There are times I sit and stare
off into an endless ocean of shadows
that drift within the winds of my own thoughts.
Sometimes I am that man who sees
everything with clarity when there is nothing
but chaos surrounding me. There are times I grasp
and hold onto everything complex because I don’t
recognize any other way to exist in this world,
because life through these eyes can be a magnificence
of beauty like a mirage of a dream sequencing
on the outlines of heavenly skies but then
there are the many times
life through these eyes were like lonely echoes vibrating
on the edge of darkness that reminded me
that was alive/so alive that I lost myself
inside an endless cycle of confusion whereas I
could not even translate the mind
in occupancy of this body
and there are times I still reach to find
the hand of my own soul hoping and waiting
for it to massage the knots out of my sadness
and relax me back into the confidence of a smile
but there is no happiness until I get to know
and embrace the stranger staring back at me through
the eyes of something familiar. I see a man
who has mirrored in the achievements of growth
and found the tears once hidden in an empty
childhood. I see the wrath of a heart
led down the path of silence yelling to have a voice
and I see a man who had the choice to stay
inside that darkness but chose to break out and become
apart of a new life created through renewal
and sacrifice because without struggle and the complexities
of confusion I would’ve never become free…
there are times
I sit and stare through the eyes of a familiar stranger
to remind myself who I once was
and celebrate the journey of everything me.
© 2011
Tarringo T. Vaughan
