I have always loved the different colors that appear at this time of year when the air gets colder and daylight becomes less and less. Some of my poetry has been inspired by this time of year that seems to be drenched in golden waves of afternoons and early evenings. Whenever I see things like these, I remember what I have forever wanted in my life more than anything that the world can give.
In college I've been exposed to many sensibilities, philosophies and perspectives on the human experience. I've also seen warriors for social justice wage battles of rhetoric and existence against those they perceive as oppressors. However among all these wonders, horrors, and temples to materialism they cannot fill the part of my soul that hungers for my greatest desire from this world, true acceptance at last.
No amount of money, influence, or change that I could enact would replace those time that I remember when I was younger, when I could bring forth my emotions like a paintbrush whisking clouds on an empty canvas, and others there would fill my heart with happiness in return. All these contemporary ideas that try to replace this experience (be it with pets, alcohol, or sexual excess) fail miserably in my eyes and lead to the utterly depressed state of many people I've met here. Everyone just seems so distant, either avoiding being hurt by some force or that I don't fit enough for what they put on a pedestal. However these times that I have lived through are changing.
No matter what type of "Mythical American Norm" that I supposedly belong to, or how socially awkward I am will change the person inside myself that I have been too afraid to reveal since I was a child. Not that this matters much to a busy rebellious person hypnotized and enthralled in the young life or the winds of change, but this is who I am. I am someone who has loved meteorology and the sky above us for most of my life, but I have other things too. I also have feelings and perceptions that I have experienced, since I was young, from the world around me that has matured into the poetry that I write today. This is how I derive my inspiration and expression, an act of respect and love for other people, places, and events. Finally I do want to truly fall in love with someone one day. She isn't a prize, an object, or some nominal significant other to extend my personal space with. She is a node within my soul, as much a member of my being as my right hand (probably more). To suggest I would think otherwise as a part of my natural tendencies, is utterly offensive to the very foundation of how I live.
These things always swirl within my mind when I am alone staring at the beauty of the world that I observe. My greatest dream, more than winning the lottery, becoming an AMS Fellow, or being the top researcher of the National Severe Storms Laboratory, is the day when I can walk up to my friends and be welcomed fully once more. That connection, that other side, is where I know that I can at least for a moment, find true happiness on planet Earth. I think of those smiling faces when I see the leaves fall in the late autumn sunlight. I know that I will meet them again, but sometimes I'm not sure when that will happen.
Have a wonderful day,
Justin Lynn Reid
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