Soundtrack “Sailing The Wind” by Loggins and Messina.
She is with me, even though she doesn’t know it. The oppressive southern humidity causes my shirt to cling to my sweaty back. The drapes billow in the late afternoon breeze as a honeysuckle scented zephyr washes over me like a tall cool glass of water. In the distance a Southern Pacific moans its farewell. I feel myself melting into the over stuffed leather chair in the dimly lit living room. It doesn’t feel like a living room, it’s a gateway into my growing hollowness. How many chances in one lifetime does one get to know love, to feel love——to be loved—–to give love? Love doesn’t seek meaning or purpose, it seeks only itself. If you aren’t quiet and still, you will miss it. If you doubt it—- when you are touched by it——-then it will orphan you.
She’s in me, even though she’s no longer aware of it. She’s in each breath I take. She’s invasive, giving me life as her memories softly kill me. Such a cruel contradiction. Love is a living thing, it can nourish you—–or it may desert you. It’s a monster, a ragged angel with broken wings. It’ll shake you, scare you—–surprise you, make you believe in miracles and allow you to indulge such sweet misery. And as quickly as she comes on to you, she’ll mysteriously abandon you.
She’s leaving me, I know it now. The living room is shrinking. I feel her silhouette in the days dying sun. I smell her skin, taste her mouth. My voice sounds like that of a stranger. I hear myself whisper——- “Stay, god please stay.” She is going on without me. She no longer gives a fuck. I’m overthinking everything, I’m over feeling everything. I no longer have a place to go. I forget what it’s like to be me without her. A honeysuckle scented zephyr washes over me like a tall cool glass of water.
On a bike ride the other day I came across these Snow Flowers. I bent down to smell their fragrance only to be met with a cloud of spores. I suddenly became light headed and had to sit down.
For a moment I lost my sense of being and my awareness of space and time. I drifted into a vision where I was introduced to this old Indian Chief named John Hollow Horn from the Oglala Lakota tribe. He held me in his gaze and said, “Some day the earth will weep, she will beg for her life, she will cry tears of blood. You will make a choice, if you will help her or let her die, and when she dies, you too will die.” In disbelief I rubbed my eyes. “Man am I high or what…..?”
I sat still for a moment and then asked, “Dude, that’s some heavy shit. Can ya break it down for me?” He said, “Cover your ears and listen with your heart. Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish caught will we realize we cannot eat money.”
As I reached out to touch him, I was suddenly jolted back into “reality” by the voice of a tourist asking me “Hey bro, how do you get to the Marriotts from here?” I was tempted to say you can’t there from here, but instead responded, “Sure, just squeeze into the traffic jam on Highway 50 east and head towards the noise, commotion and the stench of Rome burning.”
“Follow the crowds Bro —— lose oneself.”
The tattoo sleeved kid clad in his Under Armor tank top and Hurley ball cap, takes a swig off his IPA. He shakes his head in frustration “I’ll find it on my own” then in an act of deference he bows his head to his cellphone and request directions. The old Indian’s image began to dissolve as he gave me a wink and a grin. I could swear he was humming “Big Yellow Taxi” by Joni Mitchell.
I believe I’d been given a vision and a mission. So, I pass this experience on to you as a Prophesy—–. What we do to nature, is ultimately what we do to ourselves (universal reciprocity is karma via mother nature).
Be courages, be forthright——be uncompromising stewards of the land—Be a soul warrior for mother earth.
I can hear the trolls already “Man, I want whatever drugs he’s been doing.”
Disclaimer: This vision was not precipitated by the use of peyote, Mushrooms or the ole peace pipe—-it blossomed from the soul of a Snow Flower. Even rocks have a soul–if you sit very still for a long period of time and listen, they’ll divulge their secrets.
I dig old shacks. Makes me wonder who ate their dinners here and then went to bed to dream their dreams. In the morning waking up to peer out the now shattered windows. Who walked these floors, maybe a cowboy or homesteading lovers, gurus, drunks or perhaps a wishful prospector.
