in a moment, a second-by-second world
With nothing behind or in front,
With no one better or worse,
Where ability matters and kindness rules.
And then he's gone.
An innocent in a world
Of hammers and saws.

Bill Purdin: 3/24/08


RIDE, RIDE RIDE

It's an entertaining place, this world.
You can really do anything you want.
You can really do anything you want.

There are no limits, just look around.
People do the craziest, funniest, weirdest and meanist things
You could ever think of . We couldn't make it up.
The billions all thinking about doing something
More than a single mind can grasp.
The soldiers, the whores, the flyers and the dreamers
The schemers and then there's you.
There in your life thinking, thinking, thinking.
Our planet lights the dark black space
We sail through. All the minds thinking
Cast a light to the end of time for you.

It's an entertaining place, this world.
You can really do anything you want.
You can really do anything you want.

To waste a life in dread and doubt
To spend day after day waiting to find out
Is the curse of all who huddle and hide
Jump on, grab a hold, and ride, ride, ride.

Bill Purdin, 3/16/08


A SLOW MOVING CURTAIN

Remember those days when you played in the sand?
Or when you ran to the dinner table, hungry?
Remember those dreams you had of a world of wonder?
What happened? Did the politicians wear us down?
Did the corporations turn us into consumers?
Or was it just the millstone of life grinding away?

Yesterday I was staring into the eyes of a newborn girl,
Just a week or two old. She was smiling in her sleep.
When her eyes opened they didn't focus, just let in the light,
And then she sort of squirmed her arms and turned her head
And fell asleep again. She was laying on a giant, for her,
Pillow made for babies to sleep on. A successful design.
When her young mother carried her around she watched
Closely as her world went by at what must seem like
The speed of light to her. Just out of the womb
Where movement was only measured in inches,
Where everything was pretty quiet and cozy dark.
Over her mother's shoulder I saw her looking around.
The world is suddenly huge and all she sees it
Is one room at a time, if that. Research says that newborns
Are "disconnected" at first. They see their arms and hands
But don't get it that those appendages are appended to them.
They do know voices and when I spoke she looked right at me.
An invader? Danger? No, it was curiosity in pure form.
Her eyes looked at me with interest, scanning for information.

I'm still thinking about that several days later. It's been a long, long time
Since anyone has looked at me like that. She was just looking.
Filling some small part of her mind with information,
Whatever it was to her. It made me laugh with some indescribable
Happiness. She filed that away as well. Those dark baby eyes
So intense and yet so open and unjudging. I was still looking
Into them when they closed very slowly. I had the sense that they
Were looking and looking as this slow moving curtain came down
Over her. And then she was asleep again.
I wanted to wait right there until she woke up, but
I had things to do and places to go.

Bill Purdin, 3/508


WAY, WAY BEHIND

It started out pretty bad.
I forgot everything and had to go back.
Half an hour behind schedule
And it was only 6:30 a.m.
Then it was really hard. Harder than I thought
It would be. But I did it.
Then I planned to spend some time writing
But the phone wouldn't stop ringing.
Now it's nearing half day, and I am still
Way, way behind. Like a runner
Who won't give up, I'm still pounding away
Looking ahead and hoping.
Always hoping.
Sometimes I think that not giving up
Is what life is all about.
It has nothing to do with achievement.
It has absolutely nothing to do with winning.
And even less with losing.
It is just a long lesson in perseverence.
It is just a long, long lesson in overcoming.
It is just a long, long, long lesson in leaving yourself
Way, way behind, way off schedule, forgetting everything
Except that no matter what ...
On you go.

Bill Purdin, 3/4/08


There is nothing better than
Doing something you didn't really want to do
And finding out how much you love it.
The dragging effort to get going,
The constant turning back thoughts
That I can't even start constriction
And the this is horrible, I'm going to stop compulsions.
Then there's the I did it feeling
That lasts all day
And the I remember doing it
And beyond.

Bill Purdin, 3/3/08


INSIDE OUT AND OUTSIDE IN

Three inches of soft snow fell last night.
So soft it brushed away like a better thought
Brushing past a thought of dread or worry.
I saw two pairs of footprints:
My wife's to the end of the driveway and back.
She was getting the newspaper. It was
Still dark and the world was quiet, peaceful.
Her steps at the end were bigger as though she had paused
There, warm slippers melting the snow
In the midst of her errand, to sense
A world so quiet and fluffy, she might
Have looked around with no one awake
And thought to herself,
"Isn't this beautiful? It's like a miracle."
I hope so.
The other footprints were really paw prints.
A small animal had come from behind the garage,
Across the driveway and up three stairs on the back porch.
Then the prints had dissappeared under the porch,
Where there is no snow and a vent of warm air.
No way to track what happened but I
Imagined the little critter stopped under the vent
And felt the warm air brush over its fur.
Perhaps it was thinking.
"Isn't this just great. It's like a miracle."
I hope so.
Inside out and outside in:
Something miraculous
Always around you.

Bill Purdin, 2/28/08



Front Page (4)

McCain says his campaign rests on success in Iraq.
Hillary Clinton down and really out, goes on vicious attack.
Quietly pressing on with hopes for the future: that's Barack.
Ford is pushing its workers to a buy-out.
American business is receding, there's not much doubt.
North Korea is hosting the New York Philharmonic
And politicos stare and try not to be psychoanalytic.
Bush always says one thing and does another.
Doesn't seem to know the difference 'tween one and 'tother.
He dances in Africa and preens in D.C.
Doesn't seem to care for Democacy or you and me.
The Dems are debating tonight on CNN
It's depicted poll-wise: older white women vs. men.
My, how the times they are a-changin',
Everything is shifting and we are all rearrangin'.
Let's hope when the dust settles there comes clarity,
Peace and harmony in our time? Or more and more polarity?
It's only Tuesday, watch our Video of the Day.

