The Bodhisattva Vow

I lift up my love
for your support. I trust you,
trust my foundation.
Underlying all,
heaven never disappears -
is never used up.
In love I enter
the primary flow of grace.
Some call this wisdom,
or say compassion
flowers near this spring -
that you will see standing here
how we must be yoked.
This act is the source
of heaven's power and truth
in my life and yours.

‎January ‎14, ‎2014 4:55 AM

Two Ways

2 Samuel 6 - 14 ...David danced with all his might before the Lord: and David was girded with a linen ephod...

Handmaids Watch David Dance Naked

The ephod was as named here probably made similar to an apron. As an article of clothing worn by priests (the high priest especially) it was perhaps improper for David as King to wear such a thing.

Also, the generally accepted interpretation is that David wore nothing else. If it was an apron style garment, then David was bare, head, neck, back and ass, legs and feet, and the apron probably did not always cover him below the waist frontally either in his energetic dance. A king naked before the Lord is a king in all humility, showing himself to be only a man, apparently devoid of royalty, only a man before God and subjects alike.

Thus the controversy arises, for a king is royal by exalted blood and raised above men and must be so or else he has no authority. It is for this reason that kings are often considerred gods themselves, to anchor authority over the kingdom. God is not generally visible either now or then. If the king is not clothed in the traditional way, then how are people to know that he is blessed by God? Why should they follow him?

Two Ways

King David dove in.
The strong new wine was that deep.
As he climbed back out
he found his daring
and began his whirling joy
about the fire set
before the Ark's glow,
the holy shrine of YHWH.
He stripped to God's skin
given him by birth
and aging, scars and marks, all
the signs of the earth,
the world God permits
though it drapes the King God loves.
King David, he danced
despite all protests,
sure of God's love in the dream
of His Kingdom come.

Wise men shook their heads
at David. God calls the wise
to caution near Him.
This too is righteous.

‎January ‎13, ‎2014 4:44 AM

The Complaint - A Sunday Whirl

The Coming Storm 

by Takeru San

The Complaint

"It's so remote,"
you whined, paying the one price
you promised never
to pay. Your impact
illuminates several
scenes that all haunt me.
I lie by the pool
in last year's litter and need
all lifeless now
as you nose the ground
snuffling peevishly at me
and the coming storm.

‎January ‎12, ‎2014 9:38 AM

Written for the Sunday Whirl's Wordle 143

The Lighthouse, 1989 - A Magpie Tale

Photo by Jean Guichard provided by Tess for a creative prompt for Mag 202

You might think as I did that this is a photoshopped image. Instead it was a matter of being in the right place and time, in a helicopter with wth right photo equipment during a storm in 1989. One place you can read the story:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Jument.

Phare de la Jument translates as "Lighthouse of the Horse" or if you will, "Lighthouse of the Mare". There are apparently three lighthouses in the area and the Mare's Lighthouse is in the sea on a small island called La Jument beyond the western tip of Britanny. This is the real thing and this photo, which I had not seen before, is obviously famous world wide.

Look at this:


The Lighthouse, 1989

Sometimes the sea grows
beyond all bounds. It will not
warn you. It won't care
that you have stepped out
to take the air or look at
the helicopter
hovering nearby.
When you leap back in, slamming
the door of the light
you are paid to keep
the sea rages and barges
past the seams of things.
There is nothing left
to do but climb to the top
and hope this is not
the day you will kiss
the world and your ass goodbye
and your wife and dog.

‎January ‎12, ‎2014 8:30 AM

I can't help wondering. The keeper has obviously stepped out to get a view of the helicopter. Did he get really pissed at the intrusion that nearly took his life? I think I would have been. I doubt I would have enjoyed the moment. I do like a good storm and have been known to take some chances with them. This sea is no question across the line for me. This wave is very close to what mariners call a rogue wave.

The Shortest Path

Political bones,
Do you love me? Probably...
How can I know this?
The chips are down.

Night
keeps your physical preaching
sharpened. Broken bones
on the shelf - they shine,
polished by speeches we gave
when we raised that flag
to lower it again
to half staff.

You wear your hair
long and flowing down.
I could be empty
stations on your latest route
around the playground.

