I am a brawler, a fighter, an untamed jerk, and an animal.
I am a poet. A lover. A compassionate servant. And a giver.
I am a blasphemer. I am devout. I am an agitator. I am an artist.
I am all of these things. I am none of them.
This is who I am.
This is who I’ve discovered–all these sides, these incarnations, of my Self.
This is all that I am when I am unapologetically me.
It’s not about the image. It’s never about how someone sees me, interprets me, or understands me. This is how I must understand my Self–the many sides, pieces, incarnations of my True Self.
Every day, I yoke them into harmony. Knitting, stitching, staying whole. How I live, move and act in the world is how I unite these many faces into harmony under the banner of One Soul.
This is me.
I Am We is my new book of poems, which debuts today.
I cannot wait for you to dive into these pages.
I Am We is a collection of poetry–my first published poems since 2012–which I’m truly honored to share with you. Feedback from readers has been exciting. I love and cherish how poems are experienced and interpreted in the eyes, minds and hearts of readers like you.
This book of poems will be particularly special. Because I Am We invites you to engage in the “yoga” of everyday life: the yoking or uniting of the many sides, faces and incarnations to your Self into wholeness under the banner of One Soul.
There are many sides of my Self. I’ve met them across the years–these faces, pieces, or incarnations of me.
Can’t you say the same? How many “sides” to your Self do you feel and experience regularly in your day-to-day? Think of all the identities, titles, obligations, responsibilities you share. You are a child, a sibling, a parent. A lover, a brawler. A vixen, a saint. A poet, a foul-mouth. Sacred at times, and blasphemous at others.
How many of those faces are curious contradictions? Does it tear at you?
Can you find wholeness in spite of the differences?
When our faces battle one another, we feel the tearing apart–like our truth is being separated by the conflict of self-contradiction. “I’m a mother, but I’m also a woman.” “I’m an amateur, but I’m also an artist.” “There’s more to this life that I have yet to tap.”
I Am We exists to help you find your peace within.
I Am We: Poems
Debuts Today in Paperback and Kindle
Enjoy this colorful collection of poems for just a few dollars.
KINDLE – $2.99 PAPERBACK – $10
The Kindle Reader App is free and can be used on iPhone, iPad, Desktop and Android Devices.
I Am We is a guide, a friend, a diary you’ve never kept, on your path to wholeness in your everyday life.
The one, unique, beautiful, complete, complex soul that we are plays many roles throughout our days and nights.
I Am We exists to knit your many faces and incarnations under the banner of One Soul: into unapologetically unified harmony.
Alleviate the conflict within. Surrender into your contradictions. Taste the wholeness of your soul.
I believe in yoking, uniting, unifying your faces into wholeness. No more tearing apart. Honor your contradictions. “Drink all your passion, and be a disgrace,” Rumi said. Be you. Be whole. Be unapologetic.
We’re living conundrums. Whole, divine, nothing is lacking. I cherish this complexity. It’s beautiful, fascinating, and means we can spend living hours and years excavating our Selves. I Am We is a collection of poems that represents the yoking, or coming together, of your many incarnations.
Enough talk. I’d like you to experience some of the yoking from I Am We right now.
Below, here are ten of my favorite poems from my new collection.
I’m honored to celebrate its official launch date with you today, and hope you enjoy what you’ll read!
Please consider picking up I Am We today in Paperback ($10) or on Kindle/Digital ($2.99) to enjoy plenty more of these powerful little poems to guide your yoga of everyday life.
Happy reading!
I REMEMBER YOU
I remember you.
That’s nature’s howling rhythm.
What the surging tide whispers to the moon.
What spring flowers say to the sun.
What heat is lit between lovers’ hands when they at last embrace.
I remember you.
IT FEELS LIKE WINTER NOW
It feels like winter now.
Frigid gusts send sun-swept reeds into playful backbends;
gold feathers cascade against a crisp blue sky, glazed with cloud.
We can anticipate the seasons’ changing all we wish,
counting days across the calendar.
But in the end, the seasons move by Nature’s will.
A transition of months seems to change in a day—changed, before we even notice it.
What of those seasons of our lives?
Anticipated transitions that hang on
and on
and on,
maybe never to turn,
maybe never to be the same
in a sudden flash of change?
AN OCEAN, A FISH BOWL
The ocean would seem a burdensome place
to a fish whose only home was his bowl.
My bowl has shattered.
I’m not sure who nudged it off the table.
But I do know that Two Strange Hands scooped me up
and saved me.
They gave me freedom by tossing me into the waves
that nearly caused me to drown.
That’s what I mean when I say we tend to spit at life and curse
this world for its unjust doings.
Some fish just prefer the bowl.
WHAT COULD PEBBLES KNOW?
Whatever could pebbles know?
Fractured from their whole.
Distant. Longing. Punitive. Small.
Kicked about. Stepped on. Crunched. Thrown.
Their Mountain called Home, it must feel so far away now.
