Excerpts from PARADISE FOUND: The Lithium Edition

The following are select poems and prose by my dad, Billy Joe Moffat, from his posthumously published book.

Riding on a wave of light, the wisdom bell arrives

With every ring, the song it sings, illuminates our lives

A sound so pure, it is truth for sure, the message is quite clear

Knowledge for those who listen, evolution for those who hear

We are all spirits in evolution. We are provided with the power of choice and a consciousness of knowledge and wisdom well beyond our comprehension. Time has patience. Help yourself and enjoy the journey.

Alone, a single stone, is resting all by itself

In the canyon lands of Utah, sitting high upon a shelf

A silent piece of matter, from a disconnected past

An actor on the stage alone, with no supporting cast

Seasons change, the soil erodes, but the stone maintains its place

Giving lessons in humility, with dignity and grace

An hour, a day, a year, you say? A century is but a yawn

A millennium to a stone, you see, is just another dawn

We walk on by and seldom see the beauty it may hold

The simplicity of peacefulness, the wisdom of the old

It's best we pay attention, even learning from a stone

It sits up high upon a shelf, not lonely, just alone

I wrote this because I wanted to pay tribute to the quality I often find in solitude. Mother Nature has always provided me with exceptional company when I have found myself alone within her domain. Some of my closest friends are lilac bushes.

Being alone is an action, being lonely is a thought.

Riding on a ray of light, I passed tomorrow's dawn

And very quickly realized next week was almost gone

I went so fast, I caught the past, on Thursday afternoon

Heard music from a Dylan hit before he wrote the tune

This consciousness of light and speed is just another thought

The faster I advance you see, the sooner I'll get caught

Light as the source of speed, and light as the source of all knowledge. I guess that makes light the source. But, far more important than the speed at which you travel is the direction you choose to take. Travel light.

It is not that we only have but one life to live. We have many. It's that we may only have but one lifetime in which to live them, and the moment at hand is the playing field. Those who have been sacrificing the now for the promise of the future might want to step back and take another look at that one. While change is inevitable, and it doesn't wait, don't fear what might happen within change. That which replaces what was given up is often something of much greater value.

There is nothing romantic about worms in the driveway, that telltale squish coming from under my shoe

I can sense by the feel, there's nothing quite like it, and from the car to the porch I always squish one or two

So, what's with this story? Come on, let's get real

We've all done this before. So, what's the big deal?

Worms are the food that most birds like to eat, but they're hard to identify flattened out by my feet

So, a robin looks around for a worm that is fat, and doesn't have much interest in the ones that are flat

A drawing for this poem is coming out soon, expertly detailed in a Gary Larson cartoon

What changes? The image, or how we see it? Perceptions are often formed to meet the desired result of the perceiver. But no matter what we see it to be, it remains what it is. It doesn't matter what it is, it only matters that it is.

PARADISE FOUND: The Lithium Edition, is available now. Visit Amazon.com to purchase your copy.