ALL THOSE SHIPS THAT NEVER SAILED

All those ships that never sailed
The ones with their seacocks open
That were scuttled in their stalls …
Today I bring them back
Huge and transitory
And let them sail
Forever.

All those flowers that you never grew—
that you wanted to grow
The ones that were plowed under
ground in the mud—
Today I bring them back
And let you grow them
Forever.

All those wars and truces
Dancing down these years—
All in three flag swept days
Rejected meaning of God—

My body once covered with beauty
Is now a museum of betrayal.
This part remembered because of that one’s touch
This part remembered for that one’s kiss—
Today I bring it back
And let you live forever.

I breath a breathless I love you
And move you
Forever.

Remove the snake from Moses’ arm …
And someday the Jewish queen will dance
Down the street with the dogs
And make every Jew
Her lover.

  — Bob Kaufman (1925 - 1986), Beat poet.

After learning of the assassination of John F. Kennedy, Kaufman took a Buddhist vow of silence. He withdrew from society and did not speak again until 1975, on the day the Vietnam War ended, when he walked into a coffee shop and recited this poem.

Had an appointment with the crazy doctor tonight … and I’ve got a lot of thinking to do about some of the things that have been going through my head the past week or so.

Things like:

1. Beating myself up for stepping out of my comfort zone, and failing. Rather than beating myself up, I should be proud that I allowed myself to go into a situation where I might fail.
2. Trying to figure out what it will take to stop falling for people who are not available. I know why I do; as long as the people I’m attracted to are not available, either because they’re already in a relationship, because they live far away from me, or because it’s just not a good match due to lifestyle differences, then I don’t have to worry about opening myself up … I can just keep my walls where they are, and let them get higher and thicker and more impenetrable.
3. Figuring out what I’m going to do with my career.

In reality, it’s all about dealing with my anxiety, learning how to control it, without letting it control me. It’s about continuing to put myself out there with my friends, continuing to risk, and continuing to live life.

HOW COULD I HAVE DOUBTED

I stopped looking for you
I stopped waiting for you
I stopped dying for you
and I started dying for myself

I aged rapidly
I became fat in the face
and soft in the gut
and I forgot that I ever loved you

I was old
I had no focus, no mission
I wandered around eating and buying
bigger and bigger clothes
and I forgot why I hated
every long moment that was mine to fill

Why did you come back to me tonight

I can’t even get off this chair
Tears run down my cheeks
I am in love again
I can live like this

  — Leonard Cohen (b. 1934), Canadian poet, composer, author

Like I mentioned a couple of days ago, my birthday is Earth Day … and while I’ve always considered myself to be relatively environmentally conscious, I’m discovering that I’m really not …

The Earthday Network has an Ecological Footprint calculator on their website … and discovered that if everyone on the planet lived as I do, that we would need 7.1 planets Earth. Take it yourself, and see how you rate.