Luggage vs. Baggage

I spent the day paying bills in advance and doing laundry. ‘Cuz, you see, I’m leaving on a jet plane bound for a different continent (moving back and forth in time to boot). And this whole process got me to thinking ‘bout the difference between luggage and baggage.

I’m gonna lug about a bit o’ luggage. Just one piece o’ luggage, though...just capacious enough to contain two weeks’ worth of underwear and socks. A sweater and a toothbrush. There's that “man purse” just big enough to hold a camera, a passport, and a novel worth reading.

Yeah, I got the luggage thing down pat.

It’s the baggage that confounds. I’m not the innocent, wide-eyed naïf I once was. No. My cataritic eyes view the world differently, nowadays. And this heart of mine? It’s a bit sclerotic.

I gots me a suitcase. A passport. An e-ticket and an itinerary. And I gots me a heart that’s broken in too many ways to count. I gots me way-too-big loads of cynical and skeptical.

I gots me luggage and I gots me baggage.

I can do without the baggage.

* * *

Up to the Mountain

"Up To The Mountain (MLK Song)"

I went up to the mountain
Because you asked me to
Up over the clouds
To where the sky was blue
I could see all around me
Everywhere
I could see all around me
Everywhere

Sometimes I feel like
I've never been nothin’ but tired
And I'll be workin'
Till the day I expire
Sometimes I lay down
No more can I do
But then I go on again
Because you asked me to

Some days I look down
Afraid I will fall
And though the sun shines
I see nothing at all
Then I hear your sweet voice, oh
Oh, come and then go, come and then go
Telling me softly
You love me so

The peaceful valley
Just over the mountain
The peaceful valley
Few come to know
I may never get there
Ever in this lifetime
But sooner or later
It's there I will go
Sooner or later
It's there I will go

Patti Griffin

* * *

I've been listening to this song all evening. Guess it was something I just needed to do.

* * *

This is the sorta song that makes you wanna fling open every door and window, crank the stereo to "eleven" and scream to high heaven: "Stop! Stop whatever you're doing right here, right now. Just stop, dammit! And listen. Listen for that sweet voice (no matter how distant in the distance). Stop, dammit! Whatever you're doing, and look all around you."

Stop whatever you're doing and revel in that sweet voice...that voice may have shrunk to a mere whisper, true, yet never completely disappeared.

* * *

Dying Inside

Saw her
In a thumbnail pic
Took a while
To catch my breath

Hair cropped short
Silvered now
Not like I remember
Still beautiful

She cleaves
To flesh and blood
Not mine, not me
Someone more precious

Saw her
In a thumbnail pic
And smiled
As I died inside

* * *