Why Do

why do we do it

I do it to be around beauty - art mostly, imagination usually.

To experience good and troubled times with a select few - let's call them family.

To have an impact - though very few do, or realize to.

To generate goodness - a multi-faced target.

To give my best - to any thing I can do.

why do you do it

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- artwork by Alexander Calder... -
- mailed to Michigan - 

Treasure

I'm lucky to have you, he says
How do you mean, they say
You can take me there when I cannot, he says
Yes I will, they say
You eat with me and think to me, he says
I am all here for me and you, they say
You respond to my touch and tales, he says
My stories intertwine, first slowly then intricately, with you, they say
There is trust when you feel me, they say
You increase and decrease my heart, and rate, he says
You are the evolving one for me, he says
I like when our minds brawl, they say
You brawl and I bawl, feeling that sinking internal ache, he says
We construct histories, extending our reach, they say
I know you. I just want to look at you now.

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- artwork by Yayoi Kusama - 
- mailed to Wisconsin - 

Catching The Reveal

The Reveal sits at this desk when I write.
Tapping tinkering mumbling aloud, just
waiting for the sparrow to transfer a rhyme.

Eyes close, open, seeing zero in front,
yet begin finding the Reveal
suspiciously perched just behind.

Slow slow Reveals satisfy the starving artist type.
But Reveals come fast as hummingbirds too,
to be worked and worked and worked into.

People will sometimes reveal themselves.
The pace may vary, very fast to very slow.
In time the parrot sings, revealing songs to the listening.

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- artwork by Lakin Ogunbanwo - 
- mailed to Illinois - 

a gentle assurance

a boy loves a girl
and a rock
barely noticing either - while avoiding a loose tooth during brushing

he believes the girl who lives above
she says they are good friends
and you love friends - according to mom

the boy feels good eating - also kicking rocks
he supposes they serve the same purpose
just the same as girl-loving

that rock he kicked all the way from the library
saved that one
showed that one to the girl - and liked it

they both felt nice
it mysteriously reassured the boy
then he forgot - and again kicked a rock, with a nagging hint of more

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- artwork by Adam Moskowitz, "Counterform Forest River I"
- hand written and mailed to Indiana -

Looking Aside

Pull focus around them
Noting the details surrounding them
Their loves illuminated by weight of importance
          
Always look to their side
This is where little angels reside
Protecting that loitering wisdom awaiting attention

Give them a stage to profess their joy
And listen intently as their flow is employed
Catching those unspoken everyday details

They  are a stranger
They  may be a friend
Or they  is you, unaware and blinded by you

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- artwork by David Hockney - 
- mailed to Kentucky - 

Heavy Days

Heavy head, hands the body a lack-luster step
If only, head controlled solely critical body functions
Head might let the body bounce and jig during stark times

As it stands, a body can tighten and hurt
Depending on the condition of said head
It is fair to nobody-and-nothing simultaneously

If the body were to enforce its girth upon head
The powerful influence might encourage a change
Particularly when head requires, or simply desires, to lie
In bed

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- artwork by Billie Zangewa - 
- mailed to West Virginia - 

An Act Of Seeing

Who Sees who when needing to..
Harry watches Holly dancing and
Holly has an eye on another
Both saying "See me See me" 
in their minds' breath forever

Seeing requires stubborn kindness
A complete momentary presence
Those Seeing
deplete their bucket of internal desires
for the sake of wholly Seeing the other

Browse your files
Push away a demon or two
Notice when someone stops to
engage in a blustery emotional instant
They See.. changing everything for you and me

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- artwork by Michael Craig-Martin - 
- mailed to Virginia - 

the Choice

Dear Mother and Father Nature
Your child is out-of-control
Destroying lives and livelihoods
Upending land, water and sky
     into a catastrophic frenzy
Your child is depositing brutality upon earth

We've experienced this before
Please, again, attempt control of Nature
Earth is the only home we know
If it crumbles
     sapping the life out of the living
Our only choice will be to.....

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- artwork by Peter Fischli & David Weiss - "Mr & Mrs Einstein shortly after the conception of their son, the genius Albert"
- mailed to South Carolina - 

Feeling Futile

Inflamed bursts are not coincidental.

Like a slow driver slowing your hurry - 
they're BORN to drive slow...

A chatty charlatan influencing your desires - 
they MUST have your best interest in mind...

An apologetic parent dying - 
SUDDENLY giving a lucid sincerity of age-old topics...

Breath (present tense), Breath (past tense) -
scream a sigh.

Solo massacres have erupted
from the inflamed.

One may unknowingly be adding flames
to the inflamed.

Fan the flames of the inflamed
at the peril of all.

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- artwork by Francis Bacon -
- mailed to North Carolina - 

Monumentally Slow

Some stuff moves tremendously slow
Like a painting divulging meaning
drop by drip

Growth can march excruciatingly slow too
plants, nails, eye lash, ear wax
Powerful perseverance needed

Even traveling to a rendezvous
(peppered by anticipation and desire)
can progress maddeningly slow

The Galapagos Tortoise walks 10 paces
in a monumentally slow swagger
They arrive where they need to be, eventually

Observing love, intelligence, even death
is an exercise in patience
Life douses experiences with slowness for good reason

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- artwork by Sheila Hicks - 
- mailed to Georgia -