Mastery

Anyone can appreciate
The master of a skill,
The one who takes the time
To do the job right,
And the one who takes pride
In all that he does.

Mastery is attention to detail,
A commitment to excellence,
A practice for perfection,
A passion for the art,
And a readily discernable difference
From that which is ordinary.

There is a point beyond which
No master is the same.
Even a simple piece of music
By two masters will be distinct,
Reflecting the uniqueness
Of the soul from which it sprang.

Some have it that mastery is hard,
But I think it not,
Maybe 99% effort would be,
But the master gives his all
Eliminating the resistance
While pouring out his heart.

Mastery is a thing of beauty,
An elegance of style,
An act of love,
A gift to the world,
A thing of integrity,
A simplicity complete.

Looking Back

I have few regrets, if any,
Over the life I have lived.
I have had the opportunity
To travel to distant places,
To live in foreign countries,
To know people
Of practically every race,
Religion and creed,
To be many different things
From an engineer
To a personal coach
And a poet.
I have loved and lost
And loved again.
I have taken on projects,
Sometimes monumental things.
I have seen them soar
And I have seen them flop.
I have made many friends,
Met some outrageous characters,
Even became something
Of a character myself.
It has been an incredible life
I have lived so far,
And I firmly believe
I have a lot more life to live.

Loneliness

We can walk through a city,
Threading our way
Past hordes of strangers
While searching for someone
We can call a friend,
And not meet a soul.
We can attempt
Intelligent conversation
Only to find people who speak
Words without meaning.
We can gaze into their eyes
Only to observe
An emptiness deep inside.
We can shout our truth,
But no one listens
Or hears our cry.
We can be with them,
Touch them,
Sleep with them,
Yet feel very much alone.
The world can appear cold,
Devoid of human contact.
We are sometimes plagued
By overwhelming loneliness,
A sense of being lost.
We struggle against the tide
In the sea of our despair
Praying for someone with whom
We can share our life.
Even when a person is encountered,
Fear often gets in the way
Of us creating
The intimacy we seek.
We are adrift
Within the cauldron of humanity
Not recognizing ourselves
In any of the people we meet,
Wondering why we are so alone.

Lizards of the Dunes

Some people might think
Death Valley is
A desolate and forbidding place,
Inhospitable to man or beast,
But if you look close, however,
There are signs of life
Where you might least expect.
Not far from Stove Pipe Wells
Is an area of immense sand dunes
Popular for tourists,
Young lovers
And photographers alike.
What few visitors notice
In the bushes at the base
Of the dunes,
Was a population
Of desert iguanas
That live entirely
Off the leaves
Of those plants.
I have watched people
Follow the tracks
Of the lizards in the sand
And never notice
The ones in the bushes
Staring back at them.
They are not tiny either,
Getting up to
Three feet in length,
But they are
So well camouflaged ,
That few people
Can spot them
Hidden amongst
The sand and the bush.
They probably migrate
Across the desert floor,
Because I have been back
A time or two,
And failed to see them myself
Even though I knew
Where to look.
Hopefully, somewhere out there
Is a population of them
Still munching away,
Hidden from sight.

Little Dog

The boy had always wanted a dog,
A waggy-tailed critter
To greet him each day
When he got home,
But that had not been possible
In the apartment
In which he and his mother lived.
When they moved
To a larger place
With a yard of their own,
It still didn’t seem practical.
To appease the boy,
His mother bought him a hamster
Which was promptly given
The honorary title, “Little Dog.”
He was a sorry excuse for a dog,
But the little creature
Seemed perfectly content
In his new surroundings.
Little Dog would spend his days sleeping,
And his nights busily running
As fast as his legs could go
On the exercise wheel.
It didn’t seemed to bother him
That it never took him anywhere,
And he didn’t even mind
If people called him a dog.
Little Dog was happy being himself.

Listening for the Power

I have learned
To listen carefully
To the words
And the language
People use
As a key
To why their lives
Turn out
The way they do.
Countless times
I have heard
People speak
About their relationships,
Their jobs,
Or other aspects
Of their lives,
And it sounds as if
They were merely
Innocent bystanders,
Observing it all.
They talk as if
They are victims
Of circumstance,
With no control
Over the direction taken,
But it is
Their choice of words
That renders them
Powerless
To be at cause
In the course
Of their lives.

