Tag: meaning

What I Did With My Summer Pandemic Vacation

I’ve been spending the pandemic kicking the habit of nihilism
It has an acrid taste, but it presents itself as a path to freedom
It goes down easy after a few
Many times I have made the choice to embrace it
It really is the easiest one I suppose
Requiring no code or framework
A bit of a short cut to the end of things
Yet when viewed as a path taken by so many of my countrymen
It looks much less like freedom
And much more like despair
When you make the choice on a personal level
It is an internal issue
It can eat away at you
You don’t have to look within though
You get to look forward
Out at the world
When thousands of people make the choice together though
It looks less like something internal to the individual
And more like a raging infection
Spreading across the land
Despair on a national level
Requires one to make a choice
If the choice is between working to find meaning
Or succumbing to despair
Well then,
I suppose I better put my Dickie’s on and get my lunch pail out
There might be some long days ahead
Each day I’ve been trying to think of things I look forward to
Even if they don’t exist right now
Might not exist for some time
They will again some day though
I can carry them as aspirations in my mind until then
Each day I think of remarkable things I have experienced in the past
Things I read
Things I saw
Things I felt
Things I heard
Almost anything
So much seems more remarkable than it did at the time
When looking back at it during a plague year
I don’t know exactly how my nation overcomes its despair
But maybe me working on mine is a start
–Gene G. McLaughlin 2020
Curiosity was far greater than our fear
It felt so simple and so prodigious at the same time
Incredible things are happening in the world
Magical things are happening in this world
-Stereolab/Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The Bear Went Over The Mountain

The bear went over the mountain

To see what he could see

And all that he could see

Was the other side of the mountain

Was all that he could see

So the bear took a long slow moment

Atop that lonely mountain

He thought of all his wanderings

Where all his winters brought him

This mountain was a mountain where

Maybe his moments could have meaning

If the bear he so allowed

The next mountain might have something

That from the bear was hidden

A sacred secret knowledge

The bear would finally make his own

His paws dug in the dirt and dust

His fur felt the warmth and sun

His bones they came to realize

The mountain knew the same things

As the next did and the one before

There were mountains to be found

By stillness and not by climbing

By the staying and not the roaming

The bear went to the top of the mountain

The bear called the mountain home

The bear climbed to the top of the mountain

The bear became of where he sat

The bear became the mountain

Together they both grew

Into another mountain

For another bear to find

Gene G. McLaughlin 2015

Breaking Bread Upon My Table

Breaking bread upon my table

We face and judge our hunger

Faith not in the believing

But in the subtle conceiving

Picture a summer watermelon

Sweet pink fruit it shall be

Pouring water at my table

We face and judge our thirst

Tell me what dreams you dream

Comparisons will be made

Faith not in the compensation

But in the stable construction

Picture a tower of steel

Shining beacon it shall be

World starts in broken pieces

Just as chaos swirled before

Piecing together of faith

So slow, progressing

Occasional progress through

Personalities and paradox

What texture does the world take?

Without the faithful?

Around me days are filled with

Purpose and light, without question

Their hearts full

What pulls them out from beneath?

If it is gone?

If the oblivious dwindle

Do the informed continue?

Gene G. McLaughlin 2015

Love Is What We Say It Is

Money is what we say it is

Paper or power or both

Life’s meaning is what we say it is

Winter’s stagnation or spring’s green growth

God is what we say it is

The center or nature or the all

The season is what we say it is

The heat of summer or cool colors of fall

Love is what we say it is

Passion or desire or hope that binds

Struggle is what we way it is

Something to overcome or accept in our minds

Rebirth is what we say it is

A continuation or the world born anew

The new year is what we say it is

May it ruminate quietly or speak in volumes through you

Gene G. McLaughlin 2013