Those collapsed walls must’ve seen it all. Next winter ought to finish off what’s left of her and the secrets she conceals—-such a shame nothing last forever.
All those houses we lived in
The stories they hold
How we never fit in
And never really could
The cities we passed thru
Back then you said you knew me
Once again, I call another disconnected number
It felt so empty—–to be me—-without you
The radio on in the kitchen
Doing dishes with your clothes on the floor
From the bedroom I mumble
This life is killing me
Do you ever get lonely
You once turned the key
You swore you’d always know me
It’s another lost summer
You found better things to do
I just park by the beach now
On a crowded day, I swear
I caught a glimpse of you
Back Home Alone
By Victor Uriz
So young, then———-weren’t we all
No one will understand our love
So just forget it,
cause baby
You’re my best kept secret
A trail of blood, leading back to your door
To what might have been
Letting go, letting on
Maybe we should’ve tried a little harder
Fantasy and reality, who can tell one from the other
Me into you——like faded watercolors
Looking back at me, looking at you
What one remembers, isn’t always what’s true
There was no place to go, that we hadn’t already been
So we went our separate ways back home alone
Like gypsies needing no home
So young, then———-weren’t we all
I was young and bound for glory
Buried beneath fears and fossils
There’s heroes in scars
There’s music in the stars
Wake up
Cause dreaming will only take us so far
Forgotten Places
By Victor Uriz
You don’t care if I’m okay
You put on your makeup,
Just to make me wait
I take you out, but you don’t care
We order drinks and blank stares
I want to take you home and do you
But you’ll play me along like you always do
It ain’t fair and it ain’t right
As you turn over and turn out my light
My eyes scream F-U-C-K
Did you ever love me. who’s to say
Texts with smiley faces
You touched me in now forgotten places
It isn’t what you say
It’s more what you don’t do
The wells been poisoned—-
Flawed intentions, desires worn thin
It ain’t fair and it ain’t right
As you turn over and turn out my light
At dusk when the city is quiet and the sun fades, and as the city lights gradually begin to come on, I get this empty feeling inside. Being empty is better than being consumed by the nothingness that comes with unfulfilled desire.. I’m better than all the bullshit that comes along with trying to be something or someone I’m not. I’ve grown tired of playing parts that no longer suit me. Those that fail to change or evolve become fossils, emotional and intellectual mummies—-soul sucking zombies. Their conversations are archeological digs into a dead past. That may sound petulant, but it’s the truth.
There’s always been this distant between me and what’s passed off as reality. Where does your reality end and my illusion begin? Is it faith, not gravity that holds this universe together? Is it hope that becomes the step child of mercy? The music is already there, you just need to let go and find it——listen…
I don’t really know anyone anymore. My wife, my children, my friends, everyone seems so unreachable. Is it me or is it them? Do others ever feel this stoic ache? Maybe it’s the cliche that we all grow apart? Is there an expiration date that comes with relationships from the factory?
I remember her giving me a hug, but it felt different. She was no longer giving herself to me, it felt like she was pulling away from me—–it wasn’t a good to see you embrace, it was a cradledfarewell.
She let go and we stood there looking at one another as if we were strangers——-it felt awkward. There was a timeless silence weighting the moment down. I believe in love at first sight…….Conversely, I believe that growing apart happens imperceptibly slow——it happens so gradual that it’s almost undetectable.
I’m beside myself as I watch my-self experience life. I sometimes get lost in the bathroom mirror.——-At times I forget which side of the mirror is me and which is an empty reflection. Am I real? What’s this whole thing about? Where’s it all leading? How did it get started? I feel myself falling through time and space on a little blue ball——Are we alone? Am I alone? I take these thoughts apart and reassemble them.
Did I mention that I over think everything? I’m neurotic, NO, I’m a writer——one and the same!
You’d think after unfurling through a million rejections I would have lost my self confidence. You’d think after all those polite, dismissive comments I’d throw up my hands and fade into the background. I thought those closest to me might toss me a bone, cause friends should understand what needs to be said—-even if it’s a lie—-but mister——-I refuse to beg.