Bill Purdin, 2/26/08

Front Page (3)

Hillary's gone ballistic over Obama.
Witch emerges over All-American Mama.
She says he's as bad as Karl Rove ever was
But the Obamanics are now hyper-activated, abuzz.
The Oscars stolled down the red carpet
The writers came back, studios paid the debt.
Big Brother 9 went on its trashy way
Ralph Nader enter the election yesterday.
'Bout as exciting as Raul's "election" in Havana
(Or slipping on a banana).
Huckabee was funny on SNL
Tiger won again, his sixth straight trip to the well.
A bomb blew up a bunch a Shiites in Baghdad,
And nothing of Hillary "hits" could ever be that bad.

Bill Purdin, 2/25/08


Front Page (2)

Homeowners wallow in debt
We shot down the satellite, and yet....
Obama takes it all and is still standing,
Clinton's campaign's spending, she's demanding
That we all see he's just a boy,
Not made of the metal: the BillHill alloy.
Democrats bicker, no resonating rhymes
And McCain blames it all on The New York Times.
Pakistan may stop our deadly, driverless drones,
But Washington still can't hear the groans
Of Darfur, Congo, New Orleans
Over Haliburton, Exxon and designer jeans.
Serbia burned out our embassy
And America goes on free and easy.

Bill Purdin, 2/22/08

Front Page (1)

Obama's got 22 wins.
Hillary's on the ropes.
He talks about the people rising for change,
She's counting on the super delegate dopes.
He says "We can do it" change America and the world.
She says "Day One, Day One" but that flag's long unfurled.
He says, "Houston, we have liftoff."
She says, "Houston. That'll be his cut-off."
He dreams of a better world where people talk.
She says, "It's a fairytale." Jack on the beanstalk.
Well, the people will decide and it won't be close.
She's lost her Mojo, plus all those caballeros.
He's got Big Mo, big time. Tally-ho.
She's making her last stand. Alamo.

Bill Purdin, 2/20/08




HALF

If you take half of what you want
You will still have at least
Twice of what you need.

If you say half of what you think
You will still say at least
Twice as much as you should have.

If you give twice as much as you want to
You will still have only
Given half of what you could have.

When you imagine your capacity for change
You will still have only imagined
Half of what is possible.

And when I wrote this poem I knew
That I was still only writing
Half of the truth.


Bill Purdin: 2/6/08


In a cloud of dust
And a hearty "Hi Ho"
Sometimes our dreams end.

Love's not love
Without an "although"
I love you most as a friend.

Life has a promise
In the ebb and flow
Of days' and nights' pretend.

-- Bill Purdin: 1/30/08


The Flag

It flew behind me like a cape.
It was red white and beautiful.
It was a life dream coming true.
When I crashed and burned I thought of you.

-- Bill Purdin: 1/28/08

THEY ARE OURS

It's a busy, busy world.
It's a rude, rude world.
It's a "Hi," "Bye" world.
The sirens screech bad news in the night,
We seem to lose wrong and right;
Everywhere you turn you hear, "My bad."
And the children seem to be sort of CSI sad.

They are watching our every move.
They are listening to our every word.
They worry we are their future.
We hope they are ours.

When we cross reference our information
It's a pretty good start; takes a stout heart.
We push and stress like constipation,
We tangle and rangle and pull ourselves apart.

It's a world of games and shames.
It's a five star, way-too-far world.
It's an all new. all see-through world.
Careful what we wished for, a consolation,
The family photos seem to stand still.
There is a ringing in your ears;
It could be the wind, or it could be the years.

They are watching our every move.
They are listening to our every word.
They worry we are their future.
We hope they are ours.


-- Bill Purdin: 1/18/08


WHEN WE WERE YOUNG WE

That feeling in your stomach
That you've screwed everything up
Is just a feeling in your stomach,
Not reality.

Once dead, I woke up again.
Once awake I remembered.
As I remembered dying
I smiled.

Death is thinking it's over
Giving into your stomach
Thinking it's real:
Fear overcoming.

We all stand on precipices
Over long falls to nowhere
There is no bridge to
Take us.

An open mind will free you.
Disregard trepidation's gravity
And freefall with exuberance
Of careless youth.

When we were young we
Knew we would live forever.
When we were young we
Had it right.

Bill Purdin: 1/10/07

SHINING EYES

Einstein discovered that velocity is relative
And gravity is not a constant.
The theory of relativity: that even as you approach The speed of light, light is still travelling
At the speed of light but time has slowed down
For you. In other words, matter and energy
Are the same thing in different forms.
Matter and energy make up everything.
Everything is relative, leaning on each other.
How you are determines how I am and
Of course the reverse is true.
The way you view the world is the world.
The way you view me is me.
And, of course the reverse is true.
Look brightly with shining eyes on the world.
Believe the best. See the best.
Today is waiting at the speed of light
For you.
It needs you to see.

Bill Purdin: 1/7/8

Just when you think you're weak, you're strong.
Just when you think you're right, you're wrong.
When you think you've got it all, you lose it all.
When you think you're short, turns out you're tall.

You search and search, but you don't find.
Just can't make a meeting of The Mind.
You pray for help but it does not arrive.
Everyone's dying, but hey you're still alive.

The secret of life is there's no dread.
"All that, that is, is," as Shakespeare said.
You try to fail but succeed.
Life tricks you, oh yes indeed.

Bill Purdin: 1/2/8


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