Categories
Poetry

Part of it all

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I want to be
part of it all
not individual and alone
not an add-on, but integral
I want my purity to be yours
and I want to spark the virtue
in all minds, together
like water, taking shape

I want to see
the aggregate of aggregates
“I” am
I want to see the “I” differently
so I am not trickster-trapped
by selfish self-cherishing
grasping the most important “me”

I want to be
the cedar on the rock,
the bark on the trunk,
a drop of water in the earth
a molecule of worth
immeasurable yet meaningful
a part of it all

Categories
Poetry Thirsty Thursday

Exception

even exceptions to the rule

break the paradigm
of their     im perfection

seemingly im possible
at the time

wait for the   but 
the     except

wait for it to fall
as the autumn leaves
still green, clinging,
still receiving the nourishment they need

still strong, then cut – jettisoned
tossed, ripped in the wind
painted glory, faded and
               quickly burnt to crisps

as the feelings
               of new love
blossom and fold

as midnight candy
                      opens at night

honeyed fragrance satisfies space
a gift for senses, too soon to pass
                don’t get attached

and you might be alright —
           except

Categories
Poetry

How does it feel?

I dream about the serenades
     I remember each bouquet
          I recollect the cards they wrote
I recall sweet things they’d say

I received all the attention,
     had a taste of every gift
          I enjoyed quality time (a plenty!)
some acts of service, if not swift

and how I miss the ways
     they’d touch me, bow me to their will
          such kind physical affection
that I crave …                 desire still

confused pleasure in each moment
     mistakenly I named the cause
          external force, sexual proponent
when really born from karmic laws

how it feels is empty
     how it feels is lost
          how it feels was temporary
even now I pay the cost

still missing stupid moments
     I still idolize false gods
            still failing through each feeling
still attached to what is, was

still hopelessly romantic
        I’m still burdened to the core
               still looking to step lightly
 while still planting seeds of war

still learning love and patience
     I still apply effort every day
               still seeking Three Jewels of refuge
and for simple blessings I do pray

                                            so when

I dream about the serenades
     smell a sweet bouquet,
          find the cards in deep dark drawers,
and reread things they’d say

I let the attachment slip away

the feeling cannot stay


Categories
Buddhism Dreams Poetry

Temporary Illusion-like Appearance

          Open your mind, heart
          to feel what you feel, name it

your Spiritual Guide whispers to you
as a wave that laps the sandy shore, gently
receding, absent whitecaps

          Name what you feel
          be not afraid
          for what rises will fall
          and what fear have we
          of what is not permanent,
          never mind what we cannot name?
          What we cannot name does not exist,
          so what is it?

and you go within,
as instructed for
within is all there is
when there is
no out there out there

and you feel

disappointment
red, raw, and sinewy
funnily, sadly, and sorely
familiar, rubbed, worn and
blistered, in risk of rot
if you let it fester like
resentment –
                    you can’t
I was here first          your way
in or out of this one

it’s not yours, except
you lay claim to its
disappointment
as though it could have been
if it could have it would have
and it didn’t so it won’t

and you think

acceptance
the sweetest fruit,
sometimes the heaviest to bear
laid at your feet as you risk despair
only having to pick it up, lift it
with legs of wisdom,
but no –
                    I chose
to disappoint       myself

yet, hope

hope is here too
blossoming as a new bud
for disappointment
could not create sorrow
where love and compassion
had already taken root –
my mind protected by a gate of
incredible goodness, the only pleasure
I’ll happily increase in samsara’s garden
where running never yields escape
for the iron fence is the nature
of the mind – presently misunderstood

so hope,

hope that yields to faith
is what transforms my dream
because I must believe that
change is possible, is real
to make progress, effort, heal
I trust my Spiritual Guide’s instructions
for I put them to the test
and when hope transformed to purest
Faith, I see they are the best
and still my foolish mind cannot
afford to rest

because I was the mind of
unnecessary disappointment today
the utmost waste of breath
when each and every thing that’s ripened
has been for my swift path’s benefit
          so this too I will transform
and birth love so great it shall
become the norm, even if time be brief
we have so little to work with,
yet there’s so much we can achieve
if we hold correct belief

so, still I see the disappointment
my mind claims as mine – though truly
I could do without, here, add to that list
my deluded doubt
                    I know my happiness doesn’t lie here,
and still I mourn a temporary loss –
                    so instead, I donate
these mistaken minds to the cause,
the cause of the effect, the only one
I wish to possess, the greatest mind
of precious Enlightenment

