The Year of Being 18

Is this supposed to be the apex?

Do you really consider this the epicenter?

Some two-thousand years of human progress,

And we’ve hardly left the arena.

It’s the same every year,

Repeating the Tiananmen Square of the America teenager.

Seek knowledge! Chase achievement! Pursue popularity!

But don’t think beyond the walls and why aren’t you in line?

Two dumb kids fall onto the bed in love,

Only to fall through the floor into the maternity ward.

Why did we even consider ourselves wise.

How did we ever consider ourselves invincible.

Arise! Oh those born with bright eyes and questions in mouth,

Make noise out loud and make it glorious,

Wield your innocence and clutch it like a sword

For yourself and your fellow warrior poets.

Alarm us all with how disarmingly easy it is

To have identity in the age of stressed anonymity,

With everyone wanting you to do or be something,

It’s your inaction that shines the brightest.

Fan Your Flames

You were born among blood and smoke and sparks and glory.
As your mother wept in awe at your arrival
Your family fell to reverence at her prayers over you.

You're a spark of fire, a spark of life;
Fan your flames for us now and hold us close
For we all grow colder when we're apart.

You took your fire in hand, cupping it around its glow.
You left and at night we could see your fire off in the distance,
We knew you had to leave but you let us know all was well.

You have grown old now,
Your proud embers have burned low but not out,
Signs of a life well lived and a fire well tended.

From your ashes rose a new fire, a new flame well tended.
It burns with your hue and burns with your intensity,
From fire to ashes and soon a fire rises again.

Fields of Summer

Salt of the earth, sweat on your brow;
Faded glory born through sunlight and summer.

Jeans with rips, hearts on the mend;
Earth on your hands and sky above.

No boxes, no confines;
Limits belong to how far you can run.

Full of laughter, empty of change;
These warm nights hold nothing to fear.

Wind in our hair, your hand in mine;
Here there is warmth beyond the streets.