Fairytale Love

Love was something
I didn’t experience
All that much
When I was young,
Or maybe it was
There all along,
But I just didn’t
Recognize it.
I was far more aware of
It's absence
Then I was of it's presence.
I had witnessed
Too many couples
Full of rage
And barely concealed hostility
Towards each other.
Perhaps it was then,
In my early years,
That I developed
A fairytale image
Of what love
Between two people
Could be like,
And I have struggled
With that image
Ever since.
Sure, I saw people
In the heat of passion
At the moment,
But it never
Seemed to last.
It wasn’t until
I was a student
At the university
That I witnessed
Two people
Obviously in love
After many years
Of marriage.
A girl invited me home
To meet her family,
And I saw her parents
Holding hands
And slow dancing
To the music
Of the stereo
With a sparkle
In their eyes,
Almost like a couple
Newly weds.
That was what I wanted
But I didn’t know
How to make it happen.
There were many
Short term relationships,
But nothing
Like what I envisioned.
I am sure
Most of the women I met
Were in search of
The same illusive dream
As was I,
And were equally
As frustrated.
It was like it was hiding
Just around the corner,
But the more I searched,
The more illusive it became.
When I met Cecilia
And we decided to
Make a life together,
There were moments
Of absolute bliss,
But also plenty
Of trials and tribulations.
We had to learn
To laugh at ourselves
And our difficulties,
But sometimes the humor
Was hard to find.
Out of that relationship,
Two daughters were born.
Those kids took over our lives
And often provided
The humor we sorely needed
As they battled one another.
I always assumed
That our marriage
Would last forever,
But that was not the case.
Cecilia got cancer,
And battle it for six years
Before she passed away.
That period was
A formidable challenge
For all of us,
And tempered who
We each are today.
After Cecilia’s death,
That fairytale love
I had always dreamed about
Seemed as elusive as ever,
And in a very real sense,
I am still looking for it today.

Within the Space of Sharing

The distance that separates us
Is not measured in miles,
But in our ability to share
What is on our minds
And in our hearts.
Bridging that gap
May be the final frontier.
The ability to say
What is there for us,
To be fully present
To ourselves and each other
May be our biggest hurdle.
Our perception of the world
Is colored by
The quality of our communications.
Within the space of sharing
Lies to key to our humanity,
And our affinity for each other.
We have so much in common
If we can only learn to express it.

I Owe My Life To That Pile

As a Peace Corps Volunteer
Down in the South of Thailand
A number of years ago,
I rode a motorcycle
To get back and forth from town
And away to distant sites.

I loved to ride
Rain or shine
Throughout the South
Traveling the jungle trails,
Cruising the roads
And going town to town.

When the monsoon season came,
Torrential rains would fall
Making it hard enough
To see in the day,
And almost impossible at night,
Making accidents common.

One such night
In a driving rain
As I passed the police station,
Who but the Chief of Police
Should come zooming out,
Only to get broadsided!

Then there was the time,
Again late at night,
While riding through a downpour,
That I managed to swerve
In the nick of time
To avoid a pile in the road.

And just as I swerved
I looked up to see
The biggest blackest
Elephant I had ever seen,
Who could have been neutered
Right then and there.

They serve as tow trucks
In that part of the world
And tail lights are not
A part of their anatomy
And strange as it may seem
I owe my life to that pile!

My Gator and I

A friend from school
Offered me
His pet alligator,
Saying he could
No longer keep it,
And I jumped
At the opportunity.
What young boy
Wouldn’t have?
I stashed him
In our bath tub
Which I partially filled
With water
So he could
Swim around,
Then tried to figure out
What to feed him.
What do you feed
A 2.5 foot long alligator?
He must have been
Ravishingly hungry
Because he went after
My fingers and toes
With a vengeance.
After a couple days
Without a shower,
And observing that the gator
Was getting
Frantically hungry,
I decided to let him go
In the swamps
Near where I lived
Where he could probably
Find something
He liked to eat
Besides me,
Maybe some frogs
Or fish, or something.
Twenty-five years later,
I happened to read
About an 18-foot long alligator
That eat a hiker’s dog
In a swamp
East of Las Vegas.
I could never know for sure,
But I had
A pretty good suspicion
Whose gator that was!

