Regretfully, the Empty Mind album never came to fruition, but I think the lyrics still carry a resonant power that the album would have thrived on.
So Young
(never recorded)
I look into a mirror, wipe the dust away,
find the stranger staring back at me.
It scares me to think what I have become
So young...
I face another day, wipe the tears away.
Clear my head of the fog of my dreams.
It hurts me to think this is all there is
for me...
My fears convince me all hope is gone.
My lies will tell me there may be one
relief for all the pain that hides inside.
Escaping from the world I know,
denying what my face will show,
resisting the pressure to decide.
I wait for resolution, fearing an end.
See the results of my indecision.
It helps me to compromise
my pride...
My fears convince me all hope is gone.
My lies will tell me there may be one
relief for all the pain that hides inside.
Escaping from the world I know,
denying what my face will show,
resisting the pressure to decide.
The Light
(never recorded)
A calm never before experienced.
A peace I've never known.
A comforting warmth inside
All I see smiles back at me.
My clouds have been swept aside.
I drift into a quiet sleep
Unbroken till the day.
The sun no longer blinds me.
I embrace the light today.
All that has gone, all that has passed
means little to me now.
All I care about is how
to keep this feeling alive.
Is it I who have given her
the blackness that once filled me?
Or she who has given me
the light that fills me now?
Her smile has created mine.
Her eyes, their eternal shine.
Her gaze forgiving me
for wasting so much time.
Complete
(never recorded)
I gaze into the eyes of a child:
Innocence and wonder,
a world of possibilities
floating in a pool of blue.
Two-dimensional reality:
all she sees is true.
I hear the voice of the woman
who has taken my name:
love and understanding,
grace and self-control.
Tells me where she'll be standing
as the years come and go.
And I realize what I've been missing.
I heard the cries, but I wasn't listening.
The clouds roll in, but their lining's glistening,
and I have never felt more complete.
I see things from a new perspective:
living and hopeful.
Absence of pain.
I cannot measure what is left to gain.
And I realize what I've been missing.
I heard the cries, but I wasn't listening.
The clouds roll in, but their lining's glistening,
and I have never felt more complete.
Aftermath
(never recorded)
A flash of light, the shriek of tires,
the world spins slowly in a ball of fire.
This fragile existence I dared to prize
is stolen right before my eyes.
How did I dare to compromise?
This life I've known
for too short a time
has broken every wall I've built.
And the cruelest joke
time plays on us all
smiles behind eyes that are still.
A world apart, a different time,
the days disappear in the mist behind.
Those broken dreams I dare to recall
Are nightmares with no form at all
that build an even greater wall.
They cry “move on!”
with worried stare
but no underlying pain.
They try to fill
this empty heart,
and reach a mind that is sane.
Do they see what life has done to me?
Do they feel the irony of its thievery?
Do they realize my meaning died
with the beauty I left behind?
Do they feel, do they care at all?
Do they wonder what it's like to fall
so deep in love and deeper in pain
from the surface I may never find?
At the lowest point of a bottomless pit
Deep in thought, alone I sit.
This life's joy in untimely ends,
its bitter irony, now sends
a thought so hard to comprehend.
But as I sit alone and cry
and struggle to finally answer “WHY?”
this thought, unbidden, is all I find
telling me the world rejects my kind -
every dream I've dared design,
every wish I've kept confined,
every thought that filled my mind
destroyed in one foul moment of time
leaving just this empty mind.
Empty Mind
(from Buffalo Fuel, reprinted by permission)
A few steps and stops,
looks around to see who watches,
shakes his fist at the night.
People cross the street and pass on the right.
Brushes his filthy pants,
wipes his dirty face with his dirty hands.
Smiles to himself
An empty mind, it's the perfect disguise.
It hides him from the world.
And he don't mind what they think of his kind,
'cause he's got nothing to lose.
Wasn't always this way.
He still looks back, remembers the day
when his whole world fell.
Closes his eyes, he's got nothing to tell.
Looking for something to eat:
half-eaten piece of bread at his feet.
Smiles as he chews.
An empty mind, it's the perfect disguise.
It hides him from the world.
And he don't mind what they think of his kind,
'cause he's got nothing to lose.
Cool air tonight,
newspaper makes it alright.
Thoughts drift away,
he made it through another day.
Tomorrow's near,
but inside he doesn't care.
Smiles as he sleeps.
Section Three:
Family Verse
Since my days with Random Sample, I have been admittedly less prolific in my poetry. I have been focusing on other writing efforts, including a completed novel (working again with my guitarist and creative muse, Dave Ruzzo) several short stories, articles, copywriting and ghostwriting assignments.
