This is my latest poem. I guess I was thinking about how we really are separated from one another and as we live in our own tight bubble of coroporate productivity or self-aggrandizing delusions of how we are well off and superior to others who have little, I started to think about the separation of people. Yet, in that separation, people become addicted to their own little corner of mediocrity. Their lives are a series of things they have done before...nothing comes as a challenge to believe in a greater driving force to live. For me, this does us no good if we are to leave this place more connected and nurtured than we found it. It's strange...my mind works very fast when I write, so the ideas come in a second...funny how this idea has stayed with me for a while.

eyes apart
11.30.07

all things around me are vacantly alone…
the blank stares from people beside me
leave me staring into what they look at.
i question the distance they must feel inside.
silence between everyone is contagious…
their splintering souls need love or time.
but it’s the mystery of the body within
that drives misery from the hiding places.
emerging with closed hands and cold skin,
humanity crawls to view the world in motion.
the noise of words drown out silence…
peace stands in-between the weak and ignored.
once again, the emptiness is vacant
of any instant connection of brand new trust.
validation of the soul is in the background…
i see thousands with hands held out for touch,
and yet they are pushed further back
into waiting for the pace of the world to notice.
they are their own blessing to each other
as no one else gets off the spinning
and teetering of the global ignorance of denial.
to save and feed, to love and to protect…
it seems the menu has a hidden expense
busy souls are already indebted to.
the space around their hearts into their
consciences might as well be a million miles.
an attitude of superiority suppresses
any shred of reply in compassion or decency.
humanity is in exile…away from suffering,
away from indifference, away from necessity.
realization of indecision lies dead and buried
by the realists who want their own needs first.
breaking the bread and drinking the wine
become rehearsed movements meaning nothing...
and so they quietly stare into the blank spaces
ahead of them, going into the moments of time.
they stare into the constant rotation of day and night,
of love and sex, of faith and doubt,
of jobs and pets, of school and luxury,
of sickness and gifts, of age and death.
unable to breathe freely from their hope,
they choke out the sunlight’s warmth from
the coldness that had been their life.
i see the blank faces stare at what they see,
and i begin to feel what separates them from me.
it is the distance of dread in a world of need.
the distance of high walls and far away emotion.
to be able to do nothing in a world that asks,
is taking its needs and executing their dreams of innocence.
and so i am left with this distance in my sight…i ask:
“when is it going to be alright for us all to stare at each other?”