It’s not funny how nostalgia robs you of the present. In fact, it’s really upsetting how the words “Remember when…” can prick at you in those quiet moments.
I find myself in the thorns of nostalgia quite often, admiring the roses of the past and becoming stuck in the memories of summer camp, elementary school, and innocent times. My eyes drift into a 100-yard stare and search for wherever time went. And by this point, it’s too painful to dislodge from the thorns because I have to accept that it’s gone. So painfully final; yesterday is gone.
Like I said, it’s very upsetting, but like all predicaments, the thorny nature of nostalgia has a positive side. I mean, for one, the moments happened. The joy and thrill of scoring three hat tricks in a soccer game against a bunch of 10-year-olds as a camp counselor? Unmatched. Nostalgia, in its own way, is a gift of gratitude from the past. And I couldn’t be more grateful. But.
It’s way too easy to admire the rose bush so much that you fall in and won’t get out.
Instead, I’ve found the better gift of nostalgia to be motivation. Motivation to be the maker of the next moment, the next experience. Motivation to thrive in the current season of life and be the finder of a new opportunity.
Nostalgia, I guess, is a funny thing, as double-edged as its nature is. I can remain in place with its blade at my neck, forced to stay fixed in place and gaze on what will never return. I mean, it’s so much easier to let life trickle by and rest in the gratitude I hold for a past life.
I could also seize it. Not aggressively, but with the purpose I have set before myself. To put life into verse, voice into the world, understanding in your hearts. And heal the world along the way.
Your purpose? I have no clue; only you do. Together, we all must seize the blade, cut through the foliage, the brush, the thorns. Past the forest of what held us, the jungle of what distracted us. Past everything we remember, once knew, toward whatever we will be rooted in next.
The roses of the past were beautiful, but what about the daises, the lilies, the lavenders of the future? I’m ready to move on to what could be precious.
As for the poem, I try to speak to all those 100 yard stares, those nights spent staring at the ceiling, and those little smiles to yourself as you remember when…
Reminiscing and missing you
the sweetest dreams are the strongest hopes,
the ones that hold on let go of reality and find escape
but there’s no fading light,
no dimming sunset on a beautiful story
you breathe and your head is whirling in the darkness
thudding onto the bed, this catalyst of other lives
lay there powerless
to change a yesterday so far gone
sail into your haze of hope, gently rocked by ripples of regret
the memories you mount upon are but mist
every night you race for relief is another day lost,
another day lost into a
dream
in the years to come
why long for a fleeting taste of the past
search for an eternal hope
the dreams of the soul – and there!
that golden light
in there, purpose
and in there, power over the present
to take hold of your future
yes, you’ve rested on the waves of tears for so many nights
but the day still comes
and the sun still rises
still, break through
✌🏿
Life of Verse 
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