Her haven wasn’t grand or wide;
no sweeping place to run or hide.
It lived in smaller things she kept~
a teacup where the morning slept,
a folded napkin, soft with wear,
a breath she balanced in the air.
She found her refuge in the pause
between two sentences—because
that quiet space, so slight, so thin,
let calm collect and settle in.
A spoon against a porcelain rim
became a steadying hymn for her,
a sound that asked her heart to stay
a moment more before the day.
Her haven wasn’t built to last
or hold the weight of shadows cast.
It simply offered gentle ground,
grace in tiny places she had found~
the ones that ask for nothing new,
yet give her back a clearer view.
No grand escape, no sweeping plan~
just smallness doing what it can.
A haven shaped by quiet art,
no larger than a beating heart.
Oh, to be a raindrop~
to feel the world
long before meeting it~
the gentle clouds and
the slow gathering weight
of stillness that
becomes descent.
to know the tremor
of release,
the tender surrender
from mist to motion~
a trust so quiet
it speaks only
in gravity.
to feel the wind carry me,
a brief cradle,
guiding me toward
whatever waits below.
to feel my own smallness,
while carrying the memory
of vast oceans,
of rivers
that once thundered,
of storms that tore open
the sky.
to feel light passing through me~
a tiny prism of fleeing brilliance
seen only by those
who look closely.
And when I arrive~
on a leaf,
a rooftop,
a child’s open palm~
oh, to feel the soft miracle
of becoming part
of the world at last.
For a heartbeat,
I rest.
Then I become
something else:
a bead of clarity,
a slip of motion,
a beginning
that never feared
being small.
Oh, to feel
the world
by becoming part of it~
one soft fall,
one bright touch,
one brief moment
of being exactly
what I was meant to be.
I’m so happy
someone slap me
bring me back to earth
before I float away, like a bird
This is a short week, before a 4-day weekend. It’s time to push it.
The density of study per square minute is chaotically high - but worth it.
If I can get everything done, I’ll have days to shake off the smallness
of school, perk-up my vital-signs and revitalise.
I’m motivated, elated and intoxicated at the thought of it
- I’m twirling in front of mirrors - can these feelings even be articulated?
I’m dancing through metro crowds
the uneven cobblestones feel like clouds
I blew a kisses to a busking mime
while bopping to ‘Lady Gaga’ sounds
I shocked an old lady
with an act of voluntary kindness
- I gave her my seat on the metro
she had groceries and looked about eighty
People aren’t mean,
they’re just mindless
it’s a form of situational blindness
I hope you guys have a great weekend too,
just relaxin’ and passing into springtime.
.
.
A song for this:
Kissing Strangers feat. Nicki Minaj) by DNCE [E]
Back 2 Back by Dazy Chain
.
.
[E] = Explicit lyrics
Power without wisdom
is only noise.
Gold does not teach judgment.
Office does not teach restraint.
A ruler is measured
by what he withholds,
not by what he blurts.
Racism is not strength.
It is intellectual poverty
wearing a crown.
To insult in public
is to confess smallness.
Even beasts know
their limits.
Democracy that elevates folly
betrays its own purpose.
When ignorance governs,
the state weakens itself.
A leader in a multiracial house
who divides by skin
rules already in decline.
Votes cannot sanctify cruelty.
Elections do not absolve vice.
A builder preserves.
A destroyer provokes.
When prejudice speaks from the throne,
the empire begins
to fracture.
History is patient.
It records
everything.
- Idull is a free pass to peace of mind - quote from poet
When peach colors swell in the evening sky
an moment in a spiral of color
Sharing my adventures in the silence
In my smallness between heaven and earth
a silent song becomes a symphony
I admitting my inadequacy
behind the curtain of humility
It falls as jewels on my path tonight
Idyllically near eternity
wish to hold on to this flawless moment
The noise of the day
has subsided and folded
into a quiet
under the soft covers
of a July evening.
The eyes seem to resist
the particular and instead
focus on nothing
but the sum - the glow
from shore lights
smudged on water,
the dark sky powdered
with translucent clouds
and the faint filaments
of stars strung out overhead.
Tonight, I don't want
the granular detail of things
to steal my attention
but to enjoy the blending,
the stand back meld
of colors, of each stroke,
forming a picture transcending
its parts. I want to feel
the evening being
put together
into a boundless whole,
to be beyond
the smallness of myself
and be absorbed totally
into the mystery
of the composition
A nobody but I'm somebody in the vast cosmic dance,
Just one small spark, yet burning with resilient light.
