tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-50976124218027808432024-03-08T12:36:04.278-05:00Times New Roman(ce)...my love/hate with writingA blog about the un-formatted life of JuaN, a stranger than fiction record collector and nerd, who on occasion exudes poetryPulchritudinoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01331898208611072326noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5097612421802780843.post-17775275785851305032010-05-25T11:41:00.011-04:002014-07-25T13:47:15.371-04:00A couple of my latest and greatest...<div style="text-align: right;">
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><br />Déjà Vu</span></b></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">He spent the first day of forever in her arms,</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Praying for better weather to w</span>eather the rainstorms he in,</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Now he'll never feel her warmth again,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It's cool,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Not like OK, but like its cold and dim</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She opened her heart,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">He found his home within,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Hopes if he cover his ears loves song will end,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Flame was hot like a matchstick,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Now alone on his mattress,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">That's w</span>hen the cold comes in,</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Kept the pain inside hidden from man,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Envisions his plan,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">His mission is damned,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But he can't understand,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Had it good and c</span>an't have it again,</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Hourglass fixed to the table,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Top run out of sand,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Fears life alone,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Like his dear old man,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Loved all but not one, got little respect,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Doubts weaken his mind so he sleeps with regret,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Repeating the same wish</span>es silently in his den,</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Not wanting to go out,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Quiet pleas to his friends,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The calls end, it's then he cries out through a pen,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">As if sound reaches her heart,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It'll scream back for him,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But the already seen,</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">He can't see once again...</span></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'courier new';">MY EUOLOGY</span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';"><br /></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I lived free...as God seed, now I'm gone, I ask you remember me,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Pretend to be strong and reach all of your goals in my memory,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Pour out nothing, everyone close knows I was not about waste,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I lived good, made major moves, with strength, style, and grace,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Underneath the heavens was us, but now above em' is I,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I reminisce on the times as my wife wipes a tear from her eye,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">And yeah, I just got my wings, but I forever been fly,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Never reached all my dreams, but the hardest I tried,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Impossible to change the picture now the artist has died,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Besides only if you notice small things would you see flaws in my life,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Some of my choices broke the rules, you would think I'm a fool,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">But I crawled up out of the gutter and graduated from school,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Traveled all over the world until my passport was full,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Defined myself as a man, made my own version of cool,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">All the times my cup runneth over I just reached for another,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Spent long days and nights working with no food in the cupboard,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Used to have lingering doubts till I remembered my mother,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">How she used to grind while I sat watch over sister and brother,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I made it all the way, honestly, without a single regret,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Sometimes I misspoke, but meant no disrespect,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Changed my situation with time, what else you expect?</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I feel like other ones in my hood fell prey to neglect,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">So please don't cry for me now, celebrate my older years,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I reached success before I left, death a motivating fear,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">So family take care, friends take care, be careful of haters near,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">I love you all equally, and peacefully I wait for you here,</span></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande';">Forever...</span></span></span></b></div>
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Pulchritudinoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01331898208611072326noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5097612421802780843.post-51416816408279580222010-04-30T10:34:00.010-04:002014-07-25T13:48:03.262-04:00Betcha didn't know I cared....<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.arealestate.com/Nowisnew/SunRainCity.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://www.arealestate.com/Nowisnew/SunRainCity.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 227px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 342px;" /></a>Let me tell you a story...<br />
