Today someone asked my age. I said what I always say, (facetiously plagiarized) from Lord George Gordon Byron, that I was a hundred years old and always have been. From that small kernel of thought my mind wandered the unkempt paths of Byron, until I thought I would write a little something about him.

For many readers of nineteenth century Romantic poetry, Lord George Gordon Byron is the iconic poet. Thousands of words have been written about Byron. He captured the minds of countless people and was a legend in his own time. Often myths and legends do not live up to their stories; however, Byron’s myth does not fall that short of the truth. Byron’s exploits and decadent life are, and have been, well studied and even more thoroughly exaggerated. One point that is difficult to argue against is that he was an extremely gifted and driven poet.

Byron excelled in sports and his exploits with women are the stuff of man-legend. He tried to prove himself as a man among men, by athletic prowess and by conquering as many women as he could. He had affairs with some of London’s most prominent ladies and countless others in the rest of England and Europe. His was called a vile sinner, a thief of women’s virtue, and a poetic genius all in the same breath.

 People spoke of him; that was what he wanted. Byron was able to see past what he saw in the mirror when the attention was on his exploits rather than himself. Byron’s romantic poetry seemed to transcend the man. He constructed poetry that was filled with passion and love. It is a testament to his complexity and his genius. His poems of love feel real and deep; they feel much more than what one would expect from a reckless and selfish man-slut. Poems like, “She Walks in Beauty,” “There Be None of Beauty’s Daughters,” and “When We Two Parted,” evoke deep emotion and feeling that go beyond mere passion and lust.

 I believe that this is the real and deepest Byron; the Byron that allowed the feelings he held inside to erupt upon the page, allowing us to witness and partake of his genius.  Byron, like all of us, often live many truths; these truths alone are not what makes us what we are. However, these truths (and lies) come together to make us the complete person that we are. We are our own version of a self-made delusion. Byron was able to write his truth¾a gift from the gods.

 

Maybe he portrayed himself best when he wrote, "I am such a strange melange of good and evil that it would be difficult to describe me."

 

 

This is an excerpt from my next project: "Lives."

Lives

Book One

The Homeless Man

Do not look at me. Just keep going. For when you do, I see more of you than you see of me. I am dressed in my greasy rags; I smell of old dirt, but you do not see me. I see the people walking past me as I huddle in another doorway or sit on another bench. Some look at me, but most try to avoid meeting my eyes. It is if they can pretend away my existence with their non-glances. Men with worried looks, wearing suits of grey and brown and black rush on, day by day, week by week, year by year. I can see in those worried eyes, those redundant eyes that drop or stare away at some imaginary thing far into the distance as they lengthen their polyester stride, that they see only a worthless wretch.  A wretch so far below them in the ivory towers of their minds that I am less than nothing¾I am invisible.

Women too pass me. I see just before they get close, close enough to touch, a shift of recognition. They almost-stop, as people do when they see a snake in their yard on a summer afternoon, or a spider idling on a lawn chair. They shift over, not even knowing they did it and they too pass. They see only a worthless thing, not a man, but a thing that is to be avoided. Their slender knuckles turn white as they clutch their purses tight, for they know in their primal selves that I may be just desperate enough to fly up and rip that purse from them.

As I walk along the street, I notice the cold pavement through the hole in the leather soles of the shoes I wear. They have been good shoes. They came from the same thrift shop as my filthy coat and everything else I pack around on this worn frame. I am a failure in this world of things. I feel nothing¾pride has long since left me as if it was a dream or a thought. It was something that died in me. It had to die. Maybe the world killed it, or maybe I killed it before it killed me. I cast it out as I ate stale bread and slick lunch meat from a dumpster in an alley…

There is a Stone Wall

Stone Wall

 

There is a Stone Wall.

 

That is alone, broken, and crumbling.

Moss grows on its parapets, It has little purpose now

But once, this wall stood strong and true, certain of itself

It held and stayed all things¾good things and evil things

The wind and the rain beat against it, the storms raged in futility

The wall was a proud thing

This wall, like glue kept everything together: lives, homes, families

For a thousand years

How it did it, no one knows

Maybe it was the souls of his makers or the blood of those he repelled that made him strong, no one knows

But in the end, the world wins¾It always wins

And the wall began to wear and to crumble and to fall

It must have taken the world a long time to do this

The time when the wall stopped being a wall and became a ruin came in a day or millennia

This too no one knows

 

There is a Stone Wall, it is alone, it is broken, it is crumbling.

Words Are Power

Blog 2/25/12

This is the realm where I explore the things that matter—spirituality, literature, art, philosophy, and of course my paradoxical musings— a writer, a wanderer, and a perpetual seeker of truth.

Words are power.

 

Life is the ultimate conundrum. Ideas manifest into actions that inadvertently shape us into the beings we are (or think we are). Life is one long thread of experiences. Each experience changes us. The big events wrap around the small ones and they are the ones that inevitably transform our intrinsic selves. A certain word, a look, or a feeling, often has more power over us than the seemingly large things. The small things are those things that we remember when we look into a mirror and see ourselves.

 

The person we really are, not the person we allow world to see. We are all liars to the world; maybe this is right in a way. We save our truer self for those that we love or trust—maybe.

Our lives are filled with judgment and the ramifications of our past experiences.

 We are creatures of Potentiality.

Stop Slavery

Human trafficking is out of control. There are more slaves today than at any time in history--think about that. We can all do something, however small, do something!

"The most cited statistics on trafficking come from the U.S. State Department's annual reports on trafficking in persons. According to the 2005 report, 600,000 to 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders each year, with 14,500 to 17,500 trafficked into the U.S. The report does not provide data on sexual exploitation specifically; the numbers include people trafficked for any sort of forced labor."
--Source: Frontline

A small, but important contribution can be made by becoming a supporter of the Red Thread Movement. They rescue women and girls from the sex trade. They are the foot soldiers in this war. We can purchase inexpensive items and not only financially support the work, but physically show our solidarity. This opens dialogue and “recruits” more support. The bracelets are hand- made by former sex slaves and nearly every penny goes to the cause.

Like Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” We can be the ripples that echo into the lives of those that are exploited and tortured.http://www.redthreadmovement.org/

 

 

I am finishing my first novel. There will be more come forth into the world of men. I have done many things and lived many lives. I have lived and worked in the wild places. I have loved many and hated some. My living was made on the backs of wild horses and among wilder men. I have been a gypsy and a hunter—a hunter of truths and a teller of lies. The abyss has been my comfort and my enemy. I believe in both good and evil, for I have known them both intimately. I have always written; I intend to tear these experiences from my life and heart and engrain them on paper.

I will try to fill this blog with poetry, updates, aphorisms, the mystical, my ideologies, and even the mundane.

Hold on.