Tattered Gray Shadows

memories of all the good times

fewer stories, oft-repeated

the tie that binds when the cord is cut

obscene tirades not remembered

the great old oak that roots the clan

at last upturned with roots exposed

one who has known you for all of your days

more demanding than your child

that person once so very active

that man now lying in his own wastes

keeper of what they used to say

simply entranced by TV games

happy model for our golden years

unlikely plans for resuming life

one who helped you when you were helpless

you cannot really help her now

he who, smiling, made it look so easy

now you find you have no answers

lives of dignity and quiet virtue

ignored by strangers at their day jobs

strong men who fought in the greatest war

gray shadow struggling to sit up for dinner

enjoying a life of wise contemplation

lying awake in a confusing silence

doing things there was never time for

squirming over bedpans and suffering from bedsores

spending time with the grand kids

frightened children at a stranger’s bedside

passing on rich memories and great lessons

mementos committed to the dumpster

secure enough after a life spent saving

nest egg plundered by corporate health care

skills for living honed and sharpened

quiet desperation among real strangers

committed forever to a soul partner

left alone to sort out the tatters

enjoying a healthy, active lifestyle

watching their bags fill through tubes

making plans and talking trips

but riding everywhere on their backs

watching fat and getting fiber

eating dog food to stay on budget

seeing the grand children growing up

mistaking your daughter as her child

wisely tending to the household

being fleeced by thieves and cons

passing away with quiet dignity

bilked one last time by the funeral ‘industry’

Finally, Really Out Of Time

When you realize that you may be almost out of time

          Things swim into focus that you know now you never really noticed

The preciousness of the dullest moments you once ignored

          Become quite apparent as you are led off to be rewarded

A series of  last times and silent goodbyes lead to new conclusions

          And things as they are molt into merest memories for you

And though voices call out as you are peeled away

          The path you must take only leads you further and further astray

Then there are those few brief moments so inexplicable and sweet

          And you try to pause within them but they vanish like the dew

And if one finally realizes the very preciousness of the ordinary

          The busy world goes on around, quite unfairly, without a second thought

When at last perched on the brink of that chasm our thoughts can never fill

          Slowly grows an awareness of that awaiting unknown, so dark and so very still

Colors seem somehow brighter, familiar voices ring much more dear

          Though they don’t yet see it as clearly, their time is also very near

There is no more daily rush to nowhere then back again every night

          And now there is this fearful separation from the herd that you must fight

The burden of increasing uselessness grows heavy and confounding

          Food and drink can be tasteless with no real life to surround them

Memories boil up from places far away and all those times that did not last

          It becomes easy to imagine a hidden goodness in the distant past

Opportunities squandered and chances not taken return to haunt

          things you took for granted all those years re-appear just to taunt

Some come to sell you jesus, some come to relieve you of your assets

          The drugs remove your fight but still you lie awake in the night

Chance events from childhood on, strive to weave a full quilt of meaning

          Feverishly your mind keeps seeking some pattern before your leaving

The little ones are brought by to stand in wide-eyed apprehension

          friends and cousins may briefly pause and ask themselves a question

Some perish in a fiery instant, some linger painfully and grow quite bitter

          But many long-held but false assumptions will never even be reconsidered

Some may find great peace in knowing faith alone will see them through

          Others continue to ignore those who pimp religion’s pretty whore

All our lives we comfort in the fact that we always have tomorrow

So it’s quite hard to accept there is no more time to be borrowed

Can I draw from long hours spent praying or squandered in front of TV

          Do I await a re-uniting with those loved ones who left in front of me

Some make wondrous plans for a future others see shrouded in uncertainty

          Faith-based reservations can be made but arrival comes without a guarantee

We can still speak of someday but there are many things that won’t get done

          We can try to forget and to ignore but it will never be again like it was before

It was never supposed to come to this, not for me, in any case

          Dying was like being old, possible only for some other race

My grandma said she would never leave me, but long ago she went away

          I still did not grasp it all, even when mom and dad could not stay

And now as I lay here, so stiff and very still, I see others who have different plans

