Monthly Archives: June 2012

With Privilege Comes Corruption

Think about this often

How petty we have become

Money, power, the big house; is this really important?

Money distorts,

Power corrupts,

The big house…a symbol of unnecessary opulence.

Those of unlike kind are frowned upon,

Lazy,

Bloodsuckers,

A drain on the system,

Is this what we have become?

Those with means holding us hostage,

Our station in life seals our fate,

Threatening to exterminate ones less fortunate,

All in the name of progressing their adgenda.

Civility and compassion tossed aside like so many feathers to the wind,

Cast out as unimportant,

So unnecessary in this capitalist system,

The needs of the few eclipse those of the many.

Talking heads and bureaucrats tow the line,

Telling us that this is our foundation,

Lies and deceit disguise their motives,

Their pockets lined with fools gold.

Still they profit at societies expense,

And we buy in to the hollow rhetoric,

Smiling and clapping as they spew their bile,

Blind to the parade marching to it’s own demise.

Our representation sold for profit,

With wealth comes power and the rise of aristocracy,

This was not the proclivity of our fathers,

Yet we watch it happen with hardly a noise.

Is this what is desired or desirable?

It can’t be…it mustn’t be our expectation,

Like mice we scurry away from that which is distasteful,

Rise up, speak up, demand your just due,

Tenacity in numbers can rejuvenate our future,

Forcing the tyrants to bow to our intentions.

Disturbed?

White noise

Distorting my senses

Images like flashbacks fill my mind

Thoughts, past, present and future

Blur the lines between fantasy and reality

Sanity or insanity

Who is to say which is which

Its difficult to tell anymore

Dreams materialize in painful rushes of sound and color

Awake…No rest, can’t sleep

Unfolding into vivid nightmares

They seem so real

Glimpses of my innermost fears

Each breath becomes more labored

Struggling to claw back to consciousness

I can feel the blood pulsing through my veins

Rapid, it battles to sustain me

The pounding in my head clouds my vision

Strong burnt coffee the medicine

Nerves steady…Fog recedes

Jarred back to life  by the caffine

Another day of subsistence

Endeavoring to crawl out of the darkness

Alone and lonely.

Piety and Hypocrisy

Father, Savior, Lord, Jehovah

Faith in the unknown

The eternal struggle never ceasing, never compromising

What to believe, that is the question.

Eons pass, bloodshed abounds

Differences mediated through conflict

Crusade or Jihad, neither is virtuous.

Blinded by rightousness, no one can see

Their lives spent and lost in pursuit of utopia

Yet contentment in this moment is never realized.

Is this the end to which the righteous aspire?

They gather in the name of peace

Projecting their false tolerance

A show…insincere in all its pageantry.

Beneath the surface bubbles hatred and hostility

Vowing to disencumber this world of the other

While smiling and greeting with a warm embrace.

Is this what the supreme being wants from us?

Are differing opinions to be snuffed out?

Our traditions say yes with a deafening roar.

Are not love and charity mightier than the sword?

More palettable then pain and suffering

To say yea would be only logical.

Still man endeavors to distort the infalable word

All for his own selfish devices

Leading the unquestioning flock to slaughter

Mindless and oblivious they follow their master.

To petition for truth, is construed as heresy

Faith the only path to eternal salvation

Yet acrimony toward our neighbors persists.

Does prejudice or averice have any authority to prevail?

An emphatic no should be the only a reply

If common decency were the essence of all relations

Peace and harmony would be all that exist.

Loves Transformation

By D. DiFrancesco

 

Fires burn,

They start out white hot

Then cool to a shimmering blue.

It’s not that the flame has diminished

The passion still glows, but its appearance changes with time.

We find comfort in one another, by being in each other’s presence.

A look,

Says more than words ever could.

Nothing can be said that you haven’t already heard.

Love, anger, sadness, all my feelings expressed in a glance

Sometimes I think you know me better than I know myself.

Maybe you do after all these years.