Here lay little pieces, once great, once watchful from on high.
Now trampled. Kicked. Pushed with every gust.
Dear One, does the life of a pebble
really sound so unfamiliar?
THE SHELL OF ME
My shell is broken open,
And all my light is slipping out.
Now, I can’t stop saying
Thank you
I love you
I honor you
You are beautiful
to every friendly face and stranger.
The shell of me has broken again,
And all my love keeps pouring, pouring, pouring out.
ECHOES OF AN EMPTY CHAMBER
Echoes of an empty chamber have woken you again.
Voices never forgotten and old haunting songs you hear yourself hum from time to time
still bounce between the brick and plastered walls
that neighbor this resting space, your bed, your sanctum.
Echoes of an empty chamber awaken you still, calling your name
from a past you refuse to leave behind.
Every morning through weary eyes, you throw open your door with a weapon in hand,
a bat, a belt, or a club, perhaps,
looking for the boisterous intruders who robbed you of your dreams.
There’s no one there.
Nothing but echoes of an empty chamber,
a room full of nothing maintained by a mind afraid to forget;
a heart terrified to move on; a stubborn-worried soul,
desperate to not fill an empty past that is already gone.
Decorate your room carefully, friend.
Fill it with joyous reminders
and beautiful interpretations of your love.
Soon, echoes of an empty chamber will find no room to play.
And you will sleep well again.
I WILL BE YOUR SUN
You carry a whole world with you.
A planet rests upon your shoulders.
You may not see it, but I do.
There is a Universe Within
that you carry wherever you go.
Ecosystems of passion and romance. Warring nations of worry and fear.
A billion living ideas, stories and experiences that make up a whole history
named You.
Wherever you go, I promise to be your sun.
It’s not that your life revolves around me.
Think of it like this:
Whenever you come to me,
I will do my best to be quiet and still
and shine nothing but kindness and light upon you.
TALKING WITH GOD
Talking with God
is not meant to be passive.
Engage in that Divine Discussion.
Step outside your home and pace your feet,
each in front of the other,
for a thousand steps.
Now, a thousand more.
Every tip and tap is a knock upon Brahma’s door that says,
“Oh, Wise One, are you home?”
JUST KEEP POURING
Love is like the ether;
unseen, it still fills everything.
Then some crotchety soul who’s grown jaded
sneaks up and scoffs, “The cup is empty! Full, yes, of nothing!”
But you know Love is the Universe: ever expanding from nothing and everything
into nothing and everything.
You smile, and reply,
“Is it really so terrifying to think that This Well might never run dry?”
Fill your cup.
See what happens if you
just
keep
pouring.
LOVE-DRUNK
Oh, My Beautiful, do I even risk writing you this poem?
The danger is this: when I think of your touch, your gaze, your smile,
all of my breath is stolen from me!
I become so dizzy that I must desperately remember to breathe!
But then my heart begs me to do it:
to write you,
to dream of you,
to imagine your smiling eyes.
Oh, there goes my breath again!
Last night with your hand holding mine, we became like the earth and moon:
a beautiful union suddenly bound us; Our Gravitational Glue could not be broken.
Two planets floating hand in hand through an endless black sky! What magic!
And although we found ourselves in crowds of drunk and stumbling stars—the night’s revelers who toppled across the streets—we did not even see them.
Everything else disappeared.
I am in love with that feeling,
that Cosmic Union which binds with a touch. Your touch.
Your gaze. Your smile.
Just the thought of you, and my breath is swept from my lungs!
Oh, I wish to write you more poems than you could imagine, all in a single moment. But I must resign to sleep, for it is challenging to rest when my love-drunk lungs keep forgetting to breathe.
Without you here,
Sleep is but an obstacle of time—
A pause in our Cosmic Union until I can see you again.
But I am awake still.
I think my Earth is looking for his Moon, desperate and longing
for you to draw into his orbit again, again, again.
I want to be there, where the drunken stars swirl quietly around us,
and nothing matters but our touch.
Like what you’re reading? There more poems waiting for you inside.
If you enjoy what you read, there are dozens more poems (over 60 in all) waiting for you inside I Am We.
You can purchase your copy of I Am We in paperback for just $10, or on Kindle (for all mobile devices) for just $2.99.
I Am We: Poems
Debuts Today on Amazon.com
Enjoy this colorful collection of poems for just a few dollars.
KINDLE – $2.99 PAPERBACK – $10
The Kindle Reader App is free and can be used on iPhone, iPad, Desktop and Android Devices.
As an author, I write books so our souls can connect without ever meeting.
Books, to me, represent slices of soul in artful form. They live alongside us, and guide us, and open us up to experience the mysteries of life with clarity, precision, and reverence.
I share these poems with you with the sincere belief that you will see yourself in them, and through them.
I hope you enjoy meeting the many incarnations of your Self.
Many thanks to you for reading, as always.
Shine on!
