A return to the rule: The Golden Rule.

We were not tricked. 

The mean were.

As they came freshly from the cocoon floating high into the air.

But were swatted away by a hand.

So they guessed they were supposed to become swatters.

I wish we all knew.

I wish we all could see the burdens of others.

I wish we had enough heart and faith left to care.

To believe that we should care.
To not be afraid to care.


To hold their hand as they cry...
Whose hand? Blast!--who cares whose hand it is.
Hold all of the hands you can find.
To hold them and say:
Just tell me what happened, from the beginning.
And listen.
To just listen until they stop talking.

For those of you who are still waiting and on your last ounce of wonder.

Waiting to walk past some person who will

Please God, just smile.

I will be her.

I will be unfailingly here for you.

Begging you to see that you weren’t wrong.

You weren’t wrong.

That kindness is real.

It’s here.

It’s everything,

After all.

La Mejor Tinta

Armando Valladares

Me lo han quitado todo

las plumas

los lápices

la tinta

por que ellos no quieren

que yo escriba

y me han hundido

en esta celda de castigo

pero ni así ahogaran mi rebeldía.

Me lo han quitado todo

-bueno, casi todo-

porque me queda la sonrisa

el orgullo de sentirme un hombre libre

y en el alma un jardín

de eternas florecitas.

Me lo han quitado todo

las plumas

los lápices

pero me queda la tinta de la vida

-mi propia sangre-

y con ella escribo versos todavía.

Not Quite Like Pocahontas...

Watch this in the mini screen version, then go watch it again in full-screen. I look so much tougher the second time. Haha...

Let this last

If there may be one thing that doesn’t rust,
Please, God, let it be us.
Let it be our love, forever young and never lost.

Let us live on in ourselves!
Not just in the things we might leave behind.
Let this picture hang over our fireplace until we run completely out of time.

Please let me have hope.
That it can be real, that it can last.
That love mustn’t end in its opposite.
In our lives happening so hard and so fast.

Please make someone somewhere
Good for the promises they make.
For hope’s sake.
For my sake.

These were they

Here’s the spot they still exist as “they”,

The spot they first became…

It’s true that the woman wore this watch on their first date.

And that man knew who she was before the end of that date.

 

She was so beautiful.

She still is so beautiful.

 

Here’s the little silver bracelet that man saw in a store,

The very next day and it matched the woman’s watch he saw.

The hands paused in eternity until that girl and her watch were gone.

Yes, here’s the bracelet he' got for his new girl.

 

Because he was already in love with her…

He still is in love with her.

 

But where is the ring

From the day he asked for the watch’s hand?

For it to pause forever on the two of them?

Where is the ring that never ends?

 

He saw it in a jewelry box. It was perfect, and he got it.

But it is still in a jewelry box. Her old jewelry box.

 

But the watch and the bracelet,

The symbol of a man’s helpless, lost, immediate love.

The watch that made my dad’s world start turning…

I still have them on.

The Compassion-Confidence Equation

When we find compassion for others, we will find it for ourselves.
We assume that the way we think is the way other people think or ought to think. So when we are critical of others, something shallow inside us tells us that we are therefore better, but something deep inside us shrinks fearfully.
Afraid of the empathy we all secretly feel for those we are unkind to.
Get rid of the harshness, the criticism, the impossible rubric by which you grade others.
Replace it with love, with understanding, with compassion.  Realize that everyone has a story.  Everyone has soft spots, even if they appear full of hard spots. Because we don’t know what went into their creation. We don’t know what harshness might have brought them here. To the person you think you see.
But we all have a story. Remember that. Do not ever for one second forget when you meet a stranger that he has lived an entire life before meeting you.
We all have immeasurable value.
When I discovered that, when I let my heart become soft, I gained confidence. Because once I realized that my criticisms for others were unfounded and harsh, they went away. And so did my suspicions that everyone else viewed me the same way.
Now I see love in everyone. I see a walking history. A person with deep desires and aspirations. A person who DOES empathize with everyone else, deep down. Even if they haven’t discovered it yet. And I am able to assume that everyone else sees the same in me.