Didn’t you realize that all the world
was playing outside your window
while you were in bed?

Didn’t you realize
that so many other beautiful things
were crying out for help?

Didn’t you realize
that all you did
would come to nothing?

And yet, perhaps you did.
And yet, perhaps still you built.

Sing strong.

In your own voice;
be it quiet or loud,
sweet, or coarse.

Sing strong.

With your own words;
saying what you mean,
and meaning what you say.

Sing strong.

For they listen
not to your voice,
nor to your words,

but to how strong
you dare to sing.

I ache.
Every heartbeat aches.

– For every landscape,
every color,
every curve.

Your beauty, world,
is a mirror that reflects my brevity.
My smallness.

Your beauty reminds me
that I am a nothing.

Art is an itch.
An endless itch.

Not good. Not evil.

An appetite
for colors, melodies, moods.

Enflamed, we scratch,
reaching for the nameless spot.

Every one of us is handed a pen;
and that pen is our will.

Every one of us is handed a page;
and that page is our life.

The only sin in life is not to write.
– To fear too much of making a mistake,
that we never dare to try.

Write!

Allow yourself to merge;
to be pulled by the slipstream;

where ice cream gets its taste
and the dawn is stored at night;

where every memory and every experience,
is stored and kept in bottles;

where blue was introduced to red,
and together they bore purple.

where every taste is tested;

where children keep their secrets.
Where sunshine keeps its warmth;

where candy keeps its sweetness;
where old men keep the fuzzy-greyness of their socks.

where lovers meet in daydreams;
where the silhouttes of trees are drawn.

This moment is like a pomegranate seed
between my fingers.

Firm, round, smooth.
I squeeze,
until finally, it burts.

I paint pictures
with the red.

You see, feel,
the chaos.

But do not fear it.

Draw the force of your song;
the life of your dance,
from the storm.

Listen for those Whispers
caught up in the noise.

Channel the swirl of the chaos,
make it serve you.

Let that eye,
the dead-calm center,
be the cradle of your mind.

Some dance in dark rooms,
rhythms surging through veins.

Others jog in bright morning sunlight,
sneakers slapping on pavement.

Others sit in old-smelling airchairs,
reading page after page.

Others paint, write, sculpt, draw.

Others work, and work, and work.

Intoxication: forgetting the self:
The idea. The burden.

Finding a way to merge with the moment.
with This.

I feel darkness clouding my mind,
as if the color has been drained from Life;
laughter, hollowed.
As if nothing I do matters.

But somehow, this suffering impels me to speak;
more; to sing.
And in singing,
to redeem.

Creativity has the appearance
of intention, will, and self-determination.

But creativity is about openness;
letting go of intention, will, and self-determination;
aligning yourself with something beyond yourself.

This is why if you try to be creative,
you will never be creative.
Just as if you try to be funny,
you will never be funny.
Whereas if you simply pay attention to things:
you will become creative and funny.

Artists tie the ribbon
on a gift, handed, already wrapped.
– They dip a cup into a stream.
– They name the bird
that landed on their shoulder.
Nothing more.

A child watched his father play
a beautiful melody on the piano.

After his father had left,
the child climbed the bench,
began to strike the notes
he had seen his father play.

To his surprise,
although he struck the same notes,
no music came,
only noise.

Every one of us gets the choice
to interpret “This all”:
Life.

Is Life a comedy?
A drama?
A horror?
A love story?

However you see it,
so will you experience it;
some live in dramas;
others in horrors;
others in love stories.

And yet somehow,
all of these stories coexist
in the same time and space.

All of us, living out our lives
in one overarching Story;
the sum of all our stories.

What is Life?

Let Life sing, through you;
let it make you a song.

Sometimes sweet,
sometimes sad;
each necessary to the other.

Let your melody rise, and fall,
as the days, years pass,
not trying to erase,
not asking how it will end.

Let Life sing, through you.

The dance originates not in her,
but in some place Beyond.

She is only a channel
for an energy to pass through.

Her only gift is letting go,
deeper, deeper.

She is an instrument;
allowing itself to be played.

Every paint stroke
suggests the next paint stroke.

Every word
suggests the next word.

Every note
suggests the next note.

Creating is an act of faith;
never knowing what will come next,
one follows the paint;
follows the words,
follows the notes.
Trusting, hoping, believing.

This moment,
pregnant with possibility,
is set before you
like a story, half-written.

The next sentence
longs to be born;
its heartbeat quickens,
ready to burst through.

The twist,
the unexpected child;
about to change the meaning
of everything that came before.

An infinite number of colors;
each different.
– Yet light, colorless,
is the Source of every color.

An infinite number of personalities;
each different.
– Yet all from one
colorless Source.

Insight overflows,
too fast to catch.

Letters and words
spray everywhere.
– A beautiful mess.
Waste.

If only I could plug you into my experience.
Make you feel
what I feel now.

What did you play?
-Alone in your room,
suffocating on silence.

Not playing,
but praying.

You were made for one thing:
music.
You sacrificed everything.

I want to listen
not to your symphonies or sonnattas,
but to your maddened prayer.

Alone in your room,
silently suffocating:
what did you play?

Your freedom is a pen;
it hovers over the blank page.

There is nothing
you cannot write.

And the only sin
is not to write.

This moment waits;

a landscape,
yearning to be painted;

a song,
yearning for your voice.

a dance,
yearning for your lead.