If your daily life seems of no account, don't blame it; blame yourself that you are not poet enough to call forth its treasures. For the creative artist there is no impoverishment and no worthless place. (Rainer Maria Rilke)

Paris, February 17, 1903
Letters to a Young Poet

Sitting in a spacious hotel lobby
which enclosed a carpet with repeating designs
Large TVs with changing projections on screens
These assertions of apparent separations in life
Two boys playing pool and a narrator on TV
speaking with all certainty proclaiming his side
A swinging lamp in pendular motion announced
the obvious rulership of linear time
However, remembering now that all these are
the making and iterations and extensions which
brighten in the light of our Awareness
But not yet home these brightened extensions
remind us that Awareness is only aware of itself
Next time might we start in Awareness and
watch the extensions arrive  ?

This morning's list
of what-to-dos
these pulls outward
resisted by a wish
for settled quiet..
after giving in
to pulling of weeds
the aftermath was
a calming recognition
that the settled quiet
ventured and returned..
the life challenge
to gain recognition
of settled quiet
in the midst of
the storms...

We want the mind to confront
a Question of significance
for the mind to struggle
and finally report that
I know not..
A Question such as
What am I?
will reduce the mind to
a not-knowing friend
melding into simple
happiness of Awareness...

thought by many
as a pejorative
a name of illness..
might we inquire
of a benefit hiding..
pointing to a split
a duality
we are bombarded
with duality's insistence
of independent truth..
might a question arrive
sooner or later
on sole right to
represent our
Truth...?

we need expect
to miss the mark
with the shadow
such missing makes..
but the knowing that
under the shadow
lies the mark
the glowing mark
becomes a teacher
dissolving the shadow
then we know
we are the mark
and the mark now
knows itself...

awareness as our oneness
as energetic substance
surrounds and penetrates
really all in all..
yet we are here
my table
my pen
my paper
my poem
my self..
and what is awareness
doing this morning..?
investigating what it
makes of itself:
table
pen
paper
poem
self...

a lowering bright sun
seeks dark forms for
splashing its light..
OR
day's end bright sunlight
exploring and discovering
finding its rays
in many dark forms
made of light...

Evolution...

is our not-knowing
many have said..
the random unpredictable
of every-thing out there..
Yet in the chaos
similarities gently assert
and these suggest
an order and unity
somewhere and sometime
or perhaps better
no-where and no-time
from which spring the
plethora and strangeness
all those differences
of 10,000 things..
Our discovery arrives
in new understanding
of deepened union:
similarity and difference
attraction and strangeness
order and Chaos...

Our perceptions
are found guarding our gateway
to Oneness to Awareness and to Joy..
the ages have presented a gateway test:
sensations and thoughts are disguises
seeming to declare independence for
all appearing out there..
common sense rushes past the
gateway and fails the test..
yet fortunate are we with teachers
ancient and new to caution silence
then to return us to the gateway which
we had so quickly rushed through..
with only this pause our Oneness
restored and with Joy we know
and say:  I am Aware...

for new things fulfilled
brings bursts of happiness..
then to another and
one more burst..
new seeking with
glimpses fading hidden
by new desire rising..
at last on one day
an amazing jolt
knowing now the search
may finally subside
and astoundingly this:
happiness knows the
seeker is the sought...

Power is leftward
about being correct
about the facts..
often we're told
your opinions yes
but not your own facts..
this leftward power
holding sway with
an occasional reminder:
facts now are
in great abundance
they are ephemeral
and often illusion..
flaws abound in
fact supported life
living off-of-center..
the clamor is calmed
with Questions arising
absorbing all facts
and remaining as
Questions...

The location the place where one stands
this morning..sitting or standing..sun or
clouds of a new day..interplay of inner
and outer..all in the location of our
Awareness of which we now have
become aware..the Place has become
created and will be created again only
to reflect an Awareness which has
no place...

Waiting in our valley
for the peak of Now
to show once again..
Another transcendence
to experience very soon..
Then to discover
the peak and valley
name the same Now
and we need only
breathe...

Named iterations..branches from Roots..
our sensing IS iteration..this truth lies
in the similarities we find and find again..
The similarity of branches speaks of Root
and indeed are joyfully Root joined..
So for similarity..now for difference
the creation also iterates as difference..
branching everything new..beauty
and energy..independent and free..
Displays of colors..yet a forgetting brings
  up-rootedness casting life shadows..
Awaiting finally a Root awakening...!

On a sidewalk
a fateful fall..
Over this dead one
two persons meet:
One wishes a disposal
quiet and away
from trafficking feet..
The other with a kick
and quick disregard
of this morning moment's
sudden dark streak..
A brief encounter
two teachers
on her path..
Each holding a mirror
for the other...