Meeting a Mate

It amuses me
Listening to single people
Theorizing on the art
Of meeting a mate.
There are more strategies out there
For guys to meet girls
And girls to meet guys
Then there are
Grains of sand at the beach.
I never figured out
If there is a proper way
For two people to meet!
It always seemed
A curious accident,
An intriguing twist of fate,
Which had me meet
The people I met.
It was seldom, if ever,
Something planned.
I met Cecilia,
Who later became my wife,
While she was hitchhiking
With a friend
On the big island of Hawaii.
That may not be the way
People are supposed to meet,
But it worked!
I occasionally would ask
Other couples how they met,
And almost every couple
Has some kind of colorful story
About the chain of events
That brought them together.
Meeting the way we did
Did have its own set of hazards.
Whenever I saw
Another girl hitchhiking,
I couldn’t help commenting,
“I wonder what she is after!”
To which Cecilia
Could only glare.
Whenever we met
A new couple,
I would invariable ask
Them how they met,
Knowing full well,
They would return the favor.
Sometimes I would tell
People our story
Before they met Cecilia,
Then after they met her,
They would inevitably comment,
“You don’t look like
A hitchhiker!”
Which was sort of
A back handed compliment.
Cecilia was a good spirit
About my teasing,
And had her own ways
Of getting back at me.
The really bizarre thing is
That about five years
Before I met Cecilia,
I picked up another set
Of hitch hikers
In the exact same location
Where I met Cecilia,
And ended up sailing
To the South Pacific
With them.
I used to tease Cecilia,
Telling her if
She gave me any trouble,
I knew where
To go for a replacement.
I never went back,
And tried my luck again,
However!

Just A Friend

“Let’s just be friends!”
Is about the last thing
A guy wants to hear
After he opens up
And lets the girl know
He’s interested.
It’s about as appealing
As a slap in the face
Or a bucket
Of ice-cold water
Poured over his head,
A less than subtle rejection
To his romantic intentions.
The guy will often
Limp away
Like a puppy
With his tail
Between his legs,
Ego bruised.
In the all or nothing
Drive for intimacy,
The guy seldom considers
Friendship a real alternative,
Entirely missing
The possibility
In what the girl said.

I Am Only Human

“I am only human,”
I hear people say
As if that is
A legitimate excuse
For being fallible
Or playing small.
What does it mean
To be human anyway?
It’s our humanity
That differentiates us
From all the rest
Of creation.
We alone tend to argue
With reality
Insisting things shouldn’t be
The way they are,
But we also have
The ability to dream,
To see things
As they could be.
We may fall short
Numerous times
Of fulfilling our visions,
Yet we stubbornly continue.
Sometimes we wander
Down blind alleys,
Butting our heads against walls
Insisting there must be a door,
But we are also capable
Of rising to greatness,
Of overcoming
The circumstances
Of our lives.
Being human is
A two-edged sword,
A blessing as well as a curse.

Hide and Seek

I’ve searched high,
I’ve search low,
And I must have scanned
Ten-thousand faces
Looking for the one
Whom I believe
Is meant for me,
But who she is
And where she goes,
I don’t know.
Is she here,
Or is she there,
Or is she playing
A complex game
Of hide and seek?
I don’t know!
Maybe I should
Just tag someone
And say,
“Your it!”

Halloween

Halloween is a time
For kids and candy,
Trick or treat,
And costume parties.
I don’t think
I ever got to go
Trick or treating
When I was a kid
Because Halloween
Was also a time for
Colds and flu,
And it always seemed
I was sick and had to miss
The annual candy roundups.
As I got into my teens,
Halloween was relegated to
Something the little kids did.
Many Halloweens
Came and went unnoticed
Until I went on a cruise
To the Bahamas
With my new wife
And discovered it was Halloween.
There was a costume party
For everyone to attend,
But we had no costumes.
It was a time to improvise,
And the only thing
We could come up with
Were the sheets on our bed.
She would be an Egyptian queen
And I was to accompany her
Dressed as a mummy.
Her outfit was easy,
But we spent hours
Ripping up bed sheets
And mummifying me.
We were just about done
When I realized
I had to go to the bathroom
And there was no provision
For such a need.
I ended up having to
Remove the costume,
And by the time
I was a mummy again,
The party was over.
I finally got my opportunity
To go trick or treating
When my daughters
Were two and three.
My wife made the costumes
And I was to take them
On the neighborhood tour.
I suppose they were a bit young
To enjoy the occasion,
Because by the second house
Both got scared,
Wet their pants,
And we had to return home.
In the years that followed
My wife continued making costumes
For the kids to wear,
But after their traumatic initial
Halloween tour with Papa,
It was their mother
Who would take them around,
And I stayed home
To greet other people’s kids.
I had to settle for
Doing a loot inspection
After the kids got home
Until they got wise to that.

