Been spending a lot of time with the Muppets lately...

I've seen the new movie twice, I'm watching the old episodes of The Muppet Show, and the classic: The Muppet Movie.

A few of my more recent posts here have referenced Kermit and Jim Henson.

I listen to the soundtrack for the new movie almost daily, which features two versions of "Rainbow Connection," the Theme from the Muppet Show, Mahna Mahna, and a bunch of other songs, new and classic that are right up the Muppet alley.

I almost always start to cry when I hear Rainbow Connection because it speaks to that poetic center of which my whole self tries to orbit around.

"Rainbow Connection," written by Paul WIlliams and Kenny Ascher

Why are there so many songs about rainbows
and what's on the other side?
Rainbows are visions, but only illusions,
and rainbows have nothing to hide.
So we've been told and some choose to believe it.
I know they're wrong, wait and see.
Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection.
The lovers, the dreamers and me.

Who said that every wish would be heard
and answered when wished on the morning star?
Somebody thought of that and someone believed it.
Look what it's done so far.
What's so amazing that keeps us star gazing
and what do we think we might see?
Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection.
The lovers, the dreamers and me.

All of us under its spell. We know that it's probably magic.

Have you been half asleep and have you heard voices?
I've heard them calling my name.
Is this the sweet sound that called the young sailors.
The voice might be one and the same.
I've heard it too many times to ignore it.
It's something that I'm supposed to be.
Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection.
The lovers, the dreamers and me.

This song talks about rainbows, not being what scientifically they are: a vision, an illusion. And in legends and myths and religion they are symbols. Symbols of promises, of the end of a storm, of good fortune and faraway magical lands. And yet, though we know it's just a trick of the eye, not one person can say they don't feel a little more hope when they see a rainbow.

And yes, Double Rainbow Guy, in all his cheezy, flaky, stoner, memehood that made him a mockery: part of me wants to salute him for allowing himself to be touched that way...

It talks about wishing on stars about how improbable it is that every wish will be answered and yet...we keep doing it.

And it talks about voices, voices that call to us, voices that wake us from slumber and say this is your task, voices that could be calling us to the rocky shoals to strand us on a reef, to toss us about and steer us off our appointed course.

And yet... they call. They keep speaking, even when we tell them not to. Even when we show them just how much it hurts us to reply.

And yet...we answer. Not because we expect anything different but because they call and we can't ignore it. We feel it is something we are supposed to be.

The voice tells me to love, the voice tells me to dream, the voice tells me that this is who I am. That I am among them, those lovers and dreamers, those magic bean buyers, those Kermits and Shel Silversteins.

You see, for all you pragmatists out there, if there's any creedence, any stock to put in a belief system and an afterlife, it is through our imaginations and our love and our dreams that we get there and the lover, the dreamer is the person who can get there.

We, your lovers, your dreamers, your fools on parade, your Double Rainbow guys, your star-gazers, your optimists, your rose-colored glasses wearers, your unabashed romantics...

We are your defense against the coming darkness of death and decay and nothingness. Treat us kindly.