Offering, Diving Bird

So this one gives me away. I am still back in October in my postings, near Halloween. And as is often the case, the spiritual and the love are themes of mine.

I wrote three new poems today. I have posted over a hundred poems so far and have nearly three hundred to go, but if I write more than I post, you see? I don't really understand this. I never had this capacity before last August. If I flame out tomorrow, I'll still have close to 150 days to restart the afterburner.

Today on Whiskey River the quote was about how works of art, especially poems when they are really finished are no longer the property of the poet. This is good news and bad news. Its good for humility and for entertainment, because when I say "this poem is not mine, or at least no longer" then I read it as a stranger and then it speaks differently to me. I also don't get outsized in my insides. But of course it really speaks poorly for property rights. I am ignoring those for now. I have to. I leave poems behind all over the place and nothing stops people from doing whatever with them. Anyway the poem I wrote today in response to the quotes on Whiskey River will come up in five months and you can't find that one anywhere else but here...stay tuned.

Offering

I am so many
Orange lobed bodies, one mind,
A pumpkin shaped life
Of dreams, of hopes, of my heart.

I am from the fading vine
Of autumn, ending
This year's display for you

That you may carve me.

*********************************

Diving Bird

I have come from reeds
Near the shore of your wild lake
To swim in your eyes
And sound the shape of your heart.

I will dive so deep in you
That I'll find the door
To the pure land beyond this
Place, then take us there.

***

Oh and here's the other thing...in this last poem I changed two words, which really has changed the poem, I'm betting for the better. By the way, there is a hidden Buddhist reference here...the Pure Land is where Amida Buddha lives. But how I use this is not so buddhist, more universal, like the golden age, or the before time, or the Garden.

Pure Land Buddhism is the most popular of all Japanese versions and also, I believe, the most like Christianity in its ways. Buddha is basically worshipped despite the common observation that there is no god in mainstream Buddhism. Except of course Tibetan Buddhism, and in all Buddhism if you want one.