“Do you hear me now?”

( with thanks to Bert Jansch)

I am soft

I am strong

I want romance

I want respect

I am tender

I am tough

I want to be embraced

I want to be understood

I don’t want to be seen

I want to be heard

I am loyalty

I am flexibility

I am unpredictable

I am security

I am enigma

I am empathy

I am perception

I am paradox

I am Woman!

Ronda R. Scott-Marak

© 23 February 2015

“Good to be older, would not exchange a single day or a year… Good to be older ah hah, less complications everything clear”

(With thanks to John Lennon)

If it isn’t one thing it’s t’other; 
if it isn’t famine it’s feast.

When the rain stops the draught there’s a deluge, 
and innocent grows into beast.

A moment’s too long or too fleeting; 
all life is too short or drags on.

Life’s oft’ too hard or too simple 
the losses too easily won.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak

© 13 February 2015

Voice-less “When the dawn comes tonight will be a memory too.... and a new day will begin”

( with thanks to Andrew Lloyd Webber, Steven Sondheim, 

and to the memory of my father )

The days slip away
hour by hour, minute by minute, second by second.

The longer passed– the easier to remember
the scents, the sounds;
except for voices–

I can’t recall my father’s voice.

I can recognise voices I haven’t heard in just as long,
but to recall his in my mind’s ear– I can’t.

Events, conversations, stories, visual memories seem sharp
even from a childhood long gone;
some more vague, embellished or diminished when reminiscing…
but not his voice.

The details are all there
the arguments, the trips, the late-night discussions;
our frustrations and successes, our desires and our dreams.

I remember them all:
the advice and admonishments
the battles neither won;
and yet his words are there–
but still no voice.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak
© 6 February 2015

“People who need…” “Who are the…?”

(with thanks to Bob Merrill)

I have lost my trust in the People;

I have lost my confidence in their humanity.

My abstract faith in spirit and benevolence still glows;

my hope that People still have the ability to access it is intact,

but my belief that the People still care wanly flickers.

Have the People lost the ability for compassion?

Have they lost their desire for thought,
to make up their own minds,

to act out of basic kindness and goodwill 
instead of blind self-interest?

Have the People exhausted the innate ability to nurture, to support,
to take an interest?

Is it now always going to be ‘munitions rather than munificence?

Is there anyone left that “will risk his neck for his brother man,”

or have all those in need of a hand, an arm, a shoulder, help forward,
or a step up been permanently given the shaft?

Ronda R. Scott-Marak

© 28 January 2015

“I'm looking through you”… “What did I know?”

(with thanks to Lennon and McCartney)

What do you see when you don’t consciously look; 

when you observe from within, 

when you scrutinise from outside?

What do you see when you look deeply inward; 

peer beyond the well-known, 

examine the unknowable?

Do you see certainty?

Can you comprehend legitimacy?

Have you the vision to recognise Truth?

Is your reality just illusion; 

do your synapses reflect carnival mirrors?

Can you recognise the image in your mind?

Are we really who we think we are, 

who we see in the glass, 

what we hear in our heads?

Is the external world illusory, 

just fantastic dream domains of our own invention?

Or are we merely invisible only to ourselves?

Ronda R. Scott-Marak

© 23 January 2015

Why? “I wake up in the morning and I wonder why everything's the same as it was; I can't understand…”

(with thanks to Sylvia Dee and Arthur Kent)

I am progressive because I wish to continue to move forward, the world to keep on spinning;
I do not want to cling to what no longer works or relates to today’s world.
I am pragmatic because I know it is impossible to always get what I want, 
but progressive because sometimes we need to push ahead to get what we need.
I believe in building on solid foundations, keeping what needs to be kept; 
not throwing out the new baby with the old, dirty bathwater, and the miscellaneous rubbish.
I am liberal with my heart, my empathy, my friendship, my involvement; I am charitable
which means that sometimes I must be liberal with the giving of money as well as compassion.
I am moderate with my consumption because sometimes there isn’t enough to go around; 
I believe more people should conserve resources, internal, external, natural, and man-made.
I am conservative with my trust, my confidence, my hopes, 
and my ideals; 
I hold on tightly and do not squander them on chimaera, threats, and veiled allusions.
I am less willing to give up my opinions, beliefs, and truths than I am my tax dollars.
I am not the only one… sometimes it seems I am.


Ronda R. Scott-Marak 
© 13 January 2015

"Both Sides Now"

(with thanks to Joni Mitchell)

Ignorance
Apathy
Hypocrisy
Delusion… Insincerity

Knowledge
Empathy
Awareness
Reality… Authenticity

Cruelty
Violence
Vitriol
Assumption… Oblivion

Kindness
Compassion
Benevolence
Understanding… Generosity

Pick a Side…
Ruthless, or Humane?
Fiction or Reality?
Even from the same window, 
people’s viewpoints may not be from the same perspective.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak
© 5 January 2015