Visions of the Third Kind

So the legend goes…

…nothing like this...

One not so ordinary day, let's call it a Wednesday, Parvati stepped out from a morning shower, her feet softly patting the flowered mosaic intricately laid across the bath house floor. Reaching out for a towel, her hand returned empty, grasping only steam and lavender mist...again. An impish grin crept across her face and she shook her head laughing. This was beginning to become a common occurrence but for obvious reasons, leading to obvious results, she really didn't mind. Her husband, Shiva, had recently taken to sneaking through the ceramic landscape while she soaped and sang and like a pick-pocket in a street market, he would snatch that towel and scurry off down the hall, chuckling to himself all the way. Of course, he knew that she always sang in the shower and he also knew that whenever she sang, her eyes would close. It wasn’t like it was a difficult task but never the less, each time he would stealthily creep in as if getting caught would produce some dire consequence. It added to the fun of the whole thing so she never did let on that, for the most part, he was a terrible theif.

A brisk wind drifted in through the windows and she moved over to the therads of light falling through the vaulted ceiling. She thought, “I may as well warm up and dry off for a bit. No reason a little early morning fun should begin with a chill and end with me and a towel, wiping up puddles all over the house.” So with a kiss from the sun she set out through the house, channeling a wary detective, searching for her hidden Moriarty.

While Parvati was spending her extra time bathing in the sun, an impatiently hiding Shiva was getting a cramp in his leg. Being all hunched over and crouching beside the dresser like he was wasn’t exactly the ideal position to be waiting for extended periods of time in. He slowly stretched his body upwards, arms in full reach letting the pain and relief shoot through and fill his cramped joints. He reached further into the sky, lifting up onto his toes and clenched all of his muscles as if he were to explode from his skin but releasing only a long breathy, “Ohhhhh maaaaan."

Looking out the double doors and past their balcony his eyes soaked in the scenery. With the Ganges at his feet, he could see clear across the Deccan Plateau, straight to the Arabian Sea. A sea blue rivaled only by his own skin and holding the same infinite view in it's depths. He breathed deep, the moment, into his lungs and was filled with an overwhelming sense of peace that warranted further exploration. It seemed Parvati had grown tired of his game so he decided to take some time to meditate and stepped through the doors.

Still very much involved in their little “cat and mouse”, Parvati quietly stalked the house peering around corners and skidding passed doorways. She knew precisely where he was, it had been the same spot every time but again, all part of the game. As she ascended the seemingly unending marble staircase, her excitement rose with the elevation. She imagined slipping in through the bedroom door and crawling over top the dresser, maybe this time she could surprise him. Much to her disappointment, once through the door she could already tell he wasn’t in his usual hiding place. As clever as he thought he was, his knee always stuck out a bit past the dresser. “Maybe he’s smartened up and found a better spot,” she thought but scanning the sparsely decorated bedroom, there wasn’t really any other place for him to hide. They liked to keep the house the same as they lived their life, uncluttered.

She thought she might grab one thing or another from the armoire and wait for him but as she divided the room she saw him out on the balcony. He was sitting atop the patio table in the lotus position, facing out towards the ocean. Playfully she moved ever so quietly 'cross the room and posted directly behind him. She brought her hands around both sides of his head to cover his eyes and in an attempt to scare him she bellowed in the manliest voice she could muster, “HEYWHATAREYOUDOINTHERE!!!!??”

No sooner had she covered his eyes than did the whole world drown in an ominous blackness. Cries reached their ears from above and below, something wicked indeed was coming and with speed! The wind ripped down from the Himalayas uprooting all in its path and hurtling it towards oblivion. They were caught in some bizarro spin on "it's all fun and games until someone puts an eye out” and she could scarcely believe what was going on. Yet, faster than the charging disaster had threatened, a flame burst from Shiva's forehead. It flashed red, then green, across the horizon like a tropical sunset with a nuclear twist, engulfing the darkness and flooding light once more over world.

Shiva rose from the table and turned to embrace his lover, as you do after skirting certain universal destruction but her expression caught him off guard. The past few moments had been intense to say the least, yes but this look…this look she was giving, it just didn’t seem appropriate. It was more like a, “Hey, uh… you got some food there on yer face,” look.

