07 Tuesday Apr 2015
Wind rocks the trees
at last.
They’ve been asking when
they’d get to dance,
and only flirtations greeted their longing.
Rain wets singing birds,
the sound enters darkened sky.
Singing in a storm-
fruition of a lifetime’s work.
The invitation is always there.
04 Saturday Apr 2015
Packs of begging children roam Delhi streets,
walk through traffic,
reach into open taxi windows-
western faces a target.
How they got there, how they are organized,
how they get by,
is undoubtedly a terrible story.
Meanwhile, there are those of us choosing
to suffer to be closer to God.
Delusion is thick if hurting that which is sacred
appears to be a requirement of the Infinite;
as if living fully the life given isn’t enough to remove
a blindness placing the gates of heaven without.
Returning our vision,
to where muscle moves blood,
and lungs exchange air, and
kindness becomes a language of its own-
there
we remember our Divinity.
In coming home,
we find refuge and
stop harming the world around us.
01 Wednesday Apr 2015
In your cringe
and bite
following another’s ignorant words,
pain.
Not the pain of a current slash of the knife
but of a gash inflicted long before self and other
stepped far enough apart to decide, even,
if they wanted to dance.
Knowing requires time,
recognition of habit a road winding into distant hills-
the shape your tears will mimic.
May strength and a giggle well up
along with each salty drop.
30 Monday Mar 2015
When rhesus monkeys come
to Dharamsala,
the cedars speak louder their wordsong
and blue green saturates sky
made milky by rains.
Taking coffee at a bistro table and
looking up to catch eyes looking down–
Moonpeak behind and unwalked horizon ahead–
wedding pen to paper becomes
a most important act.
25 Wednesday Mar 2015
Hummingbird scratches
before zipping off her oak twig perch
to import elated business to pine.
Her tongue flashes free a moment
before flight.
One hovering wiggle and the flowers burst
into a contagious grin.
25 Wednesday Mar 2015
I weave gold
from Light.
When next you find yourself reaching for rope
to heft yourself back up from the cavern,
I’ll be within your palms
for eager fingers to twist around.
The strength is in you,
the Way is in me.
Nothing created lacks
the gifts of gold,
if only you will commit yourself
to listen.
19 Thursday Mar 2015
Older even than yesterday,
not by loss or separation but
through integration.
Finding one’s bones calls together pieces
held apart
by the paralysis of stories requesting endings.
When settled back into bones,
whole now,
a new story begins.
Fire and Wind,
Light and Shadow,
Earth and Water,
the pairs learn
where to weave their edges-
fingers finding each other in warm dark.
This is full movement,
empowerment,
the invitation of Being.
For that,
there are no words.
19 Thursday Mar 2015
Our lips found each other last night.
How, I don’t know.
But the soft skin hidden on you
came to the same softness in me.
Bringing you back,
wherever you are,
takes no effort-
moon and light align
outside time.
Joyous reunion.
15 Sunday Mar 2015
extending a hand
for a body not there,
a person
you thought you left behind
but, in sleep, forgot..
snapping awake,
heart speeds
until you find ground again,
the flicker of light-
even in
gone
beauty arrives.
laughter sweeps the dusty doorway
for friendly toes-
yours definitely,
another’s,
maybe.
either way, the path
is clean and clear
15 Sunday Mar 2015
You call my name
when I go to that place I don’t understand,
the one where the word for terror was unknown.
Your firm, tender voice reaches in,
helps pull me out
of history that feels like a drowning.
Reclamation becomes devotion.
New birds continue to perch on the tree,
a proof the threatening waters
did not claim me.
When you call, I return
from somewhere losing its strength
to possess.
Difficult to say,
but I couldn’t do this alone.
I hear you call,
Thank you.
Salt, Smoke, Water and Stone 