Tag Archives: evolution

The Renaissance Myth: bref double

If genius is the thing that saves mankind
by pulling it along above the mud,
and with the rarest spark, inducing flames
to warm against the night the coldest souls,

then why does the world still seem deaf and lame?
Could be, outside that magic, a savant
controls the weak container that is man,
so that true genius rarely breeds in coals;

and Nature, seeking balance, leaves most duds,
to make such genius difficult to find.
So talent tends to weaken other skills
and handicap our saviors in their game.

The renaissance mystique we rarely find;
and by its flaws, most genius comes to nil.

24 JAN 2017

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Happen

If it doesn’t ever happen
was it ever gonna change?
Do the puzzle pieces ever move
or just not look the same?
Are the ones that make it happen
just the ones we find to blame?
Do we pick and choose the enemies
who help us feel less strange?
Are we really hoping those like us
are all that will remain?

If it hasn’t ever happened
who’s to say it ever could?
What percentage of the greater
helps define the greater good?
Are the enemies we’re fighting
just dressed up in different hoods?
Is the only thing preventing change
that no one thinks we should?
Do we really think the universe will
end, misunderstood?

If it’s never gonna happen
what is evolution for?
What’s the point of boats, or bridges,
standing land-locked, on the shore?
Are the only ones who ever learn
the dying, dead or poor?
What’s the reason to keep going,
or for trying any more?
When there’s no one left still standing,
does it matter who just scored?

10 AUG 2015

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Cycling: a lune

When you start
things seem a lot easier
than they are:

you wake up
each morning with a smile
and positive attitude,

a clear goal
to accomplish on that day,
with known outcomes.

In the middle,
things get a bit cloudy
and less obvious:

each day comes
and then it simply goes,
with much undone;

you grow tired
of just making it through
to start again.

At the end,
a kind of clarity returns,
some tell you:

the little dreams
become a lot more important
at day’s end.

The hours fly,
the years just simply disappear;
then they’re gone.

4 APR 2014

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Spare Change

There is no thing that doesn’t change:
some change, but no one sees;
some change a little, but no more;
some change to great degrees.

Some change and become something else;
some change but look the same;
some change because of point of view;
some change in all but name.

There is no thing that doesn’t change:
some change and never know;
some change without a reason why;
some change but never grow.

Some change to suit a place and time;
some change despite themselves;
some change outside but not within;
some change just for a spell.

There is no thing that doesn’t change;
some change without a clue;
some change for better or for worse;
some change but are not new.

Some change to find a better way;
some change, yet stay behind;
some change but never seem to grow;
some only change their minds.

1 APR 2014

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Let Loose Your Weapons: a dirge

Let loose your weapons, guns and swords!
Forget your sovereign gods and lords!
The old ways must be left behind
for us to learn how to survive.

Forget rigid philosophy
that separates your me from thee,
those ancient and quite useless lies
that we think help us to survive.

Let droop your flags, your ill-placed pride!
Bring those loud cannon back inside!
The fanfare and the hoop-and-cry
are not what help us to survive.

Forget the blame, it matters not;
The time is past for vengeful plots.
Destroy your poisons, sheathe your knives,
if we would learn how to survive.

Let flow your tears! May they wash clean
those hearts that harbor the obscene,
destructive hate that will deprive
us of the longing to survive.

Forget no more! Awake from sleep!
Release compassion from the deep,
dark prison where barely alive
it waits to help us to survive.

Bury now these dead and gone,
who made no evil, did no wrong
by any yardstick we’d contrive
to prove we deserve to survive.

Let us away! There is no time
to waste debating this foul crime.
Let us denounce it, and then strive
to learn together to survive.

14 DEC 2012

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How to Save the World

One of the blogs I read pretty regularly is Dave Pollard’s How to Save the World. Occasionally, something he writes strikes a particularly resonant chord with me — like his February 4th gem A Miniature Truth: Becoming Authentically Yourself.

I’ll admit, some of these things I’ve thought and compiled myself over the years. But to see these 9 ideas strung together, in fact, dependent on each other in such a way that in order to accept one as truth, you really have to accept them all, for better or worse, in order to truly understand the implications of each, is a step I’d never taken until reading Dave’s post. In summary, these truths are:

1. We do what we must, then we do what’s easy, then we do what’s fun.

2. Things are the way they are for a reason; if you have any hope to change something, first understand what the reason is.

3. Life’s meaning, and an understanding of what needs to be done, emerges, most often, from conversation in community with people you love.

4. Community is born of necessity.

5. To get people to change, first Let Yourself Change, to become a model that shows people personally, one-to-one, a better way to live.

6. You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.

7. Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.

8. To be nobody-but-yourself — in a world that is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else — means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.

9. Our civilization is in its final century.

For more detail, please refer to Dave’s blog 🙂

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Ayn Rand

So you would change the world
and make the roughest edges plain,
extend your level down the field,
widen and pave each lane,

erase what makes a difference
between one soul and the next,
reward in equal measure
with the coin of self-respect,

enforce equality across the board,
no matter what,
regardless of the steps it took
to get each to that spot.

Forget that it’s adversity
that defines who we are,
our flaws as individuals,
the perfect surface marred

that makes a talent marvelous,
a special gift unique,
a voice worth recognizing
in the mob from which it speaks.

The world is not an easy place;
it is not meant to be.
A price is paid for every breath,
for every liberty,

for each kind of convenience,
for the smallest bit of joy,
for every gift you choose to squander
or by luck, employ.

To change the world,
to make it so that each has equal share
when some work harder
than the rest seems blatantly unfair;

that’s like imagining auditions
to find out who’s best
that don’t require participation
or some kind of test.

I wonder how you pick
a winning singer on a show
where everybody thinks they’re great
because someone said so;

despite the fact they have no rhythm,
sense of key or pitch,
and will not listen to advice
but instead only bitch

that those who judge are blind,
or worse, malevolently cruel,
and cannot see that every lump of coal
contains a jewel.

Which isn’t so. Only a few,
that persevere in time,
and overcome the pressure make it
to the finish line.

Would you lay out your hard earned cash
for coal and gem the same?
That’s not the change that this world needs.
It’s already half lame.

19 SEP 2006

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