White noise

I'm clawing back these roles

like the black crayon scribbled

over your rainbow- 

who's your picture of?  Not what.

The wax is cluttering the space 

beneath my fingernails

and I question- why there's no color here,

but the droning white of a living room

with nothing on the walls.

I can't teach you to hear the music 

I do when my eyes flutter, awake

to drink in the day- and feel it all.

To feel is the guide from here to there

in this life- to live in the sound

and the guts and heartstrings

of your internal orchestra

and not in the white noise

of what you're made out to be.

You are not what you do, but who you are.  You define your roles; your roles do not define you.  If you live a life consistent with your feelings and gut, and stay honest with that moment-to-moment-to-moment, your life will be true to you- and unforced and uncomplicated.  Only when you don't listen to that and you allow what you do to be bigger than who you are- you lose yourself.  And only if you allow the way you think you should be to stifle the voice of who you actually are- you lose yourself.  Learning to listen is the hardest part of life- learning to listen to yourself means facing the uglies, taking responsibility, and learning to be vulnerable, but it is the only way to turn the white noise, the dull buzz in the background of a life, into sound you can move to and believe in.  And live in, fully.