Encouragement.

Even when life is about to break, live a little.

When your heart can only feel the ache, live a little.

In the long weeks when noon-day sun is dark and grey

Feel the colors deep inside you quake.  Live a little.

Ripped in pieces small as post-its by packed schedules,

You must melt back smooth as if a lake.  Live a little.

Empty and alone, curled up tight and sobbing mute,

Reach out, don't fear for what is at stake.  Live a little.

Within souls all these deep sorrows, holding me down too,

Let's light sparks for happiness' sake and live a little.

The Phoenix

Flat and featureless a great plain,

stretched to the horizon.

White sheets track a wandering trail

we cannot keep eyes on.

Far ahead the lone man wanders

searching the blank canvas

for the setting sun in its nest,

eyes dripping with sadness.

Where rests the evening phoenix bright

that once flew south to him?

Where nests his summer lover fair,

fled here as if by whim?

He walks for days, or months, or years.

Yet still the darkened gloom

pervades the air with stale despair.

The plain is there his tomb.

His tracks erase behind his path

no sooner heartbeat cease.

His final breath takes at last,

yet still he has no peace.

In spectral form he floats e're on,

his journey not complete.

A chill sticks firm to his clear skin.

The sun he can not meet.

Some say those lover's destiny

is not to reunite,

but if his flaming love can reach

her soul will surely light.

A streaming pillar shooting up

to heaven with rebirth,

their souls entwined in passion's flame.

A phoenix born on earth.

But we no more can see his trail,

can follow through the snow

no more.  So back we to our work;

forget his tale of woe.