(for others’ benefit, may I forever cease
these horrible, painful minds of suffering)

Categories
Poetry

Even You

I always wanted the best for you
that’s kind of why I wished you knew
what you wanted in life, mostly
and, you know, kind of who you’d like to be
maybe one or two simple goals
a job, career — a commitment-phobe
is what I got instead
with stress and anxiety round
his balding head, and don’t get me started
on the gluten allergy

okay, I’ll try not to make it personal –

as a bodhisattva, with bodhichitta
I now pray
for each and every being to be happy
each and every day
for all suffering to be gone
for even you to get your fill
for not one enemy I claim
not one ounce of ill will remains

I hope you’re happy on your path
I hope you’re surrounded with love and laughs
I haven’t left a bit of wrath
to blame anything on you
even when I wanted to
instead I saw the good you grew
in me and many others

despite the bumpy, gritty roads
calves in ditches and girl scout notes
the ups and downs and round and rounds
and endless suffering,
I’d choose it all again —
if I don’t escape this life
we’re bound to repeat that goddam strife
because we couldn’t close the loop
our destiny will be to regroup

unless one of us is liberated,
one of us is freed
although I wish it would be you
I must know it will be me

if what I see in you,
is merely a mirror of myself
a bloody tormented soul
I’ve now left upon the shelf
a chrysalis ripped apart
the snakeskin that I shed
unlike losing hair upon your head,
intentional,
even you remember intention
maybe you even have it now

I believe we all can change

I’m doing it somehow

all beings will destroy delusions
all virtue will ensue
all beings become Buddhas

even me
even you

Categories
Dreams Poetry

Elemental Insanity

I am of the earth

and I do not trust the water

It laps my shore
I lick it up, moistened
soft and damp
left yearning
unoiled lamp
left polished
but wanting wear

I’m earthen
–yet rarely feet have trodden here
while I walk the substrate bare-
footed, rare to see another
with the will to exhaust
such karma there–
upon my earth
travellers now fear
such dirt
and toxins leached have
run amuck
now gotten stuck
upon my shores
where you wish to lap me up

I do not trust
I will not harm the beings near
and you, my dear

I stretch my eye to the edge of
the horizon — trying to find where
water ends and sky begins
unaware I’m standing in
that ether now
my waist deep wading
transcends liminal space
and I no longer seek
to stretch my sightless senses far
but rather remain to feel
the space around

I look up and down and see that
in the sky, reflected back,
a different sea, a cloud
soaring condensation
ready to transform at any
moment, dark and massive
holding deceptive weight
threatening to rise the tides
and drown us all

I don’t trust the water

— — — — —

I am of the air

I do not trust the fire

I love it, though,
and how alluring
it dances and matches
my rhymic fancies
alighting neither
here nor there

like spark to ash
rising into the night
up to the stars –suddenly
dying, vanishing and descending
silently — crying and proclaiming
that life’s not fair

the fire burns me up
its heat draws me in
as if an answer
to the ice around my heart
as if it could possibly melt
lifetimes of anger
turned sorrow to rock
how I wished the fiery
heat-of-passion-
spawned aggression
was the answer
crystal clear —
yet the delusion’s not
so before I’m eaten up
I make like a deer
and run

I do not trust the fire

— — — — —

I am of the light

I do not trust the space
my depth perception’s off
my conception’s out of place
I do not trust the time
the way it moves so slow
to the uncomprehending mind
that dims my afterglow

I don’t like the space between us
as messages get lost, and
when you’re seeing me as separate
with problems you are fraught
I see emptiness before me
yet mistakenly, I know
naming ordinary appearance
where boundless magic grows

I do not like refraction
how it contaminates my rays
I am pure light
I feel it
yet space eliminates & constrains —
though I am the brilliant being

I don’t trust the space

— — — — —

I am of deep ignorance

or else I would escape
this elemental game —
this cyclical existence
in which I’m continuously betrayed
by each and all delusions
that gather round my head
and constrict my heart’s pace so
I can barely catch my breath
it’s time to let this go
into the water I will drown them
& with the current
let them flow