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<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-size: 180%;">In The Sunshine</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 85%;"><span style="line-height: 200%;">There are 33 vertebrae in the human spine, and I estimate a great majority of them are out of alignment in mine. Its 6:48am on a rainy gray Tuesday, yay. The only sound I hear is a solitary bird whistling in the distance. Kind of cheers me up until I realize I have to go to work. Thanks for the effort though my friend. I live alone and on a budget, so I sleep on a “bed” that has no frame or headboard. Actually, it’s all that’s in my bedroom really. I don’t even have a nightstand or clock radio. I paid 380$ for this shoddy ultra-firm mattress, which was supposed to be the “mid-grade” model. God help the souls who opted to save a hundred bucks and go with the value padding. Hell, now that I think back I didn’t spend four hundred bucks total on my last girlfriend, but that’s another story. “Argh, I need a nightstand!” I fume silently in my head, my hands dragging along the scruffy worn office gray carpet searching for my cell phone because I know in two more minutes the distinctly acute ringing of its alarm bell will start its stinging chime once again. I hate snooze. Who pushes that anyway? I just want it to stop punishing my ears, I’ll get up. I promise.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 85%;"><span style="line-height: 200%;">I suppose I should tell you a little about myself, since your already scrutinizing my sleeping quarters, I guess, in essence, we are working backwards. I was a slinky nerdy Puerto Rican and Black kid who grew up in a tough low income neighborhood. My Latino father fell into the shadows of drug addiction shortly after I was born, leaving my mother struggling to make ends meet. So she did what most women do when the man doesn’t live up to expectations. She made plans to move back home with her mother in Dayton, Ohio. Sending me first, alone on a plane, with a note, some Welch’s fruit snacks (which I still love to this day), a Ziploc baggie of only black jellybeans saved from Easter, and a black Hasbro “My Buddy” doll as company, I tread the journey on my own. I was just 3 years old. A few months later my pregnant mother followed, and soon after that my sister was born. For the next decade we lived there in a Section 8 housing project called Bella Vista Estates in the heart of rough West side Dayton. To this day I have never lived in a middle class neighborhood. To this day my mother lives in the same house I grew up in. Our family rooted in the same blood stained earth where three of my friends have been murdered over the years, where I was almost hit by gunfire just sitting on the porch, and I was even stabbed coming home from school in a robbery attempt. To me it’s real life. To live any better is a blessing of fortune.</span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 200%;">I guess my background makes me a survivor of sorts. I’ll need every survival skill I have to endure today. See, I usually have Tuesdays off. But I need more money for food. So once again my class work has to suffer. The one day I had to work on just my school work is gone. Even worse is my job is commission based, and by the looks of today I don’t think many people will be out at the oceanfront. But I tuck my doubts away and quickly put on my crisply pre-ironed shirt on. I amuse myself by wearing some of the ugliest ties I can find at thrift stores. My managers have made fun of several of them. But in a corporate sinkhole it’s hard to retain any individuality; this small gesture is all I have. I savor it too. I finish my tie in a perfect full Windsor, thank you Boy Scouts, and guzzle a quick cup of coffee and head out. If there is one saving grace to a rainy day it’s the smell. I love this smell. Its nature, wet concrete, and clean fresh air all at once. It climbs in your nostril and rests there until you appreciate it. But then, I’m quickly annoyed again because in the split second it takes me to get in my car the rain has already destroyed my creases in my sleeves. Combine that with a bit of mud that splashed on my pant leg and this ugly tie, I look down and out. Oh well, at least I like this radio show so there is hope still for a good day.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 200%;">I arrive a few minutes early, thankfully enough time to get a majority of the dark stains off the Khakis I’m wearing. Dirt is really, well, dirty. I dry my pant leg with the hand dryer and rush into pre-shift feeling like my dog just died. But at least I’m on time and will be making money right? As my manager drones on about the importance of the reports we file post-shift, I stare at the slots left open in the blinds. I pick a few random rain drops and watch them travel down the glass. I watch them grow in size and pick up speed with each smaller stationary drop they seize and finally crash into the bottom of the window sill, returning all the water collected to almost original form, several small stationary drops. It makes me think of life, all of our lives. Is this how we live? Gathering knowledge and possessions, gaining understanding and friends, trying and failing, and achieving and underachieving, all for naught. For an unpredictable end in which we must embrace death and return to our origins, the earth herself. “Right Juan?” I quickly turn back toward where the sound is coming from. “Uh…yes, I believe so” I chime. It was my manager. He’s a younger Type A guy who always smells of coffee, his catch phrase is “School is for fools”. I don’t even know what I just agreed to but who cares, we we’re allowed to leave after that and everyone was smiling at whatever agreement it was, so I assume it was fine. I picked up my stat log and rushed outside to my car, to drive to location.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 200%;">In the car I slumped in my seat for a minute and recalled that bird from earlier, his song. I knew I would need something positive to balance whatever was coming next. I looked at my shift log and sighed, I had agreed to go to the one place no one else wanted to go, the Ramada. It had the smallest work desk there, and just recently construction had started on a new restaurant so it was a jackhammer I would now be hearing sing almost my entire shift. I started the car, and it grunted and whined as usual if it hasn’t sat for long before its put to work again. I grinned at its insolence. I had just had her oil changed days ago. The audacity of this machine, unbelievable. On my way to location I seen only a few lost souls walking the boardwalk, and with the construction I knew the hotel probably had only maybe 20 or so sold out of 105 rooms. Maybe I wasted my time taking such a slow shift. I parked and trudged in, this time weaving to avoid any puddles and staying close to the building to avoid the showers. I laid my things down on the tiny desk, and headed to the bathroom. To wake up I guess.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 200%;">I slowly turned on the faucet and observed the stream head straight down the drain, and I reflected once again. Thinking of the rain drops I observed in the meeting, the way they each moved along a general path collecting and growing all they could, and I thought of my mother. Doing the best she could with the path that was set for her, gathering and building all she could for us with what was available. I watched the water rushing in the drain again, bearing too much weight to slow its reckless path to an obvious dark end and thought of my father, taking the fast track and handling the weight of all his problems differently. In both cases the same element, moving forward through time without choice or control, and in both cases an end was reached, as with all things. But the difference was the paths taken, and how. I love them both, but I respect my mother’s struggle much more. I laughed aloud and smiled at my lamentation, and rinsed my hands quickly to go out and cherish the rain I had cursed all morning. I rushed past my desk and through the front doors, only to find it was no longer gray and dismal, but the sun had shown his face. I looked up and smiled in thanks. I made three hundred dollars that day, and was the only one who had any sales.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 200%;">I like God, because you see, he is a strange fellow. The way he brings us to realize things is always unique to the point where we wonder if it is him or just our own minds losing sense. But it’s deeper than that; it’s beyond just each of us as individuals. Because you see, what we are today, what we used to be in the past, and where we come from are all small matters when compared to what is in store for all of us in the future and what we will become. So do what you can when you can. Besides, after all of that living you have only one thing left to face...the end.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Pulchritudinoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01331898208611072326noreply@blogger.com