I suppose others have their own moments of undoing——a silent desire for whispered condolences that go unspoken, until it’s far to late in the game, until it’s written for them in a Hallmark Card—–sincerity stained by obligation and too often regret—–that overwhelming feeling of regret that comes when awakening to the finality of it all.
The universe loves a fighter, at least that’s what I tell myself. I find few like me, swimming against the tide, a comfortable misfit, a beautiful pariah, a practiced oddball. I’m at home with the weary, with the ugly, the wandering ones wearing a lost look in their eyes. Cause, to be truly alive is to be totally lost, living in the gray areas, at odds with convention. Seekers must always go it alone. The cost of adventure is the possibility of coming out the other end changed, some for the better, others for the worse.
Pay attention to those in your circle, give them thunderous words of respect, cause if not from a friend———then whom?
This eclectic batch of original tunes were inspired by a mash up of styles including John Prine, Jackson Browne, Roger Miller and Bonnie Raitt. These songs walk that tight rope between the sacred and the profane
I write songs, stories and tales about good love, bad love, no love at all, regrets, redemption, humor, hometowns, drinking, old memories, god, the devil, what was, what might have been and what is. Such is the perils of being human in an often less than human world. I hope you find a thread of yourself within this collage of words and music.
My job as a writer is complete if I can make you feel less alone and more comfortable in your own skin. We’re all weird, some of us just hide it better than others. My style of music will take you to places where being different is a badge of honor.
The CD or music download is available at Amazon.com, iTunes and cdbaby.com.
Soundtrack “If I Go, I’m Going” by Gregory Alan Isakov.
raindrops falling and disturbing still water
she smelled like fresh laundry and the newness of a morning sun
this ole heart is wearing worn and cracked work-boots
It’s the miles not the years
You fell in love with me
like a frozen statue
like a fallen hero
Mistaking love for things that never change
even our sun
will someday die
put on a sun dress
and I’ll wear flip flops
and we’ll get sunburns
while drinking beer at the beach
Internal wallpaper is how we decorate our lives
You were my star in this darkened theater
There is no poetry in Los Angeles, it’s got chicken scratch graffiti on concrete, where tattoos are mistaken for art, its train like cities that have no beginning or ending, just endless strip malls, fast-food joints—-with its smog hallowed sun. How can there be so much loneliness in these crowded places, we have become citizens of cloned hometowns, we’re generation X, or Y, or millennials,—–held together with Facebook velcro.
Nobody really knows what’s going on or what it’s all about. We’re all just running around trying to figure out what we should do, where we should go next, whom do we dare pretend to be. The clock is always ticking, all is uncertain. Before it’s all over we are desperate to discover our part in it all. Occasionally you’ll touch something and it will shock you, like the unforeseen bite of static electricity, or glimpsing a dead falling star. And for that instance your puny life takes on a speck of meaning—–one random piece of the puzzle falls into place.
Her love was like wisteria. At first it brought a subtle beauty to everything it attached itself to. But in time its clinging nature enveloped and entangled what had once been a free-swinging garden gate. Over time there was no way to gracefully enter or exist, the overgrown gate was forever intwined and frozen. It clawed over, across and on top of what once gave the garden its structure and form. In time its need to control and twist all it touched would cause the lattice to sag, to crack under the weight and finally give way. Such beauty strangles the life out all it once embellished. She was my weed strewn garden, she was everything I wanted, but the last thing I needed.
I’ve heard it said that writing is the loneliest of pursuits. It’s just you, a blank piece of paper and your thoughts. I don’t know how writers of pulp fiction feel about their craft, but I suspect that the poet is much more of a desperate soul. His ankle is tied to a huge rusty anchor and it is plunging him to the bottom of the sea. He’s headed to a place where there is no light, no sound, an inhospitable cold region. Poets aren’t depressed—-—no—they’re truth scavengers trapped in a world of forgers. If they were afflicted by depression they might find relief in a drug or in a support group. There is no clinical diagnoses or magic cure for being a poet. Please don’t be afraid, its not contagious.
