PDF

Sparrow


by Darryl Price


I don't care what my reincarnated 
self thinks about today. I'm already 
aware that everything stinks in the end. 
Well. It's supposed to. But all things must seek 
travel while they can. Dance while they can. Dream 
while they can. Laugh while they can. Nothing fair 
remains the same or it solidifies
 
where it steps and simply falls apart. Yet 
everything is still here. In some new form. 
People make religions out of this shit. 
I just don't know. If you were the one and 
only Cleopatra in another 
lifetime, you haven't learned anything else 
from it. I bet she wishes she were you. 

The grass is always greener in someone 
else's innocent stare. But don't look too 
deeply. You'll only see the same sad lines 
looking knowingly back at you. They just 
want you to believe in something so you 
won't feel so alone when you get lonely. 
There's your cosmic mystery. How can you 

be that alone when you are constantly 
being surrounded by all this life? You 
are still being born. That's the only thing 
that makes any sense. Not everything has 
to be where you find yourself on the path. 
That would become very boring very 
fast. And a boring parade's an insult 

to all intelligence, an unkind smear
on imagination. As a being 
with a soul, you have opportunity
to turn base metal into the light of
wisdom--Alchemy anyone? There
are as many ways as there are stars and there
is only one true way--and you are it.  



Bonus poems:



Love Was Here

by Darryl Price


Of that I am sure. It stood where I am 
standing now. Love was here. Just a little too late 
I suppose. Love was here. Did I do EVERYTHING wrong? 
Love was here. It happened so fast. Love was here. 
Don't be a cry baby, Love was here. But haven't 
we met so many times? Love was...ah? The Goddamned 
joyousness of it! Love was here. The sentry at the 
dry back of my throat must have fallen asleep again.
Love was here. Riding up and down my spine like 

a bolt of lightning on a rollercoaster. Love was here. 
It was the wind mocking the wind out of me. 
Love was here. Sniffing like a cat through a garden. 
Love was here. How did it find me? Love, all 
that is dangerous, was here. Love was here. What do 
you know of truth? Love was here. It showed no 
signs of abating, should you ask. Love was here. To 
kidnap all who lie naked and dare to whisper the 
impossible. Love was here. The perfect dream shape. The perfect 

sun and with the perfect moonlit shoes to go with 
the perfect stars above. Love was here. With fingers refusing 
to unbend from the steering wheel. Love was here. Saying, 
so glad you could make it, I was just thinking 
about you. Love was here. Don't you get what I 
mean? Love was here. I'm not saying sorry. Love was 
here, Darling, demanding as hell: sign here! I will. I 
will not. Yes, you will. Yes, of course. Yes. No. 
Love was waiting here. Why should I give in to
 
an angel, voice like a laughing snow, talking softly in 
her gentle way? Love was right here once. Hi. Hello.  
Help me. Help! Love was here. Should I come? Am 
I to be meeting a friend? May I leap into 
your arms, too? I'm going to wait and see. Love 
was here. It's a sad world. Love was here. I 
get tongue-tied. Love was here. If I could I'd lower 
my face into its fountain and sleep. Would you like 
to hear something funny? Don't you know me? Get in. 



The Sorrow

by Darryl Price


You feel it, too. That should be enough, 
but it's not. Just because you walked, ran, 
tripped, fell where you walked, you think you don't 
have to say anything that just might 
incriminate you to me. That's the 
cold kind of utter bullshit that makes

a good person feel lonely inside--
because then even you don't want to 
be hanging out with that dishonest 
of a person, even if it's you. 
Look, I wasn't trying to find you. 
I wasn't hiding from you either. 

I just happened to find you where I 
was standing once upon a time. It 
made me feel glad for the pain. You feel 
it. I know you do. I know you curse 
me for the fresh discovery of 
feeling. It's not my fault. I made my 

own way in the world's hungry grip and 
squeezed out alive and in one piece right 
there in front of you somehow. A sad
different tree in a same forest. 
A barely noticeable flower 
in a rolling field. A musty moth 

on the moonlit bark. An anxiously 
awakened lightning bug on the grass 
blade, about to rise like a twinkling 
star again. These are windy stories 
to tell, but they both end up with the 
two of us being together long 

enough to establish the fact. So 
now I am to be an incomplete 
song in this time and I know it like 
I know my own breath on the chill air
before me. You know it, too. All I
can do is leave you these words and smile. 




moon

by Darryl Price


I am the unremarkable moon, 
not the one that explodes and becomes your 
favorite playmate. That was just a joke 
some of us said when we thought the adults
 
were sleeping standing up. You've got to do 
something to improve the air quality 
of your life--before it is all sucked out 
by cars passing by on the highway a 

million miles away. The little thorn bush 
gleaming in a butterfly's eye can turn 
you easily to stone if you are not 
careful, and everything likes to be touched. 

Isn't that so damned funny? We deny 
ourselves the one small thing that would make us 
truly happy just because we messed up 
love the first time around, and probably 

every single time since, too. It makes no 
difference. Only liars cheat and so 
cheaters are not the only liars. The 
brazen schools are full of them. Look, we've all 

bought a dream, only to get home and, oops, 
realize it was a bag of air, Yes, 
pretty or not, the ghost sitting on a 
spooky log in the middle of the dark 

spooky woods expects you to come over
and have a seat. You might as well take your 
fright and burn it. You will be expected 
to dream walk. To look into the fire's head.

I didn't say it would be easy. I 
didn't say anything. You are the one
looking for a way out of here without
getting caught. I only came to watch you.
Endcap