Categories
Buddhism Poetry

The Unforgetting World

We live in the Unforgetting World

Unforgetting

You hear the word
you ask what it means

A man in a dress tells you it means
we never forget our attachments

What’s an attachment, you wonder
as your background in sales leads you to believe
it’s an item you attach to your primary sale
in essence, you should upsell three attachments
with each cell phone (case, cable, warranty)

There are no guarantees,
the man in the robes says
except that you won’t forget
your attachments

You learn:

Attachment is the mind that exaggerates
the positive qualities of an object
(attachment loves ignoring red flags)
attachment spins a deceitful fairy tale:
it claims the object is the source of your happiness

And we believe this tall tale
despite all contradicting evidence
we love to ignore evidence
when it does not corroborate our stories

You walk away

You begin to forget
what the wise man said
almost immediately

You think:

I am forgetting
I must live in the forgetting world
I have forgotten what I ate for breakfast
I have forgotten what I did yesterday
god only knows what I did last month

I only remember things I’ve labelled special
I only remember what I’ve done
in accordance with its repetition

When you ask me who I love,
I say friends and family
because they are familiar, and the answer
is engraved on our hearts over lifetimes, infinite

I have forgotten almost everything about my life
who I was, who I’ve been, the characters I’ve played
and the friends I used to have

All I have is the present
and if I think about what I can remember
at any given moment

it is my attachments

It seems it is the only thing
I can remember

Like some sick joke on our weak human minds
that a mental factor could purport such wicked lies
and how could we not remember that
we’ve fallen into such traps before!?
How can we keep forgetting
we are betrayed forevermore?

Until the cycle, the pattern ends
until disrupted, samsara bends
and finally breaks

You remember the man,
in the dress, in the robes
he gave you a liberating gift
an opportunity to see the truth

By seeing differently and remembering
I am ever unforgetting


The Unforgetting World (podcast)

Categories
Dreams Poetry

The Illusion

I saw a puppy dog in your eyes
I consulted with the night
“Is this a disguise?”
I waited and waited but heard no reply.

I heard an old soul in your voice
I questioned my spirit guides
“Have I before made this choice?”
They laughed and whispered, “Silly pride.”

I retrieved a fiery star
from a faraway realm
“I felt something stir,
and he felt like home.”

“O foolish girl,
we’ve told you before;
you’ll know when you feel it,
you know you need more.”

I combed with my eyes,
searched above and below,
searched within faces,
searched for what I know.

Unexpected, unexpected,
was the whisper from the moon.
Unexpected, unexpected —
but was that going to be soon?

There’s a craving and a longing,
like I’ve come unmoored.
There’s an anxious buzzing dancing,
and I’m yearning to be cured.

Seeking through external,
same mistake as before.
I know it when I feel it,
I know going in means more.

I released the burning star
“What does unexpected mean?”
“You’re missing the point,
stop playing ordinary being.”

I imagined I saw pain in your eyes.
I confessed to the night
“He reflects my disguise.”
“Your wisdom grows,” the dark replied.

I felt a soft soul on your skin,
but the imprints came from mind.
I recognized my old soul from within,
and promised, “This time I’ll be kind.”

The pain I’ve caused in countless lives,
has come against me stacked
with loneliness as a simple karmic scale
bringing balance when with patience I react. 

I accept and cultivate pure love
as an antidote to suffering – both mine
and yours – and with gratitude to guides above
heart embrace, entwine and with universe align.

Virtue and emptiness and wisdom and union
through my intention, ultimate and supreme
with universal compassion, the ultimate communion
and above all else, I will remember the dream. 

Categories
Philosophy Poetry

Observation 1

The space between 1 and 2 is the 
same infinite quality as between 2 and 3

Not the same space
different aspects

Yes the same nature
infinite

Categories
Poetry

Lost

I lost your number
a long time ago
— right away

after the lock broke
it was clear
I couldn’t be trusted

how things have changed
and mistaken memory
makes you
bigger, then smaller than
you were, are

who are you now?
I wonder

I lost my privilege
to know

the you
grown in moments
now passed