Speckles of Time

Have you ever stopped for a second And thought, Thought about who you are, Who you are right now, How you differ from the you a few years ago, Or a few months ago. I bet you have. But have you ever considered How much you differ from the you Just a week ago, Or day ago, Or even hours, Or minutes ago? That is the beauty. In a mere second we become Someone new and remarkably unrecognizable, Yet stay old and familiar. The beauty of who you are lies in Seconds of micro changes. So, stop. Think about who you were this morning. See how you've changed, How you've evolved, What you've learned, And enjoy it. This process, This endless process Is who you are. Ever evolving being. (Embrace it.)

I can remember the time when the blank page used to scare me, Its remarkable whiteness, Whiteness you only see when you should be doing something else, But your mind is stuck, Stuck on that whiteness, Its pulsing little, tiny black line, But not for long, Soon it becomes big, threatening, scary, Growing and expanding until it becomes the only thing you see, Reminding you of your task, Of its greatness, Its meaning, And you start to shiver, You cramp up, You hide. But not anymore. Now I sit and redirect my mind to the million of rushing thoughts in my head: "Should I write this?", "What if I make it red instead of blue, would it make a difference?", "Wait, wait, what word is it again?", And the fear goes away. The fear of the page And its whiteness. Yes, new fears step in, But they are not fears in fact, Just random blabber of ever racing creative mind, And then, Even that disappears, And I write, Write and write. Nothing else...

That moment That moment when you feel it When you finally feel it Feel the feeling you've longed for so long The feeling you thought was just a fantasy A dream Something imaginary. But no. You can finally feel it Feel it with your whole body Your whole being Slowly filling every inch of your every corner Filling you up with unbelievable joy Drawing a smile on your face Slowly lifting your spirit from the mud of your very own ashes Sending a tear of realization down your face The feeling so strong Your whole body shivers under it Yet so simple you're wondering how the hell it took you so fucking long to finally feel it It is the feeling of freedom Complete freedom Not of mundane things But of your soul There is nothing else Nothing else exists in that moment Nothing is real Only it The feeling The utmost feeling of freedom.

In the dead of night, I feel one. I feel one with everything and everyone. I feel one with yesterday's me, With tomorrow's me. With 10-years-ago me, And 10-years-from-now me. In the dead of night, I feel like no time has passed, No time exist, Only me. The multiverse of me. In the dead of night, I am one.

Fill the tub with water Get undressed Light a candle Switch off the lights Get your right foot inside and your left one Grab onto the banks of the tub and sit. Take a deep breath Close your eyes and just dive. Remain there. Under the surface. Calm. Listening. Listening to the sound of your heart. Thumping sound. Relaxing sound. Only you and the sound. Tup-tup tup-tup tup-tup. If you need, emerge and take another deep breath. But dive back in. And listen. Only tup-tup tup-tup tup-tup. A heaven on Earth. Repeat, and just relax.

Change. That sneaky little friend. You wait for it, Without patience, Like a child waiting for Christmas. And it seems to never come. But when it does, It is everything but Christmas. It is more like shedding your own skin. Slowly, Painfully, Bit by bit. Parts of you are being ripped off To be forever lost And you like it. You've waited for it so long, Yet you hate it. Every bit. It hurts, Losing parts of you. It hurts, Even though you feel the new parts coming it, Slowly digging their way in, Into your skin. The process is long. It is sad. It is painful, And it is necessary. Once the last bit of your old skin sheds, You are a new person, And it is then that the real change begins.

Grab a mirror Bring it close And stare Stare at yourself. Notice Notice your eyes Your lips Your nose Your cheeks Your skin. Notice Notice how you cannot look at the same time, And I mean really carefully look, At both eyes. You just can't No matter how hard you try Only one at the time One beautiful eye per one beautiful eye. Notice Notice how you cannot look at your nose At the same time as your cheeks It just doesn't work One part of your beautiful face Per one part of your beautiful face. Notice Notice how you cannot look at the tip of your nose Or the inside of your eye retina At the same time as the outside of your eye retina Or the root of your nose You simply can't Not if you really look Only spot per spot. And notice Notice how you cannot see your face, your body, the whole you at once. So, why try to understand it all at once? Why not understand it part per part? Why strive for the whole without knowing the parts first?

