i hung a pic-

i hung a pic-
ture on the wall

a glimpse of dead-
ly sins anoth-
er committed

i bleed; i bled

salvation come

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

role models

vases are emptying
beneath the visible plane
as one tries
he fails to see
them there
so
he cries
refilling the vases
unknowingly
helping another
by showing emotion

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

The Death of Poetry

Yes, this is not a poem.

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Singing to the Air

I sing because I can
I sing because I will that I must
I sing because I like singing
I sing because I sang

I sang because I sang
I sang because no one can hear
I sang because I feel absent when doing so
I sang because I am singing

I am singing because who wouldn't?
I am singing because I hope
I am singing because I'm alive
I am singing because...

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

(Uneasy) Autumn Joys

Clicking, clicking, clicking - a rhythm beneath the noise
Reverberates
Steady heartbeats begin to race
In anticipation
How simplistic at first glance
The lives of all surrounding
Yet how much is missed
If a second glance
Is not given

A wonderful, intricate design is
Weaved
Interlacing smiles amongst
The crowd
Bounce, jump, skip and try not to fall
A child worries so little

Near perfection
Is attained

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Salvation

Countless windows into lives, you walk on past
Who can help them all? So why even try?
Fiery days preceding cold nights
Working furiously to no end
Viciously cut like him before
Don't worry it will happen to the next.

Peace, war, power, and gossip...
The endless noise accumulates
Eventually it's all just too much to take

Why try? Why care? Why cry?
No one can make it in this world on their own
So who will care about another?
Everyone has their own problems.

Perhaps mortality isn't so bad.
With worry and doubt abounding
Futility rises through the fray
So all you want is to die quickly and forget
A God can not exist or surely He is evil!
I can't take it; kill me, please!
But no, you won't even do that.

Eternity is so long
How can one endure it when life is too much already?!
Perhaps there is nothing more.
Can I be so lucky?
Give me something now!

Then it comes in a rushing wind -

Peace, joy, serenity, hope, wonder, and amazement
When you kneel that first day...

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Forward?

Kindly profess my love and I
Am seen so very forward
Try not harass my love but I
Cannot help but seem forward

Where is the line that I may not
Cross if I wish not be forward
Tell me the time; I wish be taught
How to avoid being forward

Why such a crime to simply ask
A question without being forward
So I opine and break down and ask
Guess what? She sees me forward

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Wish List (From May 26th, 2009 Facebook Post)

Late at night the wishing
Of all yet seen to come
Veering off and dreaming
Escaping

Pictures in my thoughts that
Answer to each missing
Image of my life I
Note fleeting

How I long for comfort
Of which to I can cling
Perhaps my day is near
End reaching

Just when I start to ring
Each note that sounds retreat
Somehow peace comes whisking
Endless puzzles off to
Some place of no wishing

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Love (From My April 13th, 2009 Facebook Post)

No word is less defined - nor an idea more pondered
Those who hold it can not describe it and
The many searching know not how to find it
Through it we bless - through it we are blessed

It is to believe the impossible while in a state
Of perceptual anesthesia. There is always some
Madness in it, but the madness is not without reason
For only it - not even reason - is stronger than death

It is the master key to the gates of happiness
Through music it caresses the infinite masses
It is a glimpse of heaven often stronger than
The convictions of man. It is the one true ideal.

It is the only true adventure, and through it
Is found the true power and potential of existence
No room is too small; it will stretch the heart
Of the most unwilling, most perplexed, and most afraid

Forgiveness is its final form and greatest power
It is what drives one's soul from its hiding place
It is a certain special way of being alive. True
Wisdom can only be found in its beating heart

For a fool in it is nonsense; only the man who
Denies it is a fool. It is true that if clutched, it
Will dart away, but though elusive, its value is great
And once it begins, it is harder than war to end

It is endless forgiveness - like the master's violin
Whose music may pause, but whose strings remain
It frees all who embrace it from all weight and
Pain, and it will never wrong nor lead one astray

What is one person to a world, it transforms into
The world to one person. It gives strength to
Those who receive and courage to those who give
It is a rare, divine power given to all of mankind

Everything must be risked in the name of it
Or else even more is risked. It is the only
Known form of immortality. It is the lone
Real gracious act capable of fallen man

A man's greatest legacy is in it; the one way
To accurately judge a man is by his display of it
In the final analysis, it is the only reflection
Of a man's true worth. It is everything

It is more than three words mumbled before
Bedtime; it is sustained by action, a pattern of
Devotion in the things done for one another
Each and every passing moment, day, and year

It is the irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired
And is not found by finding the perfect person
But by seeing an imperfect person perfectly
And above all this, LOVE is a friendship set on fire

- Daniel Z. Garrett* -

* This is composed of numerous famous quotations on love from known and unknown authors alike. Some quotations are quoted exactly, others are paraphrased or have only an excerpt displayed above. Most were simply inspiration for things I wrote. Of course, some of it is purely original material, as well.

