"All things are perception, until we see."   Trg,4/1/2016

"B.S. walks as it talks. Smelly and messy."

"I'd be an atheist, but I pray."

"Don't care much about what you claim to believe, or say is the truth. What
you do preaches these clearly."

"Yes, feed the poor, clothe naked, spend time the lonely,
--write a check and go home."

"What do you think about God?" - one Friend asked.
"I'm not real fond of God, but I do like his Mother."

"Everyone has something to say, and everyone says it
in a variety of ways. Now if we dare to listen then
we will hear something."

"Salvation can be bought" timothy r gates, 2/5/2013

Salvation can be bought
old 5 & dime didn't have it,
but they should've.
Jesus or Buddha
or No-deity,
all support writers
not having much to say,
but to proffer their notions
"For Free,"
only $24.99, plus tax
for their non solicitation
of their Salvation.

No cheap grace,
drop your cash,
check, or credit card # --
you get to be a newbie,
if you hang in there
learn the language
quote the favorite lines,
next thing you know
you'll be part of the inner circle.
Learn to cry,
offering what you "don't deserve"
if you're blessed
TV's next,
offering your mysteries,
"Please send your tax deductible offering."

No TV?
You can still sell your
Jesus, Buddha
or No-deity
stuff
if it works out
you'll be a beacon,
showing others
the path of Salvation.
maybe here's a place for
imprecatory prayers regarding
Bullshit?
Or,
"Everybody let's get stoned?"
i mean, "get saved."

In Awe, an ah - ah, awe moment.Mythos, ways of telling stories of what we don't know.For myself, obviously, being in awe is sufficient, from the stories of old, through the evolving stories of science's observation, into this breath's moment- I'm a speck within it all, quite cool.
'Seasons know no death' timothyrgates, 3/5/2016
Seasons know no death,
Resurrecting at their transitions.
Fall's burial colours the Earth,
Hues of the night's Moon,
She knows the Sun's morning.
Winter's six feet under,
Gift of apparent death,
Humming a rhythm and blues tune,
"Everybody wants to go to heaven,
But no one wants to die."
Spring's taunting of a blessed repose,
Reminding the Northern Lights,
"You too, as I, have your time,"
With each dead flower's seed
Arising from an impermanent grave.
Summer's brilliance, hides nothing,
Looking through this prism we see, yes,
But we do more if we dare -
We behold,
Like a diamond's tear,
The facets are only limited by light.
"And the evening and morning were
the first day."
Both know the other,
Legs and arms hold near, but not locked,
Lovers always, happy for being spent.
"We will awake, again,
We will fall asleep, again
We will smile at both
We will wipe our amorous moisture,"
Our unspoken hymn of Seasons,
Love's blessed repose.

.'Rape is rape'               timothyrgstes, 3/22/2013

Daddy's sweetness. timothy r gates, 3/21/2013
uncle's unintentions like
some priests and rabbis
(convenient for a catch all referencing),
not unlike Washington's dry eyes,
sending our children
off to their wars.
Why?
Because they can.
"Rape is not always rape,"
not unlike other ignorance --
"She dressed like she wanted it"
"It's her fault"
She said yes at first"
"She was flirtatious"
(also said by pedophiles)
Politicians and courts
buy violators of personhood,
their opulent indulgence
makes them unable to see,
vying for their own entitlements
telling the rest to screw off.
Rapists rape
Pedophiles rape -
Ill? Hell yes.
Thieves of innocence?
You betcha.
Worse?
Legislators legislating second chances

'Seasons know no death' timothyrgates, 3/5/2016
Seasons know no death,
Resurrecting at their transitions.
Fall's burial colours the Earth,
Hues of the night's Moon,
She knows the Sun's morning.
Winter's six feet under,
Gift of apparent death,
Humming a rhythm and blues tune,
"Everybody wants to go to heaven,
But no one wants to die."
Spring's taunting of a blessed repose,
Reminding the Northern Lights,
"You too, as I, have your time,"
With each dead flower's seed
Arising from an impermanent grave.
Summer's brilliance, hides nothing,
Looking through this prism we see, yes,
But we do more if we dare -
We behold,
Like a diamond's tear,
The facets are only limited by light.
"And the evening and morning was
the first day."
Both know the other,
Legs and arms hold near, but not locked,
Lovers always, happy for being spent.
"We will awake, again,
We will fall asleep, again
We will smile at both
We will wipe our amorous moisture,"
Our unspoken hymn of Seasons,
Love's blessed repose.

'Daydreaming, who'd a' thought?'           Timothyrgates,3/18/2016
between acid trips,
Grandpa's always making things alright,
fear of the Bomb
and then the impending "draft,"
protests against the War
for Civil Rights
for equal rights,
dissident sit-ins
Rock festivals
and Jesus People, "One Way," held high
Peace Signs, also, held high,
the obligatory F' off to "authority"
each with varying digits -
darkness had a gift:
Hope.
yes, a "Daydream" for a teen,
where you sing the Songs of then
Songs of your parents,
and grandparents Songs,
of darkness Songs of joy
damn, and Songs of your children,
and their children.
Looking out the school class window,
Daydreaming, who's a' thought?

