The ancient discrepancy

The ancient discrepancy                                                                        

The sun rises, it seems, from the heart

spilling onto a sky bright sails of hope,

invariably to founder upon the day’s living reefs;

tired old bindings to be sure, but ever-new tendrils

and the spellbound inertia, the snug-enough shroud.

Evident in the distance between

lightning’s flare and the thunder’s roar,

the ancient discrepancy,

as I hurtle toward yet another failure –

everyday and the lifetime, the ages-old –

the slowly-becoming awareness of how

thoroughly deep go the erected barriers,

an integral part, alas, of the structure itself.

The sun rising every morning from the heart

to shine upon my impotence and light

beyond me the fair, faraway face of my Savior.

O child of God, hopelessness in the New Life

has nothing to do with failure or despair.

Swiss army knife

Swiss army knife                                                                                              

Everyone has been issued a Swiss army knife

but lately I’ve discovered there’s one blade

few people ever use,

deeming it useless or superfluous.

It’s the only blade I ever use –

the blade for which I, perhaps incorrectly,

assume the knife was made – the one that probes,

pares down, whittles away; the one that digs,

challenges and yet is also the one that spoon feeds.

Persistent use has kept my blade shiny, honed

while most of the others never trouble

to pry theirs open.  This is not a boast . . .

or if it is, it’s an oddly forlorn, collateral one.

I simply move about most everywhere,

not knowing any other way to live,

out of loneliness, fear, curiosity, discontent,

blade in hand and observe how it interacts

with the world and what it uncovers.

O child of God, the Beloved supplies

each lover uniquely with the tools required. 

Leading with my chin

Leading with my chin                                                                              

As an old man now, I aspire

to be somebody who can take a punch –

not a speed bag’s wobbly pummeling,

mind you, but a stolid heavy bag full of grit,

eye-bolted solidly through a ceiling beam

and not in some gymnasium for anyone

to try but maybe a garage or cellar,

collecting dust in the corner but still intact.

Somebody who can take a punch if need be

and absorb the blow from any angle,

any adversary and not be moved

more than an inch or two off dead center,

returning quickly to a perfect plumbness.

I’d be going through life then leading with my chin,

not from haughtiness or spunk

but with poise and a quiet faith,

bearing the blows of whatever

rough-housing opponents may cross my path. 

To be somebody who can take a punch,

take a punch, take a punch and not hit back.

O child of God, aspire to the love that allows

an innocent man to turn his cheek for just one more blow.

A divine opportunity

A divine opportunity                                                                                

When the razing began, I thought

the garden walls would go first,

(romantic that I am) – a flood of love

upending my neglected grounds,

enabling a long-hoped-for hidden eden.  

But You began with the house, my shelter,

dismantling it down to the bare slab,

me too numb to foresee or care anymore

what subsequent half-structure will take its place,

simply trusting it will be apt.

This ruination holds neither hope nor shame.

Like any other death, of spirit or flesh,

it’s merely a naked opportunity for something

to be built beyond the outmoded purpose of the original structure.

O child of God, approach your undoing

with the God-given composure of faith.

Monk's garden

Monk’s garden                                                                                          

Somehow it’s good to know I haven’t a prayer. 

Like old Job – no say-so in the winding up,

the unwinding of my own affairs.

God is in the details and I’m merely one,

hoping to serve by a studious abstention.

I weed my monk’s garden, encouraged

by the yield of abeyance and abrogation.

The old urgency has deserted my legs and lungs

in mid-stride and the pace, this late

in the game, has slowed considerably;

enough to where it’s more comfortable

to take His hand and follow His lead;

relinquish a bit more the irresistible

compulsion and illusion of plotting my own course.

O child of God, settle in as best you might

under the vast foot of the elephant.

Reason for love

Reason for love  

There’s no reason for love.  

Get used to it.  Go ahead –

work up a few doddering explanations

for your unruly behavior.

Something to make you linger longer

outside the charnel house.

The trick is that love is never sure

and is thus impossible for the wary.

But what if this time, you ally

with someOne besides your timid self?

SomeOne Who might, perhaps, strip you

of motive and prudence, and at the same time,

stir you to sacrifice

all you know and think you are

for the simple reason

that there’s no reason not to,

nothing worth holding back or onto

and nothing else at all worth doing.     

