There are times that I truly miss driving through the deserts of the American West.  I learned and saw and lived a lot there.

Desert Skies
by Michael Romani

Life for all its anguish is ours
It belongs to no other
We can spend it in the sunshine
Or, we can spend it in bars
Always seeking the company of one another
Always risking all in calling another mine

Love, or, so it nearly always seems
Cannot be taken but only given
Given as it can be not as it should be
Love, is the substance of dreams
Belonging to those who forgiven and are forgiven
In whatever sort of eventuality

So much of life looking like almost nothing
Until we dare to look ever closer
Recognizing the patterns of life's story
These are the things that cause us to sing
Never surrendering, always bending until "No sir"
We are then unwilling to budge from its glory

To the untrained, half blind eye
Desert country is built on skeletons
Sometimes it even seems completely empty
Out there under the painted desert sky
But, there is teeming life to all but the simpletons
Who choose to see only what they will see

To many assuming to have it all sorted out
Too few really holding anything close to a clue
So many searching only for answers they want
Like a long black train filled with no doubt
Certain of their track as the only track to do
With only a handful of us certain this dog won't hunt

There are those few with truly opened eyes
Who those others call artists and dreamers
Daring to truly see and live our dreams
Out underneath the expanse of open desert skies
Having had enough of egoists, conmen and schemers
Let us learn to recognize and live beyond the painted seams.

(c) February 28, 2019   Michael Romani
All Rights Reserved