Funeral Rites

I, like most people,
Had no experience
With staging a funeral,
And had no idea
How someone is supposed to
Go about such a thing.
I just did what seemed
To be appropriate.

People were obviously
At a loss
As to what to do or say,
As they struggled
To express
Their condolences
And share my daughters’
And my grief.

My wife’s funeral could have been
A depressing thing,
But that would not have been
Fitting for who she was,
Or the way she lived her life.
I wanted an appropriate tribute
To our seventeen years of marriage
And the life we lived together.

I saw the funeral as an opportunity
For people to acknowledge
The extraordinary life Cecilia lived.
I decided to call on
One person from each area of her life,
To allow them to pay tribute,
To recall the woman they knew,
To reveal the side of her they saw.

Professionally,
Cecilia was a registered nurse.
One of her former coworkers
Got the privilege
Of honoring her as a nurse,
Recalling her superb skill,
Her commitment to teamwork,
And her dedication to patient care.

There was a personal friend
And member of her Toastmaster Club
Who noted the power of her words,
The quality and emotional impact
Of her many speeches,
As well as her incredible sense of humor.
Life with me was the source of
Many of her humorous speeches.

Her Karate instructor
Told of her fighting spirit,
How she had been a leader
In introducing women
To the art of self-defense,
And how she had fought
As long as she could to continue Karate
After she became sick.

There was the doctor
Who had cared for her
Through years of radiation.
He was inspired by her
Courageous fight to live.
He personally witnessed
Her will and determination
Not to let the cancer get her down.

Next was Becky,
Our oldest daughter
Who had just turned sixteen.
She made me proud.
She acknowledged Cecilia
As an awesome mother,
And told what it was like
To be her daughter.

Then it was my turn
To comment on the woman
Who had been my wife
For all those years,
I acknowledged her strength,
Her character,
The principles she lived by,
And the love she gave.

Each of us saw her in a different way,
But what was generated
Was the portrait of a life lived well,
A person who appeared
Almost larger than life.
Each person that shared
Was honored by the privilege
Of being able to pay tribute.

The reception afterwards
Was a major feast,
An Irish wake
For a Filipina Princess.
There was so much extra food
That Food Share was called in
To distribute the excess to the poor,
A final credit to the woman she was.

A Romance of One

I am sitting in a restaurant
Down at the pier
Overlooking the harbor,
Soaking up the warmth
Of the fire to my side.
A step away,
A young couple sits,
Eyes aglow,
With their hearts on fire
For the passion
Of the night.
Further still,
An elderly couple
Are holding hands
Across the table,
Gazing into each other’s eyes,
Oblivious to all
Except each other.
There is a softness
To their voices,
A gentle peace
Which envelops them.
A sailboat silently passes
With a man standing proud
At the helm,
Tacking into the harbor.
I watch as the sun sinks
Into the horizon
And the shore lights
Begin to flicker on.
Bit by bit,
The night comes to life
With a richness
That colors my soul.
I sit alone,
Not the least bit sad,
Contemplating life,
Observing the world,
Totally present
To its beauty.

Gone Just a Little too Long

It hadn’t been all that long,
Or so I thought,
Maybe a couple months
Or more
Working as an engineer
In Northern Peru.
My two daughters were only
Two and three years old
At the time,
But apparently
I had been gone long enough
For them to forget
What I looked like.
When I called my wife,
She was in tears,
And told me how the kids
Ran up to some guy
At the supermarket
Screaming “Daddy! Daddy!”
For some reason
My wife was not
At all enthralled
With the kid’s
Adopt a father campaign.
I can only imagine
What the guy
Must have thought
And how he explained
The new found family
To his wife!
It was obviously time
For me to head home.

The Act of Playing Small

She was gifted with
A razor sharp mind
Capable of grasping
Complex concepts
With apparent ease,
But she had learned
To repress that gift
As a child.
It must have been
Around second grade
When she noticed
That the other children
Seemed to resent
Her being so smart.
In order to fit in,
She learned the art
Of playing small,
Of pretending
To be ordinary.
Her brilliance
Would often show through
In flashes of inspiration,
Or stunning insights,
But she had a way
Of diminished the power
Of anything she said or did
By the words that followed.
It was an act
She carried with her
For close to forty years.