Night Empty room Dimmed light Soft music playing in the background. I sit Paralyzed. Staring Staring into nothing Just staring. Unable to think To speak To move... And then A movement Or at least I think. And again A movement A feeling... I can feel a teardrop falling down my paralyzed face Slowly Gracefully. I can feel its descent down my eyeball It slipping between the density of my eyelashes Its slow ride down the nose-side lane And its persistent movement disrupting my paralyzed cheeks. Night An empty room A paralyzed body And a rebellious teardrop...

Sometimes there is a storm inside you, rumbling, screaming, making your walls shake from the ground, rapidly destroying everything you've been building for decades. But sometimes there is no storm, just a cold war. You fight whether to push the button or no. The button that will surely devastate not just everything you've spent decades building, but your whole life. Your whole life gone in mere millisecond. And so you sit, staring, unable to move.

27, But it feels like 100. A full glass, Sitting on the brink of spilling over. So you sit, thinking: "What to do?" If you spill, the water can destroy people, places, the whole cities and civilizations. All the goods will be lost forever. All the hard gathered minerals will be wasted into the night. So you sit, thinking: "What if I get a new glass? A bigger one? A wider one? No water will spill then, and new can come in." No fear of devastation, no fear of waste. But, you have to choose wisely. The glass you choose now might be the last, And once it is filled up, there is no escaping.

Wrapping up the month with the third and final part of Elementary chapbook containing some of my dearest poems. Hope you'll enjoy them. 27 Cold War Teardrop Mirror Change Heartbeat Unexplainable Lightness of Being Dead of Night Freedom Blank Page Who am I?

00:00 Silence. A touch of soft nigh breeze On pale, gentle cheeks. Stillness. Only deep dark night And a few shinny stars. Calm. A distant barking sound And re-approaching light. Nothing. Not a sound. Only calmness. And the night.

Dec 23 12 degrees Celsius Sun, high and bright Sitting Eyes closed Feeling the warmth on my skin As if it were summer Thoughts rush Pictures change I travel Travel to far places Places I know Places I cherish in my heart Helsinki, Lisbon, Vienna, Novi Sad San Francisco, Berlin, San Petersburg, Tallin… I count and count, And count Even the places I have never been to At least not physically But still They are a part of me Buried somewhere deep in my heart For me to visit them whenever I want And so the sun shines Bright and warm And I sit With my eyes closed And travel Travel in joy and happiness.

2:30 am Night Dark One of those Those sleepless nights But good Not bad Just lying Watching movies Having fun Waiting for the dawn to come And somewhere along the way In between two episodes I feel the need to readjust So I sit up And start to order the cushions around And there it is The stillness The emptiness The beauty I see the road Road that is usually so crowded That one can surly imagine Cars falling off And now Now nothing Not a single car Not a single soul Just vastness And calmness Of it all And it strikes me As my mind and eyes race To catch the fleeting images Of the moving pictures on my laptop The world outside my bedroom window Holds still As if dead With nothing but lights still alive Waiting Waiting for someone to pass To acknowledge their existence And so I do If only for a second

There is something soothing in the night, In its calmness, Its plainness, Its darkness. Something knowable, Something touchable. As if the night is the reflection of yourself, Your inner space, Opposite to the day's outer space. In the night you see you. The shadows of your utmost secretive thoughts become visible. They start to get lines, And dots, And colours. They start to get shape. And you, You feel at home. Peaceful, Satisfied, Numinous. Transcendence is calling you, Whispering gently in your ear: "Come out and play. It is safe, The safest it will ever be." There is something soothing in the night. Something secretive.

