Troblems and Prubles

Troblems and Prubles
Come waddling westward
Biting at heels
With hatreds and zeals
With monkeyshine monies
And sugars and honeys
With dripping loose lips
That have sunk many ships

Troblems and Prubles
Rustle on rooftops
Hiding in walls
With muffled catcalls
With something to say about
Any and everything
There is no sin
That they will not swim in

Troblems and Prubles
Have answers for everything
Sing out of key
But they sing with such glee!
With choruses chiming
And words out of rhyming
And now they are saying
Goodbye with a grin
Because we all know
They will be back again

© LW Publishing 2015

Eyeballs

My eyeballs are letting me down.

The fact is, they've never been much to write home about. They've never been functioning at maximum capacity. For me, it's a way of life.

When I was a little kid, I tried to take piano lessons. I was SO excited about learning the piano. But the teacher told my parents I just didn't have musical talent. (This was said with certainty about an individual who grew up to sing, play drums, guitar, some keys and a little banjo to boot, not to mention playing in several bands and writing hundreds of songs.)

Turns out, the real issue was my eyeballs. They couldn't see like they should if the music was too far from my face, which it was, and no one knew about it until after I was expelled from the world of the Piano-Forte. What did I know? I thought that's what the world looked like. And my physical limitation had me branded as a "no talent."

I have lived with this eye thing my whole life and I am not really sore about it. At this point, it would be like being sore because you have brown hair or green eyes. It's just the way it is.

And now my eyeballs have started a new journey of instability and insufficiency. They call it "Vitreous Detachment." The inside of my eyes are sort of falling apart. People don't seem to realize, in general, how gooey and gross the inside of an eye is. But when it starts coming apart in there and blocking your vision, well, it's hard to ignore. It's like looking through a veil of snot floating in salt water. And it's stubborn. It won't move out of the way

I'm told I will probably not go blind. Probably. And I have to admit that I like seeing things. But I will still have to adjust to the pseudosnot inside my eyes, clouding the sunniest of days. I also have to watch diligently for other signs of trouble.

Your body, it seems to me, is supposed to be your friend. It carries around your taste buds, which makes eating enjoyable. I'm thankful for that. It carries around your brain, which is certainly helpful. But as time goes by, this good friend starts letting you down a little bit at a time. You start losing your trust in this old buddy ol'pal. But what can you do?

In this case, it's the only friend you've got.




Peace to you.

© LW Publishing 2015

Icebergs

Lettuce, or large chunks of ice floating in the ocean, it adds up the same. There are parts you can see and parts you can't. There are things that don't show. How come we don't use artichokes as a symbol for the human condition? Or rocks?

If we were able to unwrap one another, if we we're able to dive below and see what's underneath, I think we would have a very hard time living with each other. Sure, there would be some good stuff living in there that we didn't know about, but we tend, I think, to show the good. Of course we do. It's the other stuff that sits and waits for some tragic moment of opportunity to strike out at the world we fear.

Perhaps our ignorance is a kind of grace.

But what if you knew it all? What if you knew every tendency toward the darkness in the people around you? What if you knew every single dehumanizing thought that came to mind in the people in your life? Where would love be then?

For us, I think, it would melt like ice on a hot stove. Wilt like lettuce in the sun.

But the Creator sees it all and somehow still finds a way to love. It is astounding to me. And all I really have to go on is myself. I can only guess at the darkness in others. But I am fairly well aware of the darkness in myself. And even that is a guarded self awareness. After all, we have to live with ourselves, don't we? Don't we?

The truth is that I don't deserve any of the love I have in my life. But it's there anyway. And I'm thankful for it. And it teaches me to love in spite of the darkness; in spite of the things that are not seen.

© LW Publishing 2015