Slightly taken aback Pervati stumbled into the room and reached for the small vanity mirror on the dresser, holding it up to Shiva’s face, which now matched her expression like a funhouse mirror. He saw what she could not stop gawking at. There, dead center in his forehead, a third eye.



Uh…yeah, I was going to copy and paste the standard story of how Shiva happened upon his third eye but…I don’t know…something else happened. Anyway, it was just a preface for a new song I wrote. Wanna hear it? Here it goes...


Visions of the Third Kind

I've been waiting for
the sun,
rise on me one day.
Melt away my soul,
burn away control,
leave me naked
in the rain.




Penance for
a life
I led astray.
Given unto me,
deafening pleas,
still I turned away

How I long
for night.
Set me free.
Blacken out my lies,
lay to waste my pride,
open my eye.

Set me free.

Love is Easy

Aside from just random musings and prose, from time to time I will be posting lyrics of songs I've written. A song pretty much is a poem set to music anyway so it's not too far of a stretch. Plus, if you never come to see me play, you'll never get to hear the words...but maybe, just maybe, if you like the lyrics, you may need to see it performed! Regardless…once I’m done writing them, unless I share, they’re pretty useless to me so perhaps you or someone else will find them useful.


In honor of my birthday I am posting a song that details a large portion of my life and the people responsible for it.  If you’d like to submit a complaint, write me and I’ll give you their address. While I am only referenced twice in passing, if characters and stories have arcs, then our two protagonists and this story are the sun that revolves around my belief in / capacity for Love. It may delve into the dark at points but Love has never and will never be easy, erase that fairy tale from your mind immediately or suffer your own wrath. Love is not a fix-all or a destination you finally arrive at. I’d liken it more to…the best umbrella you ever saw.  It may be the greatest damn umbrella known to man but let’s face it, given the storms you are going to have to weather, you are still going to get wet, you’re still going to get cold and every now and then the wind is going to blow that thing inside-out and you’ll have to get a new one, can’t be helped.  Expectation, at the feet of fallen intentions, quickly turns on everyone in the vicinity like a family dog gone rabid.  Love doesn’t make the bad disappear, it gives you an elevated view of it.

Now that I’ve sufficiently slathered you in metaphor, enjoy!

Love is Easy

Oh, she held tight her eyes
tryin’ to hold back sunrise.
She say’s, “I can’t tell who you are going to be today
and I don’t know where I will be tomorrow.

I’m in love with a man,
woh oh
if he’s not here,
I don’t think I can.”


Sunrise to starlight,
the whole house goes dark,
save
a nightlight.

She was hearts, he was wild
out on the Dixie port tiles.
He wore a heart twist with rage t’keep him spinnin’ round.
One touch of her grace…
he slowed down.

Bridge-

“I know everything changes
but nothing
on the walls
warned of this day.”

Refrain-

“I’ll try to make it easier
to love me like you wanted to.
It’s just that I never bend,
it’s always been
the part of me that’s true.

But, I promise you
these changes we are going through.
They’re as real as I’ve ever felt.
I never fell
as hard as I’ve with you.”


 “I’ve seen 20 years go by
since you first filled up my life.
Oh, the world for your smile,
while we lay rest with our child.

I’m a hard man I know
but worth fighting for.
I was drowning inside,
my heart’s still on fire.
Oh, I would never let you go,
I could never make you stay.
I wanna give love to you darling.
Don’t know what else I could say…”

Bridge-

“…but
oh, I know everything changes
but it doesn’t
work
right!
If you’re not with me.”

Refrain-

“I’m gonna make it easier
to love me like you wanted to.
It’s just that I never bend,
it’s always been
the part of me that’s true.

Oh,
I promise you
these changes we are going through,
they’re as real as I’ve ever felt
and I never fell
as hard as I’ve with you.

And if you want me to
I’ll tear down these walls for you.
You held me in my darkest night,
here comes the light,
I shine when I’m with you.”

“It’s gonna be easy.”

 I took this picture at the Sutro cliffs trying to catch the sunlight and ended up with the old couple by accident.  Awesome accident....that should be a band name!

