its summer in winter
85 degrees today
a record
i loved every bit of it
it was daddy day
the ocean didn't feel so cold
jad played with his cars in the sand
alone for a minute
as i relaxed for the first time
determined to allow him to be upset
we both did ok
coming to settlement
meant walking away from money
but leaving the birth home
meant all the possessions inside
were meaningless
none of it
could ever make a child
emotionally whole again
divorce changes everything
your entire life plan
career, work, vacation, travel
visiting friends and relatives
your outlook is very different
as a member of an intact family
but as a non-primary parent
with a few court-assigned hours
time with your children
is more precious
normal activities
feel abnormal
without your child
one gets so attached to things
bought from around the world
carted from place to place
for decades
books of favorite poets
writers
activists
it all gathered dust
in martial bondage
a thousand books
without a second to read
with the chains now broken
i have no need for possessions
i can live life
and write books
whatever i possess
is worthless
compared to that which
i cannot possess
a leaf
flower
the beach
whenever i show up at the house
to pickup my child
boxes of my stuff are placed outside
she is always surprised
when i refuse to take anything
possessions for them
and this world
is the reason for living
but rarely used clothes and books
are better off donated
to others who might find them useful
the marital bond
was a material one
the more it had
the more it wanted
there was never enough
it was doomed to fail
it was gibran who said
the most pitiful among men
is he who turns his dreams
into silver and gold
a father dreams
of being a friend
to a boy he hardly knows
who hates him
for being so miserable
and alone
of raising a child
to care for the earth
in a world mad with possessions
“The love of money as a possession
- as distinguished from the love of money
as a means to the enjoyments and realities of life
- will be recognized for what it is,
a somewhat disgusting morbidity,
one of those semi-criminal,
semi-pathological propensities
which one hands over with a shudder
to the specialists in mental disease."
John Maynard Keynes quotes (English economist, journalist, and financier, 1883-1946)
