The Burning Leaves of Autumn
Yesterday was a gentle walk in the woods. September days are quiet, soft in their own right, messengers of times to come, days of change.
Sunny days in September are a double blessing: light and warmth without the intensity of August, yet the amazing colors of a turning seasons included, free of charge.
I carry a camera with me on many walks, watching and aware of those moments that hold a portrait, those moments where light, texture and form tell a short story worth acknowledging. On this particular day, the woods were quiet and deep, shadowy and thoughtful. Little photogenic content; merely a day for feeling the sweet earth and breathing in that mysterious oxygen.
But one leaf caught my attention. It was a single Maple leaf, bathed in a solitary beam of sunlight, against the shadowy background of evergreens.
Something about this leaf, the change of seasons, made me think about my own life and the changing of my own seasons. It has occurred to me before, that what we see ‘outside’ in Nature, is often a reflection of our own self, our own life: our beauties, our strife, the wideness of our compassion, the blossoming of our own soul.
When you get past 50 – and you see your own body changing – these things take on new meaning. We’ve all heard this, and we all know this. Aging. No one wants to be reminded of this inconvenient little clause built into the contract of human life.
And it’s struck me before: why do we see such beauty in the aging of Nature, yet we see ugliness in the aging of humans? We see the Cycles Of Everything – coming and going: seasons, jobs, relationships, homes, children, cars, friends, lovers. And somewhere inside of us, we cling to our fabricated immortality of these things, and we suffer, we cry, we hurt … when these things change and move on.
There’s something in Nature that Gives. And, relentlessly, IS. We, anchored in all our “holdings”, our small-town religions we’ve fabricated, look through our tiny portals – from our unnatural world, into the natural world – and we breath a sigh of relief. There’s something real out there. There’s something out there that speaks of Life and Giving and the true Divine Plan of things.
Somehow, we’re all a part of that plan. No one is exempt.
Why is it, that only later in life you see the inevitability of things? There’s some measure of sobriety that’s gained from sensing deeply your own mortality – the mortality of life itself – and also the mortality of persons and things that you love, that you surround yourself with.
In the folly of my youth, I was surrounded by the folly of other youth. I was not mentored by wisdom, by those steeped in self-knowledge, by ones who had seen deeper than the facade of life. Perhaps this is a thing of the world, and world itself is coming of age. The world itself is mortal, and this fragility and mortality is being spelled out graphically in front of all our eyes. It will all go, and it will all change, even if this is enacted over eons of time.
But … our tiny little time? Our sweet and short encounter with breath on this planet? Our transparent skin, our falling hair, our disappearing resources, our ticking clock.
One day, our children may be taught to appreciate this – at an early age – from those who “get it”. From those who see. Until then, it’s up to us: our own thirst, our own knowing, our own seeing. Our own understanding.
Read MoreOld Radio — Endless Static
I am listening to Van Morrison
on an old radio.
I am an Old Person.
I am remembering a Long Life;
a life that no longer exists.
I am entering this moment called “Now”,
and I can take nothing with me.
Van Morrison fades, and the Radio is gone –
gone into something Younger,
a voice I hardly know.
A Younger Voice is singing about Love & Sweetness;
these Guitar Chords have been used before.
the Minor makes the Major all-the-more worthwhile.
It’s an Old Guitar and a Young Voice,
and the Afternoon aches for recognition
as Time slips by.
Van Morrison is gone, and I can’t recall his name.
Young Voices have taken over the radio
and I’m dissolving in a Purple Flame.
The Magic of Love is massaging my Heart,
and I just don’t know What To Do.
Perhaps I’ll just be quiet,
And let the Triumphant Armies of Love
Come Marching right on through.
Ocean, Sand & Chain.
Who are you, you who are reading this post?
Are you a visitor, a stranger, a dog at the door, a crumb in the kitchen, a flame in the tinder-box forest of Love?
Are you a One-Night Stand, a Toothless Old Lady, a Bottle-Washer from Winnipeg, a Mohawk-Hair Earing Studded Leper of the U2 Colony of Extended Liberation?
Are you really Who You Are?
Are you AwArE?
of the Hardware that Certifies you as “Human” …?
of the Software that upgrades your Heart to the Silent Flame of Life, dancing in Fragility deep in the Cavern of your Inner Breath?
of the Extended Shelf-Life that you’re Living, defying the Pain of Breathing, the Obstacle of the Ancient Hill-Climb, the Marathon of the Eternally-Dying-Dog, running in the Heat of the Night?
Who are you, you who are reading this post?
A lost Lizard in a Day-Care Center for Dinosaurs?
A Standing Tribute to all the Gay Singers of the Roaring 40’s?
A Plush Popsicle, waiting to melt in the mid-day Sun?
A Jehova’s Witness, standing “Naked-For-Jesus” at the Door of Eternal Life?
Does God inhabit your Genitals… or is your “thinking” all above the 49th Parallel?
