Mythos & Marginalia

2015 – 2025: a decade of days


  • Definite Steps

                         Freshly fallen snow accepts my footprints.
                             I continue.

                                              How long have I travelled
                                              and where will I end up?

               The path is not solitary.

                           In my absence the footprints will be joined
                           by the definite steps of others, strangers I will never meet,
                           but each of them will leave a mark.

                          As I have done.

              Footprints will continue after the snow has
              melted or washed away with the next rain.

       Every step impermanent, but not without purpose.

       We are each on a path, at times without direction.

                        All of us have somewhere to go
                        even if it is not witnessed by others.

     

    © 2023 j.g. lewis

     

  • a specific ideal

    I once thought I
    was somebody else,
    unrecognizable
    to my self,
    my sanity and
    a specific ideal
    of whom I should be.
    Somebody else, unlike me,
    historically.

    I thought once
    somebody else could
    recognize me,
    the way I was or
    wanted to be.
    Flaws and all,
    as it is, as
    it was, as it should be;
    mysteriously.

    © 2023 j,g, lewis

     

  • Moving Ahead

    Stand your ground, or step forward.

       Moving backwards is not healthy. Time expires, the routes change as the distance grows, and you have gained so much wisdom from the day-to-day journey.

       You got where you are by traveling where you have been.

       It’s all too easy to become complacent in the moment, but what is keeping you there?

       Think of all that is ahead. Keep moving.

       Leave your troubles, or your pain, behind.

       It’s not the past that holds you back, but what prevents you from moving ahead.

       Emotional traffic and fear has built up, yes, but attitude and mind control can help breakthrough the barriers.

       We move on for a reason.

       Many times the unknown is healthier than knowing, or remembering, where you have been.

     

    © 2018 j.g. lewis

  • Interruption

    There are those days when you can’t do what you intend to do; when you can’t do the things you regularly do with the consistency you usually do them.
       It is an interruption to both your will and your way.
       There are too many things interfering, or clouding your intention (or your judgment). You are unable to do what you feel obligated to do.
       You end up struggling through whatever you are doing. Even your expectations become unclear, and all you are looking for is clarity.
       When you can’t do what you normally do, you simply do what you can.
       This is one of those days.
       Sadly, there have been a few too many of those days lately.

  • no warmth no welcome

    Eyes wide open

    in the dark, blood rushing, pounding heart. Still I cannot see.

    Can you believe, will you find relief

    walking down once-familiar streets?

    Before light to the darkness of the dream, or the dawn,

    or the dread,

    now only streetlights. I wake. I walk, I wonder.

    Halogen hum overhead, the only sound, above scorched earth

    or snow-covered ground.

    Only one reason for being here, everything else

    is gone.

     

    Let me sleep.

    Let dreams whisper. I’ve got thoughts, which must come out,

    I shouldn’t need to shout. I cannot listen.

    Below a moonlight serenade, the homeless search

    for shelter and sustenance, while new lover’s trade

    secrets

    behind the door. Promises not shared before.

    Not with each other.

    I wander. These were once streets, bursting with kindness.

    The sidewalks, now, little more than foreign, there is no welcome here.

    Not in the way it was, as I left it.

     

    Do you take

    what is there, take the care, or do you wait to lay your heart

    before the soul who once listened to all you know,

    and found comfort. In my voice there was enough,

    yet now it is torn with edges

    rough.

    What was still is. Or is it? There is value in a thought.

    A struggle with contempt

    of dreams I might have spent, but not wisely.

    There is no warmth. I will go back from where I came,

    my presence will remain.

     

    © 2016 j.g. lewis