I Woke One Day and Was a Man I’d wondered what it would be like to be a stranger in a body rented from God, cargo damaged more each day. I thought being a man would mean freedom to go wherever I wanted, do whatever I liked to do, not bound by the long leash […]
Tag: Philosophy
It Happened So Quickly
Light in a sapphire over exquisite wine campfire-light and shadows on a redwood grove, Daughter of Ceto naked in the ferns waterfall pouring behind you guarding the portals of Salmon Creek sun of all worlds our fiery heart Diablo winds coming in news of a fire somewhere, Big Sur summer. […]
Has It Really Come to This?
The story has been told and retold: Ben Franklin was walking out of Independence Hall after the Constitutional Convention in 1787, when a lady asked him…. “Well, Doctor, what have we got a republic or a monarchy? Franklin, “A republic, if you can keep it.“ But that’s not the end of the story which most […]
Break This Bottle
If I taxed my heart long enough to reach ninety-one I’d run short of beats, I know, dumb idea, no matter. I don’t need to map life that far to be happy– Still it’s good to know what’s out there before setting a course for the Isle of Calamity—waves rise and fall no gull flies […]
Being has no center, this poem has no name
Being part of not apart from is to turn against the turning world and time in favor of the third eye wisdom, the living wonder of one divine nature God-Spirit-Buddha word or sound Oh say what it is… (It is peace with all.) Can that be Be / cause you are a part of all, […]
The Tree
Buddha before enlightenment starved bony looking into the moment for a way out the joy and pain the universal law at the center of the chaos in and around him knowing we all wait under a spreading tree the return of turtles setting eggs in sand salmon roiling upriver to spawn sea lions […]
The Pest
If in the vaulted ceiling cold cathedral air Warming itself in sunlight, there is one fly And I am kneeling, I alone in supplication Am l lifting prayer to a higher power, that fly Will surely light on my ear! By heaven I know well the silver winged pest Red eyes refracting light Is God’s own […]
Bedtime Prayer
Soma, Zany, vodka sweet Now I lay me down to sleep I pray that death will not come That would be pretty dumb To die alone without a friend Would be a bitter wasted end. But if I die before I wake I did my best for fuck sake I don’t know where I’m goin’ […]
Invocation
In silence older than the sun the desert holds me like a lover needing little, offering nothing but peace– A voice in the wilderness, “There is no lasting happiness Samsara, Samsara.” Darkness older than silence, older than the coyote howl hunting song of the owl bat wing flick, mule deer kick To move and breathe […]
The Search
I wanted to be a serious poet, but heard they are prone to heart attacks so I lightened up and became a playwright, rented a little studio where I could audition the truth, ran an ad in the paper, “Desperately seeking reality.” And some very interesting characters came to read. There was a sage addicted […]