Soundtrack

Heady youthful years
when we lived
beyond our fears
lost in the soundtrack of our lives.

It returns to stir us
in later life.
Tuneful memories
linked to
exhilaration or emotional pain,
love found and lost.
Long days and nights out,
inhabited by the cast
of our former selves.

One ling of a song,
four bars of music,
and we are transported back.
It is as close to time travel
as we will ever get.

Fully alive,
raw and rough
around the edges.
Musical history
that does not exist in museums,
but only in our minds,
as each one keeps a
soundtrack of their lives.

Begin Again

When life has
stacked its circumstances
against you
so insurmountably high
that you can't see anything beyond
begin again.

When disappointment
has rubbed rough salt
into your former wounds
so that you wince
from the pressure of invisible pain
begin again.

When discouragement
has removed the mat
from under you
and the floor
and left you sprawled on hard dry dirt
begin again.

When the vision
that burned beacon bright
has dimmed
to dull intermittent glow
begin again.

When your spirit
aches for even
a drop of living water
to ease the torment of desert thirst within
begin again.

Nothing is beyond you.
No dream, vision or plan
now dropped or discarded
is truly dead,
if only you can find the courage to
begin again.

Enemy

My enemy drops
words of hatred,
sinking lead weighted
into my soul,
ready to be hooked up
into my conscious thoughts
at a moments notice.

Left long enough
not dealt with,
their toxicity spreads
its poison,
and the diseased seeds
unnaturally spring
forth new and bitter growth.

The cruel words spoken to me
are spewed from a churning pit
of fear and pain,
entrenched by years
of practiced unforgiveness.

There is no sign of compassion,
grace and mercy
that marks humanities restoration
towards original intention.

Instead the broken and scarred outworking
of sin,
left unchecked
to run its violent course.

My response if undisciplined
is judgement and contempt,
but I try to tread a different path.

My heavenly Father
bids me that I would become like Him,
and bless those who curse me,
and pray for those
who spitefully use me.

I choose to do this
not because it is easy,
but knowing if I don't,
my face will reflect my enemies
and my heart turn out the same.

Teen Party

Some were drunk before they got there.
Others arrived
with an ammunition of alcohol,
enough to take down an army.

She clutched her one drink
with wide eyes,
watching the others
staggering and slurring
around her,
oblivious to her sobriety
and lack of peace.

She willed away the hours,
hoping her handsome hero
would arrive
and notice her.

He did arrive
on the arm of another,
and she cast
downward eyes.

Something kept her there.
The hero had smiled,
and his smile had glued her
to the ground,
unable to walk away.

He looked at her again.
Her resistance melted,
she was his for the taking.

He moved towards her,
and the palest blue of his eyes
suddenly seemed cold.

She felt darkness press against her,
and stepped backwards,
feeling the familiarity
of the wallpaper pattern
with her outstretched palms.

Good to see you,
he said with thick sweet breath.
She turned her head
so his lips collided with her cheek.

With acrobatic agility
she extracted herself
from the moral conundrum,
and fled from the party
to return safely home
to her bed.