A Stranger

Oh, the chances that slip by,
What years could be had if
For a moment a single word
You could speak to a stranger

What harm would there be
If your gesture is so declined?
Ah, what good could be gained
If for a moment you just spoke

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Help

The universe can't contain
The war that rages within
Nor can relentless time
Resolve this one conflict

Only one word can I whisper

Help...

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Justice Tarries

The world reaches
For the innocent
Grasping lives
In an instant

The Church fails
To stand and hold
The great beacon
In the cold

Millions taken
Day and night
Many more
Give up the fight

But one day soon
He will return
All saved will rise
And the world burn

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Infatuation

Your love withers my hopeless heart
Into acceptance of what that is
Once I thought of but only your hand
Then my dreams you sent to dark

Silenced all my wildest dreams
I ask you now for just one favor
If I cannot have hope of you
Will you take my nightmares, please?

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Death in War

Rivers of blood
Flow in streets foreign

In a single instant
Nine months are sullen

What a life lived
What a life lost

High a price paid
For some old man's thought

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Young Revolution

Silver days eclipsed by
Golden nights
Infants slay
Their fathers' only lives

When will it pass?
The Day of Judgment
And haunt those whose tasks
Kill the remnant

Justice seems not exist
As they fall
Those who ask
Never receive their call

How long can one
Only hope to live?
As but ev'ryone
Soon meets their end

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Frantic Nights

The years
The nights
The fires
The lights

Passing on
To blood-shot eyes

How feverishly you find yourself
Searching for a single rope
On which to climb to free yourself
Or on which to hold for a hope

But you drown
In your wild search

The tears
The fights
The liars
The sights

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

The Gilding Mind

Fixation beyond imagination
Perils in the deep of old
The fountains cease
The rivers soar
In sound mind and body
One is no more

Dreams forever
Pains to feel
In the endless nights
As stainless steel

The heart hardens to linger on
Or crushed it is to be assured
The soul longs
The spirit yearns
Oh they dedicate
The mortal's fall

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Abyss

Darker, forward she comes
To face you without a face
You tremble before no one
Yet, she stands there waiting
You wonder where they are

Are you all alone now - NOW?!
In a time such as this?!
The worst of times, you think
You urge onward, fending her off
Long enough to say one word
To an ear that will carry on
Searching everywhere for naught

You feared this moment
Not for yourself but for them
Just one word...anything...
You search for the perfect thing
While you run - forever...

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

If Only

A child
His smile I adore
The first cry
The first tear
I hold him

The house
Barely large enough so
I struggle to
Provide all so
We can live

And everything
I'd give so readily
For this dream
To be reality
For one day

With her
A lifetime of joy
I'd feel in
That single day
If only so

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Covenant

Frightened beneath
A single tear
Falls

Infinite peace
You once thought
Erased

Nothing matters
For all lost
Cries

Until once
You fall asleep
Alone

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Frozen

Standing still, yet ever moving
Within the confines of oblivion
Time is an alien to the reality
Encompassing your universe

In an instant, you live forever
And travel beyond all known
To a place of unknown wonder
And perpetual joy and serenity

Everyone around you has gone
None remain, but neither do you
As you become the unimaginable
All else fades into the distant past

So much that you merely dream
All life is a dream, and life is lost
Beneath the layers of ecstasy
Till it drowns in the forgotten sea

Where everyone once held cares
Now regarded as merely nothing
And even the memory of death dies
For it drowns and passes as well

- Daniel Z. Garrett -

Reflections (From my MySpace Blog of May 26th, 2008)

Four years
Four loves
All lost
All doves
Each seeing
What I could not
Each not feeling
What I had thought

Two hundred friends
Two hundred funs
All frost
Beneath the Suns
Some closer
And some not
Some forever
Or to be forgot

Eighty poems
Eighty songs
Held inside
Perpetually caught
All foreseen
Within my mind
All revealed
Within my rhyme

One million burdens
One million crimes
Sorrows held
For all times
It seems so cold
In nights as such
Yet to Christ
I will always clutch

- Daniel Z. Garrett -