          To them it is very obvious I cannot escape, but that they most surely will

Like time to a stone

like the long spring twilight so slowly fading but not quite ending

          the dark winter's night without any real beginning

like the endless school year when we were still young children

          time, to a stone, as it is ground into sand by a stream

like the trees never growing though seen every day

          the changes on our own faces, so difficult to notice

like the loss which hurts less often than it did at first

          the future that contains us knowing only one direction

like the threads that lie scattered without cause or effect

          the lines of our lives flow then end, with no change in pressure

like the volcanic islands which arose, flourished and were swallowed

          the constant roar of the ocean as it is pounds away on a shore

like the day of the year which shifts light into dark

          the memory of a lonely figure fading off into a dusk

like the smallest of details which plagues one for long years

          the certainty of our passing can never quite be ignored

like the vision that visits in time of our greatest need

          there is this mute summons served without any notice

like the confusion that we sense at the center of so many things

          comes a slow perception that quietly aids in our adjustment

like the fearless zeal of those who know very little

          the honesty of children which cannot be ignored

like the brief moment we spend as ourselves on this blessed earth

          our un-measurable fraction of all of time grows ever smaller

like the two atoms fusing brightly in a far-off star

          the smallest cause can bring about the biggest change

like the simplest ideas that transform entire societies

          only the best teachers can explain all things to their children

like the way that details appear when one walks upon the land

          the faster we can go the less we are able to notice

like the myriad drops forming a river that’s now lost in the ocean

          those experiences unfolded into someone we had known

like the way the dawn ends so very quickly

          the morning builds quite slowly and then disappears

like the distance light travels while we are sleeping

          the multiverse measures our allotment with utmost precision

like the strain in our voices that was never there in the past

          the stranger with failing eyes shuffling up to the mirror

like the end of the day as we finally drift off into sleep

          the journey of the dying is taken alone, by one and by all

like the time that you wake up not a child anymore

          the days of our wisdom pass quickly in a dimming of our senses

like the home only dreamed of and the childhood but imagined

          the long distant future is as empty for any as for all of the others

like the many days so far gone that we have forgotten when we forgot them

          the unknown we emerged from lies infinitely open before us

like the things which once moved us and the songs in our hearts

          a quiet contemplation becomes a means to our end

like the far distant stars which move but little no matter our puny time frame

          things pass so quickly for so long and then comes nothing more

like the years passing by ever faster than we can grasp them

          the volume of uncertainty increasing geometrically

like the jagged lightning, we are hurled to the earth

          the endless days that follow leave but a random pile of pearls

like the holy blue planet in whose shallows we bathe in the light

          the darkness eternal surrounds while enfolding us into long night

like the countless tiny creatures with crucial lives to attend to

          the nearness of the emptiness spurs us on to but small actions

In A Heartbeat, If I Could Just...

Someday I’m going to really live like that music sometimes makes me feel

After a couple years I won’t have to listen to their whiny bullshit anymore

Pretty soon I won’t have to see any of these clowns here again

Just a little while and I’ll be out of here for good

Before you know it, I’ll have all the time in the world

In a heartbeat I would blow this pop stand off, for once and for all

Someday I’ll stay at that place I still remember from in my rear-view mirror

After a couple years every day will be just like Saturday for you and me

Pretty soon I’m gonna drive off in a big old brand new pickup truck

Just a little while and we’ll be doing all the stuff like they do in the movies

Before you know it we’ll beat these old timesheets into funny postcards

In a heartbeat I could pack it in for them parts still unknown

Someday I will take the time to stay a few more days

After a couple years we’ll be off somewhere chasing red Indian sunsets

Pretty soon we can sell this tired old house and retire in real style

Just a little while and we’ll make it to the top of the hill

Before you know it we’ll spend the entire autumn simply watching changing leaves

In a heartbeat, if I could just pay off a few more of these crazy healthcare debts

Someday we won’t just be acting, like we do now, every weekend

After a couple years they’ll see that I really wasn’t just like them

Pretty soon I won’t be all pissed off just because it’s Monday

Just a little while longer and I’m going to walk away from it all

Before you know it we’ll be relaxing together on some white and sandy beach

In a heartbeat I would tell them all to take a hike and ride on out

Someday I’ll have the time to read that stuff I keep on blowing off

After a couple years we won’t even bother to watch TV every single night

Pretty soon we’ll be staying home to avoid the weekend crowds

Just a little while and, Hey listen, I swear, we won’t be too old to enjoy it

Before you know it my dumbass boss will be a just a funny memory

In a heartbeat if only the cars and house didn’t cost so much, each & every month