A caress,

Something tender and sweet

Your warmth, skin against skin, your beauty

Isn’t it fascinating how each of life’s seasons seems frozen in time?

My vision of you, still a twenty-something

So precious to me because of the spirit that is you.

Our lives,

The bond we share through adulation

Through friendship, endearment, and adoration

We have become one.

That nothing in heaven or earth can decimate.

My best friend, mate, and truelove for all eternity.

Those Left At Home

By D. DiFrancesco

Are they ok?
Where are they?
Questions asked daily by parents of children
But they aren’t really children any more
Only to us.

A letter home
The occasional telephone call
Pictures and postcards
Somehow it isn’t enough to quell the fears
While serving in a land so far away.

We can’t hold them
We can’t advise them
We can’t comfort them
All we can do is worry about them
So Many more questions than answers.

The military says they will take care of them
They say they will try to bring them home safe
“Try” doesn’t make this any easier
But they can’t make such promises
No one can see into the future.

Parcels are sent regardless of cost
Trying to provide some comfort to them
Little things to remind them of home
A little thing to make us feel useful
Yet it doesn’t change anything.

This is what they chose to do
We swell with pride at the thought
We fly our flags and display our yellow ribbons
Small signs to the rest of the world of the their sacrifice
And our sacrifice.

They are a gift
Given to all of us to cherish
They pay the price for our freedom
They weren’t asked to, they weren’t told to
They give because it is their destiny.

Remember these heros in your prayers
Because you know them or someone like them
And because they deserve it and have earned it
This is the very least we can do
Don’t let their sacrifices be for naught.

The telephone rings
Our hearts skip a beat
Hello, is answered with an endless silence
Angst gives way to elation
Hi…Mom…Dad, its me.

Desolate Beauty

By D. DiFrancesco

 

Pale blue cloudless skies

God’s of granite rise to meet it

Hawks and buzzards scream their cries

Parched and cracking earth crumbles bit by bit.

 

Yet life does thrive in this barren wasteland

Angry flora and fauna its solemn masters

Brown and tan the palette at hand

Landscape the pupil, sun the headmaster.

 

Cliff dwellings and hieroglyphs call home this domain

Once proud inhabitants have faded and gone

Arachnids and echoes are all that remain

Of an era that is all but bygone.

 

Still man insists on taming the unattainable

Its lifeblood rerouted and dammed

For cities and towns, its inhabitants expendable

The resultant effects unplanned.

 

Yet with all the scrub and cactus and scorpion

Its peace and beauty abound

The mountains and valleys elicit euphoria

No greater gift can be found.

 

Try as we might to alter its reality

The eagle keeps watch over this land

Man and machine try to prove natures frailty

But nature does refuse their demand.

 

As the celestial heat wave succumbs to twilight

Nocturnal denizens hiss and bay

Under constellations hunters commence the fight

For the strong to live another day.

 

With each days pass the circle unbroken

The animal and land meld into one

Of mountains and desert, lore has been spoken

In God’s own will be done.

 

A Personal Story, Is this Coincidence or Something Else?

I feel compelled to share a brief story with you  that has both touched me greatly and amazed me at the same time.

Yesterday afternoon I completed and posted a poem, “Wither Away“, that was a very personal poem about my grandmother.  Suffering with chest pains, she had been diagnosed with congestive heart failure about 4 months ago and her doctors gave her 6 months to a year to live.   The doctors also made it clear that there was nothing that they could do other than to prescribe medications to make her comfortable.

Initially after diagnosis she had more good days than bad, but of late the opposite was true and she became unable to get out of bed without being carried.   As you can imagine this is a very hard thing to watch happen to someone you love.

Now to my point.   Whether by fate, a premonition unrecognized by me, coincidence, or something else that I can’t explain I received a call from my parents last night to tell me that my grandmother had died early yesterday morning.   They chose to wait to tell me until I had gotten home from work so that I didn’t have this on my mind all day.

I know that this type of thing is not unheard of, but it does make me wonder how something as seemingly random as posting a poem could turn out to be so prophetic, at least to me anyway.  I guess it will just have to remain one of those strange occurrences that happens to a person during the course of their life.

