Like a Bumbling Bee

Like a bumbling bee my mind tries to escape me. From the wall to the horizon to the carpet to the couch then running past me in a flurry of fluff my mind does wonder. Here to there in seeming disorder and confusion. What comes out only I know because sometimes my foot speaks for me receiving a blank countenance in reply. Does it matter what I say? If speech were any indication of one's current condition then in fact I should speak in riddles and my words should blow around like leaves, one minute caught up in a whirlwind of confusion and the next lying still on the ground nestled between earth and sky ready to inspire the wondering lover. Then perhaps at that moment the beauty or chaos of the speakers moment should inspire those words of the listener. That is precisely the conjecture.

At the end of the day left to stare blankly at the fire as if the only escape from the bombardment of bad news is the comfort of knowing that somethings do stay still. The fire does flicker and sway, but as each flame explodes upward it seems to die back to the same place of origin. Back to the fuel which holds it in place. Yes the fuel can become anything at any particular time with the readiness of oxygen, but that is not the point! The point is that this fire at this moment is stationary and that is what he is staring at! It doesn't matter that the carpet could catch fire at any moment until it does! Then that is something to worry about, but not right now because the carpet is not on fire! This fire is contained and is offering me a bit of comfort.

How does one contain that fire that so often draws us near? The fire is a necessary evil. It has many uses. The fire can keep us warm and alive. However the very same fire can burn us or be used to ignite a fuse to an explosive charge. So how do you learn to control the fire? The fire of course being metaphorical. I don't know. I've been asked this question before, more than once. But the real question is not how, but do you (actually) control the fire at all. And I say no. No we do not control the fire. The fire controls us. The only thing we can do is learn to live with the fire. And if learning to live with the fire is all we can do then not all the fire produces is bad. As I said earlier, the fire also keeps us warm which can keep us alive. If we are not burned then how do we know what a burn feels like and how can we tell when another one is coming; you can't. And maybe that little burn before is actually a blessing in disguise because it saves you from the life ending one later. You see the warning signs, you see the fuel and you feel the fire growing stronger and like a fire it draws you near telling you that it is simply keeping you warmer, but you now know what is really happening. This is all we can do. We have to see the warning signs and come to a reasonable conclusion that the situation is dangerous and therefore abort it or contain it and leave it.

Enough of the fire/burn mumbo-jumbo. Take the things that make us happy! Wrap them up as tight as you can and hold on to them! Visit them as often as you can and if the situation allows bring those things out for ALL to see and LET THEM FLOURISH! Let them take root in your life, let them sprout their potential, and let them blossom in to beautiful blessing for all! I have been to such a place! I walked among a field of blessings! I smelled their sweet fragrances! And there in the middle of them were my family and friends! They danced beside me in the lilies and held my hand as I became transfixed on the beauty before me. And I do take this blessing with me! I took it and I put it in my heart! I wrapped it in love and care as tight as I could and I planted it. I planted it in my heart! I try to water it and give it light as often as I can. I want it to blossom into a blessing for others. I pray to the spirit, let these blessings flourish in my heart and mind and help me share your blessings with the world so that we may enjoy them and grow from them forever and ever.

To the Undelivered

He had been there before; sitting in the tattered, vinyl seat of his '92 Camry. From years of the same old routine one of the springs had torn through the left side of what remained of the bottom cushion and was poking at his leg. The car was now going on its eighteenth year and it was beginning to show. The dashboard was cracked and faded, and at each corner parts of the speaker cover had begun to break apart, fall onto the rotted speaker below and from time-to-time made a low rattling noise that could be heard in the background as he listened to Drake and Zeke in the morning. There was a large starfish shaped crack in his windshield where the rear view mirror was. It had served as an outlet for his anger from an argument he and his wife had on the way back from a trip a few years earlier. He never got it replaced; not because he didn't have the money, but because it was a reminder of how enraged he could sometimes get. The day that it happened he learned a little bit about himself, but now it was the furthest thing from his mind. He was aware of and often thought about these things, but they seemed to fill his mind. Strange, random, and often inappropriate things. Where did they come from? What were their origins? Why did he obsess over them? He had his own ideas about what caused this bizarre behavior, but hadn't had the time to put them on paper. They would have to wait again because the only thing that mattered was right there.
The rancid black cloud pouring from the eighteen-wheeler in front of him was filling the cabin of his beater as they sat deadlocked in another I-240 traffic jam. It was early August and temperatures were expected to reach 100+ that day and there was no doubt in his mind that they would. There's just something about the combination of humidity and heat in Memphis that although it was expected every year just never got any easier to bear. It can kill a man and it has. During those hottest summers it was not uncommon to hear reports of yet another heat casualty. And why should it be? Once he himself had passed out on a hot summer day from trying to accomplish to much in the yard without being mindful of the thermostat. It’s strange, passing out, the only thing he would remember is the darkness closing in from both sides until it was as if he was looking through one end of a cardboard tube and could see only the things on the other end until they too succumbed to the darkness and that was it. As he sat there he could feel the now drooping headliner of his car flickering the top of his head as it whipped in the breeze of the luke cool air blowing out of his dusty vents. This absurd attempt at cooling himself was by no means an effective way to escape the scorching heat that day. The pavement had taken on that effect where if you catch a glimpse of it at just the right angle everything beyond looks fuzzy from the blistering heat radiating off of the petroleum soaked black desert. Besides trying to forget about the inevitable reaming he could expect as soon as he arrived to work that day he was trying to relax so that he would not brew up anymore sweat than what had already begun to turn his collar yellow. Just at that moment a monarch butterfly, glorious in all its splendor, came bobbing across the bleak landscape in front of him. For a moment the insect came in to his day carrying with it a nimbus of beauty that made its presence explode in front of him drowning out everything else that had filled his mind that morning. As his eyes followed its every move he reveled in its intricacies. He noticed how the wings with their black veins running over an orange canvas reminded him of a stained glass window. Even when the light from a setting or rising sun shone through those luminescent panes it held no comparison to the perfection that fluttered before him. Every time he had a moment to stare astonished at such a spectacle it only strengthened his belief in an ultimate divinity. Surely the Creator took great care and consideration in designing every gift he has given us. As he sat transfixed on this moment of joy it suddenly whisked upward unable to control itself in the billows of black, suffocating gases that now consumed it and as quickly as it had livened his spirits it now lie lifeless intermingling with the debris and trash that so often collected along the road side. Now it was nothing more than a lifeless something that once made him feel alive. It was dead and so was he. Once again he was back in his body. He was back in that heat. He was back to the place from which the gift had for a moment rescued him. He was back to the misery; sweat gathering at the back of his legs, beading on his forehead, and soiling what once was a clean body.