Duality

They was all…wham, bam, slam & jam but they was more like...hush, shush, whoosh & swoosh. Needless to say, neither was willing to budge an inch, a likely effect of running extra miles for fair weather mobs. After all that posturing each walked away confused, with a greater sense of how much they truly did not understand the other. Which is quite lovely given that confusion & frustration play nice-nice in the sandbox like Abel & Cain…brothers til’ the end.

Regret

I can see her, even now.
Dancing in that summer storm,
starry eyed and reckless,
chasing rainbows in the dark.

The moon hung low,
gazing out with a macabre red glow.

Rain hissed like steel chains crashing down from Peter’s gates,

refracting the lunar hue ‘til all we knew was awash in rose.

Traipsing ‘cross those Louisiana river slopes,
I spied her from the hillside:
A fleeting sprite, drenched in white,
illuminating our hallowed nook in the Mississippi.
The crabgrass and clay were soft, warm against my bare feet,
sinking slowly into the earth with each step…


It’s difficult to find yourself at a moment like this.
Expanses of time when you’re grasped and held firm,
Wholly present on the cusp of an eternal zenith.
All that was, is, will or won’t
culminates here in plain sight -
the event horizon,
our Opus Infinitum.

Of course, this is true of every moment really
but to actually feel it,
to recognize and cherish it…?
I don’t believe I have ever felt so real.
Before or since.

Which is oh-so-funny now,
considering...

A lantern hung beneath the old willow tree.
Its branches stretched out over the river with grace and care,
our only hope of solace from the storm.

The rain pounded that rusty beacon,
scattering drops of gold to the wind.
Twirling about she seemed to lift clear off the ground,
swept up in a cyclone of lights.
The Queen ‘O’ the Wisps,
charming her court,
wooing princes
and beckoning a fool.

I have never witnessed such rage and wonder unfold in a dance.
It was hypnotizing.
Like she was speaking in tongues and I understood every word,
I could hear her hidden tune.
A sirens song played for only we two.

My god she was alive!
Truly living.
With such intensity that, even in the downpour,
her hair set aflame,
caught the night and shot out across the sky,
wild laughter in tow,
filling every space left between us
& echoing still.

I remember how my eyes felt,
beaming in smile, ready to burst.
As if I held some secret surprise,
waiting to reveal,
teasing the notion.


But between us there were no secrets.
I had none, anyway.
She told me once,
in that slow drawn out drawl of hers,
“Ya know how…some people,
they wear their hearts on their sleeve
or maybe they got a…a chip on their shoulder or sumthin like that?
Well, you’ve got everything
right there on your face.
Christ, every time I look at ya
I gotta wade through it all before my eyes even see you!”

She always did though…
maybe.

It’s a funny thing, truth.
People like to get philosophical about it.
What a joke!
What could they possibly know?
Stumbling around, fact and fiction swirled up like oil and vinegar in their fishbowl brains.

Now, I’m not talkin’ about silly things like where you been or who with.
No…I’m talkin’ REAL truth.
The kind…
The kind you’d rather bury 20 feet deep and pour a cement foundation over,
build a house on top and burn the whole cursed thing down while still inside.
…So no one ever goes near it again and you do not have to live with it another day.

Life is a spider web of stories,
one strand over another,
connecting us all.
True or false they are the only things we actually find interesting about each other.
You can keep yours,
let me keep mine.

The Dixie heat wrapped and held us,
closing in from all around,
words & bones, entombed in a moment.
Beautiful though it was,
if not that day,
then every moment since,
I drown in that river.

We had stripped ourselves down,
bare to all the wilds,
disarmed and earnest.
Our midnight debut,
a tragedy,
anything but new.

It’s strange, the things we remember,
often false,
incomplete renderings of faded images and ideals.
Reality is so impermanent,
vapor trails, dissipating in air.
Dreams are the true monoliths of time,
stalwart beacons, towering above the fog.

Her name I’ve not spoken for what has seemed a lifetime.
Though the void left to me was more just…time,
faceless, countless time.
An endless crevasse I could never cross.

