Today - a historic landmark event for the civil rights of gay and lesbian citizens of California:
The ban on same sex marriage in our state has been struck down by the state’s supreme court. In other words, it is now legal for gay and lesbian couples to enter into legal marriage. We are one more step to achieving equaulity in this Golden State. As the Mayor of San Fransisco stated, “If California, then so goes the nation!” And Amen, it is about time…
laying in bed
listening to the 5 am news
the world is suffering
i’m safe in my place
block out the noise
if i can
i can hear my own breathing
i’m alive
the calm is here in this mountain wood
retreat
i am in the guilt bed
i am helpless or so it seems
i will not be moved and yet i know others are dying
while the forrest jays sing carefree tunes
from protected places on branches high
others who live lingered lives are in pain
their mothers, their fathers,
their sisters, their brothers,
their children
are dying
how can i exist here
while such pain and sorrow?
what can i do?
oh what can i do?
i can hear my own heart beat
i can hear my own breathing
i can block out the newscast
i can turn the channel
i can tune out
and it still exists
not a drug, not a religion,
not a politician, not a talk show,
not a film actor, not a self help book,
not a fad diet, not the evening news,
not a bloated ego
can solve the big dilemma
my own brething is ernest
the huge conflict twirls about me
all about me and yet i pull the covers up over my head
i cannot tolerate the dread
while so many people are
dying
what can i do?
like others in the world, i feel helpless
i can hear my own breathing
and it echoes the world
(I wrote this poem recently during a sensitive emotional moment one morning after I was woken, then hearing the international news, which conveyed stories of natural disasters the world over : tornados across the mid-west and southern United States, a cyclone in Myanmar, and now a 7.9 earthquake in China killing an estimated 50,000 people. With all this suffering, how dare those of us with priveleged lives moan and groan over slight discomforts…)
SKIENS