Reflecting upon my dearest friend's words, -- Good day, this day.--
'Earn their trust' Trg, 2016
They told me
all I needed to do
was to earn their trust,
to earn their loyalty,
to earn their love.
I learned
that such folks
are yet in bondage
to those that taught them the same.
(Doing what is known)
When you start with a debt there's one way out,
f' it.
let what cannot be sufficiently earned,
like a slave buying their freedom where it's yet legal for a person to own another person -
let those exacting debt
owe it if they choose.
Love is God.
Some follow theirs,
offering animals, plants, even themselves
upon their coals,
requiring paying
for what already is.
Love earned
is love morphed.
I like this four letter word.

'Your Eyes speak'             timothyrgates, 3/24/2016
molten refuse,
giving the day's hell
space.
then, I see you.
I remember,
whether a God, or not,
one thing I know:
your deep eyes speak,
I believe in you.
now I can take that s'
and plant a garden.

#2 of reposts. No matter the feeling, being free to admit, affirm, and own them without equivocation is not so simple for some.This begins freedom from their control.Bigotry from others, yet from yourself being worse,from all spheres, screw such attempts at enslavement.I am glad the prisms I am given.
'tears in your bottle' (prose poem) timothy r gates, 2/27/2012

I awoke this morning in my drenched bed, soaked by tears of the night,
not knowing whether they were mine or those of the angels glad they no longer needed
to keep watch.

Dreams are a funny thing, sometimes so fanciful that you have no need to have them informed, yet other times more real than real. Surreal. I have no need this morning to know which are more true. Or, if either are.

Memory's streams, reinterpretations times a quantum equation, our own stories
weaving the myth of our linage back to the Garden's crossroads of the Tigris and Euphrates.

I pray that my intoxication with the tributaries of the Mississippi's allegorical run of north to south knows its way, facing from the west to the eastern sun.

Children open both sorrow's tombs and joy's forgotten genesis, allowing lazy feet to dance, skip, and yes, swirl. Here I find the leaves waltzing with the breeze more real than another's story.

Thoughts are just that, thoughts, often a waste of otherwise well spent energy, looking for answers where there are none, yet not resting where there is room to sit.

I awoke this morning, Déjà vu or merely another night's walk with Jacob completed, only difference, my step not as pronounced with a limp. Or, a casual observer might say it is.

I pray, this apocalypse is as it should be, one part of any given day, “and the night and day was the first day.”

I chant, “You count my wanderings; you, put my tears into your bottle; are they
not in your book?”

Dreams are a funny thing, sometimes used as divination, other times they are only
dreams. And, a day is a day, nothing more or less, yet the only one that is. Ha! Dream.

#1 of reposts, freedom is partly found in this acknowledgement. People I count and thank to be friends affirm the same if themselves. Blessings namaste. 'I'm offended'      timothy r gates, 8/26/2012 (cutting through the bs, aagain
Lord have mercy:
when I think my shit doesn't stink,
sweet like baby shit,
ready to spew
yet you know diapers must be changed.
When I get angry
over another's attack on 'my' political
gal or guy,
as though she/he truly gives a shit.
When my creed, or yours,
is above ridicule -
honestly, what good is a deity
if they're not able to take it?
So you're offended,
thinking your opinion is transcendent beautification?
Maybe -
most likely just personal bullshit,
giving a feeling of in the clouds significance.
I am offended?
A Monk once offered to my complaint,
"When I think too highly of my own opinion."
Lord have mercy,
sufficient for me.
If this offends you,
maybe it's time to change a diaper.

Whatever,however you do, do not spend this day, I wish that you share your love with another--and my friends missing beloveds no longer in the time's space, it matters not the day other than you know you're not complaining and laughing together. Love is.  Enjoy, my friends. Thank you. Love. And, more.
'Holidays, yes varied'              timothyrgates,3/26/2016
Easter,
one tradition borrows from
another's tradition,
Pagans and Christians
Moons and red eggs
Empty tomb and Solstice dances.
Pascha, my tradition,
still uses two millennium old dating -
Passover's "never forget,"
four millennium before
another's A.D.,
Bread and Wine,
more than remembering.
Ramadan, months before,
seems near,
but nearer is Milad un Nabi (Muhammad's birthday)
Winter Solstice, Hanukkah,
and another December one -
Bodhi Day (yes, Buddah's 'enlightenment'),
and Nativity, or Advent.
Civil and Family holdays
days off work (less and less, every year, it seems),
government offfices, banks,
and many businesses closed,
opportunity for any tradition,
if just the tradition of being together
without a time clock.
children don't give a s',
fun is fun
celebrating is celebrating,
as long as our holidays kept
are not in the way of playing.
Holidays, yes varied,
hurrah for breathing.

'Broken'                        timothyrgates, 3/28/2016
You're gone.
They say you're in a better place.
Easy for them to say.
When losing a lover in time
Or, loved person to time
We ache, broken.
Our hearts break
Not a dissected body, soul
Our bones hurt,
Like when having the flu
Our bodies, our minds, our souls
Weep into nothing -
Not unlike when entwined,
Amorous intoxication, writhing
Lost to each other
Your breath, "Love."
Lover's lost in time
Loved person lost to time,
I smile.
Sometimes one tear joins in
Most times cheeks remain dry
(I laugh out loud, at some moments.
confusing anyone catching a glimpse.),
In awe
Celestial, terrestrial universes understand,
In a better place,
I smile.