O child of God, cast yourself without cause

into that ultimate, impenetrable mystery.

The dhuni

The dhuni        

In the queue snaking to the fire pit's roar,

permanently blackened by sacred ash and soot;

the rhythm of handclaps and the mounting litany

of Baba Hu, the sun descending and a murmured prayer,

everyone clutching their latest, most prominent distractions . . . .

Pilgrim!  Don’t leave the dhuni in Meherabad! 

Carry it with you everywhere you go,

smoldering, heart-hungry for the sandalwood

of your hewn desires as you turn the mind away

continually from its habitual ego-nurturing

and toss the gathered parings

onto the flames of holy remembrance.  O pilgrim!

 

Every thought not about Him or the task at hand

is an encumbering desire – fuel for the fire.

O child of God, do not abandon the dhuni to its extinction,

eight thousand miles away from your heart.

Persistent honesty

Persistent honesty                                                                                  

The monk’s cell is bare except for solitude. 

Plenty of that which I have shouldered

outside these walls my whole life –

marked by it, encapsulated, enisled.

Is it everyone, I wonder, or just me? 

Much like I wonder if there is not

at the heart of everyone, where the self stands

naked before its own illegitimacy,

an inherent antipathy yoked with a desperate longing

for that which is True; that which is Whole -

the solitude of the monk’s cell

and our impenetrable selves

merely the lonely, persistent honesty

of every beating human heart.   

O child of God, the self is built

of fallacy, reclusion and alarm.

Needlefish

Needlefish 

One truth I’m onto this late in life,

gleaned from research and abstractions:

Truth cannot be found

sifting through the ashes of maya;

mulling over the minutia of illusion;

polishing a tile to make a mirror.

It’s not the sought-after needle in a haystack

but more like a needlefish –

a creature totally at odds and impossible

to the area of search.

To grasp the True from the false, hands must be empty –

our hands too small to grapple with both.

This is my sole discipline and duty,

the whole rest of my life to devote

toward the allowing of illusion, by grace,

to slip through my tremorous fingers.

O child of God, you spill words onto the page

knowing they can never tell the truth. 

A regarding of the cup

A regarding of the cup                                                                                

Unlike the subject in the parable, making his one-pointed way

under the king’s order and not spilling a drop from his cup –

there is no blade threatening my back.  It’s a different try

when the sword is abstract and everyday – the milk hither

and yon spilt constantly from the neglected cup

yet yielding no attributable dire effect;

the world whispering in my ear the whole long trek

like Satan in the garden. When the king’s order

is just so many words among the cacophony,

my own figure estranged and timorous,

then the (God-given) sword of faith

must meet the purpose, held not to my back

but to my own throat for the suitable vigilance

of my try at constancy and devotion.  

O child of God, a circumspect regarding of the cup,

the Masters say, leads from communion to Union.

Poem of apology

 Poem of apology                                                                                           

To everyone in this lifetime

whose path I’ve crossed –

I ask forgiveness: 

I have lacked humility.

Not my only sin, of course,

but perhaps the most pernicious,

the root of all others,

for it has kept me

from loving you

the way you should be loved,

the way I dream about,

the way my Lord advocates,

the way that would draw us all

nearer to our divine inheritance.

Take this poem as a timorous,

though heartfelt opportunity

for me to seek your forgiveness,

unable ever to ask you face to face.

O child of God, the one reduced to true humility

is no longer there to be forgiven.  

drawing by Rich Panico

A journeyman's hands

A journeyman’s hands                                                                                       

Francis said as stone into dust –

long to be crushed! 

The duty of the lover is to sing

his Beloved’s gift of song; 

articulate the pain in the distance

between mouth and Ear;

between heart and Heart

solely for the Beloved’s

amusement and entertainment.

Sing, o lover!  a reminder of the day,

when you’ll bear no song,

no mouth and no need of one –

being, at last, the unutterable Truth.

That’s the promise Francis clutched

in a journeyman’s hands;

sang with wine-bright eyes

through an old man’s broken throat –

a gift for his Beloved and for His lovers

gathered near and soon to follow

that bowed, dusty codger into oblivion.

O child of God, begin your apprenticeship as a lover

under that old Aussie ploughman stone mason poet.