We could simply care for one another, but capitalism demands that its needs are met first, and its cut exhausts our resources, completely. We must then engage with capitalism to simply receive care, and we cannot care except through transaction. To care becomes a term for believing in something strongly, while being reminded, moment by moment, of our being too busy to engage our natural response to offer care. We need to care for one another. Capitalism doesn’t care.
poem
🔺
Who is the you? Which is the me?
Wait–are there three?
You may find that you see
everything one way,
just as it is,
until one day you
question something and
have a crisis, and
make a big cognitive leap,
and then suddenly,
there’s another
possibility.
You might find that you’re seeing
everything a million different ways,
completely overwhelmed,
until one day, you
have to get something done,
and you have a crisis, and
make a big cognitive leap,
and then suddenly,
there is only
three.
One of you is going
to be the me
in a conversation with you
some time today.
You’ll know, because
you will find yourself
thinking, “this person’s thinking
is so simplistic,”
or possibly
you will find yourself
thinking “that person’s thinking
is so complex.”
Which one will be right?
If we pause, and reflect, and listen,
and speak with care,
i think you’ll see
–(between you and me)–
we’re not two,
but three.
You,
the peace we just made, and
me.
Which one is the me?
🛒
You see an old man in the parking lot, losing control of his cart, and you’re right there, and your hand instinctively reaches out and stops the cart from rolling, and you pause, just long enough to show safety with your body, and say:
“it’s fine,”
and move on.
And then, a second later, you are standing across from a young woman screaming at her wailing child:
“chill tf out!”
And your body is frozen, except for the heart that pumps as if it is trying to put out a fire. Which it is.
And as you bear witness, you wish that it was this cart your hand could instinctively reach out and stop from rolling.
🗯️
seeing a man peeing on a wall, next to an open port-a-potty:
have I crossed a threshold into a world of pure metaphor?
💔💔💔
When your heart is connected to people in Palestine, Israel, and Iran, there are no good days, only good moments that refuse to find common ground.
🧹
Meth makes you feel powerful.
Healthy habits make you powerful.Rage makes you feel powerful.
Discipline makes you powerful.
fossil evidence
If you know where plastic comes from
you may experience overwhelming grief
when you see a child’s dinosaur toy
abandoned in a vacant lot.
Poem: Knowing They Are Needed
KNOWING THEY ARE NEEDED
Organizers can go to bed early,
and wake up refreshed.
Fire tenders, blind to time, tend to stay up
all night, crafting, restless.
That is not their fault – it is just their way.
Organizers, because they see
only one way of doing their thing,
are very focused, and work together
like bees, in the bustle of day,
when the sun is high. It takes a lot of them
to get their work of organizing done. They organize
themselves into shapes. This is why
they are called organizers. On the other hand,
only a few fire tenders (who tend to scheme and craft,
in the calm of night, by the crackle of the fire)
are needed to keep the lions at bay
while the organizers sleep.
Fire tenders tend to see
a million ways to do one thing.
That is not their fault – it is just their way.
They scheme and craft, in the calm
of night, by the crackle of the fire,
and tend to dream, blind to time,
of ways to be helpful when it comes:
the time that they know they are needed.
Because there are more of them,
and because they’re so good at organizing
themselves and working together,
within their shapes,
in the bustle of day, when the sun is high,
organizers tend to believe it
when they think that their ways are best.
That is not their fault – it is just their way.
Tradition helps to keep them
focused and working together, within their shapes.
Because they are so adept
at doing one thing, the organizers
are not so good at noticing
when the way they are doing
their thing is wasting their energy.
That is not their fault – it is just their way.
Fire tenders sometimes try to share
the strategies they conceive, while scheming
and crafting, in the calm of night,
by the crackle of the fire, with the organizers,
who are not so good at knowing
what they need, or needing. The fire tenders
have become accustomed to hearing,
“that’s cute,” and “you’re overthinking it.”
Organizers can be kind of judgy.
That is not their fault – it is just their way.
Judging helps them navigate
the bustle of day, when the sun is high.
Fire tenders tend to feel a little
hurt by this, but they love the organizers,
and want to please them. That is why
they are called tenders. Because
they can only scheme and craft
in the calm of night, by the crackle of the fire,
and because they love the organizers,
and want to please them, and because
they are good at noticing when the organizers’
ways of doing their thing are wasting
their energy, and because they are good at
knowing what the organizers need, and because,
when they try to reveal the results of their schemes
and crafts in the bustle of day,
when the sun is high, they are told
“you didn’t cite your sources,” and “I love
the way your mind works,” the fire tenders
will sometimes craft maps, that show
the way to a new way of doing the thing
that the organizers are wasting energy on,
within their shapes. They know
when they are needed, and leave the maps
where the organizers will find them
when they wake up refreshed
in the bustle of day, when the sun is high.
The organizers, finding the maps
that the fire tenders made in the calm of night,
by the crackle of the fire, suddenly
see a new way of doing their thing,
within their shapes, without wasting energy.
When conditions are right, they don’t fail
to adopt the new strategy, and claim it
as their own. They are not stealing
or being vain: that is just how organizers
work. The fire tenders tend to be
untroubled by this. Blind to time, they know
when they are needed. They love the organizers,
and want to please them. That is not
their fault – it is just their way.
Because they have been so often told,
“you’re wrong,” and “just relax and be yourself”
by the organizers, the fire tenders tend
to carry around a lot of shame.
Because they are organized, the organizers
believe it when they think that
the fire tenders carry shame because
they are not able to organize themselves into shapes,
like the organizers. Though that is not
the case, sometimes the fire tenders
begin to believe it themselves. They tend
to love the organizers, and want to please them.
That is not their fault – it is just their way.
What happens when the shame
the fire tenders carry around compels them
to adopt the ways of the organizers,
whom they love and want to please,
and organize themselves into shapes,
in the bustle of day, when the sun is high,
and go to bed early, and wake up refreshed?
Who will think of a million ways to do one thing?
Who will scheme and craft maps
when they are needed, in the calm of night,
by the crackle of the fire, to point the organizers
to a new way of doing their thing without
wasting energy, within their shapes?
Who, blind to time, will know
when they are needed? Who will keep the lions at bay?
– Ryk Groetchen May 26, 2025
MAY ALL BEINGS REALIZE THEIR TRUE NATURE
EVERY DAY IS NEURODIVERSITY AWARENESS DAY