Ornate yet vacant,
that’s how it always seems to be.
Seems to me we could to better,
would do better,
not to dress it up to mask it’s lack of meaning.
If hollow were so prized,
we’d realize that form needs no function
but we berate the barren
and substance reigns supreme.
So why the pretty package
that holds an empty promise
when we endeavor for wisdom unadorned?

I dream underwater dreams
of pale seahorses
and silver bubbles rising.
Green sea grasses stretch
to touch the glass ceiling
where sunlight sparkles like jewels.
The luminous jellies
make slow motion circles
and I float suspended
in the cool liquid blue.

Just some words of last year’s NaNoWriMo attempt. I always post poetry so I thought I’d throw in a little prose and I suppose it’s satire more than anything.

It was one of the warmest, most beautiful afternoons Grayson had seen so far this summer. July had been decent but August was heating up nicely and even though May knew that California held some gorgeous warmth for most of the year, she still couldn’t pass up a day like today. Besides, the Grayson population tended toward the pale so she was hoping to get a good blush of color before landing among the locals, who she still imagined to be bronzed and shining, even though they had the same sun screen warnings as everyone else. She would be acquainted soon enough with the modern miracle called the spray tan.

As she lay stretched out and relaxed it was only natural that she should fall asleep. The dreaming began quickly and she felt herself lifted up in the air, feeling a lovely floating sensation that she sometimes felt in her dreams and often wished she could feel in real life. Usually she just floated up and around the neighborhood, peeking into peoples second story windows and trying to see what books were on the shelves or if they had any pets. Now however, she floated up and up until the earth fell away beneath her and daylight dimmed into darkness. She thought she should feel cold, you know, the coldness of space and all, but she felt perfectly comfortable. Perhaps it was her body letting her know it was still warm in the backyard waiting for her return.

So here she was, drifting in infinite space with nothing to look at and no one to talk to. She marveled at the enormity of it, the much referred to vastness and just when she had begun to enjoy the solitude of the moment, she heard low tones that became the sound of a female voice. Words were indistinguishable and as she was mentally trying to piece together something she could understand, a nebulous figure took shape before her. Kind of looked like Joan Rivers and she repressed a giggle, although she wasn’t sure if she giggled up here it would make a sound. She was too embarrassed to try now that someone or something was here. May was an introvert of extraordinary proportions.

The two of them floated across from one another, in amiable semi-silence, until finally the voice that had been mumbling something at her for the past few minutes finally took on language and May was able to pick out actual words.

“Balance” was the first thing that came through to her. She took it literally and looked around her floating self to see if she was tilted or falling but all looked adjusted. Still afraid to speak, May waited for the translucent Joan Rivers to say something snide about how her flip flops so did not go with the bikini she had on and how that particular shade of yellow washed her out entirely. Yes, she was floating in the ether of space clad in a bright yellow bikini, rhinestone studded flip flops and her chic, trendy sunglasses. She knew Joan could have nothing to say about the sunglasses. They were extremely expensive.

“You must..” and the words faded out and then back in again. “your destiny…”

May’s curiosity got the better of her and she had to ask.
“Do you think I look good in yellow? I was going to buy the red one but yellow seemed so sunny.”

The figure looked surprised for a moment then formed more words.
“You have been chosen.” Opaque hands reached out to her.
Wow, a full sentence but it certainly did not answer her question. It was also ironic, that here is the girl least able to make a choice and she finds that she herself has been chosen. May wonders if that has anything to do with her condition.

“There are duties you must perform to protect the planet. It is out of balance and you must set things right. It is your destiny.”

Never having thought of her life in terms of destiny before, May is thrown by this comment but suddenly remembers that she is dreaming and feels better about it instantly.
“Okay, so what do I have to do?” she says, playing along.

“Further instructions will be given at the turning.” Joan began to fade and May was experiencing a definite falling sensation.

“Damn” She muttered as the wind rushed past her in her rapid deceleration toward what she feared would be a dreadfully sunburned body.

A bit of a free write-brainstorming kind of thing. Just a moment from inside my mind.

The ink in the well, wellspring of my muse, the source begetting the void, bringer of all, birthing the beginning, setting eternal clocks ticking and I spin on the center of the wheel, trying to feel my way back through time, separating space, moving together, pushing or pulling, the maker, the made, the earth in the shade and the sea is a shadow of mist, distilling the bliss and listening to wind in the trees, a sky split asunder, the grass that grows under, a sun melting into the sea.