But, I have managed to complete a handful of poems that I feel are worth saving and sharing. They range in tone and subject matter, and help distill an idea of where I am these days emotionally.
I think the overall picture is more stable than it was fourteen years ago when the oldest poem in this collection was written, but some of those old fears are still present and accounted for.
But isn't that really the human experience? Aren't we all just struggling in different ways with the same basic problems and fears over and over again?
And isn't that why we come to poetry? To allow the poet's unique view on a universal truth or feeling to further illuminate our own?
I know that, consciously or unconsciously, that is why I write poetry, and why I continue to find it to be the truest of all the forms of writ
ing I engage in. No matter how hard I try, I will never be able to match with prose the pure-hearted justice of words that shed light on ideas as I do in verse.
I hope you enjoyed this purge from fourteen years of sweat and tear-soaked creativity.
-- Justin P Lambert
Afternoon Nap
Quiet light filtering in
through lace-capped panes of glass
A puddle spilling silently
across hardwood floor boards
A tiny hand making shadow puppets,
graceful arm swan-necked, quacking
Dust spinning in whirlpools of invisible
currents, mottling the pond
That was not there.
My daughter smiles with sleepy eyes
as her hand mouths the sounds
A floating menagerie
in light and shadow
Her dreams beginning early
as her body battles the darkness
Unbroken animals call filling the space
between waking and sleep,
As daylight fades.
Dust ebbs and flows around
a perfect arm floating south
Her eyes slowly draw the blinds
on what is left of daylight
And her dreams continue behind
closed eyes, mind drifting
On that invisible pond, swan pulling
her further below the surface
And she sleeps.
As My Wife Reads the Reader's Digest Aloud
She reads of teachers, incompetent, racist,
Paid for years by tax payers’ money,
Unwilling, unable to teach for their own
Empty heads and hearts.
She laughs that sad laugh, knowing our children
Will soon enough Feel the icy
showered baptism of man’s schooling,
Not knowledge, facts.
She reads of signs, slaughtered English,
Printed reasons for foreign views
Of America the Beautiful,
The tired, the poor, the nescient.
She sits quiet as the magazine
Mellows in to a less chaotic thought train,
Its passions subdued behind higher word count,
Meanings filtered, stretched
And I filter my own written words
Through years of life unlived,
Days of hours lost, of minutes squandered,
And wish only to crystallize the sound
Of thoughts shooting through fingertips
To keys then to cursor, then back again,
To linger a quiet moment inside
Empty heads and hearts.
The August Air Cooling Too Early
Lazy breezes shift the leaves
Their softer bottom side reflecting
Sunlight dripping through thinning trees
Autumn falls upon us too early every year
We step outside with shorts and t-shirts,
Skin goose-fleshed by cool exhalations
Of October in August
The midday siesta abandoned
I came home today
The product of a canceled appointment
A postponed punishment
Seeking the solace of a patio fire
But as the flames died,
Their faltering embers smoking a dense fog,
The August air punished me again
For insolence and solitude revisited.
Elixir
Should I confine
In drops of time
The gifts received and undeserved
It would, I think
Comprise a drink
To quench the fiercest thirst
To satiate
And fill the plate
Of the most insatiable appetites
To gently sting
And spread my wings
To lift on borrowed wind, to flight
May I recall
Before I fall
The liquid that bubbled life
And heartily share
That blessed snare
The devoted warden formed, my wife
I Have Struggled
I have struggled
I have broken the back of my flaw
I have realized the need
I have ignored the reality
I have opened the door to what is left
I have never been so afraid in my life of something I can not understand or explain
I will thrive
I will continue to absorb the energy
I will open my mind
I will close my eyes
I will hope for the best in the worst
I will never require more than my own best efforts can give me and I am sorry
Can you love?
Can you forgive and forget?
Can you remember the feeling?
Can you cherish the thought?
Can you keep me in your heart forever?
Can you ever forgive this empty hole I have left in your expectations?
I have struggled
I will continue to remember
Can you cherish the memory?
I have ignored your feelings
I will hope for a resolution in calm
Can you respect a man who has done his best
to put the past behind him?
Loud Inside
Leave me alone with my thoughts
For a moment, no more
Lest I begin to believe all the messages
Caught behind my mind’s door
Whisperings in languages
I wish I did not understand,
Screaming obscenities and frozen silences
Washing through time’s dripping sand.
Making me believe the unbelievable
Forcing me to see the invisible
Helping me develop a healthy loathing
For the one who is responsible.
So leave me alone to work this out
But rescue me before I breathe
Or you may never hear my answer,
Drowned by the darkness beneath.
Thank you so much for downloading “Sanity is Boring!”
If you'd like a second book for free, simply come to my website and let me know:
https://justinplambert.wordpress.com/free-book
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