there are so many ways to fall so many ways to crack down the middle and vanish so many ways to singe your wings so many ways to crawl to crashland in the swamp without a compass or stick of bread so many ways to stay too late and lose your way home so many ways to get sick of it all there are so many ways to put yourself out for nickels and dimes to huddle in the dark waiting for the ambulance to come and cut yourself up on the fangs of regret so many ways to seek nourishment from a sewer to lose your sense of style to go begging for a tiny crumb of purpose to your best friends cause they can’t help anymore to wrap yourself in damage and smash yourself flat to run out of mercy so many ways to laugh at all the wrong times so many ways to walk like a loser and run like a dog to twist as the atmosphere shrinks and you’re only a half step ahead of the law and you gun’s only loaded with glass bullets and the only way to open the windows is to smash them and time is a thug creeping up on your trail and the SWAT Team’s got your blood type and you don’t even have the breath to gasp an epitaph and the gulls are shrieking bloody murder and the wind is whipping your rags around there are so many ways to lose heart so many ways to lose faith I’ve tried them all and they all seem to work for a while but if hope is a moron and ambition a lie pride is a drug I need every day so many ways to drown in 3 inches of water so many ways to ruin what you love the most and drag it from the fire and give it a new name and sling it on your back so many ways to walk down a road with no end
From Bruce Isaacson at Zeitgeist Press: David Lerner expected poetry to save the world. He expected this quite literally and concretely. He expected both to change the culture around him, and to change his own position in life. He expected poetry to reawaken the primacy of feeling in modern life like some dormant gland. He expected poets to take the helm of modern culture, and steer us toward a future where the human soul is restored of meaning. A wild, impractical dream, perhaps, but let me not live in a world where such a dream is only madness.
You can find all of David Lerner’s fiery works of poetry at Zeitgeist-Press.
What gets me is the under current of resilience running through the poem. Even when things seem hopeless, there's this stubborn refusal to give up. It's like the speaker is saying, "Yeah, life sucks sometimes, but I'm not going down without a fight." And that line about pride being a drug? Man, that's so true. Even when everything else is falling apart, pride can be that thing that keeps you going. It's not all sunshine and rainbows; sometimes it's just one struggle after another. But even in the darkest moments, there's still that flicker of hope, that stubborn determination to keep walking down that road, no matter how endless it seems.
I’m inclined to add: that because there are so many ways, there are so many opportunities to practice compassion, generosity, and patience, both with others and with ourselves.
There is an old Buddhist saying that “those who fall to the ground stand up by the ground.” And we can also fall to the sky and stand up by the sky, fall to the ground but stand up by the sky, and fall to the sky but stand up by the ground. Every instant offers an opportunity for exploration and growth.
Thank you for the poem this morning.