In a patch of sundried earth
dark cracks emerge.. forms resembling maps
remembered from schooldays and Google..
Appearance of arbitrary lines depicting
States newborn..
Our everyday maps also born of the Sun..
the Sun's artistry with rainfall..the points
of assembly of water in place and flow..forms of
unique identities each subdivided patch..
Raising the question of new possibility of finding
an Awareness.. becoming the Sun and seeing
the patches and lines and States anew
as images projected.. from that projector..
those many miles away...

So much depends on Awareness of
our real Self..That Self of dimensions
our lives between..Happiness only
found in singular perspective reaching
and caressing the other...

I am looking at the black cover
of my journal..where
these numbers stand 2014..this measure
of the line from my birth..a lengthening
line we each own..now Billy Squirrel
approaches my seat on a sunny porch
morning..and come to think that Billy
knows no line..his moment's interest is
a just discovered peanut..now standing
and hands handle as I would if becoming
that squirrel..are there matters more
important..on this Saturday morning..
than erasing that line..and becoming
as Billy with attention all gathered
to that peanut delight...

Just as bees gather honey, so we collect from all that happens what is sweetest—and we build Him. Even with the littlest, most insignificant thing, when it comes from love, we begin. We begin with effort and the repose that follows efforts, with silence or a solitary joy, with everything we do alone without anyone to join or help us, we begin Him whom we will not live to see, any more than our ancestors could experience us. Yet they are in us, those long departed ones, they are in our inclinations, our moral burdens, our pulsing blood, and in gestures that arise from the depths of time.

Rome, December 23, 1903
Letters to a Young Poet

Our yard is sheltered
high board fence with trees..
Only I know and see
this she-deer lying then standing
sheltered on this Easter eve..
Alert as ever with swiveling ears
each of my in-door sounds
is entered in her registry..
So this connection of
mis-trust and rest
makes her life..and ours..
until sometime when
mis-trust finds real rest
that of eternal
already Now...

When the knowing
is duality..conversation roams
over fields of facts with connections
as arising..these connects may point
to embracing non-duality..which some say
should have been the beginning knowing ..
Mis-connects spread..separation rules..
red emotions rise with the exchanging heat
and in some domains..blood streaks the floor..!
Non-duality apparently must be tasted
and tasted again..to savor its humble flavor
cleansing those doors of perception
simply knowing not-knowing...!

in your toes and in your eye lashes
then shifting elsewhere as you choose..
We direct our focus to ever present
electricity producing that glow and
in simultaneity attend to the doing and
to the noise of this moment..

With a postscript: can we remember
as we forget...?

Simple as this..?
As flatlanders experienced
the nonsensical unbelievable
and heretical third dimension..
Are we now evolved
after those eons to be surprised
that the Fourth has been here
all along awaiting each person's
unique discovery...?

Time distorts
the reality of things..
One direction it claims
a forward path
as the only path..
But then perceiving
with eternal sense
time is illusion when
standing alone..
A new sense
reveals time's twin
brings symmetry with
new found peace..
Reality reveals as
layer upon layer
canvas upon canvas
awaiting the last
brushstroke to
perceive the All...

The day is coming when
a single carrot
freshly observed
will set off a revolution.

-- Paul Cezanne (1839-1906)

In this place which
is not a place..
Our Awareness is aware
of itself..
With the inhale
sense the oneness
this transparent
high vibratory glow..
No objects attending
just Awareness aware
of itself.
Then the exhale
returns the object world
transformed in Now..
We project those objects
and find them immersed
in our lingering glow
with exclamation:
delicious..!
beautiful..!

Our resistance
to deformation and flow
this is our thickness
unwilling we are
to let go..
But letting go
is not being lost
the grittiness remains..
rubbing fingers together
feeling fine sand
the thinning of
what was before
thick shadows and
boulders of pain...

In the chaos
with fragments flying
damaging crafts and souls
yet a tether remained..
Those past simulations
crashes experienced with
foreboding repetitions
for this mission..

On another plane
driving and driving
dulled unbearable pain..
Here the gravity
in this black hole
a command urgent
to simply let go..

Vicarious feelings of
a family's love
a dog's barking..
Then resignation
outcome dis-regard..
Advice from a dream
located the oneness
launch and landing
a knowing grace of
ends and beginnings..

Water wind and sail
what of the ecstasy
of those who sail..
Those bright mornings
with water at peace
and those evenings
waves rough and roiled..
And the wind spirit
pressing powering and
yes destroying the sail..
The sail holding free
in a moment's haven
poised right there
mid terror and peace..
They know quite well
ecstasy arrives in
becoming the Sail...

Imagined on the violin
the piano
work in spring garden..
These instruments of flesh
extended or not
create and produce
the work of our day..
connecting right and left
yet remaining
right and left..
Is this the simple secret
of how we are...

