I still want to figure it out
even when it doesn’t matter,
I think about those days,
all the different ways
we did live our lives,
we did hide our sorrows.
I think about the time now,
the what ifs
the why nots
the constant barrage
of never knowing how.
We live a certain way
in our society,
the ability to walk away
is sometimes easier than sticking around
then there’s that missing part,
that missing what we never want to return.
Usually news, not just an epiphany,
perhaps a tragedy, friend nearby, makes us want to
have a long cry
when we, well
similar sounding sigh,
we, well, I cannot really describe the loss of
uniformity
while chaos rears its impulsivity upon the
normalcy of our lives.
~
Last night a dear friend told me news
her friend, one of a lovely circle
of women I have had the privilege of stories,
an endearment of souls traveling the years,
and they will band together,
they will search and plead and pray
for some new authenticity,
allows all of them to feel
together.
~
She is a very kind soul this dear friend of mine,
I can feel her ache,
she has memory of the sort
we all carry around with us to different degrees
of understanding loss and pain and confusion.
~
So let the world remind us all
when in the quiet silence of a sunlit morning,
we can stand still,
feel the permanence of our frame of mind,
when life seems so apparent
its penchant for reminding us all,
standing alone is no place to know,
only a landing upon where we sometimes fall.
~
Perhaps there is a gesture we only know so well,
a moment of peace, of love, when then hearts do swell.
© Thom Amundsen 4/2021
(for Cherri)
He walked alongside,
non-descript,
hoping to be noticed
in order to quell
such is the pain inside
of an insecure mind.
Started as a child,
one day he lost all hope
in the manifest of
life over death,
or the cruel hand of God
in what we call a miracle,
yet absurd,
inside the fear
is simple departure
of the one we love.
That internal flame,
became ignited
virtue of a confusion,
the wonder of why,
the angry response
to losing someone we love
at the hands of innocence,
where that person,
that wonderful being,
is cut short.
A woman recently,
suggested I take the knife out of my back,
its is a long line to
understanding
why we carry the demons we do,
when in reality,
if we could just live our lives,
we might
discover
a certain peace,
the one we see
in the eyes of those
we may never know.
© Thom Amundsen 3/2020
I am a working man,
with a verve, passion, a concept
of what I feel is right
in the vocation that I am.
I need to see the might
of quickly drawn out ideals
that give me inspiration,
capture a full moon at night.
I watched her drive away
her smile was something to hold
wondering then what happened
to the silence of today.
This isn’t who we imagine,
the working man in his day,
has thoughts of some reaction
speak to personal, my chagrin
I am a steadfast human being,
drawn by a mechanical means
I cannot step away from love,
a sordid state of wooing.
She walked away from a life we knew,
and then ironic, so did she.
© Thom Amundsen 3/2020
Its
deafening balance is one to be reckoned,
the quiet inside a sallowed severance,
the act of dismissal,
the purity within timely terror
on life
on reason
on separation
on courage on and on and on and on
we go the circus of our lives.
Its
measure of circumstance
erupts in a vision,
perhaps it is a dream
the waking sun explodes upon
a memory,
washing away the moments
the solitude
the granted harmony
the swift
welcome left now to fester
a lost melody.
Its
cruel hysteric necessitates
a reminder why,
this slow eventuality,
years upon years,
giving days their own causal
sacrifice inside the solemn
nature of
a discord
a grief
a denial
a disbelief
a convincing declarative
demise.
When routine begins its own culture,
the words in mind could discern as tears.
© Thom Amundsen 3/2020
I found myself crying a lot this week. I don’t mind a good cry, it can be rather cleansing. However, this emotion I experienced had layers. It had begun early in the weekend, the truth of a sudden turn in my life had reckoned itself to such a degree I felt for the first time I was unable to turn back. I realized pain, and sought some way to reduce the impact of my fears. But I couldn’t, the foundation had been laid down, and I was now faced with never being given another chance to redeem myself. I think the most difficult aspect of that reality was that I was confused with what was real and what now is illusion in my life.