‎January ‎11, ‎2014 4:30 AM

To Each In Their Places

Real Estate Ad: House for sale, no longer zoned duplex. Main house a two bedroom, one bath with remodeled kitchen, gas heat, front entrance ramped in wood for wheel chair access. Garage attached. In the rear and separate, a spacious studio apartment attached by a breezeway roof in order to create a legal duplex in a neighborhood zoned for duplexes at the time of upgrade. The apartment, a former two room garden shed totally remodeled in 1999, a kitchen and bath added, the whole completely finished. The garden shed: the oldest building in the neighborhood, once a part of the original farm prior to the current land use. Grandfathered in place in perpetuity so long as the roof outline remains unaltered. The front house was built in the seventies. Owner has moved on. Price negotiable.

All I ever got
was a small house, a small lot
city sized though with
an even smaller
back house I rented to my
former lover once.
I thought oh maybe
last chance but she moved quickly
on to buy fancy
up the road a piece,
over the bridge, up the hill
among the rich folks.

Me, I stayed down there
on the flat but high enough -
no flood insurance
needed. So much for
loving the soulful rich girl
beyond my orbit.

‎January ‎10, ‎2014 5:41 AM

Said This Way and That

Oh God, I don't know
how to unwrap my cramped hands,
my fingers fat claws
and this chain rusted
with oceans upon oceans,
the anchor down deep
dragging some unknown
bottom, not catching ahold,
not digging deeper
as it must to catch
the world and slow me as I
sail on, on and on.

I am astonished
how I chose calico fur
like some Cheshire boy.
I thought like that cat
I could disappear at will
leaving smiles behind.

‎January ‎9, ‎2014 5:47 AM

I've Come Back - Three Word Wednesday

Three Word Wednesday
Faithful; Isolate; Scrutinize

Tom Waits was singing and I picked it up...

I've Come Back

Oh it's time, time, time
for the faithful to declare
themselves as true blue,
and me, time. time, time
that I do not isolate,
no longer alone,
no longer delayed.
I know you scrutinize signs
and shadowy forms
of love's whispered sense
of grace. I shall stroke the strings
of my life for you.

‎January 8, ‎2014 8:22 AM

It's A New Year - A Magpie Tale

"New York At Night" photo by Vivienne Gucwa, chosen by Tess at The Mag 201 as a creative prompt for those who love to work and love to read.

It's A New Year

I walk the late streets,
the shiny streets, water slicked
with much less traffic
than at noon for sure.
The time is perfect for me
to think of the way
you would look at me
in those other moonlit nights,
so far away now,
navigated lanes
of time peeled back leaving raw
shapes of bone and hair.
It must be love, dear.
I don't understand this love
nor stone truth be known
do I understand
any other or life either
though I must live it.

‎January ‎5, ‎2014 9:37 AM

After The Storm

What I might expect
from the whistle bit caress
of the spare scarlet
sky behind the sun
struck down in my wan first pair
of eyes caught weeping
though I tried to keep
the dream I thought would save me,
where I might have been
is just not where I am, not
this weird sunken day.
Ain't it grand the wind
stopped blowing, you said, shaken.
Be glad we're still here.

‎January ‎5, ‎2014 8:09 AM

Written for The Sunday Whirl by Brenda Warren
Look for these words:

Hard Luck

While the story alluded to in the poem is all too common it is not my story. I chose not to have children. However, I know many people who do have this story and it's a painful one, I think we all agree. Things get very tangled and confused and a parent who loses his child is very close to despair or murderous rage. There is no pain like this one. I believe it's very difficult for many to see their own contribution to the mess in the middle of the suffering that losing one's child entails. This is my father's story.

I reconnected with my father a few years before he died. At one point I asked about his marriage to my mother and got such a heated response that I stopped talking about it. I was nearly 60 years old at this time. After all that time my father was still deeply disturbed by what had occurred and he offered to tell me about it. I of course knew the story from my mother's side.

My mother divorced my father citing I believe irreconcilable differences. She was given a modest child support which my father unfailingly sent for the first 18 years of my life. At the beginning of their divorce he would come and pick me up on Sundays and take me a variety of places where we spent our time together. I recall the MG that he drove. When my stepfather began to court my mother in earnest, my father began to pull back. When the new marriage was close, he stopped visiting with me altogether.

