Categories
Poetry Saturday Expressions

Imagination | Session 20

Imagination is a funny thing
Can be a vile thing
A wildling, can motivate
Or desecrate
With or without the evidence
Mind makes its own proof
Mind draws me in attachment
Then makes me act aloof
Imagination is a lonely thing
Appearing individual and separate
Travels as though disparate
Never in one place
Ever pervading space
Remembering those I’ve met
Ever scheming, making bets
Ever brushing against yours
Yet pretending we’re all bores
How can we rely upon such a beast?
For it’s our untuned vehicle
Rattles over bumps and around curves
Unoiled, rusted, nearly busted
Soft, moth-eaten, torn-fabric seats
Our minds have been used and abused
We’re so confused, and we’re always
Giving our power to those who prey
Who eat away all day to get their fill
Upon the lonelies,
the innocents, the broken
Those who have not awoken
Those whose hearts have turned to clay
Moldable, opposable yet breakable
When dry and old and grey
May my mind not go that way
Imagination is a funny thing
A lovely thing
Can make you sing,
When you fill yourself with love and understanding
Gives you courage to jump
Lets you float before landing
And how can we access this happy mind alone?
One that helps others
Defends against crones
Simple as this
Control your mind
Or someone else will

Categories
Poetry Saturday Expressions

f*cked | Session 19

If I cannot have pleasure
free from all pain
while enjoying samsara’s treasure

I must be addicted to pleasure
and addicted to suffering
in absolute equal measure

Categories
Poetry Saturday Expressions

What now? | Session 18

If it was never fixed,
    it can’t be rebroken

yet it’s shattered now completely

while I am made whole

I have been repurposed
                   utterly renewed

now I know
         freedom,     not heartache,
         ensues

amazing – I waited
                   so patiently —
. . .
         okay, no
                    I begged
I literally got on my knees and pleaded

(humiliating really)

for C L O S U R E

I practically pulled my own teeth for it

(I simply stole a toothbrush instead)

I was intoxicated by the lust for a bitter end –

while being denied it again and again

knowing it’s going to come
inevitably

so I begged for early release

the buildup was incredible
intense at times

(filled with that crazed yearning)

but, as it so often is, then withheld

so when the climax didn’t come

time went by and trepidation

S t R e t c H e d

to a numbed oblivion, almost
forgotten – then rediscovered and

(as I was waiting for, begging for)

followed by the instant explosion,

so incredibly quick we call brief into question

a lit fuse to a pinch of dynamite

I waited for the punch! And it never came

it merely sizzled
                 a spark, lacking flame
                                  and while I wish

so strongly, I could say,       you too
were just a sizzle to me

instead I just admit you were a strong second

(sorry, never a first)

and of course such thirst for you

has permanently ended

no hurt            no difficult goodbye

no hard feelings

             just sweet, sweet relief

what now?

Enlightenment

Categories
Playlist Poetry Saturday Expressions

Hard to Swallow: A Playlist Poem Adjacent | Session 17

Hard to Swallow
A Poem dependent upon 15 songs

Runtime: 59min

I’ve to remind myself
       how I feel has nothing to do
            with what I can see now
                  for what I see does not function
to produce such un peace
       yet here it arises as if
            I were heroin-deficient
my mind chiming
                 you make me feel
                 you make me feel

and          how I hate to hear that lonesome
whistle blow

              knowing       it’s our time to
go
       100, 500, 900 miles
from            wisdom, further away as
uncontrolled                  desire blooms,
wounds, pierces all the wrong places,
                births desperation, debases

a toxin edged along the blade
                    a goddamn shame
slit wrists, caught in the undertow
cold as sorrow      I can’t breathe
       I’ll drown you with me
steeped attachment       deep
       & tormented       held tightly
to my weak mind
       I’m not alright

