Tag: life
More Of My YouTube shenanigans
Vermont
My Latest YouTube offerings from a recent trip to Vermont.
Random Photos From A Life
Notes from the Other Side
Sometimes sorrow turns into
irreversible regret.
We choose to live an icebox
existence.
Wallowing in misfortune’s
frosty glass.
Consorting with memories
Squabbling with dreams.
The poet too has felt life
interrupted, days that vanish
upon awakening.
I’ve known suffering and
the pull of solitary confinement.
Now looking back from a happier
vista. I’m hear to tell you,
the pitch of pain may never
be unheard, but it does gets softer,
fading into a bittersweet refrain.
The past becomes part of
your case history, to be read
by nostalgia’s light on rain
soaked nights.
In time the visible world brightens
Let it entice you with the woo of
the today and what will be.
Take refuge in the heat of
places uncharted, linger in
the sweet realism of the hour.
Walk toward the future
with unshackled feet.
The misbegotten shadows
behind you now.
Let the smudge of the sun,
and the warmth of a steadfast
hand be your guide.
-Tosha Michelle
The Middle
The middle years brings first a relentless restlessness, that eventually blossoms into a melancholy sweetness, a mindfulness of the passing of years. No bitterness allowed here, only a tender tendency to remind ourselves that the world brightens with grace and gratitude.
We see summer now for what it is fleeting with it’s sun soaked glory days and hazy afterglow appeal. Now we linger in autumn’s red leaves and take time to appreciate the moss under our feet, the hand holding ours, ready to go anywhere, to adventure and explore.
We know winter will come soon enough, moving like liquid lead over our lungs. For now we breathe, Now still, in this moment that is ours. For today let’s create some
unforgettable music. Music that will sustain us on future days when the world seems less possible. I’ll provide the lyrics.
You can hum the tune.
Years on my dear, we can dance under nostalgia’s moon and let our melody move over our souls, reviving and replenishing in the spaces between the here and hereafter.
-Tosha Michelle
‘We found our place
On the branch of an old oak treeOur feet would sway
To a voice in the breezeAnd birds would sing
On the banks of a narrow streamThese memories will stay with me’https://youtu.be/j6Keg3XKKjM
Awareness
I remember when we thought everything would go our way before 911, before mass shootings, before division and racism became amplified and highlighted, back before we realized just how slow progress really is. Back when we stood for nothing but comfort and apathy, oversummering in our lounge chairs, oblivious to the bees circling, the wolves feeding near our doors, the terminal frost ahead.
These days there’s no closing our eyes to the ice laced rain, to the world’s breathless history, the cruelty of humanity foraging it’s way into our collective consciousness. We lounge no more. We wade out, knee high into the water punctuated with slippery rocks. We stand hand in hand in the middle of a turbulent river. Knowing there’s no getting around the realities of humanity short a few stem cells.
Still, we don’t lose hope. We know if we channel our anger into proactive socially aware behavior, a new membrane can grow. Together we can cover the hills with our diversity song, drowning out voices of hate and bigotry. We can leave behind artifacts in the shape of question changing growth until the taint of today is nothing more than a microscopic bygone scene of old. Knowing now everything may not always go our way but finding purpose in the knowing.
-Tosha Michelle
I Can’t Hear You.
Raise your hand if you’re tired of keeping company with anxiety, perpetuated by a relentless virus and the dwindling sanity coming out of Washington. The wind there cold and reeking of hubris and greed. Empathy becoming a supernatural thing.
Raise your hand if you’re losing your patience with narcissistic behavior and a culture more into canceling humans instead of reforming them, a society on the precipice of being nothing more than a hollow hulk.
Raise your hand if you’re done with the self absorbed and lack of regard for community. People happy to button their own coats but with no time to consider their neighbor’s thread bare wear.
Raise your hand if you’re tired of apathy, of those wrapped in a flannel sleep, Always content to let others shovel the coals.
Now instead of raising our hands, let raise our voices. Don’t wish for lungs that can sing. Sing! Step up! Be visible. Be heard. The dark blistering rain is not quite frozen yet. Prove that all the light did is far from done.
-Tosha Michelle
How to be an Expert at Life.
Praise imperfections.
Ask questions.
Don’t fear the answers.
Do fear snakes, toads,
and Donald Trump’s hair.
Adore books, animals,
weaknesses, the broken,
and growing older.
Find a love to orbit around.
Have a constellation seeking brain.
A heart that star gazes.
Don’t trip on what’s been
gone for years.
Walk hand in hand with today.
The one seemly not
telling the truth is
the one you should
listen to the hardest.
Pay attention to your
conscience, make
sure it’s really yours.
Know there’s beauty;
in words. The ones
you use and the ones
you leave out.
Read the classics.
Brighten to artistry
Don’t be afraid to improvise.
Listen to jazz while
drinking iced coffee.
Don’t admire yourself
too much, this can
lead to disaster.
There are two types
of people in the world,
be neither of them.
Know sometime what
seems useless is
full of meaning.
Learn how to bend,
not break.
Lose yourself to love,
to madness.
Always carry a suitcase
full of mischief.
A passport of adventure.
Don’t forget to add a dash of moonlight.
Season the nights with heat.
Create the scene.
Live it.
Lose your shoes and inhibitions.
Split the wishbone.
Know nothing important
comes with a manual.
Just because your
spirit is tangled,
doesn’t mean your
soul has to be tied in a knot.
Be full of vigor,
meaningful chit chat
and chocolate. Lots
of chocolate!
Know there is holiness in the missteps.
Grace in the fumbles.
Remain unfinished.
Be the light.
-Tosha Michelle
On Roses and Netted Woods
Hello lovely ones. I’m sorry I’m so sporadic with my posts. I can’t promise I’ll do better, but I thank you all for sticking around. On a random note, going to see the Mister Rogers film this afternoon, excited for it. He was such a beautiful soul. I’m sure Tom Hanks did him justice. Now for a poem. I hope you like it. Happy Monday!
——–
In the journey of my life,
the voyage of self awareness
I’ve fed on roses,
walked through woods netted
with bramble
Mixed metaphors and signals.
I’ve had glimpses of narcissism,
flirted with egoism, had brushes
with bitterness, doubted my worth.
I’ve questioned the validity of the sun
and found solace in torrential rains.
I’ve left small bruises on paper,
but nothing that hasn’t been felt
by others more lyrical than me.
I’ve had childlike faith and believed
in the flickering of fireflies, even now,
as the days grow shorter,
each year the footnotes longer.
Finally I’m home again, content to sit in
our garden and pay attention to the
call notes gathering in the air.
The bird sings sweetly, no
longer in her wicker cage. I join
her chorus, besotted with the
fever of a life living and lived.
-Tosha Michelle
Goofy goodness 
Everything I Never Told You 