Someday we’ll sip margaritas every afternoon in the shade of a nice palapa

After a couple years we’ll go on that trek up and through the Nepal Himalaya

Pretty soon the kids will be gone and we can start to travel

Just a little while and I’ll retire and write down the wisdom I distilled from all this bullshit

Before you know it we’ll spend nights in the smoke of the magic campfire

In a heartbeat I could give it up and sell hot dogs at the beach

Someday we’ll blow off health insurance even though we’re a little fat

After a couple years, if things get better, we should be able to retire

Pretty soon your flawed project’s artificial deadline won’t mean Jack to me

Just a little while and me and the Marlboro Man will be out riding on the range

Before you know it I’ll be on to more important things than this

In a heartbeat if I could just hit it right on a couple of quick day trades

Someday soon I’ll chuck all this shit and go off to work for myself

After a couple years it looks like the end should be coming into sight

Pretty soon I won’t find that I’m mad about something stupid all the time

Just a little while longer and there won’t be any more of that boring housework

Before you know it we’ll just be in them commuter’s way as we take off on our next vacation

In a heartbeat I’d walk away from all my MP3s and the big-screen TV

Someday soon I’ll get a break and we’ll roll in style on out to Vegas

After only a couple years I should begin to see a little daylight

Pretty soon all my money won’t be going up in smoke and interest charges

Just a little while and my fat pension might actually kick in

Before you know it we’ll quit working and stop getting any older

In a heartbeat I’d blow off this mess and go away to live like Jesus

Someday we won’t just have to worry about money all the time

After only a couple more years our time is going to come at last

Pretty soon I won’t have to listen all day long to morons on the phone

Just a little while til we ride away in our brand new RV for good

Before you know it we’ll hear the ocean from our hammocks every night

In a heartbeat if we could just find a way to get past this and that

Someday I won’t just be trying to get through another week once again

After a couple years I’m thinking we won’t spend so much time at the malls

Pretty soon now we won’t be so damn tired we cannot see by Wednesday night

Just a little while before we can start to live for whatever things might still really matter

Before you know it, we can start to spend all this time that we’ve been saving every day

In a heartbeat I’d tear up my damn credit cards and burn down the house

Someday we’ll have lots of money and we won’t have to work anymore

After a couple more years we’ll have a little time just to set and think things over

Pretty soon we’ll pack up our reading glasses, prescription drugs and go

Just a little while and we will stand aside and laugh at all the rodents

Before you know it, why, we’ll have time to just wait until the light is right for the picture

In a heartbeat but I got this deadline and we just re-financed the house for Jason’s college