New damage
new separation
and stitching
awaits sealing
and new union..
Knife and fork
breaking bread
for inner rising
in new strength..
Surgery on high
removed a rib
Eve's attraction
urges re-joining..
A line reading
linear distortion
yearns for
whole in-sight..
Surgery creates
and stimulates a
New Day...

Self-similarity
quietly speaks
in fractal visions..
A special sameness
with difference spices
appears and reappears
in spreading iteration..
If we then
become a pattern of
sacred Sameness
observing out there
the dance of
Sameness and spice
we uncover
for our moment
a most hidden
Sacrament...

both of them
joined
these we are
Both very good..
we build houses
write letters
extend the race
and many other
miraculous moves
These joined thrive..
Yet we learn
ego is both
power and less
always in need
of a good Eye..
And we learn
of self-less light
a present grace
in that Eye..

The name chosen
for a tribe
annihilated..
This ship too
confronted the
Whiteness
and found its own
Vortex of death..
Ishmael observed all
and learned of
the White Source
the Leviathan
that consciousness
which as One
bore enveloping good
with evil edge..
From his horizon
of rescue
of Love
he Observed
and did know
of creation's sorrow
and blessed flow..

Call us Ishmael...

A most
delightful day
when our constricts
our restricting fences
are drawn inside
and dissolve
in merge with
liquid space..
This is life
experienced
with uplifting
days and hours..
Repeatings
strengthen inner
flow and channels..
Readier acceptance
lubricating
Welcome...

With two water cans
she suddenly emerged
from a backroom..
Watering lobby plants
in a medical place..
Broad-leafed
tall and green
thriving inside
knowing not winter cold..
She brushed and clipped
at watchers she smiled..
Viewing each plant
with quick becoming
a glancing OK..
Arrived and departed
leaving trailing glow..
Plants whispered of
brushed love
grace-full care...

in the Rye
where much is
phony..
All the externals
those shells
postures and lies..
The darkness
covered life force..
Dialogue suffers
the desire lost
to honor difference
then to discover
common elevation..
Phony inside
knows phony outside
as with good..
Perspective reigns
Shades inside
shade outside..
This is pain
perhaps birthpain
a new adam
with new
composition...

It is now in our time
That we find assurance
Of a dimension
Quieting long history's
Externality proclaim..
Modern sciences are question
Question of dimensions
Unseen and unknown
Whispering of One..
Our receptors now tuned
Finding deep *******
Resonance not explained..
Conversations express knowing
Knowing with confidence
Absorbing raw challenge..
What's more to say..!

are new creations
which in our
landscapes appear..
A new attention
on our walks..
Surprises declare:
see my difference
from dreary
familiarity..
Yet that familiar
lodged in memory
were once strangers
in our midst
declaring…

From our
awareness
let us choose
the vantage of
our looking..
Most looking in
work moments
finds the many
definite lines
and cautions
demanding our
alertness..

But in moments
of respite
might we elevate
our vantage
finding those lines
at an edge
of a purer
space..
This revolving
advances our
Self into more
healthy realms…

A window frames
a brushy scene
but she asks:
does the sea reside
on the other side..
On quiet evenings
waves of healing
she hears them
breaking
on her Shore..

Rehabilitation
this her lot..
Remembered pain
the surgeon's stitches
a promised gain..
New movement
she is told
gifts transport
to her sea
again..

Yet for her
for this while
another transport
to her Sea..
Midst her life
of quiet prayer
By her window
her Seashore
She is there…

for Sister Barbara

The dark coatings
of our lives
serve as does
black paint
found on glass..
A mirror formed
seen on rising
facing our day..
As our mirror
convenes both
dark and light
Our greater Eye
convenes the same..
Now we see
our dark coatings
form the Mirror
for our Eye
to see…

There are many
forms of prayer
of meditation
wishing to reach
and stimulate
the Divine..
The warnings:
of a Plan
of false humility
of slippery ego's
hidden goals..
Yet it seems
when our filtering
is complete
only this remains:
intention Centering
in the pain
yours and theirs..
And then simply
Crying out…!

With a question:
Who is Crying…?

Oh that strange
minuscule Atom..
Atom has posed
with planets spinning
with electrons jumping
with self-contradicting
waves and photons..
These secret poses
Over a century
Reveal and conceal
An amazing truth..

Atom smiles slyly
such confusion here..
Yet now and then
A scientist is startled
By a mirror reflection
A poet Behold..
Self-knowing arrives:
My name is Atom
and long enough
have I posed…!

There you are..
Yet we ask
Where are we
When stepping softly
Into innerspace..
There locations
Shift and slide
And don't pinpoint..
So a revision:
Whenever you are
You are everywhere…