We are shaped by war
Even if we have never
Fought a battle
Or met
Someone who has
The grandfather you
Never knew
Shapes you
In his absence
pulsing out the suffering
He saw
Across time
When he killed in the sun
Achilles did not know
When Patroclus died
He found out
What his glory was
Blood spilling
Only pooling in the sand
Unmoving
Bring neither friendship
Nor grace to him
War is the main character
In all our stories
Even if we never see its name
Written in the tale
Gene G. McLaughlin 2026
There’s a blockade starving Gaza
There’s a glitch on your timeline
Depending on your algorithm
Everything is either burning or maybe all is fine
I watch the young play college football
As ICE stalks outside where they play
From the seat I’m sitting in
It all seems a world away
6,000 miles from Gaza
800 from the football game
In measuring all the suffering
Maybe all distances are the same
Can you hold on to what you love
Are you part of us or them
What will they allow you to keep
When they calculate the sum
Of what your worth based on the parts
Of acceptable DNA you contain
Of your pigment percents
Of your gender preferences
Of what you view as sane
Is the cookout winding down
Are there hotdogs left on the grill
Do you have a headache from the day
Should you take a headache pill
You have tomorrow off
Tuesdays coming up soon
You gotta keep on working
Putting out off your mind what looms
Gene G. McLaughlin 2025
The passing of time
Perforate us with laden moments
Stinging like prickers
Upon the flesh
The eyes of others
Reflect upon us ourselves
Swirling emotion and expectation
Blotting identity on the skin and soul’s canvas
The passages of meaning’s creation
Are forever barbed and confounding
Yet down the shrouded twisting path
Lies joy
Gene G. McLaughlin 2024
May your faith be like the sun
Ever present in the changing sky
May your love be like the stars
Shining brightly now and when you die
May your fear be like a river
With you, but always moving on its way
May your dreams be like a bird’s song
Hope carried from the night into day
May the numbers be in your favor
As they build and bind you to the path
May you know the face of your savior
As it appears within the math
May at your core there be a tower
Of blood and thoughts around your spine
May this structure grant you power
To sense the presence of the divine
Gene G. McLaughlin 2023
I like that there was a time like that
Even if it is not mine
I like that there was a place like that
Amid the ruins of time
I like that love existed
Between those I shall never know
I like there are those that shall travel
To destinations I shall not go
I begrudge the universe nothing
I shall take what is given to me
But my universe shall exist of
Much more than I can see
In the earth are buried narratives
Stories by the score
In the sky are floating passions
Making the world both less and more
It is all one tale
Told outside of time
That I am the lead actor in
Yet which is never mine
Gene G. McLaughlin 2023
To do it for joy
Without expectation
To do it for journey
Not destination
Ignoring the narrative
Embracing sensation
The pain and beauty
Your soul’s validation
Gene G. McLaughlin 2023
Fat Tuesday
We all got scars
On soul or skin
In churches or bars
We all got sin
In the public eye
Or held within
Raise a glass
Sing a song
Go to mass
Hit the bong
This too shall pass
Before too long
Want redemption?
Not tonight friend
Tonight’s for wine
Creating vague memories
We all got wars
We all have lost
We all got scores
Of things they cost
Live today
Pray tomorrow
Find a way
To ease the sorrow
Sin not committed
Cannot be repented
The cycle repeated
As was intended
Ash Wednesday
Remember that you are dust
And to dust you shall return
Are we more than want and lust?
An engine designed to yearn
Repent, and preach the Gospel
Even for the apostate and the apostle?
I repent to those I have done harm
Not to those who I do not know
I carry love for those now gone
As I await my time to go
Our 40 days come with no warning
They just arrive
Our 40 days feel much like mourning
You might survive
If it is too heavy to carry
Take it from the pack
If the weight of it overwhelms
Give it back
The intrinsic should not be surrendered
The extrinsic is not judgment rendered
The ashes on your forehead
Are forever made of you
Gene. G. McLaughlin 2023
I am walking away from the me of this
Through the halls without walls of the mind
I am seeking the clear light of the universe
As the fabrications of identity unwind
From is to was to void
Of what do the cosmos sing?
When the sum of one is undone
What actualities might the time’s order bring?
Gene G. McLaughlin 2023
I have always been open to the idea
That I would fail
Prepared and resigned
Comfortable with the idea
That when it all went to hell
I would be ready
I am a witness to the worst
Things can get bad
To this I attest
Things also
Can expand
The world can grow big
Near endless
Even for those with little
Nothing even
There are victories
Successes
Sunny days
Fists raised in triumph
The scope
Is everything
Everyone
All at once
This is not a zero sum game
It is a whole number
That counts you
Successes can be hard to see
They are not always visible
If you are a nail
Bracing for the impact
That strikes you down
For good
Be the hammer
Be the nail
Force and energy
Are all one transaction
Consider the possibility
This might be one of the days
You stand in the sun
Feeling strong
With possibilities
Burning around you
Like fire
Gene G. McLaughlin 2022
I want a world more Pissarro than Picasso
More the sum than a piece
More the glory of all of it
Then cubes of us at our least
Gene G. McLaughlin 2022
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