Unexpectedly Into Forever

It comes early on a Saturday, out of school and without a care

          Leaving only thousands of glass shards that sparkle in the air

In a darkened room mercifully at last the long struggle finally ceases

          Leaving behind nothing but the small comfort of the ritual cleaning

After a brief and overwhelming chest pain he codes within an hour

          never had the first sign or symptom to even slow him down

Reaching for her coffee while talking on the phone she drifts to the right

          Taking out a rider who is smeared to the pavement underneath his bike

Slowly the minister backs from his driveway rehearsing his Sunday sermon

          A terrible bump and his trusting little girl is pinned beneath the wheel

A friend slides off a rainy mountain road, rolling again and again

          Those left behind are forced to ponder who stays and who must leave

A small tree planted and cared for does not awaken in the spring

          A  small part of the caretaker is consumed by his own futility

A simple misstep results in a long period lying alone and helpless

          Just as the life force slowly leaves an insect kicking on its back

Working to restore power for thousands of impatient customers

          A sudden massive jolt scrambles his life processes, all at once

Unable to sit and too weak to cough, barely able to whisper

          Fluid fills her lungs and she drowns in a bed up there on the 25th floor

Unwilling to continue coping after long & drawn out years of depression

          Sudden inspiration is followed with a quick shot to the temple

Sparking the grill loaded with unburned natural gas

          Intense explosion scatters consciousness in a fine aerosol mist

Finding a loaded weapon in the drawer next to daddy’s bed

          A smiling brother’s head is blown open, smothering the echo of his laugh

Taking a relaxing swim at a beautiful beach on a dream vacation

          The undertow silently claims another panicked victim

Working hard to save money and make a better home for his family

          The ladder slips and father falls leaving them all on their own

An improvised explosive rigged as a roadside truck bomb

          Sends bagged parts of a son home with honor in a neatly-draped coffin

Another overcrowded ferry capsizes miles out in that dark and stormy channel

          Hundreds quickly drown but others manage to struggle on for hours

Twister rakes a mobile home in which poverty’s occupants desperately hide

          Opened like a can of sardines it paws away at those inside

Oversized but lacking conscience and ignorant of moral authority

          One home boy shoots another and earns a better education in a prison

Five young graduates ride fast on country roads well after 0’DarkThirty

          And with great laughter they leave the road and suddenly end their lives together

Tiny apartment dweller is fascinated by mommy’s smoking paraphernalia

          The shiny lighter brings bright flames, smoke and fumes to where he hides

Massive sixteen wheeler crosses into the other lane as the driver falls asleep

          A coincidental family trip is ended at a randomly solid bridge abutment

Somewhere in the Andes creeping up a narrow road, an old bus blows a tire

          Forty people roll and roll into a colorfully indistinguishable blend

In the hectic traffic of a crowded southeast asian city, someone takes a chance

          And yet another cyclist spills out his brains upon that wet, warm pavement

Mother deer leads her fawn across the road for the very first time

          Speeding armored family SUV takes her out and drives on, just a bit shaken up

High on drugs and life, young men take to playfully climbing on the rocks

          Just a slight slip and that quick fall ends one life, a quick hundred feet after

One more uncontrollable burst of red-faced anger starts another day

          A sudden brain blood clot leaves behind nothing but a mute and crooked face

Loyal retriever grown too old, stands next to master’s hunting rifle once again

          Knowledge of the discharge ends when that bullet exits from his head

The miracle of a butterfly flutters through the sunlight on its appointed trajectory

          In a fraction of a second mounted inside out on the grille of my speeding vehicle

In Just A Few Billion Years

In a couple of billion years what you have done is still not going to matter

After the sun grows cold and has long ago given off its last photons

Well after our star has swallowed this blue planet in a thrombolitic swelling

When the last geological epoch ended much earlier in an unrecorded history

Even the last fossil has long since disappeared without a trace

And our succoring atmosphere escaped sometime in some distant past

In just a few billion years all the ripples from your thoughts merge into nanonymity

Death will no longer have a presence in our solar system

And I just bet you will still be up there relaxing in heaven with jesus and mohammed…

After the milky way has grown old and merged with other galaxies

When the life force no longer travels with our beloved Sol

Our earlier history can still be seen from several billion light years away

In a couple billion years all your rules will be long in their rightful places

Forever after the oceans boil away, the story of life on earth goes untold

Our shallow graves have been vaporized for human eons no one counted

Universal truths, discoveries and morals wait unused and without volition

When any injustices inflicted have long since had nothing to affect

The grace achieved from suffering gave way to the yet organic but now interstellar

In a few billion years our collective unconscious shares no memories

Probing life forms cannot discern the slightest trace of our existence

All our trash is at last truly recycled and diffused to the density of outer space

Long after the subjective ceases and the objective is no longer measured

The life force blossoms sentience once again for other creatures to briefly ponder

And you watch it all from somewhere off in a gloriously painted baroque heaven…

In a couple billion years, geo-years will disappear as the earth ceases to orbit

Time can be marked for a while by the dead sun’s journey round our galaxy

Unceremoniously our foolish actions and beliefs evaporate and attenuate

Our chaotic signals diffuse across space, merging with the cosmic background

And all the information that we ever had is still there - but quite still and unknown

Lo, after uncountable universes come and go you still dwell in that gilded heaven…