I do not recall ever being aware as a small boy of hostility between them. All this took place in the very early 1950s. 50 years later, my father was still plenty hostile. It was apparent that he felt my mother cheated him out of his firstborn son. He went on, married again, and built another family. He had two more sons.

Hard Luck

I would look where you
pointed if I had courage
but it has leaked out
the holes left in me
by my poor choices after
she told those stories.
I chose to run, hide,
fight losing battles with ghosts
of all my losses,
with the harsh moment
of dread she left me in place
of my first born son.

Written September 3, 2010 9:01 AM
Modified January 4, 2014 9:32 PM

Wiki says: Wystan Hugh Auden (21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973), who published as W. H. Auden, was an Anglo-American poet, born in England, later an American citizen, regarded by many critics as one of the greatest writers of the 20th century. His work is noted for its stylistic and technical achievements, its engagement with moral and political issues, and its variety of tone, form and content. The central themes of his poetry are love, politics and citizenship, religion and morals, and the relationship between unique human beings and the anonymous, impersonal world of nature.

Said Three Ways

Said Three Ways

I am so scattered
these days, as if someone drew
through me with a rake.

It's like I am spilt
corn across the road waiting
to be ground to dust.

You were my heart's glue.
You have taken me apart
with a turn and glance.

September 3, 2010 8:48 AM

Stranded At The Bus Stop - Reprise

I am a thief. I am not a brave thief nor all that clever but I am sneaky and a fair actor so I don't really look like a thief, ever. That I am a thief is no more true than it is in my spiritual life. Don't act surprised. The Divine Thief is central to spiritual life and that character appears in full maturity at least as early as the ancient Greeks, who had Prometheus stealing fire from the Gods for men, many stories of necessary thefts, and Hermes as the Divine Messenger who was also the Divine Thief. Thus it is. I am a thief. I am still spiritual, still devoted, still accepted. I have that confidence.

Wait a minute. Hermes is the Divine Messenger. Communication is thievery. I hardly ever behave as a thief anymore. I have nothing I need and do not need the thrill either. I have not actually stolen anything for a long time. The last time I did so, I stole to test if I still had a thief's heart. I stole a small item, a common thing often stolen from stores, as I would well know. I did not get caught just as I have never gotten caught. I slept just fine that night. I am still a sneak, still a thief.

However I write and write and write. Communication is thievery. I will not try and explain that. I suspect it has something to do with the Divine Power accessed through words. It has something to do with true Magic. To be mortal man and access Divine Power at will is to be a thief, always. Ancient wisdom. I will say no more.

So I am a poet, an artist. That is the current incarnation of my thievery. The biggest context is art in general. Art is communication and itself through and through thievery, stealing the power of god in mortal frames.

The Divine Messenger is a Thief. Both aspects are central. The messenger is a servant. What is true of my position in God's World, I snuck in, stole my way in. The way open was the servant's entrance, and yet I am not really God's Servant. Back on May 31, 2010, I first posted about this. Nothing has changed since November 14, 1966, when I committed my Divine Theft.

In 2010, I wrote:

"I snuck in the servant’s entrance. Along with that, I say I made a decision to prove a point in [a thief's - today's upgrade] argument with God, why I have come, but how I got here, the bus let me off and I have been waiting ever since for it to come back and pick me up. I am sort of deflated. I think I will die waiting."

Nothing has changed. God placed me at this stop, a consequence. There are always consequences.

Stranded At The Bus Stop

I sit on this bench
here at the bus stop waiting
hoping for the bus
to come and worried
if this transfer is still good
or now out of date,
too old, me too old,
so even if the bus does
come it won't be mine.

Written June 2, 2009 9:16 AM
First Posted May 31, 2010

Asking For Help

In The Lap Of God

Asking For Help

I heard the master
say today that God will comb
me into his hair.
He said violins
sing out the joy of God's mane
flowing free above
the flight of bright time
and that when I tumble down
into God's wide lap
I will see it all
as if I was never small,
never small at all.

I said, oh master
that has already happened
to this pilgrim long
long ago. Have you
the rules for the runes I cast,
ever catching up
to my exalted
best self only to fall short
over and over?

