​​It's taken more years than I care to count, but I can now see that one of our biggest human failings is most certainly that we've allowed ourselves to decipher worth based upon the recognition of difference between species.

I can't however seem to fathom how much better off we would be if such alienation didn't exist.

What might we be if I meant as much to you as you do?

Would it be for better or worse if the well-being of a dog, a bird, an insect held the same regard as our own?

I think it would be for the better, and I think if this practice of loving even that which we find most different from ourselves were taught to our young rather the teachings that have brought us to where we are now, that a very near generation might find that love as a default serves much better than a division among animals and come even sooner to the realization that loves opposite is only required when love is allowed an absence.

​This, my own eulogy, is another post that will change with time.

​As the calligraphy that curls and swirls to paint the pages of our days flows from shade to shade and through the soft and elegant strokes of a poet to those of a madman's pressing pen shredding the dancing days swept like pages through the storybook that was David, I'll change the way I'd like my final words to come out.

​Whether he was to you a hero or a villain, a brother in arms or a bitter enemy, friend or foe, know that David cherished above all things being part of your story and the fact that you helped to write his.

David's first life lesson was love. He learned to love before he could speak or walk.

He learned how to love from his mother, a lady that loved everyone and everything she came into contact with. A lady that also forever emblazoned the definition of human and super hero in his mind as the type of person he wanted to one day become. She gave him his bearing, but the rest of the world would dictate his course.

He learned who to love from a collection of old Pinups that his grandpa had stashed in a cigar box in the shed.

He learned what to love from an old truck that sat in his grandmother's driveway, rich with the smell of hunting trips, gunpowder, and the occasional cigarette puffed in sneaky haste.

David loved his wife for more reasons than he could ever count, but mostly for always playing the softer, kinder, and caring side to his untamed, harsh, and undisciplined ways. Brenda was to him, more than a friend, more than a lover, and more than his wife. David looked to her as superhuman, and as an embodiment of everything that he would never be good enough to become. She grew more beautiful to him with each passing day, and to call her the love of his life would be a tremendous understatement.

​Most men will never know the force that drives them to be better, David held hands with his motivation every single day. Brenda weathered his childlike antics and embraced his flaws. It was her that defined his purpose, it was her alone from which David ever felt a constant where departure had played a starring role in the majority of his life. He owes her more than words or gifts can ever repay, and he reveled in every single moment that with her he could share a smile.

He loved his children for their promise of doing things better than he had. He cherished the days that became years and one by one took them away from home. He measured their success not in dollars, but in their individual ability to love. His sons and daughters inked into him were gifts that he would show to the world at any opportunity. Most spend their days with the hopes of saying "look at what I have". David, through his children was proud to say, "Look at what I've left".

He loved his motorcycle for the fact that she shined even when the days were grey and stormy. He loved Guitars and Old Trucks because they spoke to a soul that he believed in his heart was born too late.

He loved sunsets, the ocean, and the warmth of the tropics because they marked, for him, a recognition of a time in her life when his mother was finally content.

He always had a place in his heart for the small and humble things that nature would show to him. His words, "We are one on this trip through the stars" was his small way of letting his guard down and embracing one small soul at a time, all of the things that walk this planet of ours.

He was a servant to those that he loved, his passion was their happiness, and it was bottomless.

As our glasses are raised, a final toast to the energy that each of us knew... cheers.

For as long as I can recall, my aunt Toni has been different from anyone else in my life.

Her differences to me though were not physical, and not mental.

​To me, her differences were human... as she was much more than most.
Imagine loving without the fear of rejection

Imagine loving so purely that you never had to comprehend love's opposite

Imagine living each and every day with family and friends at the front of your mind rather than yourself

Imagine the desire to greet everyone that you met with a smile, a touch, a long embrace and a kiss

Toni didn't have to imagine, because her love for life and those that she knew was above everything, very different.

As we lay Toni to rest, I can't help but finally recognize how dramatically different she was from the rest of us, and how beautifully different we all might one day be for having known her.

Goodbye Aunt Toni, and thank you for every single hug, kiss, and glance away from normal that you ever shared with me.

​Burke

​Its been a decade mom...

Ten years to live this down

Ten years to forget the hurt and the loss

Ten years to let go and live

Ten years to learn from the legacy that you left

But mom, I've wasted my days. I've lost sight of what it means to do this well. I look into the mirror at an aging face and wonder if our ends will be the same. I fight with demons that my heart and soul blame for your leaving. I curse and kick at the walls of belief that will forever keep me out

What originally felt like the quick snuffing of your candle has proven to be a slow dimming of the light that you shared with all of us

I'll get through, I'll find your fire again… you raised me better than this.