My grandmother was 92 years old when she passed on.  I will miss her deeply.

T.G.M.

March 16, 1920 – June 7, 2012

Rest In Peace

Wither Away

By: D. DiFrancesco

The pain of watching one wither away
Indescribable and yet inescapable
Remembering how vibrant and energetic they were
We think they will never go away.

I can still see her
In the kitchen apron on making a meal
It doesn’t matter which one it was
They all are precious memories to me.

I was a child
She was everything to me back then
Eyes shining, the silkiness of her voice
These were some of my happiest days.

Then childhood passes
Like the sweep of the second hand
Harsh reality clings like beads of sweat
Those once so virile commence to fade.

We try to stave off the inevitable for as long as we can
But alas it proves useless
No magic elixer can halt the decline
How swift does frailty overcome us.

Her eyes have sunk into evenings dark abyss
The hunch in the back, a sign of a life of burden
Her stride gives way to a shuffle
The mercy of others her only salvation.

No longer able to self-sustain
Twilights arms embrace who she once was
A child returns from where it started
The circle of life incarnate.

Her mobility has vanished, now forever prone
But oddly the memories of her past are clear
Thoughts from more modern times she can’t remember
Eternities multitude is calling her home.

She’s withered away, her grace in passing inspires
In her destiny we see ourselves
We fear this most as our time here is finite
To our maker we must trust our mortal souls…farewell.

A Common Life

A COMMON LIFE

By: D. DiFrancesco

Dreams of greatness pass
Like the flickering flame of a candle doth die.
Youth brings thoughts that cannot last
Through every hope reality replies.

Ambitions push for fame and glory
These too are dashed in fires eternal.
Ministering to the flock the age old story
Left for lifes pleasures carnal.

To serve with honor next desired
On oceans of blue and green not to be.
Parental opposition they both conspired
To steer this ship into calmer seas.

So many attempts have I endevored
To make my way on paths I’ve chosen.
To no avail the byways severed
A common subsistence I’m now beholden.

Regrets at one time there were so many
Now reconciled I am at peace.
Born to this world a life of frenzy
The joys of experience cry out for release.

Tears no more will my eyes engender
My path to destiny fulfilled.
To the little things I prize surrender
A troubled conscience now stilled.

I worry no more of roads less traveled
As a life lived well is a life worth living.
Those that I love smooth what I have raveled
Content to pass on with all I’ve been given.

So worry not for me when the time doth come
The fruits I’ve inherited, greater than my share.
Resolute I’ve gifted far more than some
Prepared to leave this world with nary a care.

Soldiers Lament

By: D. DiFrancesco

Its warm and quite now
Oceans of tan and brown fade to black
I close my eyes but sleep seems to elude me
They don’t want us here.

Dawn arrives with a boom!
Haze clouds my vision
Restless sleep proves no reward
They don’t want us here.

Boots hit the ground!
Dust flies almost blinding
The sounds of yelling and running feet fill my ears
They don’t want us here.

Shouts of mount up, split the air.
Iron horses within we ride
Cloud thick dirt becomes the air I breathe
They don’t want us here.

Spider cracks, mirrors shattered
Rocks not stones thown with reckless abandon
Duck for cover out of natural reflex
They don’t want us here.

We’re here to help.
Superiors echo, they tow the company line
Calls for retribution go unanswered
They don’t want us here.

Menacing children their parents aware
Deference expected at all costs
Villages many, quietude evades
They don’t want us here.

Back to drab structures we call home.
Rest and repair awaits
Animosity subsides with works resumption
They don’t want us here.

Supplanting shattered glass
A ritual most repeated
For tomorrow will reinact this dual of wills
They don’t want us here.

To whom do we owe this greatest of honors?
A chance to die for what end
The new day replays the deadliest of dances
They don’t want us here.

With a final salvo its time for slumber
Wash the Afghan filth from a body that aches
Dawn’s break is right around the corner
They still don’t want us here.