‎December ‎28, ‎2013 3:44 AM

The Turning Point

The Turning Point

I stood bent over,
weighed down with my thoughts of you
at the misty edge,
at the precipice,
leaning against the guard rail,
with the wind billows
opening my coat
while I decided what next
in the scheme of things,
what I should do now.

August 31, 2010 9:48 AM

Before Sunrise - Three Word Wednesday

A belated contribution to Three Word Wednesday. Oh the shame. I could not do that and Christmas too.

I've been reading about the Large Hadron Collider and the Higgs boson. The LHC smashes very high energy protons together. Protons are synonymous with monatomic and ionized hydrogen nuclei, meaning stripped of their single electron. Monatomic means Hydrogen not joined into the cold form of two Hydrogen atoms bound to each other, each sharing the other's electron to fill the primary double electron energy shell, why they pair up like that. This bond is easy to break at relatively low energies, which is why Hydrogen is flammable in the presence of Oxygen, and it easily makes water in that reaction. That is also why burning Hydrogen is potentially a cheap and very clean fuel. It is so flammable however, that controlling the Hydrogen burn safely has so far proved to be expensive even though as a fuel source it is cheap and basically in unlimited supply.

Thus collections of protons are positive Hydrogen plasma, and can be kept that stripped down way easiest at high speed (which also means, very hot). In this stripped down form, Hydrogen is the main substance of stars in their younger stages, whether small or large and thus is the most plentiful substance (and the simplest) in the universe this side of dark matter (which certainly exists) and dark energy (which it seems must exist unless something basic and crucial is still unknown). By the way, the negative ion of Hydrogen is a single electron and streams of electrons are quite common on the planet, driving all things electrical.

The LHC controls this positive plasma using very high quality vacuum and supercooled and complex surrounding equipment. It is not easy. The proton beams are not radioactive, but you wouldn't want to stick any part of you into the beams (there are two beams going in opposite directions so they can collide) because they are as I have already written very, very hot.

The physicists have high confidence they have found the Higgs field as it manifests in its very rapidly disappearing boson form, which means they have found a sufficient number of the right sorts of after effects of its presence. No one can ever see any of these things. They are smaller than light waves or for that matter electron waves (the smallest usable wave that we control and use in electron microscopes). What can be done, physicists can identify and name with consistency the predicted particle signals left behind in sophisticated counters and detectors of several kinds.

This week's words: Crisp; Exquisite; Magnificent

Before Sunrise

Oh crisp kiss, my love,
you exquisite example,
you magnificent
turn of phase, heavy
on the far Higgs side
of all bosons and leptons
joined in the standard
configuration,
light on the near side, color
a corruscation
on skintight flimsies,
you display of dreams
inside my brain stem, creature
of my wants and sighs,
I shall walk the bluff,
moving past your fine midriff,
on lookout for dawn.

‎December ‎26, ‎2013 7:02 AM

Written for 3 Word Wednesday

Life's Hard, Then You Die

An owl could not see the glass and didn't even slow down. The negative is left behind because birds oil themselves.

It is in the nature of bird sight that glass is invisible to them. It is in the nature of bird brains that they cannot learn their way past this invisibility. It is in my nature to be a poet. What is it I cannot see? All of it breaks my heart.

Life's Hard, Then You Die

I can't believe how
tough this thing gets after all
the work's said and done,
like that dumb feather
brain splitting his beak against
the window again,
get it? Again! Like
learn, damn it. Nope. Not any
time soon, broken neck
sooner than that. Some
things just don't compute of you're
a bird or for that
matter a person
either.

‎December ‎23, ‎2013 9:06 PM

Before We Go - A Magpie Tale

Madonna With the Milk Soup, 1510, Gerard David
Offered by Tess at The Mag: Mag 199

Before We Go

The God not quite made,
too young yet, still fed on milk,
the turned wooden bowl
taken from the cat
for this breaking of His fast -
I need a guide book
or some minty paste
to shine up my new found aims -
I would go to church
with you if you would.

They have shut the doors to keep
the goats out. Donkeys
tethered near the snakes
hatching in their dug up den
see me hide my tithe.
We've been told to sit,
all wrapped up, round with passion,
perfumed with spices,
keeping the faith clean
and fresh faced no matter what
tales fly out the gate.