I wished it wouldn’t happen
       but here the karma ripened
              and I found it hard

didya think it’d be easy?
              if it was easy, everybody’d do it too

don’t be the fool & certainly
                     don’t give up
don’t let me steal this moment from you       
now       get through the messy muck
       and find relief, in faithful peace
                     grasping’s           release

but      in ignorance, more so
            tell me that you won’t let go

Categories
Music Saturday Expressions Video

Obscurity | Session 16

Video & Poem inspired by “Her & The Sea,” song by CLANN


Uncertain are the times
unknown is the plot
does the shadow ever darken
where time cannot be bought

we hasten t’wards our doom
driven by attachment’s whip
we medicate our gloom
dying in delusions’ grip

Categories
Music Poetry Saturday Expressions Video

In My Mind | Session 15

Lately I’ve been back in the forest, capturing a fraction of my experiences. Here is glimpse of my visions that demanded to be expressed to the music of CLANN. See the Youtube channel for more.

May your Saturday be filled with love, joy and expression!


In my mind

though light will rise,
first darkness falls
at the faerie court
they see it all

understanding should not
be confused with power
in the deathless state
we fearlessly devour

delusions


Music: “The Faerie Court (Under Sun)” by CLANN
Video & Editing: K. Samways

Categories
Buddhism Photography Saturday Expressions

Words haven’t been invented yet | Session 14

I sit
in what should be peace
I have a mostly happy mind and yet
not knowing how to feel
amongst constant mistaken discrimination
I stare longingly into the sky
cold press of flat rusted metal bars
under my calves
lukewarm Bengal Spice on my tongue
splashed on my knee
messy me

dark periwinkle birds, raptors
highlighted in pink and gold
dance and dive, painted as clouds
across the sky
part of me wants to cry
and that’s the seeds of delusions for you

because in reality
my mind is peaceful and content
and I have no problems

Oh! How I long for a problem!

so my mind searches and searches
and it detects a sadness that was only a seedling
and I tendered the seed of sadness until
now I could pluck at any time a flower
with each its own story of sorrow
and right now my mine is one of loneliness
the most stupid delusion of all because,
rooted in self-grasping ignorance,
it pushes me toward attachment along
a line of inappropriate attention
here now I’m hooked
on something I’ve never known, never seen
another unfulfilled desire has its evil hold on me
in another I cannot find, I can’t foresee
here I’m hooked
on suffering – making a terrifying joke
out of another precious lifetime

so while I sit and wish and wait
on Dharma I will meditate
knowing with blessings karma’s Fates
will be only kind
I dedicate my merit
feel sad, feel compassion
and with only bliss now cry


Categories
Dreams Saturday Expressions

Three Dreams | Session 13

I’ve had four to five memorable dreams over the past year. Here are three of them.


Chapter One

In the first dream, I was back in a student house.
I had to pack up and be out by the next day.

Too tired to do anything that evening,
I went to bed in a sleeping bag
on a mattress on the floor.

A recent partner was spending the
night in the other room.

I had a large upturned couch
in the next room and spilled
jewellery and beads all over the carpet. 

The next morning, he got up to leave.

Aren’t you going to help me? I asked.

No. I just needed a place to stay the night.

Oh. Disappointment.
Also thinking, how the hell
am I going to do this alone?

When are you going to get it?
I’m not here to help you.

He emphasizes
what should have been obvious.

Chapter Two

In the second dream, I was walking
down the street to my mom’s house.

He was walking back to a van
parked outside her house.

I was surprised.
Surely he would have told me he was in town.
Disappointment.

He gets in a tour/camper bus. He is with his ex,
some girls from work and school, and a new face.

Without restraint I put my hand on his crotch
and aggressively groped him while choking out
Nice to see you. Thanks for saying hi.

I exited, lacking any shred of dignity.

Chapter Three

In the third dream,
I was walking through mist.

He came out of nowhere.
Why didn’t you tell me you wanted to talk?

I tried. Do you want to now?

Why didn’t you tell me?
He faded back into the fog.  

Predictable.

