Ecstasy illuminates It amplifies joy Making time feel inconsequential Grounding me deep in the moment Called by the here and now Allowing full presence in the experience of it Ecstasy demands we be seated in our bodies To experience pleasure And laughter And belonging as part of the great tapestry of living Our senses acute and engaged Begging we greedily partake In the gifts that life offers Richly Vividly Intricately With all of our senses Inciting never ending curiosity And a desire for the bliss of it to never end
Each time the house shook I knew
A storm was brewing
With unbridled rage
Knew that pools of acrid magma
Were rising to the surface
Seeking release
Each time the house shook I knew
That nowhere was safe
There was not enough time to escape
The maelstrom was coming
Wrathful and vicious
Seeking release
Each time the house shook I knew
I would stand against the gale
Diving deep into my power
Drawing on an ancient strength
Of ancestor, element, and divinity
Seeking release
-gws
Your love has me floating
Like a helium balloon
Tethered to the ground
By a heartstring
Your love caresses my senses
Like the sharp, clean freshness of pine
Endlessly stretching heavenward toward the azure sky
Crowned in misty clouds and enduring
Your love has me believing in forever
Like the love found in bedtime stories and fairy tales
Two hearts forged into an infinity loop
As twin souls merged will do
-gws
I often wonder if I'm missing something
I keep seeming to make the same mistake
Unable to avoid the pothole I know is there
To avoid the nail that snags my sweaters
Every time I walk past
Always forgetting the indulgence that makes me ill
Perhaps these continuous tragedies are the result of
An education I have failed to get
Or failed to learn from
The ripping and tearing
The tripping and falling
The banging and bruising
All from things I know will cause me harm
Things I should know to avoid
And yet I cannot seem to hold the lessons
I cannot seem to employ the learning
And I wonder what is wrong with me
-gws
I think we are strangers
I want to love you, but I don't know who you are
Do you know?
It's hard to love someone you don't know
You don't seem to know who I am
Do you really want to?
We continue to dance in circles
But never to the same tune
All stomped on toes
And elbows to the ribs
Frustrated and blaming the other
Our sketches of the other
Horrific distortions
Each of us unrecognizable
In the images we hold up to each other
Like a horrible collaboration of Salvador Dali and Marc Chagall
We speak to each other in discordant tones
Two different conversations occurring in the same time and space
Cacophonous and dissonate
Everything lost in translation
-gws
You are a bad habit
Like nail biting or tobacco
Like loving the villain more than the hero
Like being addicted to pain
No matter how many times
I reshelve your story in the bookshop of my life
The familiar weight of it always ends up
Going home with me in my bag
Even though I know how the story ends
No matter how often I quit
No matter how much will power I employ
It's never enough to break the habit of you
And like the power inherent to so many bad habits
You may well be my undoing
-gws
"Disobedient children don't live half of their days."
I can hear your voice reciting this sentiment
Did you ever consider how scary that sounds to a child
I know it was meant to scare
But was it meant to scar
This turn of phrase left me so confused
So convinced that I’d never see adulthood
I know you meant no harm
You carried forward what you learned
Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep brought no comfort
For what does a child know of life and death
The memory of that oft said phrase
The memory of that terrible prayer
Still haunt my inner child
Rock-a-bye Baby always made me sad for the baby
Why was the baby on a treetop
A baby falling from a broken tree bough
Is hardly a comforting lullaby
I did not carry these things forward
I staunchly refused
I surrendered the nightmares of these things to the ether and to time
And celebrate every day that this disobedient child is still here
- gws
Words Wishes and Wisdom 