I spend time on devices,
That claim to help me learn,
Of happenings around the world,
And all of its malices.
I dig and dig and dig and dig,
I dig and I bore,
A dog searching for a bone,
Under a marble floor.
Veneered on the surface,
Whole I am not,
I dig because my life is marble too,
Is this it? I question what is there to do.
We've been exploring how to be,
For 3000 years with thinkers great,
Of all the ideas that have emerged,
On the worship of numbers,
We seem to have converged.
This uniform seems dated,
It's sleeves short,
It's buttons constrict my air,
These medals condescending,
I'd much rather be bare.
Everything feels noisy now,
Like five thousand people trying to yell,
Everyone is selling a way of being,
Which way is forward, no way to tell.
It almost feels intentional,
Like my confusion is someone's gain.
I wish I found that someone,
At least I'd know who to blame.
I wish I saw a lighthouse,
A north star to align my boat.
But so much seems corrupted,
Falsified by what victors wrote.
My boat seems without a rudder,
Lacking a compass too,
But the loneliness as I feel this,
Is what that makes me shudder.
I try to listen to people talk,
I nod along and smile,
I often don't hear a thing,
It's as if they too are lost at sea,
I wish I could point it out,
But their eyes need me to agree.
It feels like everyone is selling something, what's missing is the juice,
For I find myself parched,
Looking for a well,
Of water the entire marketplace
Doesn't seem to sell.
I seem to be searching for real,
real enough to feel solid,
Solid enough to stand on,
Solid for more than a week,
A realness I see in glimpses but cannot define.
At which I can only peek.
My rationality exhausts me now,
Everything which was ethereal, Reduced to the sum of its parts,
A dull gray becomes,
Of all the green in the grass.
I'm looking for what can't be burned away,
I'm looking for what remains.
What stays through a forest fire,
What stays when it rains.
Now heroes merely human,
Temples muddied by priests,
I look for my own answer,
A new stream I now meet.
As I retreat inside,
The noise seems to wane,
I watch how I spend my time,
I watch how much of it remains.
It's not the places that I have been
Nor the things I happen to own,
Nor the things I have memorized,
Nor the things I've been shown.
The Becomings of those I care about,
Witnessing a flowering of sorts,
The Beauty in the small,
The Magic in the mundane,
The Colors of it all.
The Excitement of an adventure,
A Oneness with myself,
The Anger at pain that should not be,
The Love I feel for everything,
All of these feel real to me.
I think I have a compass now,
Found in the embers,
However faulty it may be,
To it's direction I surrender,
What's real is what I remember.
Filler words 