Advice, Culture, Emotions, Happiness, Human Nature, Life, Living, Love, Lovers, Passion, Poetry, Relationships

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel: The World Only Wants You to Feel Good

Paul Sunstone

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel

“Never love anyone who treats you like you’re ordinary.” ― Oscar Wilde

(About a 3 minute read)

Nine of every twelve truths
The world tells you about love are false.

The world is not trying to harm you,
That’s not the problem.

The world is only trying to make you feel good.

The world tells you love is cute.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world tells you love is soft.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world tells you love has no thorns.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world tells you how to love.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world points your feet down a road.
It tells you down that road you’ll find love.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world tells you to look at your feelings.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world tells you to look at what she means to you.
It only wants you to feel good.

The world tells you to look at what he means to you.
It only wants you to feel good.

My friend, if you want to love someone,
Look away from the smoke and to the fire.
Look away from how you feel and look at them.
Look away from what they mean and look at them.

Forget how you feel. Your feelings will be there anyway.
Treat your feelings like a hardy weed you don’t need to garden.
Focus on your feelings when you want to navel-gaze.
But don’t focus on your feelings and call it love.
That’s like calling the smoke the fire.
Don’t call that love, don’t fool yourself.

You tell her she’s the one.
But you treat her just like you treat one hundred other women.

You tell him he’s the one.
But you treat him just like you treat one hundred other men.

Who have you been looking at?

The world tells you to look at you.
Do you really think that helps you better see your beloved?

I see the sparrow singing in the hedge.
Do I see it any better by looking at my feelings?
I see the sparrow singing in the hedge.
Do I see it any better by looking at what it means to me?
I see the sparrow singing in the hedge.
Do I see it any better by looking at me?

People so often close their hearts
Just when they think they have learned to open them.
The world tells them which way to swing the door.
The world only wants them to feel good.

If you really want to love someone,
If you really care to love,
Don’t rest your gaze upon your navel,
Turn your gaze to them instead.

You can know everything there is to know
About your feelings.

You can know everything there is to know
About what someone means to you.

You can know all of that, and even more,
Without knowing a thing about the one you love.

You can know all of that, and even more,
While you’re leaving your beloved
And heading off down the road.

Art, Authenticity, Being True To Yourself, Community, Courage, Death, Dying, Hate, Honesty, Human Nature, Humor, Life, Living, People, Poetry, Quality of Life, Relationships, Self, Self Identity, Self Image, Society, Values, Whining, Wisdom

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel: The Bitch Next Door

Paul Sunstone

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel

“I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.” — D. H. Lawrence

(About a 19 minute read)

A strong woman with a singular passion in life
Once consented to become my neighbor.

Her spirit ran as simple and deep as a law of nature.
It was elegant in its simplicity, but ruling in its scope.

She was younger than me,
Younger than about half of us folks,
But she held herself truer,
Truer than most everyone does,
To her passion in life,
Her singular and sole passion in life,
Her one guiding star.

She loved and adored,
She cherished and adored,
She passionately adored,
Being a bitch.
Continue reading “A Flock of Sparrows for Majel: The Bitch Next Door” →

Abuse, Agape, Alienation, Alienation From Self, Alison, Attachment, Authenticity, Being True To Yourself, Christianity, Evil, Happiness, Hope, Human Nature, Jana, Knowledge, Learning, Life, Living, Love, Lovers, Oppression, People, Poetry, Quality of Life, Relationships, Spiritual Alienation, Spirituality, Unconditional Love

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel: The Tragedy of Fool’s Gold

Paul Sunstone

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel

(About an 8 minute read)

Jana was nearby,
For a decade, always nearby.
But I was not close to her.

She became my wife
And we shared a house.
We shared a bed.
We shared our bodies,
And we told each other
We shared our hearts and minds.

In truth, she was that spot on my back
That I never could see,
And that I never could reach
No matter how often,
And no matter how hard
I stared into the mirror,
And turning this way or that,
Tried to spot her.

Continue reading “A Flock of Sparrows for Majel: The Tragedy of Fool’s Gold” →

Human Nature, Life, Living, Love, New Love, People, Poetry, Romantic Love, Terri

A Flock Sparrows for Majel: “When We Pivoted on Our Egos”

Paul Sunstone

A Flock of Sparrows for Majel

(About an 8 minute read)

Do you remember now
That long ago dewy night
When we dissolved our proud walls in the Milky Way?
We were surprised to discover our hearts were twins.
And we began purring together like two cats cuddling.

We were strong and confident and nineteen.
We had returned for the summer from our universities,
And we lay, face to face, and eyes to eyes
On the hill behind your mother’s home.