Sometimes though, I slip… I find darkness a bit softer than realities harsh light…

I just miss you mom… still… always & forever

Strange to feel trepidation in penning a thought to my daughters. Stranger still to realize that the times dictate our fears, and bind what should flow naturally from parent to child.

I'll scream it louder than the norm might shout and not fear society's scowl in doing so.

To the most amazing young women I've ever had the honor of knowing, my daughters, a thought that I trust you'll consider, and hopefully hold close.

"Your naked body should belong only to those who have fallen in love with your naked soul."

Live unencumbered my angels, and chase passionately every single thing that steals the attention of your heart.

I am not one to post political crap or even feign interest in the constant flow of excrement that spills from my TV, phone, etc... but the past couple days I've been stuck on this "where are we" and "how far have we come" couple of thoughts...

We are paying interest to banks to dwell in the buildings and homes that we built. We are paying interest to banks to drive the cars and trucks that we built.

We are being shown 60 second commercials advertising drugs that will kill us and that represent a 19:1 ratio (advertising : R&D) at the hands of Pharmaceutical companies while simple (but not profitable drugs like the Flu and Polio vaccines remain in short supply because they dont represent a massive profit margin).

We are tolerating a government that is so incredibly massive, that it has the staff, the funding, and the time to govern vegetation (marijuana, psychedelics) and restrict what grown human beings can and cannot do to or for themselves, while this same government advocates and even promotes the sale of controlled, chemical substances to the tune of prescriptions equaling 64 pills per day per every single American citizen.

We pay monthly subscriptions to watch a little box in our living room that tells us not what we need to know, but what we want to know (eg-not breakthroughs in science or exploration, but which red idiot said what to which blue idiot).

We pay to watch billionaires play a game on Sundays while our soldiers, police officers, firefighters and teachers are eligible for welfare.

We pay a percentage of our wages to an unknown pool that gets spent on who knows what, and then we pay more for the same year after year.

We cast a popularity contest to see which liar we should follow for the next four years.

We listen to millionaires puke insults on the radio about the color of each others skin, and we pretend that its okay.

Then, in all of this we pick sides rather than siding with one another and asking WTF? We all see these things and a million more like them... we all know it's wrong... but what will we do tomorrow? Same fucking thing because the rest of the flock hasn't shifted directions yet...

​Like a child before Christmas, I’ll lay awake and wonder about what I might find in the morning...

Will I wake up alone at the end of a dream, or will this wonderful slumber continue?

Will I find you again when I open my eyes, or will the sandman have broken his beautiful spell?

Are the memories and beauty that you’ve shown me just wishes come true in some dust land fairytale? Or are you really there, and still playing captor to this old heart of mine?

If my dream is over, then I’ll forever cherish the beauty and magic that I’ve seen... that you’ve shown, that you’ve shared...

But if this dream is to continue... if I find you wrapped in these arms when the sunshine kisses the sky, if your smile and starry eyes are still the first things to illuminate our morning, and if you’d care to hold my hand for another trip through the stars...

Then I’ll smile and find content, lost in the beautiful dream that you’ve made for me.

we are born into this...
no... we have brought ourselves into this...
no... we were planned and placed into this...
no... we find ourselves here...

right here

we find ourselves bound to a day to day where breath matters not until its our last
we dedicate lifetimes to the gain of others
we strangle passion and desire while profit and demand are resuscitated
we profess ourselves above beings thriving in the same sunlight
we measure ourselves and eachother against the schemes of credit and debt
we disagree with our predicament, but find comfort amongst the flock
we mute the raging mind that chokes on its own disbelief in our quiet hours

right now

I'll say what I feel
I'll love uncontrollably these creatures that share this trip through the stars with me
I'll stop only when I can't go on
I'll follow only when my heart can no longer lead
I'll live before I die... I'll live.

​Sad that for his entire life, Rafiki knew nothing but a cage. We all wake up to this single, wonderful opportunity to chase dreams, love and emotion on this quick trip through the stars.

Somewhere along the way, we've tripped and twisted in our purpose. We're limping now through this entanglement of ideology set forth for us by those that we can't seem to stop following, feeding. Someone set a precedence and someone accepted it and someone taught it to another that chose to accept rather than question.

​Set another precedent. Someone ask why. Someone stomp and shout against the norm. Someone bash and beat what we've become until we become something new. Why do we default to hurting when we are capable of healing?

My rights as an animal are no different than Rafiki's, no different than the unnamed, untamed that still live by instinct alone.

My heart breaks at the thought of a cage for such a beautiful creature. R.I.P. big brother.