I feel this is an odd sort of milestone- that connection between the odd geeky new-ish Dad who has no sports IQ, and the Son who has overcome many hardships and seen the shattering of many dreams now enjoying something together this simple. He said it meant a lot to him, even me reading up on the rules of football so I could follow the game better.

These little things, these passing minutes of our passing time, accrue such value. The moments are forever sealed in some holy place, tied to our names and our fragmentary existence. I cannot estimate the value to him to validate his passions, something that passes in about 3 hours, something as small as passing a ball back and forth.
Tonight, we have watched a game, but I feel that we've won something far greater.

Since those early golden days, I've become a Dad twice over, a published author thrice over, and have been within an inch of my life a few more times than I care to count. The point is, as the lyrics go to "Indiscipline" by King Crimson: "No matter how closely I study it- no matter how I take it apart, no matter how I break it down, it remains consistent." My life has been spelled out for a few million strangers for seven years, and though each day I may acknowledge its fragility, this life persists. This name, just like yours, just won another minute. All the more reason to speak more clearly from the heart, and more powerfully from the mountain top. The words that we emit may not be constrained to a single place now, in this age of constant connection and the madly addictive buzzing of an entire planet learning to speak. They spread out, and when the lights go out, we are saturated by words from throngs of souls we'll never meet. Provided we do something with the strange knowledge that we are all connected in ways that cannot yet be comprehended, we are fulfilling the dream of ages- being humanity and simultaneously sharing the same stage.

The Internet is just a very rough and queer step on that path to true interpersonal, international interconnection. It is a primitive and crude simulation of that uncanny feeling we all know subconsciously, that feeling where we know that we are surrounded by the very knowledge we lack but just can't yet touch it. Each of us is tapping on some steampunk telegraph to the rhythm of our soul, at the least calling out in wonder from our common biology. It is still a young tool no matter our comfort with it. It is an opportunity awaiting your Next Important Search.

So, what does all this really mean? Heck if I know, but it has been and continues to be an immense pleasure to hold this place dear to me and share it with you, bot or Bolivian, with unconditional peace. For the next year, Bird on the Moon will persist in one way or the other, and the Internet will grow in untold ways, and hopefully you will be given the opportunity to use your voice in transformative ways... come what may and for whatever reason.

In the spirit of our endeavour, as searchers and teachers, I can only leave you with this spellbinding gift:

I know I'm not alone in asking for help, and as I said, my dire situation is an opulence most of the world cannot enjoy. We rats have been bred to accept this paradigm, and create dependencies that are beyond what is reasonable to sustain life and thrive. While in comparison this is small potatoes, for the moment, it's an emergency.

I am squeamishly and humbly asking for any donation possible. I need at least $250 to breathe, but about a paycheck's worth to relax. Anything you can provide is a wonderful gift, and accepted with gratitude. Even if you can't help, I'm grateful that you're reading this. Every thought does indeed count, and while I ask for help this way, I know I have it through the incredible generosity of my friend's spirits and hearts.

For that, I'm eternally grateful, and by that I am truly sustained.

(Poem written for the 10th annual WNC Hunger Banquet)

I can't yet say I'm proud of this- that'll take time- but I am grateful for all of these opportunities to create, both in verbal and visual media. Thank you, again, for occasionally popping in the studio and saying hello, even if the desk is dusty, it means that this place holds value to you as well.

Cheers, friends.

I made a bonfire out of yesterday’s fallen heroes,
Holy crackles be-glitter the night
And my words are burning- and my heart is burning-
And my eyes are burning with
The pure revelation of your love, heat and gusts of leveling breath
Rocking my foundation
Shaking me and transforming me into the very cinder I feign to master.
As we collapse into ourselves, I hear the distant anthems and
Proud hymns as all saints come passin’ through.

The last exhale, my Beloved, your hurricane of re-affirmed yes,
A symphony of innocence
That crescendoed through the valley and shook the dome of the night, Made the stars waltz, those very lights where you were and I am
So temporarily placed under.
Your name is now flung among the constellations,
The twinkling play of suns
Where you now run, full of love, as all saints come passin’ through.
I ask who will stop the time- who will stop time- who stops time
To honor the faces that fast become as thin as air, who we
Too easily forget when once we held them warm, alive?
We once stopped time for each dearly Beloved,
For those once-opened eyes where all saints came passin’ through.

This isn’t a metaphor or a convenient way to say to the
World how holy you are for having been incarnate- no-
When we touched I knew that same dizzy love that makes champions Of the dispossessed and raises up chiseled busts from
Rough hewn rock, and there ain’t none
That can question the virtues which arise from doing something more With love than just sighing.
Eye to eye, breath upon breath, this isn’t death because
There’s no stopping love.
Death stops no champion, no hero, no lover,
And at the moment the veil of life is loosened to the wind,
All saints come passin’ through us,
Among us… we bridge the mystery of light and shadow
By holding on to dear life as each determined heartbeat
Turns a gear in the clockworks of every soul you dared touch.

Today, I heard about a rush of leaves that came from heaven
Flocking through sunlight as a million fiery angels
A sudden blaze in your colors- the rustling was your name,
And that was enough for us to know
That you, my saint, my hero, my beloved,
Just came passin’ through.

For Ursula

We become each other’s connective tissue
When we, at last, become our selves.

***

When I walk, bone and muscle and tendon and energy
Are remembering, deeply, the symphony that is time.
I notice the woman who moves slowly up the hill
Under a large and twirling umbrella.
She is at once the center of the Universe, and its entirely,
And the nothing from which it came.
She does this so simply
Just by walking
Through a night where the cicadas keep time with the good rain
And the shadows merge silently.