The Day After

All is now a blur:
memories, reminiscences of
yesterday's festivities
are floating in some
feverish haze,
plenty of folks are struggling
to awaken from their long sleep.
Such is life when one chooses to
live it up on occasions like these.

It's time to face the new day.
Oh wait, we're struggling
to do just that.
And how did we manage
to find our way back home
after all this carousing?
How'd we make it this far?

Some of the best times
we had yesterday are also
some of the best times
we won't remember having
thanks be to one of our
trustworthy companions.
Later on,
when we get some pics up,
chances are we'll have
lots of good laughs,
just trying to make sense
of that wild & crazy afternoon
(& night)
we spent having
the time of our lives.

We survived; we made it
through every trial of fire
which the bottle
presented to us.
Now we've got to
endure the day after,
the awful hangovers
& everything else
in between.

And yet what fun we had,
what good times we shared
yesterday,
what carefree moments
we spent living the good life.
Tell me,
who would want to pass up
occasions like these, even now?

The Choreographer

Frame after frame the message
still remains as is, unchanged:
In still motion, history can still be recorded.
History can still be made
with each graceful move,
each marked step.


Against conventions, history
still finds ways to make itself felt
long after the camera
has stopped flashing,
long after the film
has been used up for good,
long after the pictures
have been committed to memory,
to scrapbook, to frame,
to the very hearts of you and me.


Life is a dance & today's events
provides the rhythms
for us to move along to.
A certain freedom keeps us
on our toes,
on our feet most of the time
we're out here living it up.

But what more
could you ask for,
what else could you expect
at times like these?
The photographer
who lives in each of us
knows there's a moment
of time to be captured,
some rhythm in a song
which needs to be heard,
part of a dance which needs
to be seen to be believed.
Our chance to seize the day
is now or never,
to take a moment of our lives
& make it timeless.

The story of our lives
becomes our lives...How well
do I know this,
bracing a camera in my hand,
anticipating the hour when I
shall take more snapshots
of some era gone past as much
as I hope to take more photos
in the present day.
History must be made somehow;
it is up to me to state when
& where it will spring into life.
It is up to me to dictate
when I will stop the moment
I've been waiting for through my lens,
start it up all over again
in a whole new frame.
It is up to me when I will make
the next bold steps known,
however tentative those steps
might appear.
It is up to me
to commit these moments to memory,
so life can still live on,
timeless & truthful.

Pregame

Here we are: at the heart
of where all the action is,
where life
can get no better than
the way it is pregame:

You guessed right,
the fun & good times
are now underway,

& who would want to
think about leaving here?

It's easy to have
way too much fun,
to have way too many
good times

where pretty much everyone
speaks one common language
& speaks it fluently.

Welcome home
to where all the action is,
to where
all the action truly takes place.
Love it or no,
this is where memories
are made on the weekend.

En Route

There they go:
across the open fields,
over rivers & streams,
above & below
railway lines...

From all over the place
they come
hoping to get over
their homesickness,
their rootlessness.

At long last
they've arrived: No doubt
their stay might only be
for a weekend
but for them it's like

a lifetime.
This place is home,
has always been so.
Even if they felt
compelled to leave

some part of them
does survive, live on
around here.
This weekend holds
special significance

for such folks for that
very reason I just
mentioned now.
A part of their lives
still remains rooted

to this city, to this place.
They made history,
lots of unforgettable
memories while here,
& what's more,

reasons to feel good
about living life
to the fullest, with each
passing moment
of time.

They're coming
from all around, to relive
the dreams, to go back
down memory lane,
to renew old bonds

which can't be broken.

The Range War

It's on:
an instate rivalry
gone out of hand,
folks gone way out
of line.

Tell me why
such things have to be,
why there always
must be some secret grudge
to be borne day in, day out.

For the most part,
there were plenty of folks
holding their peace,
not doing the slightest
inkling of harm

but whenever
the fluent language of choice
got misused/abused
past the point of rescue
disorder ensued,

tempers flared, folks fumed
& raged & did whatever it was
they were planning
on doing
now that their good name

had been insulted.
We were only out to have
a good time, true.
But the instant
one rival spoke gibberish

about us - to our faces! -
then & there we stopped
playing nice.
Some chumps threw whatever
they could find at their disposal:

empty cans reeking of beer,
programs for the day's game,
glass bottles...
Of course we were eager
to return the favor,

get back at our foes
by whatever means we could.
Thank heavens
that we stood our ground,
remained resolute the whole time.

All this began
over a piece of turf,
just to see who's the real deal
around here.
Chants & taunts drew us

to where the action was,
with a magnetic pull
unlike any other
we've encountered before
or ever will again.

This scene sure enough
became a tumultuous sight
for all to see,
the enactment of a war
with no winners

or losers on either side.
Everyone involved, it seems,
had something to prove,
some scores to settle
but to no avail.

Such is life
in rivalries like these,
when even your closest
of friends
are siding with the enemy.

Weekend

For us, the right time for fun
& good times begins today:
we're out on the open road
once more, taking in life with a passion
which can never be surpassed,
brushed over, swept under the rug.
If there is a time & a place
to make new memories
& write new chapters in our life stories,
now is that time,
the location is anywhere we choose.


So we get into the car, not knowing
where we're going or how long we'll be out
on the road: All we know is
that we're traveling,
searching for some of life's greater joys.
Rolling the windows down, one smells
the aroma of burning firewood looming
over the air like a hefty cloud of incense,
one sees from afar the towering buildings
which are downtown,
one sees the farms & fields drifting by
as in a dream, the lure of the interstate
too much to overcome...
Whatever it is we're looking for,
chances are we're going to find it
out here, out on the open road.

The weekend has arrived:
It's now time to gather up what belongings
we were planning to bring along
for the ride & depart from this place;
there is life to be lived
& new memories to be created
once we reach our chosen destination.
This is not goodbye.
We're only now starting to say hello
as we're preparing to go see the world.