Never is illusion an easy outlet to define. The term suggest we are ill in our own state of mind, to such a degree, we are compelled to create something out of nothing. In doing so, I remained stuck in my own quandary over how I lost someone I really loved. Everything in my life became one-sided, and I had no recourse. I was no longer connected to the security of our passage of time, and I was forced to imagine life without her.
And then it happened. Something bigger than any of us could ever predict. I lost two people in my community that recognized a certain culture buried in backlash and discrimination. Two people died under unusual circumstances. I watched someone I was very close to unravel, and it was difficult to experience. At the same time, I kept wanting some explanation in another part of my life that leaves me today, extremely alone.
I didn’t find relief, and tonight as I write these passage, there is still no peace.
We are taught to know love,
a spectacular spiritual solemnity
we embrace
wonder
wander through our lives
with a constant
in some evaluative sojourn.
We know lives
touch the spirit of others
in quiet encounters
a silence can speak so
tenderly in its clarity
to know her,
answer him,
wander through a myriad
of human condition
centered proclivities.
Yet in the quiet
of loss
of tragedy
of the knowledge
we do not have,
though sometimes protest
to hold the key
to why it is
who we are
what we might become
in such judgment
we can never really know
beyond our ability
to show compassion
in the eyes of hope
For it is this confusion that draws
the most stolid heart to tears.
Dedicated to the short lives of Bushra Abdi, 19, and Zeynab (Hapsa) Abdalla 19
There are already open wounds
two young women lost their lives
their final moments
in a panic with 911.
We have these preliminary assumptions
the dead can no longer speak
a certain beauty will now forever
encompass the memory of their lives.
What happens in the middle of the morning
to find the soul and heart
crying for safety, lost in a certain mire
unable to see, perhaps without ability.
Now we have to listen
we have to hope in the midst of tragedy
no foul play, only the reality
of two lives ending in such a tragic way.
They perished in a city
in a hot bed of controversy
the marginalization of a society
lived and breathed until this day.
We will wonder the bystander
if there are questions to remain
perhaps two children in the throes
of living each day like their last.
They will be, were, are always loved
ours is not a place to judge
only find the peace of finding Grace
finding paths for their soul to rise.
I feel lost and helpless, out of control,
I cannot fathom the pain that is now endured
by the family, the friend, the community,
the loss of life so random and unexpected,
… and this has nothing to do with the shooter.
I’m left in a fury of angst and simple confusion,
I know the emotional drain of being human,
living out our purpose and striving to be,
and like Hollywood, just when we realize …
… and this has nothing to do with the shooter.
I think we all think about how a person’s day begins,
the same as yesterday, perhaps a sweet happiness,
or even probably the angst of having to be the machine,
another day of social squabbles and night’s end purpose.
… and this has nothing to do with the shooter.
All of these moments we’ve all felt together,
we know the sense of sunshine in the morning,
we understand the beauty of a co-worker,
the laughter of a memo, the reality of our family.
… and this has nothing to do with the shooter.
There isn’t a day when we are awoken
by the silly notion of our mortality, when thriving
seems to be our goal. There is no reaction
to the possibility our life will be taken with random …
…. AND THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE SHOOTER!
THIS PART has everything to do with the shooter,
because those lives, those people that were so important
to everyone far beyond the trigger of your cowardice,
deserve an opportunity to COME TO LIFE AND WATCH,
WATCH YOU SUFFER INDIGNITY, YOUR FLAWED PURPOSE ON DISPLAY!
It was the changing season,
a tragedy,
we were all crying,
dumbfounded and surreal
the moments ahead
forever.
He was heart-broken
no place to stand or sit or feel,
just simple pain,
always and forever,
misty eyed and helpless
to the reality of the human condition.
He’d been tested,
he’d been traumatized,
together
ships passing in the night,
his words to soothe,
his reaction lost in agony.
How could the world ever be normal again,
when his son had left to travel,
and nearby,
a consoling brother,
a relative of sorts in marriage,
in a consoling gesture,
suggested a distraction.
How might he react any other way,
then lose faith in humankind,
when the soul of his world,
remained lost in the mechanics.
There is heartbreak to be noted,
when one’s dream
suddenly fades
while all of those around
have no idea the strain.
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