Two hearts in the happy ending machine...tbd

The call for me to do a new CD has intensified since the releases of "Kisses for Karma" (yes, I know it is only a day old, but that's the beauty of the world-wide-web, almost instant gratification). I'm not taking a position on this, as I want time to evaluate how I would approach it, market it, distribute it...and there is the question of content. Give me a few days to think about it, m'kay?

Excellent, just excellent episode of LOST last night. Between the recent quality of it, 24 and these final episodes of THE WEST WING, we seem to be living in a Garden of Eden for well-made television (and let us not forget last week's season finale of THE SHIELD).

Someone wrote the other day and asked where they could find a copy of my poem "Small Hands" for Mother's Day. I wish I knew. Originally posted to a site called CyberVines, it and a half dozen other unreplicated works were lost when that site went down. Repeated emails to the site owners were not responded to, so I finally just wrote off that poem and the others, including "Salieri's Children" (which I think I recall enough of to replicate someday). If any of my readers out there did make print outs of my works from that site, drop me a line...I'll gladly swap an autographed volume or two for a copy.

I have been asked to explain my phrase "kisses for karma", which is the title of the new work and also the line appears in a few earlier poems of mine. I can only offer my sincere insight:

"Kisses for Karma" is my take on the old Beatles' line "And, in the end...the love you take is equal to the love you make". I think that either it is, or it should be, that the love you find, the joy in your life, should be tied to the sincerity, instensity and purity of your passion and love for others, particularly your lover. Yeah, I have screwed things up, more than once, but on the whole I have been an earnest suitor, and I've paid a penance in dishonest, disingenuous and deceitful lovers as much as or more than I have ever been feckless or false.

In the end, I hope it is true that you trade "kisses for karma", that the universe judges you by the purpose behind your actions, and your actions themselves, in determining the happily ever after. I can honestly say that in the vast majority of situations, I have gone the furthest in my relationships. I still hold out the hope for the happy ending, to paraphase Darryl Hall, I'd be satisfied with "two hearts in the happy ending machine".

A recent acquaintance and I were discussing our relationship histories and she paused and said "you don't have relationships, you take on projects"...yep. What most of my former lovers and my mother long ago observed is obvious still. Whether due to a need to do penance for some past sins, or just a desire to be a good guy, or a vision of the need to be filled, I have a history of sacrificing myself on the altar of love, out a desire to help the most bruised person in the room. That's probably why I am attracted to truly, truly damaged people so often.

Hey, somebody needs to do the heavy lifting, and what do you do when a beautiful friend leans on your shoulder and says "I don't think I could live without you in my life, save me"?