In a few billion years our effects will cease rippling the cosmic pond forever

The inexorable march of entropy renders our miniscule labors moot

And all of this can be sensed in the space between these two simple breaths

What Would You Do

What would you do if you learned it would only be a year

          Could you do everything and then sum it all up, if it were so very near

What if right now you knew you had to leave in just 30 days

        How much would you try to experience and what goals would you raise

Would you find something different in the beauty of every sunrise

          Would you note all the last times like each was good for a prize

Could you possibly place everything in order and be prepared to unwind

          Perhaps you might simply determine to fight and to somehow survive

Suppose that you were convinced you would be dead by tomorrow

          If the colors seemed so much brighter, would that be simply from sorrow

Should you rush about trying to do all the things you had promised

         Or maybe spend time dwelling on something you knew you had missed

Would you consider their memories of you and try to change their tone

          Would you bother to get rid of those many things you still own

Consider that the plane is falling straight down and gathering speed

          How could you prepare yourself in that awful panic, terror and need

How much time would you ask for, if it were forced to be decided

          At that crucial moment, by what principles would you be guided

Would you even bother to watch your beloved TV anymore

          Would you pray for salvation or consider the void as never before

Who would you contact and what might you say

          What affairs would you attend to and which ones would you let lay

What should you do about your children’s future

          How might your spouse do without you to help and to script her

Would you sadly realize that you had wasted so much time

          Would you mainly miss daily actions of the most ordinary kind

Are there those you would tell the things to, that you have always known

          Would you expire inside or outside, far away, or in your own home

Would you keep on working until they carried you away

          Could you remain quiet or would you tell anyone who would stay

Would you turn to religion and let faith be your true guide

          Would you just end it all early and leave the priests feeling denied

Should your family interrupt their lives as you are expiring

          How could they understand the way your neurons are rewiring

Does it make sense to ease your anguish with pain medication and religion

          Why bother to keep up with your physical education

In this strange light, what message would you prepare for your children

          Should you spend money furiously on dreams to try and fulfill them

Would you sleep dark nights through or lie awake counting every moment

          Could you draw any meaning looking back on the blur and the foment

Should you take some time and write out your own obituary

          Does it make sense to fuss around cooking and keep being handy

What activities could possibly sustain you as you counted down to the nil

          Would you donate your organs and finally make out your last will

Would you still strive to keep your lawn well-trimmed and green

          What could you share with your grandson so he would see what you mean

Do you think you could extract some bit of wisdom from where you have been

          If you find ways to maintain will they conflict with what you have seen

What would you do first and what would you try to be doing at the end

          Would you swell hotly with anger and then collapse among friends

Would you choose peaceful narcotic fantasies or the blunt edge of reality

          Could helping others possibly ease the pain of your imminent fatality

Could you consider the fate of everything that you have been taught

          Could you conceive of a universe completely devoid of your own thought

Would you be able to draw any real satisfaction from your old recreations

          Would it help those you hurt if, near the end, you had some revelation

What would you choose to be the last thing that you say

          Who would you have stand by you as you finally slip away

What would you do if you had only a few short years left on this earth

        And how would you react if that time began the instant of your birth

As You Left

David Meyer, October 1, 2004

As you left

          I only knew for sure that I, too, would go

As you passed

          I asked in silence why not me

As sure as you were gone

          I was sure I would not stay

As you grew cold

          I watched myself grow very still

As you faded off in time

          I observed as I returned to dust

As you slipped away

          I found it made no real sense

As you parted company

          I dwelt upon my own farewells

As you moved on

          I caught a glimpse of all our pathways merging

As you disappeared

          I could see my own outline growing fainter

As you turned away

          I witnessed that there is nowhere left to turn

As you left us

          I felt the guilt of the living

As you sailed off

          I thought of myself sinking

As you grew so still

          I did not want to move

As you went off all alone

          I saw me leaving by myself as well

Chapel Of Bones

As you now are

          So once were we

As we are now

          so you will be

so once we lived

          as you live now

so soon change we all

          as you see how

as you walk today

          so once we traveled

as we lie still

          so your lives unravel

so once we laughed

          as your laughter now echoes

so quickly follows silence

          when one’s breathing goes

as you leave today

          so once left we

as we lay tonight

          so will you stay

so once we prayed

          like you meditate

so soothing your voices

          as day grows late

as you gaze down

          so gazed we cruelly

as you are drawn

          so were we quite truly

so once we cried

          as you grow quiet

so moist your firm cheeks

          our tears long dried

as you quickly forget

          we forgot those before

as we are forgotten

          so are your regrets

so once we journeyed

          as you now travel

so still our bones

          as we have learned

as you now love

          so loved we then

as you grow old

          so came our end

so once we played

          as frolic your children

as you grow older

          so our flesh decayed