The Silent Windstorm

20 minutes of writing in the coffee shop ... the first writing I have done in a long time.

Why can't you see that you are lost
in the quiet windstorm of our age.
These are the dust bowl days,
but the wind blows so powerlessly,
so odorless and flavorless,
that it sneaks in past your coat,
or convinces you to go without one
and it it seeps into your pores
A toxin inside your body.

Your mind finds a new center,
All outward attention dilates with new focus
On a very surface level
this new center is simply yourself.
What used to be the wonder of the great outside,
what used to be a magnificant world of the great "Others"
Subtly shifts to the world of "providers" or "products" or "rivals"
The world shrinks as our need shifts
What used to be seen and understood and lauded,
Is now only stolen, consumed and destroyed.

But again, this is only the surface,
This is the initial stage of the sickness
The first happenings of this nothing poison
blowing into our soul.

There is another level of realization:
All of these demanding needs
at the very least the form they take
while born in your body,
born in your heart
were planted from the outside.

There is a larger business at work
These "needs" are imports,
and there is a sickening sameness about them.
Creativity is hardly allowed
for someone full of this empty wind.
Like the wash of a suburban commercial skyline
is our souls laid together shopping.

But we must recover, and quick.
I will wear an iron coat,
but what of my insides?
How to be cleansed and changed and saved?