this sunset solace;
the will to go the distance
heart in acceptance
Light Beyond Light
Light beyond light
Law beyond laws
Stillness in flight
Pulse in a pause
Road of all roads
Love that is higher
Than all our modes
Of hope and desire
Show me the way
The inner eye shines
Both night and day
Between these lines
Song for Tibet
a song for Tibet is a song for freedom…a song for freedom is a song for our humanity.
Union
We stayed at home, and tried to go on working, charged with destiny.
We wore old traditional habits, maintained hope, sweated at the foundry
We followed paternal patterns, our shuttered or buried minds in custom and duty.
We worked for little or nothing, our bond for this passion play was enough reward.
We lived and died but our union as poets, generation to generation, was eternal.
Communion
I will speak. Yes I will. I will not, cannot be silenced. I am responsible for this seed landed here called Human
To root it through and through me till every pore breathes. That it break the sheen on the stuff of things.
That it scratch this varnished light a little. To trace what lies beneath it. That what be called gross or foul.
Be charged with clearer breath. For blood, sweat, salt are particles of radiance. And shall be known by their true names
And for what they really are. But how perfection leaks from cracks in the mosaic bowl of now. And how time
Drips constant through the porous jar of presence. And how you and I may realised each other as we fit the shards together.
Yes I will speak. I must. And of these things too. This plant that grows from our speech in joy here I name: Communion
Innocence (Classical)
An extended version with a slight Latin feel… with thanks to Andrea
Small Bird: A Song of Innocence
The daylight has lingered on longer than expected, but now the gloom of the short April evening is settling down fast in the wood. The silent and motionless trees rise out of a mysterious shadow, which fills up the spaces between their trunks. Only above, where their delicate outer branches are shown against the dark sky, is there any separation between them?
I sit back on the old bench and begin to read a new poem by Andrea Wicks*,
Small Bird
You don’t make a song and dance, you simply sit.
I look at you and rest my eyes.
The world slows down, as you adorn
a winter branch with solitude.
You simply sit. A nod – a searching out.
The air around you stills:
particles suspended in mid air.
Tiny eyes, as black as coal.
Pin-prick sharp: driven
by a hunger on the wing.
Heading home to roost, you lay your head.
You sit in stillness, simply.
You are a gatherer.
Minute twigs and down, the fabric
that you weave,
inside this stubby bush outside my window.
How do you think.
Rain shrugger. Sunshine sucker.
Snow, a place to leave your mark
that you were there.
Careful choices. Not a word.
Each crumb considered first.
Kindly, you watch the worm slowly turn
and leave it be.
Feeding flesh to every mouth that begs.
Bones enough for you. You perch
and open-mouthed, a joyous explosion makes
every leaf vibrate.
The words vibrate inside of me and somewhere in the deep shadow of the underwood a blackbird calls “ching, ching” before he finally settles himself to roost. In the yew the small birds are already quiet, sheltered by the evergreen spray; they have also sought the ivy-grown trunks. “Twit, twit,” sounds high overhead as one or two belated little creatures, scarcely visible, pass quickly for the cover of the furze on the hill.
Then bird songs lifts me as notes fall from air. They seem to land in my hand. In that moment, as already the interior of the wood is impenetrable to the glance, music comes alive. Gently chords, subtle rhythms and harmonies rises though the sound of closer birds who have restlessly moved in their roost-trees. Darkness is almost on them, as they settle in their song of innocence.
The cawing and dawing rises to a pitch, and then declines; the wood is silent, and it is suddenly night.
*Small Bird shared with kind permission. See WiseJourney for more unique poetry, photography and mindful writings.
