Brother,
Stand unashamed
In the truth
Of your enquiring self.
You are he
Who must ask questions
To quench his thirst.
You cannot fight
Your birthright
Or the way
You are in the world.
Rest in this knowledge
That the path is right,
And your place on it
Is where you must be.
There is a deep truth
In acceptance
Of all
That you are
And all you have taken on.
Only this
Will see you transformed
And untransformed.
How you are
Is the truth
As it stands
In the moment.
There is sweetness here
Even while bitterness
Is tasted.
There is great freedom
To be powerless
Before God
To be as He is
To be as He is.
spirituality
Feng Shui
In the house
is
space
and objects
on the shelf
and furniture placed
but
mostly space
as if
each object
was a pointer
to that
which held
it
safe
as if
subtle space
had traded place
with form
to be
the
more important
thing
and that
which calls
attention
to
itself
allowing
all
the stands proud
to find its home.
Before All Else
To share
The sunshine of the heart
Is to find
The sun upon your face
And bliss
In basking
In its beauty.
For around each corner
Is a smiling face
Reflecting joy,
Both playful and loving,
And each new corner
Yields still more of the same
Infinite quality.
Can you imagine
A world
In which the heart
Is worn naked
And transparent
In the body,
And everywhere
There are flowers
Glowing
In adoration of the sun?
Well, this IS the world
In which the heart
Finds its place in plenty
And where the mind
Has settled down.
This IS the world
Into which we are born
Through the tool of the body,
Knowing the grit and dank
Of the soil
And yet also
The ineffable reality
From whence we all come.
How could we not share
This truth
Made of light and love,
Beyond the bounds of space
And time
And all we deem heavy?
How could we not share
This warm and tender truth
Of happiness
God-given to us all
As life
Found effortless
Just like the sun
And the flowers -
And really
All forms under
The light loved down.
How could we not share
The sharing
That brought us to ourselves
And to the boundless
And to the truth
That we are love
First
Love first
Before all else.
Rose
Some are green buds
Barely begun
But pushed
By the weight of the universe
To become
First the pursed lips
Of an imminent kiss,
Then the ripe indulgence
Of a beauteous flower
Generous scent
Wished to all,
Then loose
With joy
As petals relax and fall
Scattered like confetti
Abandoned
As the church bells toll
Marking the ever-passing moment
Of celebration.
Equals In Seeing
You cannot really share the light.
It does not travel
from here to there
from you to me
or me to you
as if there was
some sort of ownership
and transference.
But you can rise to it -
find the frequency
of yourself
attune to the light
in another
which is only
the light of yourself
and be
the light you are.
For all
are equals in seeing
equals in light
equals in being
and there are none among us
without this divine capacity
to be
and live
and love
in truth.
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The Precipice
Could it be
That the great precipice,
That peril conceived,
The fall from form feared
Is but an invitation
From fear itself
To ward you from the truth
That the cliff is no cliff
From which you must jump,
But instead
Is the gentlest slope
Like the soft sand
Of a gorgeous beach
Where a warm sea
Reaches to meet your feet
And invite you in
To something so vast
That all your worries
Would dissolve
Into the whole loving truth
That what is you,
What is real and true,
Recognises itself.
–
Copyright distilledvoice 2025
The Thoughts Of Us
When the heart swells
And thoughts are glossed in wonder,
Coming to the world
Wet with love
As if they had drunk deep
Upon the source
And imbibed
A draft’s worth
Of that subtle, unformed substance,
It matters not
What these thoughts are
For all are equal
Under love’s law,
All are painted in love’s sheen,
All are born of love’s significance,
And none are higher or lower,
Weighted bigger or smaller,
Nor judged to be greater
Or deemed to be less than any another.
Like us,
They are materialised
And glossed in wonder,
Coming to the world
Wet with love
As if they had drunk deep
Upon the source
And imbibed
A draft’s worth
Of that subtle, unformed substance.
Like us
They come to life
Imbued with light,
To dance
For the fleeting moment
Of their being.
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.
Sanctity Beyond Arithmetic
The past is littered with casualties:
And mind
Will go back
And count the lost,
And perhaps dwell there
As an unhappy accountant
To that which should have been.
–
But love is never lost:
The wise
Cast away the past
With all its woe and misery,
And hold only
To principle love,
The heart warmth
That tells of eternity
Beneath the messy arithmetic,
An inward wealth
To right all wrongs,
Solve hurts
And salve wounds,
A truth that swells
As it is acknowledged,
A truth that wholes
And reveals
That beyond and behind
The persistent ills,
Love holds all
In sanctity pristine
And being,
Ever perfect.