Are you Decaffeinated, or Simply Relaxed in your own Shoes?
Can you feel Peace in the Tentative Strings of your own Heartbeat?
Can you Hear the Vast River of Angels in the caverns of your “indoor plumbing” …?
Can you slide back the Sun-Roof and eject yourself into the Stratosphere, comfortably, quietly, without activating your Air Bags, your Nagging Housewives, or your Dumb, Eternally-Barking Inner Guard-Dog, who has ruined many Staff Picnics on your own behalf … ?
Who are you, who is reading this post?
Yourself a Poster? A Toaster? A Hostmaster? Nutcracker? Sailor-Boy? Country-Girl? Breaker of Fish-cakes and purveyor of Manna from the Heavens? Have you let your little girls and boys out to play? Where, pray tell, is your playground?
Lost again, forgot the trail of Breadcrumbs. Forgot the home buried deep in the woods. Disowned and forsook your own Forest, your own Sacred Trees, your pure and unspoiled rivers. For the sake of “Candy”. Expensive Candy. No Dentist, no Teeth, no Wisdom, no Food of any worldly kind will ever stop this incessant craving of the heart for that Infinite Candy not known to any scripture.
Who are you, who is reading this post?
Can you truly read, and taste the lines of silver and gold between the stupid Times New Roman, or are you caught up in the dance of words, intellect and pride. There is no recycling plant that will handle that stuff. It is yours to sip until you fall drunk into your own mortality.
One tiny Diamond in the Garbage Dump, and the Human Life is made Noble.
And the rest falls gently, as Oceans once again make their Claim …
The Heart with No Name
Dear Baby,
I am the Harpoon Hunter
I am the Whale that got away
I am Good Friday waiting for Bad Monday
so my Mediocre Memories of how-to-play
Get lost in the picnic frenzy of “Workahol” – the Drink of Everyday Man.
I am the Opening Door
that closes only for you
Only for the Light that sees right through
Only for Rose-colored Spectacles that Paint my world Blue
I am the Academic Scholar
that fell below his White Collar
and slid down the Shiny Breasts of Mother Maya
into the Belly Button of Nature’s Lost Fire
I am the Only One who knows My Way Home
so I journey there Alone
while dialing on my Telephone
The Crystal Number of your Name keeps coming up
(is it still the same?)
And before I fall into Melodies of Silence Insane
and become a victim of Love’s Purple Flame
There’s only One Thing that I Remain …
Yours Truly:
The Heart with no Name
The House of Breath
The House of Breath
We go out and play
we save our tear-drops for a Rainy Day
We Play
We visit Others – our Cousins, our Brothers, our Lovers, our Mothers
We live on their Doorsteps; we Stray
We save our Dances for a Sunny Day
The House of Breath
Chance, Circumstance – finds me at your door
(have I been here before?)
You seem so familiar – the Curl of your Hair
Your hot summers’ Air
Your Roaming Fingertips of Despair
I linger and Lurk: you must think me some kind of Jerk
This House of Breath
This house of Living Life and Dying Death
This House I left behind, the only thing ‘mine’
This House of Colors, Fullness, Feeling Filled, Softness, Stillness, Willing to be Thrilled
This House calls me home at the End of the Day
This House of Breath is the only Place
My heart wants to Stay.
Lost Feather ~ Crystal Silence
I was a Lost Feather,
a Man Without Cause.
Looking for Identity, Reason, Homeland, Season.
There is a Journey somewhere:
a Calling, a Knowing, a Home-coming.
A Crystallizing in Silence.
Life proceeds along “attractively”,
for most that we know. They have a car,
and a house, and a small piece of snow.
They are “busy”, these birds are busy.
These people are never seen talking to
a flower on a street-corner, or looking
into the Divine Eyes of a a baby
in a supermarket crowd.
They have points and merit-awards
and plots reserved in the cemetery,
“right by Mom & Dad”, and they have
sugar on their corn-flakes and Organic
Pet-Food for their Geriatric Cats.
I have never been “busy”.
I have avoided and deconstructed
the word, “busy”. I don’t listen to
busy signals or go to business meetings.
We are busy avoiding ourselves,
being distracted into the world of nothingness
that we think is “somethingness”.
We are the collectors of trash – the material
garbage of the world; we are the undisputed
kings of mountains of Nothingness, which we
endlessly worship as “somethingness”.
We are Lost Feathers in a Big Storm.
We are Lost Feathers clinging to Dust
that we think is “somethingness”.
We are headed towards the Hot Fire
that burns Lost Feathers
and all their Precious Dust
into ashes of an
infinitesimally fine nature.
The Big Storm and the Hot Fire
dance & play every day.
They love the sound of Feathers
going, “snap, crackle, & pop”.
This is the Opera of Life & Death.
And everything in between.
This is the Sky of Blue,
the Swing of Breath,
the Color of the Canyon Green.
The Crystal Song of Silence,
and the Moments In Between.