Is it in the heart

Or in the eyes

For all you see

To then despise

Is it anger first

Or love at last

Can you judge the future

By the past

Does the meaning change

With every choice

Your words return

Another’s voice

Last wish you make

One vow to pray

Your vision strikes

—all doubt betrayed

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

What determines genius…

an endowment or a choice

 

Is there destiny in all of us,

waiting for a voice

 

Is to reject your epiphany,

most used as an excuse

 

By those who pull the shades down low,

the darkness theirs to choose

 

Was Van Gogh so enlightened,

when he cut off his left ear

 

Or Joplin ever doubtful,

when she sang beyond her fear

 

Is genius so misunderstood,

its meaning false portrayed

 

That we see gifts in others

—as we let our presents lay

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

Do your lies hold as hostage,

every truth you never told

 

Has your heart become a stranger,

to the wishes it unfolds

 

Is your past if then forsaken,

free at last of its own self

 

Orphaned memories never spoken

—orphaned moments never felt

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

Your lies much more exciting,

than any truth you never told

 

Stolen moments of pure delight,

the future your cuckold

 

Touch betrays what your eyes still hide,

my dreams you come to steal

 

As your body moves with time divorced,

love’s reality—unreal

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

The threshold of lies

is hearsay

 

The jailer and killer

—of truth

 

(Devil’s Tower: July, 2019)

If words were notes upon a score,

would the melody play beyond…

 

Each phrase a chord, each line a hymn,

each paragraph a song

 

If words could sing harmonic,

as their letters drift away

 

Would music take you past that place

—verse forces you to stay

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

As you age and days get shorter,

do you reach out for the source

 

Whether family, friends, or lover,

is the pull a constant force

 

Is the attraction of returning,

going home to shed your sins

 

The final stage in your progression

—to refresh and rebegin

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017)

A pat on the back,

smoke up the rear

 

Shake with both hands

—perdition is near

 

(Dreamsleep: August, 2019)

Rushing waters,

bleeding hearts

 

Autumn winds,

the past departs

 

Voices silenced,

the coming rain

 

Ice forming

—to freeze the pain

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: August, 2019)

If music is the soul of art,

then what can writing be

 

Is it the eyes, perhaps the heart,

in printed reverie

 

Is music the stage whereupon,

all other art encores

 

For if it is, all words rejoice

—to sing for evermore

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: March, 2017 )