Too often
We seek the answer
In the dry bones of thought,
Picking like carrion crows
For something edible,
A scrap among the dust.
And again we seek love
In dry thought
And find ourselves wanting,
Thirsting for a truth
Devoid where we look.
Where is this love
Of which some are flushed
Easy
In rich abundance,
Drinking as they wish?
For I go always
To the arid thoughts
And suck
For marrow
Long since desiccated,
Wishing it was wet
Like a spring.
Where is this love
That thought has promised
But fails to deliver?
For his promises
Are as juicy
As a succulent fruit
That I never get to taste,
Hovering always out of reach
Distant upon the horizon.
Where is this love
For which I have sought
Like a mad man
In the desert
Drinking only mirages?
For I have looked
Under every stoney thought
And found nothing
To quench this thirst,
Finding only dehydrated
Thoughts
Forever wanting,
No hint of Source
In thought,
Nothing to wet my tongue
And bring me home
To love,
Only these parched thoughts
Thinking
And thinking.
mental health
Choice
The mind
Offers a key
In the latch
And a compelling reason
To open the door
And walk
Along the avenue of suffering.
And for so long
You watched your hand reach
For the key
And fell through
The door
Like a bad dream recurring,
Travelling that road
As if you had no will to change.
And yet when you stand here now
On the threshold
With your hand upon the key
Some other voice speaks
Like a murmuring of love
And says,
All is well my friend,
Trust in me
Who offers no evidence
But for the fullness of the moment.
See the mechanism
Of the key
Turned in the lock
And the mind’s
Invitation to suffering.
See that desolate walk
- That well-worn track -
As not the truth
The mind suggests
Is paramount
But simply a choice
Of which door
You wish to open,
Which road
You wish to tread.
Be Happy
It’s trite
But truer
Than we think.
Be happy!
But… says the mind
And lists
A barrowload of objections.
I can’t be happy because……
Be happy is the mantra
Without sound or words
It is the silence
From which the mind
Finds its subtle ground
And supposedly rises.
Happiness is that
On which
The mind
Leans
And borrows
For its list of grievances.
Be happy…
It’s trite
But truer
Then we think.
Child of the Universe
Like a child of the universe
My heart drinks
The love
That comes
In a flow
Of warmth
Like the breath
Of my beloved.
At base level
The heart is a pump
An organ of flesh
Higher
It is organ of feeling
Floating on an emotive sea
And yet higher still
It is receiver
Of higher dimension
And the portal
Through which
The universe
Feeds its children
An opening through which
Love pours
Into self
Ignites the body to living
And lifts
Everything it touches
With light
Owned
By none
But God.
Dearest
Dearest,
For one moment
Rest
The machine in your head.
Sometimes it seems
So overwhelming, I know -
Those thoughts thinking
Way too fast,
Exploring all sorts
Of dark passageways.
And sometimes
You think those passageways
Are the vesicles
Of your heart,
And at the depth of you
Is a crypt
Where there is something
On which
You should never ever look.
No, no, no,
Hear me now child of love,
This is not your heart
But cobwebs
Made to look
Like fearful things.
Your heart is beside you now
Beautiful child,
She stands with you
In the space of always.
And if there are cobwebs
She loves them.
And if there are fearful things
She holds them in her arms
And loves them too.
Dearest,
Do not believe the world
That says you’re lost
To She
Who loves you always.
Do not believe that world
High on separate thought.
Feel instead
The warmth
That stands beside you always.
Dearest,
You are loved by She
And truly,
It can be
No other way.
To Find the Truth
I used to think
That to find the truth
I had to mine
The self
For the original sin,
That first crime
Where I walked away
When I should have
Remained,
That first step I took
Outside of myself
Which split me
And delivered
All the subsequent pain.
And perhaps there is truth there
But also
Such a long time
Using the fragmented mind
In an attempt to fix itself,
Yet finding
Only a collage
Of disappointment
And recurring dreams
Of regret.
Now, I do not mine
But sit here relaxed
Without the need
For cause and effect,
Holding loosely
A mild indifference
To symptoms
And that great causal defect
That the mind
Made into
An unwinnable game.
Perhaps there is a partial truth
In searching out that
Primordial shame
Locked in a deep pit
Beyond the scope
Of finding.
But perhaps
The greater truth
Remains
In the full heart
That bears
All that could ever
Come to pass,
All found
In its witnessing.
For the greater truth
Lies in love
In open love
That always looked
Without flinching
In freeing love
That brings the greater truth
Of love’s
Acceptance
Of everything.
Tick Tock
Tick tock
You cannot stop
Scrolling
Your
Time away
Tick tock
You cannot stop
Endlessly consuming
The slop
Tick tock
Tick tock
Tick tock
You cannot stop
Images
Rolling
And scrolling
In and infinite loop
Never giving
Enough of what you need
Tick tock
Tick tock
You cannot stop
Giving you life
To the machine
That feeds
And feeds
And feeds
From your attention
But never returns a thing
Tick tock
You cannot stop
Tick tock
You cannot stop
Myself
Dearest and closest
Most intimate friend,
You are made of nothing
But being.
When I acknowledge you,
When I fall back into you,
I return molten with love
As if you had dissolved
All but the essence of me,
Dissolved all
But that which you are,
Dissolved all
To which I was bound
In mind, body and thought.
And for a moment
And maybe moments after
Or even when moments stretch to hours
And perhaps really
In the truth of timeless always now,
I am free,
Free in being
And free in love,
Free to be myself.
Old Lives
Sometime the old lives rise
From where they lie,
Undisturbed
But fully functional:
Scripts we once called ourself
And followed unconsciously,
Ideas we believed
But forgot we believed,
Whose presence
Steers us
On courses
Now obsolete and irrelevant,
The machine trundling on
In a groove set
Years ago,
Thoughts we ceased to see
Guiding us
In the robotic program
Of our walking sleep.
Dial In
You can dial into love
As simply as smelling a rose,
As simply as taking a breath.
Dial into love
And feel the love that you feel:
It doesn’t matter if it’s for a pet,
A person alive or dead,
It doesn’t matter:
The warmth of love is the same.
Dial in to love:
Love that love:
Love and be loved
And step into the expanding realm
Swelling in your heart’s domain.
Taste the love that loves,
The love you have always been.