Categories
Poetry Saturday Expressions Visual Artwork

Risk Taker | Session 12

Leaving the salt lamp low
I undress close to the open
window, watching the wind stir the trees
feeling the breeze on my skin,

Living on the edge of losing it all
pretending with non-attachment I won’t
care, at all – I love this type of faith
but still mine runs deeper than that

What illusion is this appearing to minds,
that makes material risk seem most perilous,
the highest stake. Meanwhile, everyone
puts their future on the line for a brief escape
regretted in the end, when such pleasures
almost always bring such pains

And still, deluded most times
I’m sure I would risk it all again,

If only to learn the swift lessons
needed for permanent escape, liberation
and if only for the benefit of others, complete
Enlightenment – the highest state

The greatest risk to reward benefit
of all, to all, for all.


Categories
Poetry Saturday Expressions

Overcoming a sad weekend through imagination | Session 11

Read time: approx 4 minutes

written in December 2020


I’ve started to root my feet as I walk
so as not to fly away
my head is up inside the clouds
and clouds aren’t here to stay

Appearing normal as ever I was
so it appears I walk on ground
yet inside my mind the streets transformed
a different time, a long lost day, reality unbound

You see, I hesitate to admit
the spontaneous overflow of emotion
that overwhelmed me this past weekend
uninvited tears and two ice cream cakes

Later and I feel better than before
and stronger without falling
feel I’m falling safely to the ground
after being so far away in order to survive

That is the key. Traveling far away
my way costs a little less these days
when travel is forbidden on a political –
I mean for-your-safety and conspiracy theories

Dismissed once more completely unlike
twenty years before when a 9-11 call
came to distress a nation continuously
paying for the evil deeds it continues

To commit. So it seems unfathomable that 
I should be able to arrange words
in a way they’ve never been arranged
before since everything is repeating itself

How did they find their way
here now to your hands
to your eyes. How many parts 
of your mind are you using 
to comprehend this basis
and how many senses are
liberating you or
simultaneously imprisoning
you in samsaric pleasure seeking
yet no endless bliss
I could be anywhere in this 
warm hazy gloom I’ve created
in this room
electric guitar riffs and
smoke lifts, incense and candles
burning low, low like my gaze,
low like the spirits of the masses
drawing near the end of what
some may call a “fucked up” year
check it out as a meme somewhere

I want to be held by arms that love me
even though arms cannot love
and to pretend the body and mind
want the same thing is deceit

Smokey blues, and my bare feet
stretched over the back of the 
kitchen chair in front of me. Not warm
nor cold and so I can no longer 
sense them and my mind in a trance
disconnects from my body and 
in the flickering candlelight dance
with the clear, thick sound in my ear
I lose myself, I lose the moment into
a single sensation of the moment
tactile functioning ceases as auditory
rapture plays a different sensation
across the skin. What’s that, pores?
Bring a friend! Goosebumps rise to no end.

If you run your hand against me now
to this solo I may literally die of overstimulation
and it’s not just the copious blooms
of Mary Jane’s bouquets floating through the dark
nor is it the magnificent high
although it helps
it’s this fucking art to heart music in ear
and olfactory tickling dense breath via nostril
and the trance of expression while
simultaneously bearing witness to
manifestation and expressing and perceiving
the metaphysics of this existing in the
future space of your present moment.

This tragically ignored dependency
worse than the drugs used tonight
has mutilated our minds into ignorance
rooted deep.

And so this skin feels music as touch
and yet feels touch not
from within this dream realm which is
impaired life, I feel the strings as fingers
strum on skin and percussion as too much
at times too intense but oh that brass
really gets me from the inside out
really putting the sax in saxual intercourse.
The woodwinds in my hair and as whispers
on my neck – over the top sensations
that would give anthropologists cause
to study: what drug is this? 

And gypsy magic would be the reply
because the music is the magic
and the roots run deep
the attachment runs deep

Yet rooting
here I am attempting
to root also
so that I might not fly away
this time, at least not today
I’ve got busy work not time for play
touching my hard nipples
to rock and roll and blues
outside of the dream
the kitchen chair is damn 
hard on my ass and I have to
adjust my position and
leave the reverie behind.