Continue reading “A Flock Sparrows for Majel: “When We Pivoted on Our Egos”” →

Art, Nudes, Paintings, Visual Arts

The Dancer

Paul Sunstone
The Dancer Winter 2019 350x703
The Dancer. 8 x 16 Acrylic on canvas (2019)

The is the first nude I’ve painted.  I did a lot of figure drawing some years ago, but I’ve had no interest in painting nudes until now.  For some reason, I found it was hard for me to figure out how I wanted to paint her.  There are about seven trial coats of paint on her — beneath what you see!

Like so many young women these days, the model told me she has serious issues with the appearance of her body.  Consequently, I think it was a bit brave of her to suggest I do a nude of her.

That also made it especially gratifying when she saw the painting and told me she thought it was attractive enough to help her with body-image issues.  In fact, I was so happy to hear her say that, I totally forgot to seize the opportunity in order to suggest she pay me a fee for having painted her.  What a horrid mistake!

I thought while I was painting this it might not only be my first, but also my last nude — given how hard it was for me to get what I wanted.  But since completing it, two more people — one man, one woman — have suggested I paint nudes of them, so now I’m beginning to wonder if this might be my new profession.

What makes it so odd to me is I typically do portraits and I practically have to beg people to pose for me.  But — and this is counter-intuitive to me — it seems at first glance that it’s easier these days to get volunteers for nudes than for portraits. What on earth?  I feel so old now!  So outdated!

Free Spirit, People, Poetry, Terese, Teresums

What a Fool!

Paul Sunstone

(About a 1 minute read)

What a fool!
I mean you, of course.
You who never believe me,

Never believe me,

When I tell you —
Just as honest as a baby’s butt —
That your spirit is a shining silver ribbon
Woven from songs and stretched between stars,
And consequently, you happen to be beautiful,
You never believe me!

But why is that?
Just why is that?
Do you think I make this stuff up?
What a fool!

I look. I see. I report what I see.
You’re a silver ribbon made from song.
Accept it, you donk. It’s the truth!
The truth dressed up incognito.

Look, we’ve been friends now for what?
Three years? Four if you count
The wear and tear you’ve inflicted on me.
And in all that time
Have I even once told you a falsehood
(Excepting only those times that I have)?

So why don’t you ever believe me
When I tell you you’re
One of the most beautiful and graceful
Free-spirits I’ve ever known?

Sure you have flaws.
Everyone has flaws.
Everyone is not me, for instance,
And so everyone has at least one flaw, am I right?

Your flaw is you lack faith,
The faith to believe me
When I say you have wings and can fly.
What a fool!

Have I ever told you
What a pleasure it is
To know someone who is
Beautiful and graceful,
Kind and loyal,
Fun and funny,
Non-judgemental and accepting,
Free-spirited and loving?

But enough about me.
You’re a lot of those things yourself!

Abuse, Alienation, Alienation From Self, Art, Life, Marysa, Outstanding Bloggers, People, Poetry, Writing

To a Young Artist — Take Care of Yourself

Paul Sunstone

(About a 3 minute read)

The snow came today and the cold,
The cold came with it so hard
It cut through the walls of my cottage.

But nothing today came colder
Than the news someone once
Had laid you on a white table
And under harsh and glaring lights
Stole your insides with a scalpel
To leave you only with your skin.

I am not a stranger to such things.

I have seen in my life how a man,
A man who can walk into a fire
And live to walk out again,
Can someday be taken up by a tornado
And without reason spun so hard his very self —
Everything that he is — is flung from him,
Cast by the winds so far away
That the man must travel decades
To find a few pieces of who he is again.

And I have seen how a woman
Whose spirit is light and tender,
Whose smile is a warm sun,
And whose laughter is a light breeze across flowers,
Can without warning or reason or mercy
Have molten lead poured into her,
Poured down into her to settle and freeze in her heart
By the man who professes to love her.

By the man
Who professes
To love her.

I am not a stranger to such things.
I am not shocked by the news today.
I did not cry for you when I heard
Of the table or the lights or the scalpel.

I did not cry for you
When I heard once again of the monsters among us —
Of what they had worked upon someone —
And I do not yet know you well enough
To mourn true and honest
Your pain, and your suffering, and your alienation:
I’d be BSing you if I said I could.

But you told your story
With such power and grace,
You told it with such insight
And with such understanding,

That you grabbed my guts
You chilled my blood,
You made the thought of you being abused
Rush through my mind like the broken ice
That crashes down a mountain stream
In the winter.

You can turn words on a lathe, my friend,
Turn them with precision and grace.
You can craft them
Into real and solid things
That punch with images,
Meanings, truths, and insights —
That punch.

There’s something great in you,
A seed at least.
I see it.
Do you?

If not for yourself,
Then for the sake of others,
Take care of yourself:
The world is better
That you’re in it.
Take care of yourself.