My father and I share a common name—“Victor”. My dad was called Vic by his friends but I prefer Victor. As I’ve grown older I’ve seen parts of him rise to the surface in me. I was his only son and we tried to reach one another, but we were separate boats being pushed by opposing winds.
I went through a period when I was an adolescent where I’d have night terrors—-I was a sleepwalker pacing the floor in sheer terror, crying and screaming out at things no one could see but me. My dad would shake me, pat my cheek in an attempt to wake me, but I’d carry on in my neither world of monsters, demons and madness. This would go on for hours. He would ask me at breakfast if I remembered these fits. I never remembered these night events. But I’d have a faint memory of something that filled me with terror.
My dad use to say “You’ll find out someday”. And what he meant by that was, someday I’ll learn that life is cruel and bitter and hard and full of frustration and let downs. He would almost say it with a sense of glee. Like he couldn’t wait until this life beat every ounce of idealism and romanticism out of me. He’d just look at me after making this repetitive proclamation, shaking his head and giving me a snide little snicker.
I don’t know how, why or where, but somewhere along the way he surrendered his personal power. It’s always easier to give in, give up and throw your hands up and concede, but that just isn’t me. I take my name seriously, I’m a Victor, I’m born to take on all comers—bring it on—–I’ll go down swinging.
Don’t fear the inevitable, such as death. But rather, fear not taking action on the things you have the power to change, such is your life.
The world is overflowing with writers but it gives birth to few warrior poets. A writer will tell you the temperature of a room, the hues of a dying day, the silent movement of shadows on pavement, the changing phases of the moon or maybe describe the light cast during a particular time of day in autumn. A poet bypasses all this obvious crap, but instead shines a blinding light on the darkest corners of your soul—–cause deep down we’re all the same, we share a common misery, we suffer a shared sadness—–and once a poem takes you there, you’ll never come back the same.
You can fall out of love with someone and still get it back. But, once you fall “Out of like” with a person it’s gone forever———irretrievable——irreversible. We fall in love for crazy reasons. You may love someone for their hair, for the shape of their ass, or maybe its the car they drive. It may be the clothes they wear, or what they look like naked. Sometimes it’s the title attached to their name, their possessions, or the size of their bank account. Love’s a superficial and primal emotion that can lead to murder——-to madness—–to jealousy and pandemonium—–not to mention unintended pregnancies and failed marriages. Love makes fools of us all. The fruits of love is bedlam—–it decays ones ability to reason. You stumble around love drunk, saying and doing things you’ll regret in the morning.
Its possible to live with someone you no longer love, but living with someone you no longer like can drive you to homicidal fantasies. If you no longer love someone, you can still exist as roommates. You can divvy up expenses and household chores—–you can even share a pizza and a movie. But once you no longer like someone it becomes extremely painful to be in the same room, breathing the same air.
To be “In like” with someone is to be enamored with the way they carry themselves. It’s who they reveal themselves to be in a dark musty hotel room at 3:12 am on a rainy Tuesday—-after the buzz has worn off——- and the loud music is replaced by dark confessions——modesty and clothes lay tangled on the floor———all the piddly ass small talk gives way to restive honesty. There’s no place to hide once we’re stripped of our vanities.
Love is the illusion of what you hoped another person to be——a fleeting mirage composed of phony pleasantries, a facade concealing an alien beneath the mask. Authenticity is the rarest of human commodities.
Liking someone is how the other person makes you feel about yourself. I like how Maya Angelou put it “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” A friend helps you untangle who you thought you were from who you no longer want to be.
You’ll know a true friend cause they give you energy when you feel like giving up. Their presence makes you smile. They make you laugh at yourself——at the world——-at the futility and absurdity of it all. They’ll open your eyes and mind to unforseen possibilities? Their sadness makes you sad. They’ll turn an ordinary day into something extraordinary. If stranded on a desert island this is the person you’d choose to have by your side. They’re the one you want to share your time with, because time is all life really is. They make you feel alive? When you’re “In like” with someone, you want nothing to be different then the way they are.
We’re living in sandcastles waiting and watching as high tide slowly creeps ever closer. The waves are unrepentant, they crumble the walls you’ve built brick by brick over a lifetime.
