Author: H.

The famous rock and roller sang,

You can’t always get what you want,

But do you really know what you want

Before you know what you can have?

 

A friend said, if you keep pointing fingers

You’ll eventually point at yourself.

Is he a savant, a philosopher disguised

As an ordinary man, a man whose

Ordinary mind turns up a nugget

Of truth, or is he a fraud, exciting

The gullible with pronouncements

So silken they’re sure to have once

Been sow’s ears.

 

You can get what you want

If you want nothing, or only a little.

A practical policy, though unpatriotic.

 

Didn’t somebody say, I want it all.

Is that person to be admired? Or pitied?

We’re cajoled into buying things we

Never imagined wanting, things we

Don’t need, things that will make our

Lives more difficult, although we won’t know it.

 

There’s the rub. What we want is knowledge,

The knowing that pricelessness is a concept

Of ridicule in the circles that may come near,

But will never open to let us step inside

And see everything we’ve always imagined

We wanted, everything that will allow us

To eagerly peer at reflections of ourselves,

To smile and say, And this is all.

 

 © Dennis Hathaway

 

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Empty spaces to be filled,

Shelf with books and art objects,

Drawer with socks and underwear,

Closet with shirts and pants,

Car trunk with shopping bags,

First aid kit, hiking gear.

 

But what of the hollow spaces

In the mind where facts echo,

Where opinions rattle like loose bearings,

And the light is so dim one has to grope

To find the way to the door.

 

 © Dennis Hathaway

 

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Standing at the window,

Watching the wind in the trees,

Overcome with sadness and remorse

For all that is gone and will never be.

A parent, a friend, an old car,

Money scattered like the brittle leaves

That flutter away in a sudden gust,

Then fall in a just as sudden calm.

They will skitter across the sidewalk

And into the boisterous street

Where a car speeds in one direction,

And a car going even faster

Speeds in the other. To where?

And why such urgency,

When the brittle crunch beneath the tires

Will fade with the swelling warmth,

And buds will appear on the branches,

And when no one is watching,

Unfurl into leaves, dark or bright,

Slender or broad, ready to dance

In a freshly awakened breeze.

 

 © Dennis Hathaway

 

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There are heroes unknown to those

Who worship the celebrities smiling

Or frowning, as the case may be,

At the supermarket checkout counters,

On TV talk programs, on billboards

That implore us to buy a product,

See a movie, take a trip to an exotic place,

Somewhere we can forget what we are

In the bigger scheme of things.

 

The woman who brings the mail,

In the heat, the cold, the rain, the Santa Ana

Winds that carry the desert’s dessicated breath

All the way to the inexorably rising sea,

Knowing that her motley bestowal

Will go, almost immediately, to the reclycling bin.

And yet she always smiles, says Hello,

How’re you doing? I knew her name once,

But now it’s gone, buried with other facts

In a hidden corner of the brain that rusts,

Not of disuse or neglect, but from an oversupply

Of information, most of it worthless,

Mistakenly allowed to collect in the belief

That it mattered. That vast knowledge would

Be the mark of heroism, when in fact that elusive

State of being arises not from anything grandiose,

But small, diligent, infinitely repeated acts

Of good will. Like smiling and saying Hello

When trudging the same drab street every day,

Bringing the unwanted mail.

 

 © Dennis Hathaway

 

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What is a home?

Floor and walls,

Ceiling and roof,

Doors to walk

In and out of,

Windows to let

In light and air.

Lamps that come on

When you flick a switch,

Water that pours out,

When you turn a faucet.

Heat that drives away the cold

Of winter days.

 

Or is it a place

In the head and heart?

A place where comfort

Is not a matter of

Light and water and heat

But of all the moments

Shared with the ones

You love, the memories

Of bodies entwined,

Of kindness given

And received,

Of the knowledge

That in an inconstant world,

There is something

That will never change.

 

 © Dennis Hathaway

 

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