I don’t know if I could tell you what became of us,
I’m not sure she would’ve approved.
But I am very certain I wouldn’t tell you,
even if she had,
for I’ve torched every corner of this house
and am lying.

Finally.

Greetings

Have you ever stopped to watch two acquaintances greet each other? The rapid unfurling of non sequitur customs, instinctual reflexes & hilariously weird hang ups, it really is a strange happening…but then, what doesn’t turn strange before our eyes? Have a look for yourself.

It all starts with eye contact, the loose thread at the cuff of this whole situation, once made you’ve got no chance of escape short of some crazy about-face and tearing off into the foreground. But who the hell’s gonna do that? Perhaps the sprinter owes the other a considerable amount of money, but I did say “two friends” and you did just start reading so it’s kind of implied that we’re going to see this thing through…so, back to it…visual contact.

Now, It’s very likely half of this pair wants nothing to do with the impending, impeding encounter but those folks are going to need better peripheral vision because it’s way too late now. You see, it takes exactly .0025 seconds to recognize a person as someone you know. Once that knowledge is acknowledged, one or both of you is going to start toward the other. This is, of course, in response to the untaught, unspoken rule and incredible driving need to stand before people we know and make noises and hand gestures. What’s most unfortunate is that it takes somewhere between .0027-.0029 seconds to filter this person through your memories and realize that indeed, you did want nothing to do with Bobby today but as stated, it’s way too late now.

Depending on how well one of our two knows the other one and the amount of time since last they met will directly correspond with the volume and length of our next topic, the vocal and physical parts of a greeting. Typically these will start simultaneously. A short burst of touching along with a prolonged period of conversation. Neither person will begin until hands have touched, shaken, hugged, kissed or patted some part of the other. Regardless of how…you can bet yer bottom yer gonna be touchin’.

Although, as if there wasn’t more than enough going around already, here’s a bit of confusion for the stew, what if they don’t touch? This could mean one of two things and both are just as likely.

1) They are at odds in some way. One fears the other or themselves. There’s some kind of unresolved issue, hopefully the very reason for this meeting. It’s never good to let these things fester, sooner than later everyone will smell it.
2) One or both can’t stop thinking of the other and they want nothing more than the physical contact, mirrored with emotion, that they are presently and purposefully denying.

Weirdos...every one.

Next comes the race. This part is all about sharing but both are going to be in a fast paced game of story trading, experience peddlers, haggling with each other. Back and forth, back and forth, trying to relate, attempting to teach, trying to inspire, congratulating, feigning interest, exclaiming appropriately. This whirlwind of communication, is the preface to a new story. One involving the both of you, unwritten and untold, yet doing so as it happens. This one doesn’t need to be shared because you are sharing it and I hope you both passed kindergarten because its outcome will directly affect the amount of time between now the next possible meeting, as well as the length of time and conditions of this alluded meeting.

Funniest to me is how this communication and motion…ahuhuh…commotion, is usually followed by the complete absence or at least calming down of those very things. As if all of it was just one’s prerequisite for allowing the other to sit or stand close and quietly while they share some time. Really I shouldn’t say “as if” because that is what it is. These are the steps we take before allowing someone front seats to our movie. Not only that, but for a time, you’re stepping back from the lead and allowing a co-star in your show. It’s important stuff. It’s what makes it all worth while, nothing feels quite so real as sharing the world with friends…for whatever amount of time you are able to remain so.

Luckily, we don’t have to go through this ritual …you can read and I don’t have to be anywhere near you. Still, right now we are sharing a moment…time traveling together really. The moment I wrote this it became my past. While my points of view may have changed, the feeling and emotion of these words are locked in them forever. So when you read this, it's a future you communicating with a past me. We cross time and space to be here now.  Yup, I just bleeew yer freakin' mind maaaan. That’s the true nature of art or more simply, creation. It's a window to wherever the creator wanted you to go and is the purpose of this blog. It’s my custom tint for others to look out through. Proof that for a span of time I was somewhere, disrupting the world in my own small pseudo-original way.

We truly are a curious bunch. Lunatic navigators out mapping a storm, chasing the day and burning our nights alive moonlighting as all fallible gods.  A freegun miracle of survival.  A better muse?  I've yet to find one...greetings.