I feel myself falling apart, cracking up, dissolving into mist. Age seems to have made me uncomfortable with all I once felt to be inevitable——I’ve come to believe anything is possible if I only open myself to it.
The things that once kept me in orbit around my identity have lost their gravity. My career, relationships, friendships, possessions and money have lost value. This isn’t a mid-life crisis, it’s more about wanting to see what’s behind the movie screen—-what’s real, what’s illusion, who really know’s me, who do I really know——-it’s not a depression—-it’s a compression. It’s life closing in on me———something is slipping away, time is running out——I’m teetering between shadow and substance. I’m calling this deaf-mute universe out. Is love a bluff? Is god a fairy-tale? Is truth attainable——-What becomes of us all?
Unimaginable things seep from beneath my consciousness. I drift through deserted cities. I float above dreamscapes of forgotten worlds. From the corner of my mind there arise the faces of lost lovers from past lives . There’s a sweet sadness to it all—–not knowing what becomes of us all.
I’ve decided to let go of all meaning and purpose and simply accept that—“What is “is”, and what ain’t, “ain’t”—That’s my hillbilly Zen koan. It’s the letting go of all the things I’ve fought and struggled to hold onto in a desperate desire to give “me” a connection to this odyssey called life——-the harder I’ve tried to grasp friendship and love, the more they’ve slipped away. The things that once made sense have fallen by the wayside, what once mattered no longer matters. I feel myself moving past, through and beyond all physical trappings.
I need a best friend, a girl to love and a faithful dog——I suppose one out of three ain’t bad.. Don’t people realize that we all crave appreciation, complements and a feeling of being special to someone. We all need to be held, loved and told how valued we are. If those closest to us fail to do these things, then who will? Yet we seldom do. It’s no wonder friends become estranged and lovers settle for tepid routine over burning passion.
I’m no longer gonna be the complementer, the conversation mover or the open ear to those that have nothing to offer me in return. Maybe that’s mean, vengeful and petty, but my time has grown to precious and my universe to small to make room for emotional hermits.
I once had a best friend who showed no interested in my writing or my music projects. It was a foreign land he choose not to visit. I’d wait for him to say something complementary or maybe offer an insightful comment about a line or two I’d written——- but he never did— How can you claim to be someones closest friend, and yet never book passage into their world. Our relationship became one dimensional. I’d listen to his stories and encourage him when he was down. I was inquisitive and attentive to his travails. I’d complement his victories, support his dreams and find ways to ease his worries. One day I stopped returning his phone calls. He left me several messages asking why I never returned his calls——go figure?
My simple recipe for a lasting friendship is simple, show an interest in their soul-hood, be attentive to their heart-fullness (two simple steps)———Amongst all the meaningless bullshit you may share; compassion is the duct tape that will hold your relationships together. Through all of life’s peril, it’s the simple gestures of empathy and kindness that keep the paths of companionship parallel.
I once had a lover who grew loveless. We tolerated one another, we’d forgotten how to please one another. If you truly love someone, you know the things that please them and conversely, you know the things that piss them off. My recipe for an enduring love affair is simple—— Do the things that please that person and don’t do the things that piss them off (two simple steps).
Deprived of vitamin L (love) all living things die. Studies have shown that babies who’ve been neglected fail to thrive. Without love they curl up into a little ball and silently pass away. Love is as essential to our survival as air and food. Babies need to be rocked, caressed and softly spoken to. They need to know that when they cry out someone will come to comfort them. It saddens me to know that there are adults who’ve given up on love. They’ve given up on affection—-they no longer reach out for someone to hold—–they’ve stopped calling out to be comforted. Inside they’re literally “dying” to be loved.
What are we waiting for? Life is brief and it’s later than we realize——Anything is possible if we only open ourselves to it——Kick down the door, dynamite the debris, let your light shine into someones lonely bubble———Love is the only passport needed to enter another’s world—-“Shower the people you love with love, show them the way that you feel.” James Taylor.
Rants, Raves and Random Thoughts 