21. To Look and Long

I look and long
When I glimpse a loving glance
Or tender touch
Things we once shared
Before the rigid stares
And frigid glares
Now proximate
Not intimate
Winter without warm embrace
Only cold eyes and face
And rare glance
Faintly hinting of past romance
Laying beneath a cloud of snow
Alive or dead I do not know
Perhaps our love again will bloom and grow

20. A Curious Craving

Philosophers ponder body and mind
Theologians parse spirit and soul
Scientists peer into the conscious and unconscious brain
All seeking to explain
The mystery
Of humanity's need to know
But the only thing that's certain so far
Is just how fascinating we are
We even preserved Einstein's brain in a jar
To search for his mind in part of his body
And so our quest goes on
To discover what makes us tick
And maybe even a cure for the sick
There you have it
A tome in a poem
About our curious craving
To know the unknown

19. A Better We

Me
Thee
We
Entwined
Entangled
Emeshed
A conjoined personality
A blended being
Never meant to be
It's time to reclaim our individuality
Our own identity
Trading codependency
For independency
Held together by the common connection
Of a co-created family
Now I'm free to be me
And you to be thee
A better we

18. Middle Night

Middle night
Sleep departs
Thoughts dart and dash
Mind wheels spin muddy rooster tails
Going nowhere fast
Stuck awake
Ignition off
Mind stills
Quiets
Sleep creeps back
Nestles in
Returns

17. The Family Math of 1+1

When I started out
I thought just one would do
Soon there were two
Then more
For a total of four
Kids that is
Gee whiz
Number four now has three
To add to one's three
To add to three's three
Now two has one with thoughts of two
What started out as one plus one
Is closing in on twenty
Counting the four's one plus ones
Some might say that's plenty
But soon the kids of the kids will join in  
With their children
It's not hard to imagine what's in store
There'll be more
Amazing to the one who thought just one would do

16. Strangely Healing

I've got news
There really is a muse
Who inspired the poets of old
How else to explain the sudden urge to write a poem
Something to say

Not well suited to an essay
Better said with metaphor
Part thought
Part feeling
Strangely healing
As mind and heart embrace
And converse in poetry verse

15. Your story

What's your story
You have one
I have one
Everyone has a tale to tell
To make sense 
of our experience
Past, present
And what's yet to be
A prophecy
Not one told by an ancient sage
One told by you
To you
With power
To shape and guide
The story you write on life's page

14. It's not a fair fight

It's an old story
A child delights
Then demands
Then commands
Soon come the fights
Some you win
But it's not a fair fight
The bigger, smarter you
Fights within 
In search of a way to win
Without a little hit
Just the threat of a lonely sit
That leaves you bearing the pain
It's not a fair fight
What to do 
When the child is bigger 
And smarter than you
And still delights
Even with the fights and frights that battle within
An older voice is heard
I had the same delights, fights, frights 
And pains with you
It's an old story with a happy ending

13. Mind Thing

What is this thing we call the mind
Is it the brain we think with and feel with
Or the soul we come with and leave with
Or just a thought with a name
To explain from where it came
A theory of mind
But one thing's for certain
We all have one
I think
Sometimes too much
I think

12. Phantom Echo

A severed relationship
A phantom limb
No longer there
But still wired into my brain
It feels so real
Especially the pain
Oh, the longing to have it back again
In time the phantom fades
Just its echo remains
To remind

11. Family Roots Wall

As I stared into the lense
Trying to look my best
I had a flash before the flash
Caught a glimpse of a time yet to be
My departure
There on a table in front of an altar
A photo of me
The one about to be taken
A portrait in a time frame
Like the ones I've seen at the funerals I've been
On their way to a drawer
On their way to a family roots wall
On display for the future to see
Searching for face parts passed on to them
Look at that nose, those eyes, that chin, that grin
Passed on by me to my children's, children's children
Passed on to me by my father's, father's, fathers
For me that wasn't so very long ago
My great grandfathers were born in the 50s
The 1850s, I mean
A blink of an eye
The click of a shutter
That's me there on that table, that wall
Smiling a little because I'm a little smiler
From a long line of little smilers with big chins
Who did my eyes come from