I Waited, I Saw...

I waited...and I saw what I needed to see

How does wisdom dictate?  It allows you to see through patience, experience...and time.

Epiphany...

I saw her sitting at the bottom of a well.  Cold, hungry and unkempt.  I looked everywhere for a rope and when I failed to find one strong enough to lift her, I borrowed money from unseemly types.  I bought the strongest rope you could imagine and dropped it down into the well.  From the top, I yelled at her to set her torso into the noose I had fashioned...no response.

I decided to climb down to see if maybe she needed help getting in the noose only to have her push away the rope at every turn.  For days I tried to reason with her to no avail.  Then, just as I was set to give up, the unseemly types I had borrowed money from pulled up the rope...leaving me in the well to suffer her same fate...  

I took on her odor.  I felt the same hunger pains and lack of rest.  Despair almost overtook my soul in the darkness of that place but I fought it at every turn.  I soon came to find that she had accepted her fate.  She had accepted the idea that the only thing she could do was sail through the winds of a fate she still had the power and strength to change.  Not me...I, through seething anger and hurt, found my way out of the well, saddened the whole time because I knew I was leaving her behind.  You see, after some time, wisdom spoke a thing to me.  I knew that if there was ever a chance to help her again; one, she would have to want my help and two, I would need to be strong enough to pull her up when that time came.  That would mean I would have to walk away.  I would have to bury all care for her under lock and key.  Not do away with it, but keep it in a place in my heart where it would not have any effect on my progress.  I would have to disconnect...

In time, I became strong again and after paying back the unseemly types...I bought my own rope.  Every once and a while I drop the rope down into the well.  I wait like a fisherman waits for a bite.  I watch her from atop and throw down food whenever I can but I will never again make the same mistake I did before.  I will not go down into that well unless I know for certain that she is willing to break her fingers to get out.  Why?  Because then I will be certain she will never want to go back into that well ever again and all my efforts would not have been in vain...

To all the wise.  We know what we know and it is not for the sake of pride I mention this.  Knowing what needs doing obligates us to do what we know to do and that can really hurt sometimes.  It will cause you to deny yourself selfish things more times than not and give you a bad taste for vain endeavors...what most people call "fun".  Leaving you with a handful of friends.  In my humble opinion...that's a small price to pay for all you get in return but it still remains a heavy price nonetheless.  You may have someone that is addicted to a subtle vice that is difficult to peg as evil but you have seen this vice destroy them and yourself.  You cried with them and fought with them for more only to come to the sad conclusion that you care about them more then they do for themselves.  Sorry but sometimes, all you can do is walk away, watch and wait to determine your next move.  Don't get dirty with them unless unless you are certain they are willing to get clean.  This is true in many circumstances and carries with it the heavy heart of eventuality.  You hope against hope that it never has to come to that but all you see has you convinced...it will.   

I waited...and I saw all I needed to see.  I know what comes next...for me...

~Apollo

Yeah...Easy Does It...

Kind of how I'm feeling right now...

To Capture The Soul...

"...because the wind is high...it blows my mind..."

I have never known a song to be so simple and so deep at the same time.  I love The Beatles thanks to my father.  Those over-sized speakers blasted their first album every weekend at 944 42nd street.  Right there along with the Rolling Stones.  I would just sit and watch my dad dance in a drunken stupor to this great music never knowing the imprint it would have on me.

I learned to listen...

The Beatles are an example of the evolution in man expressed in art.  From cheesy and naive to deep and mature.  I love their music and this piece, I would come to learn...could "explain" me.  Yeah, something like that...

~Apollo

The Back-burner...

"...All day long I'm sitting singing songs for everyone..."

We all have trajectories we set upon.  We start our engines, hit the gas and hope to make it to our destination in time.  Sometimes though, we are thrown off course by duty.  Sometimes though, we see a soul on the side of the road needing our help.  We stop and offer them a ride only to find that they not only need a ride...but food and shelter too.  Your trip is now on the back-burner.

How many times has this happened?  Too many to count.  Don't get me wrong, this is not a complaint but an acknowledgement of this truth and maybe, just maybe...there's more to it than just a delay in plans.  You see we all have our "office" in this life and if when called upon to officiate we shrink due to personal goals, then it means I am only to willing to expend all currency on myself.  I ask you...where is the "eternal" in that?

Some are there to drive her and lay her in a warm bed.  Others are there to make the right calls and make sure all forthcoming information is up to date.  While others are there to make sure all the loose ends are tied together once the dust settles.  Whatever your role in this life, never shrink away from your duty.  There is something I must do for someone I care about...I'm just waiting on my cue.  While I wait, my goals proceed on slow autopilot.  It's just how it is people...

~Apollo

It Ain't Over...

I begin this post with the murmurs of a hospital room.  Sullen eyes cracking jokes and nurses not knowing what to do with themselves...

My mother went to the ER last night.  She couldn't breathe right while at the same time suffering through heart palpitations.  My sister thought it wise to take her to the emergency room.  She was right.  Turns out, she might have a blood clot leading to her lungs and anyone that knows anything will tell you...that's serious.