The second part of the three-part chapbook Elementary is here for your enjoyment. Soothing Night Worlds Acknowledgement Christmas Time Night

Night Winter Stillness Not a soul Only sleeping parked cars And distant flashing light. My thoughts travel Travel in time Travel in space To you To me To us. Wonder if you're sleeping Or lie awake, Awake in sleepy winter night. Do you think of me at all? Does my name still casts a shadow over your heart, making it mine? But wait. A cat. Standing Calmly, Watching Vigorously, Reading my mind. But wait. Off she goes Silently into the cold winter night Leaving me with my thoughts, My thought of you, Of us, Of me.

It strikes when least expected. You feel happy, Full of life, Excited about the future, Invincible. And then you read a quote Or hear a song Or see an image And it hits you. Unexpected. Hard. And you cannot even put up a fight. No, you cannot. You are already down. Knocked out. Left with nothing but the feeling, The feeling of loss, The feeling of loneliness, The feeling of not belonging. And all because you're homesick. Homesick for that hug, That simple hug, A moment a certain person puts his arms around you. And you feel at home, As if nothing can harm you, As if nothing can go wrong, Because you are safe, Safe at home. And home is that hug. Home is he.

I wonder, What goes through your mind? Do you think of me at all? If you do, Do you wake up thinking about me And shake the thoughts away As if to shake of the nagging cat? Or do I sneak into your head A few times a day When least expected While you do your regular, routine things Just to stir you up a bit? I wonder, Do you open a message board And just stare Thinking what would you say to me, If anything at all, And end up closing the board Without saying a word To keep yourself safe? I wonder, Do random things, Such as a funny guy on a bus, Make you think of me, Of our conversations, Our special moments? I wonder, Do you dream about us, Not as we used to be, But as we could be, Together, Somewhere beyond all the trouble Of this everyday life That divides us By mileage But also estrangement? I wonder, Do you still believe? Do you still want me Or have you given up For it being too hard? I wonder, Would you let me pick your brain One more time...

I would like to pull you close to me, put my arms around you, squeeze you, rock you from side to side and whisper in your ears: 'It is alright. I am here. You don't have to be afraid. Everything is going to be alright.' But I can't. Not anymore. It is not my task to do. It is up to you. Only you can do that.

That feeling. The feeling when I see you. Not your body and all its quirks, Not even your behavior and its (un)predictability, Nor your words and their rigidness, But YOU. Your soul. The unexplainable beauty. Not even an image, But a feeling. No, not a feeling. A sensation. Peace, Harmony, Light Warmth, Spring meadow full of sunny flowers... Oh, no. No words could explain it. Portrait it. Describe it. It just is. There. Before me. Knowable. As if it always were there.

All I wanna do is Lock you in a room, Strip you naked From all your masks and walls And dive in. I wanna get to know you, Every inch of your body, Every move, Every sound, Every expression you make. Wanna study your face, Your breasts, Your arms, Your legs. Wanna make you feel things you never could have imagined. Wanna make you scream with joy and disbelief. Wanna make you open up like you never did before. Wanna make you talk and talk. Wanna make you shut up and stare, Stare in awe. Wanna taste you all. And wanna make you wish the same.

Late February day The temperature just started to go up again Little stroll through the town Dusk And city lights The smell of fresh air The closeness of water And its calmness. But wait. A distant music. Delicate chords of acoustic guitar Accompanied by soft, warm female voice. As I approach, I see people standing Listening Smiling Enjoying Coming to life, Just like spring, And I stand Listen Watch And for a second My thoughts travel Travel high and above The music The people The night. As they travel My eyes meet his Across the bridge Listening Traveling On their own And just for a second Surrounded by a warm blanket of music Two strangers are no strangers at all.

A year ago an idea to arrange some of my poetry into a chapbook,  Elementary,  was born. A year later, I share with you the first of its three parts. Note: two poems have already been publish on this blog, but you get the link to them anyway. Enjoy. February Expiration Date Saturday Morning Wanna Taste you All Knowable Soul Alright I Wonder Homesickness Do You?