‎December ‎22, ‎2013 9:06 AM

The Shortest Day

The Shortest Day

The morning is still,
all mist and slow moving time
and I see your shape
down the slope, under
the stretched out apple branches
with your hand against
the gnarly old trunk.
They claim you're something special
like an old time sage
and I don't argue
though it's against my nature
to paint such big noise
on any of us.
So chances are God Himself
could appear right here
and I would turn, turn
and say, "No, not you! Who else
have you got on deck?"
Even for the likes of
me, this is Winter's Solstice.
It rains on me too,
and my snuffling dog
whether we are just or not.
It's time for a nap.

‎December ‎21, ‎2013 10:00 AM

Hidden Wealth - Reprise

Emeralds mined and prepared for sale in Afghanistan.

Hidden Wealth

I looked underfoot
Expecting nothing for it
But found something there.

I wanted to stake
My claim but you said, "Nothing
Doing little man."

I don't think it fair.
It's so close to me, easy
For me to pick up.

That is how it seems.
You said, "It's your hidden wealth.
Must remain just like that.

"Won't fire you up otherwise."

Written January 7, 2009 12:26 PM
First Posted May 26, 2009

The Knot

Alexander deals with the Gordian Knot.

It was said that the king who could solve the Knot of Gordias (left in place by Gordias' son and successor Midas - presumably not the Midas of the gold) binding the Phrygian satrapy of the Persian empire would become the Emperor of Asia. The myth has it that Alexander solved the knot in one version by cutting it apart and in another by creatively thinking outside the box to undo it. That is why these days the Gordian Knot is often used as a metaphor for a problem that appears to have no easy solution.

The Knot

The wind makes a sound,
a blood red draft of the world
I hear in the room
I rent below ground.
Don't be combative, you say.
You represent spin
from both left and right,
both sides now rather sluggish,
fat from the feast held
after the tangle
was undone, knifed, sliced apart
at certain key points
like Alexander
cut the knot of Gordias.
I'm distressed because
I'm forced to horn in
these drab and chill greased up days
to comfort the Gods.

‎December ‎18, ‎2013 9:07 AM

Written for 3 Word Wednesday

Following The Master

Following The Master

We are all teachers,
homeless no matter our dreams
of home, of the wind
instead and all snags
ready to rip unwary
skin from vagrant bones.
The lessons seem harsh
I guess by design but who
started us slicing
down these slips and blades
is ever unclear. I have
my guesses and you
have yours but no one
admits to the blame. Maybe
no one is to blame.
"I didn't do it."
We all say something like that,
flashing if you ask.
Old owl hoots, directs
me to say thank you for all
your goddam lessons.

December 17, 2013 2:22 AM

I was reminded recently that G. I. Gurdjieff taught us to thank everyone who galls us. We thank them because our original necessity is to struggle with ourselves and only with ourselves. How else are we to do this? That is the sense in which we are all teachers of each other.

My Friend Stopped By Last Night

My Friend Stopped By Last Night

The party did not stop
when you knocked on the front door
but we went downstairs.
There I listened for
some tell tale, some sign of things
to come. You said stuff
and I oiled my legs
as I must these days. They crack
open and fill me with
dread as they bleed out-
just a little bit, two drops
last time. I hear you,
you know. I hear you.
It bruises my heart and scrapes
skin off both my ears.

‎December ‎16, ‎2013 6:05 AM

Butch and Sundance at the last. There is friendship and love but the rain has stopped for good.

Ain't We A Pair - A Magpie Tail & Sunday Whirl

The Ice Cutters Natalia Goncharova, 1911 offered by Tess as this week's Magpie prompt. Go to The Mag-198

Ain't We A Pair

The waves of clay lies
they packed all around the box
they prepared for us
all point to winter
and the ice cutting angel
at least where they say
anything at all.

That's what we get for standing
apart.

You snatch stars
in your simple way.
I'm clouds. I cover the moon
as best I can, love.
Sure. The fix is in.