I went to see her not only because she is my mother, but because I sought confirmation of something I've known all along...she will not die in a hospital.  I arrived to find a feisty, stubborn woman intent on getting to work on Tuesday.  She got her nights sleep thanks to Tramadol and to her, that's all she needed to keep going through her impossible life.  To convince her to stay involved mind tricks and subtle manipulation.  How do you tell a stubborn, tough as nails woman, something she does not want to hear?  Shit, it ain't easy lol  She sees everything before you do so she has prepared answers for it all.

I'm gonna tell you all something...she is one of my gauges to what happens to my sister, my brother and I.  As Matriarch, she has a certain place and I am fully aware of all that means.  She will face it all first.  What's good, what's bad and all grace.  I do not take this lightly.  To see her stubbornness was something of a spectacle...but a welcome one at that.

Please pray for both her and my sister...they will need it...

They are both at the end of a very long trial.  Their rest is just about due.  I pray they will recognize it when it comes...

~Moses

Bogota...

"...a heart that's made of gold couldn't beat at all..."

I went to Bogota tonight with Millie and Josh.  Great food and a nice tasting "Old Fashioned".  It was a good night.  I sat facing the crowd as is my custom and maybe that was a mistake.  My peripherals could notice glances frequently coming my way.  I don't know, maybe it was that they never seen some muscle before...I could give a shit.  My son confirmed what was happening so no, it wasn't delusions of fucking grander...so my head stayed down.  You know why?  Because in that moment, I was with my son and a woman I not only love, but have the utmost respect for.  I'm not about to sully that by playing the "boy".  You know what I'm talking about.  The boy that would make all those who glance believe they have a shot at what they admire.  That's just bullshit.

Someone had a dream that I had done that and that is not me.  If I am with you...I AM with you.  Even if it's just for a moment.  No one else matters.  The sun can entreat me and I will not budge.  You can walk away and I will remain yours...no one else's.  I have always been this way.  My father mentioned it to me once when I was seventeen.  We came out of our building and he mentioned the obvious.  He said "I notice that when women look at you, you look down", "why do you do that?"  I told him the truth..."I would never want a woman to do that to me, to purposefully draw another man's attention...if I would demand that of her, why would I not demand that of myself?".  People, it's just about respect.  You either have it or you don't.  Why men place rules on who they're with that they can't live up to themselves?  Whether it's rules you place on each other or not...it's still just a matter of respect.  Who I am will not violate this rule I placed upon myself.  I cannot understand anything else...

I don't want to because it's all just "boy" shit.  Knowing this difference is one the many things that separates the men from the boys...

I'm not "superman".  I'm just a man that believes rules are there for a reason.  I'm more than just "good"...

~Apollo

My Vantage Point...

Convinced of my deception

I've always been a fool

I fear this love reaction

Just like you said I would

A rose could never lie

About the love it brings

And I could never promise

To be any of those things

[Chorus:]

If I was not so weak

If I was not so cold

If I was not so scared of being broken

Growing old

I would be...

I would be...

I would be...

Blessed are the shallow

Depth they'll never find

Seemed to be some comfort

In rooms I try to hide

Exposed beyond the shadows

You take the cup from me

Your dirt removes my blindness

Your pain becomes my peace

[Chorus:]

If I was not so weak

If I was not so cold

If I was not so scared of being broken

Growing old

I would be...

I would be...

I would be...

...frail

Dark Passion...

"...you're free to leave me but just don't deceive me...and please believe me when I say I love you..."

"Jealousy, will drive you...mad..."

~Apollo

To Co-exist...

Apollo defies convention...Moses seeks to redefine it...
We were both "born to die"...

Moses and Apollo have met on the battle field many times.  Often ending in a draw with a terse..."I'll see you again"...

Both share the greatness of quality.  Both reckless...but for different reasons.  Two alpha males seeking supremacy.  Always...one over the other.  The grand idea?  What if they were to join forces?  What if they stopped fighting for the home they lived in and learned to share responsibilities?

What would ascend from those ashes?  The best of both worlds co-existing in a blaze of principled flame.  Where the uncontrollable found purpose...direction.  Shit wouldn't that be something?

I guess we'll find out soon enough.

~Apollo

P.S.:  Yeah, I'm still lookin for what my Homie's descibed as my "Phoenix rise".  It's gotta be something special... 

The Madman...

Art is truth in earnest.  To catch it you have to treat it like a butterfly.  Watch how it flies, cup your hands along it's trajectory and gently grab it.  Too hard and you will kill it.  Too soft and it will elude you...

The madman now sane, enters the rooms he once scribbled truths upon.  Standing in the center of where it all began, he remembers writing in every space he could find.  Never for a people, never for a prize...but just so that he would never forget.

His memory takes him to a man that saw more than his world could handle.  His writings would never see the light of day.  A glance at a saying causes him to loosen his tie.  The reading of a parable removes his shoes and jacket.  At the end of the longest day of his life, he finally removes all his clothes.  Standing there naked, he now understands that he has lost his sanity.  That what all considered to be "mad" was in truth more than just sane.  Naked now, he wants it back.  He sits on his old floor.  He waits patiently in his new reality...to find ways to make the old relevant again.

Success is just a word away...

~Apollo