Love Alone Is Not Enough

He was unemployed
And barely scraping by
When they met,
And she was young,
Headstrong
And independent.
From the moment
They first locked eyes
On each other,
A brief but torrid
Whirlwind romance
Blossomed
That culminated
In marriage
Several months later.
They each thought
Their love for each other
Would last forever
And would carry them
Through any difficulties
They might encounter,
But after several months
Of his continued
Unemployment,
She began to tire
Of carrying
The financial burden,
And their relationship
Soured and finally ended
Almost as quickly
As it had begun.

Fighting the Structure

He had chafed for years
Against the necessity
Of getting up each morning
At the crack of dawn
To do the work he did.
There was a discipline
Demanded by the company
He worked for
Which necessitated
He show up
Like clockwork each day
And that he work diligently
Until the day was done.
The structure he adopted
Got the job done,
But he always envied
Those who seemed
To be able to lead
A much less structured life.
What he couldn’t see
Was that even
An artist or a writer
Must follow a regimen
In order to get
Anything done.
The only difference was
His company dictated
His schedule,
Whereas the artist
And the writer
Must each determine one
That works for them.

Father and Daughter Reunited

His wife and he
Had gone separate ways
A long time ago,
And they had a daughter
He never really got to know
Who had just come
To live with him.
His eyes glistened
As he talked about her
His love for and pride in
His daughter were obvious.
He had spent three hours
Talking with her earlier,
And he still glowed
From the encounter.
I gathered he had been alone
For a long, long time,
And conversations that mattered
Had been few and far between.
He was a man
Who had apparently encountered
Many hardships,
With few, if any, victories
He could call his own,
But his daughter’s presence
Was total vindication
For all he had endured,
And for the moment,
She was all that mattered
In the world.

Embers

The flames of their passion
Burned bright
For a while,
And it seemed
They couldn’t
Get enough
Of each other,
Then almost
As quickly as it started,
It was over.
The fire that filled them
With such ecstasy
While it lasted,
Now smolders,
And only embers are left
Of what was.
He seeks to rekindle
The flame,
But she feels as if
She was burnt by it,
And no longer trusts
Him or herself.
She needs time and space
To nurture her wounds,
And only if he can allow her
Those things
Will their relationship
Have a chance.

Don't Forget That Name

I learned the hard way
One of the primary rules
Of human relations
During my college dating years.
I met a very attractive coed
Whom I invited out
To one of the local
Chinese restaurants.
She was a novice
With chopsticks,
And I had a lot of fun
Teaching her the art
Of oriental style eating,
And watching her
Play with her food.
Afterwards I invited her
Up to my room
Only to find
My roommates playing cards.
Of all the inconsiderate things
They could have done,
They asked me
To introduce my friend,
And for the life of me,
I couldn’t remember her name!
For some strange reason,
Though we had an excellent date
Up to that point,
I never saw her again.

Cultivating a Doodler

As my oldest daughter, Becky
Was growing up,
She became the consummate doodler
Drawing on everything in sight.
No stray paper or pad
Stood a chance
Against her onslaught.

I didn’t always appreciate
Her artistic abilities though,
Especially the time
She took lipstick
And autographed a set
Of unfinished furniture
I had been working on.

We used to dine out a lot
And everywhere we would go
Becky would commence to decorate
The table napkin,
Drawing queens in lavish dresses
And ladies in fancy hairstyles
Intricate patterns and floral arrangements.

Quite a number of times
The waiter or waitress would see
Her doodles there
And ask if they could keep them
Sure that someday
Becky was bound to be famous
For her oodles of doodles.

Of all her artistic surfaces
Some of the strangest I think
Were the bottom of my feet.
I could lie there for hours
While she doodled away
With intricate designs and colors
That disappeared on taking a shower.

Now what does one do
With such a talent?
What kind of encouragement
Could I provide?
Well, we developed a game
We played for years
At every restaurant we visited.

I would draw a part
Of something, often obvious
And it was her challenge
To turn it into something else
Incorporating my design
Into something totally unexpected.
The more outlandish, the better!

I would draw part of the salt shaker
And she might turn it into
A crocodile, a dancer on a stage.
Her imagination was wild,
Each time she drew something different.
I never knew what to expect,
But that is how I cultivated a doodler!