December 15, 2013 3:41 PM

Wordle 140 offered by Brenda for this week's Sunday Whirl. Go to The Sunday Whirl-Wordle 139

Brenda said she chose these words as part of the lyric of the song Family, written by Pierce Pettis and sung by Dar Williams. Dar often covers worthy song writers and is also herself one of my all time favorite young song writers. She is no slouch as a singer either. Go here for a compelling duet of Family by Dar and Francine Wheeler. Francine lost her child to the Sandy Hook shootings yet she is able to stand and sing a solid part with Dar in this performance. Of course the audience is flayed wide open. Chances are you will be too. I was.

It's A Big, Big Moon

It's A Big, Big Moon

You don't make much sense.
That's how it feels, young moonbeam.
Down, down, down you come
from the high round hall
as the waves rise up to reach
and establish zones
of love and witness
palaver among the threads
of true blue glowing
weavers of the night.
No, you don't make sense.
It's more than my shadowy
way with things, because
yes, she said so too.
Indigo has tuned her strings
and her thrum comes next.

December 13, 2013 9:29 PM

I Woke Up Today - Reprise

To clarify: I posted this one in May of 2010 and this poem was written in May of 2009, shortly after the hospital procedure referenced. So when I introduce the poem that's what I mean.

Sometimes I am just not myself. I may be a little weird. In fact there may be moments when I am full blown batshit. HooHoo…ooahhahhahhah…

I’m all better now. Or not… At this time last year I was still echoing from that three day hospital thing where they put a flexible cage of titanium wire inside my heart’s lower right artery. Holy crap! I’m a bionic gray squirrel, a tree rat, as it were.

I Woke Up Today

How odd to come to
sitting in a seedy tray
wondering, where next?
I have some strange bugs
on me and a curious
hankering to scold
someone, anyone
who dares mess with me today.
Maybe if I place
myself upside down
on that tree with tail twitching
I will feel better soon.

May 17, 2009 12:01 PM

I'm Already Taken - Reprise

Here’s a poem about commitment. I wonder how many other things it is about.

I'm Already Taken

The wind and earth fought
over me but I belong
to the pale moonlight,
to starry rivers,
to the morning shine of sun,
to your warm rose heart.

April 15, 2009 12:58 PM
First Posted March 2, 2010

Cross Currents - 3 Word Wednesday

Three Word Wednesday







Highlight; Instruct; Submit.

Cross Currents

I shall hesitate,
shiver and shake, crawl the walls,
highlight the gray hills.
Am I to instruct
the hapless in the old ways,
the stone faced grim wights
frozen in mean time
aching to find the blue heights,
the winged grace, white smoke
among the live oaks?
I shall submit to her thrust,
such a greedy storm.

December 11, 2013 8:48 AM

Alice Cooper

School's Out Completely

I am many words
into this thing, word after
word after still more
words chopped up by lines
and counting, always counting
as if it meant more
that way, but at least
it's not a whole damn novel.
(This is not a line)

‎December 9, ‎2013 3:26 PM

I took the idea from Alice Cooper. He wrote "Can't think of a word that rhymes" as a centerpiece lyric in School's Out - a classic rock song from 1972. School's Out is just about perfect Rock in my opinion including the sentiment, and including not caring about lost grade points because of lousing up the rhyme. Even students buried in the slog up the degree slope feel just like this. And even better than that in the song is the wide open acceptance of childish rhyme as a legitimate expression. All of it embedded in real musicianship. There you go. Perfect Rock.

Of course in "real life" Alice and the entire early band graduated from the same Phoenix, Arizona high school where they were cross country runners and then Alice (named Vincent at the time) attended some community college. He quit school to pursue success in the music business. Thanks to Frank Zappa, among others, he made it. Vincent was originally a Detroit, Michigan boy.

In the same spirit here I can claim I am missing a last line because I write in triplet lines using Haiku 5-7-5 syllable count. But wait. That is the last line. :D



As Cooper himself stated: "We were into fun, sex, death and money when everybody was into peace and love. We wanted to see what was next. It turned out we were next, and we drove a stake through the heart of the Love Generation" This was in reference to the band's increasing shock rock success circa 1970. Hmmm. As a full blown Hippie I should hate this guy.

Always a consummate marketer, Alice Cooper renamed himself after his band. He was born Vincent Damon Furnier. I wonder if he keeps his name as a backup anonymous identity. I would.