I walk unseen through crowded streets, a passing glance,
A whispered name forgotten with the fading night.
Yet in my quiet moments, worlds expand within,
My thoughts create universes none have ever known.
The smallest acts of kindness—where legends begin,
From tender seeds of nothing, mighty trees have grown.
A nobody to history's grand, unfolding page,
But somebody to those whose lives I've gently touched.
A heartbeat in the rhythm of this fleeting age,
A single drop of rain that makes the garden lush.
So call me insignificant, I won't protest—
For in this seeming smallness, I have found my rest.
A nobody but somebody—perhaps that's best,
When being truly human is life's only test.????????????????
If I was a gnat I know whom I would bother
I would hide in their garbage disposal
flying up into their face when they ran water in their sink
I would hit them in the mouth, disgusting them
when I tired of being a gnat I would become a mosquito
buzzing in the ears of my enemies, biting them with gnarly teeth
in my smallness, I would finally get the revenge I seek
Drowning in my bitterness
and the smallness of reluctance
I refuse again to see
what life has gifted me unclaimed
Falling back into the prison of my dark
unfolding memoir
Drifting lost into an older time
— negativity holds dear
(The New Room: May, 2024)
Herm saw in Fee, a person who barely knew how to live
John recognized Fee’s will, she had survived childhood Armageddon
Herm focused on her downfalls, belittling her
John nurtured her potential, inspiring her
Herm discouraged most of his students, they received low grades.
John built his students up, admiring their goodness, giving A’s.
“I never have given an A,” Herm said, in a proudly weird way.
John had no words, recognizing the smallness of the man.
Written: November 15, 2023
__________________________________________
Some seek leisure in the pristine wilderness
The solitary coast is the site of separateness
Each one is barred from harboring bitterness
The ocean thundering, roaring in its utterness
Nature fascinates me beyond my smallness
Never before impeded in the path of emptiness
From lackluster scarcity and austere emptiness
An itch for oneness in the cosmos of loneliness
We wait idly for the angel's plea for tenderness.
A gull is tossed by high wailing winds,
then it lets its wings ride the storm.
Cliff top, we who watch under rain hats,
sway, and stare
strangely entranced by the sudden squall.
A certain sense of our smallness
in the greater scheme of things
comes upon us,
an acknowledgement perhaps
of our allotted place and power
especially the power
to roll with life's heaving seas,
and the wise choice
to fly with its winds
and not against them.
The faint sound of breathing
is heard in the silence of darkness
where eyes gaze into the sky
with tear-stained thoughts
how still the moment
the smallness of being
reliving each sorrow from yesterday
as a metaphor
that stands on the edge of emotion
looking into an abyss, feeling nothing
awakened by a mirror of reflections
that flutter in the background
like the last organ grinder
pulling his worn-out cart into the shadows
on an empty cobbled street
playing, though no one hears
beneath the last lamplight
as a quiet death of echos
fade into the dim-lit realm
to leave an after-image in the swollen eyes
and a haunting sound of sadness
that endures through the calamity of loneliness
IF peace is largeness within the many chambers
of you i should dream a world of loveness
a n d m a n y t e a r s b y j o y
to tell you the dream when smallness was
the many vapored obscured heart-tied hands
hanging upon the highest star
There is within me enough room for you
as words from distant cousins lock meaning within
a single stanza the numinous feelings are that much
nearer I -- the pupil of Life and my sight
is becoming more clearer.
:: 11.27.2015 ::
The sky has climbed over
its usual low cloud cover,
today it is high, blue and vertical
with no hand holds,
those places for the eye to cling to.
In the city we don't get 'big sky'
we get pencil thin shafts
that sweep the dust off ledges,
we have foot-slogging
staircases and elevations.
where the sky cannot rise beyond
one last viewless window.
Far below
upon those hemmed-in streets
some seem forced to grow
into hybrid creatures
that must suck upon
each other's fears.
There are trees, a few stretch and reach
like mountain climbers,
yet all that high air above us is not reassuring,
it creates a feeling of smallness,
our arms too paltry to grasp the infinite.
Mostly we give no thought
to the sheer narrowness of it all,
and so with only these
manmade clifftops to jump from
it's no wonder some choose to leap.
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