Foreign to the heart

Foreign to the heart                                                                     
 
The sea batters the stone quay;
salt corrodes the railing. 
 
‘No abiding self,’ whispers the Buddha.  ‘Nothing lasts’.
‘God alone is real,’ You add – softer than a whisper.
 
Surely ignorance and impurity
must also come to an end.
 
Surely death and impermanence
must also come to an end.
 
The Buddha / Avatar – the eternal grace within our flesh.
Lowering another sack of bones into the grave,
 
minds grieve, but our hearts conclude –
we are not the body; we are not the mind.
 
Eternity to the brain is incomprehensible,
but it’s death, inexorable death, that’s foreign to the heart.
 
O child of God, listen to the voice within and move
without contradiction through life, death and beyond.
 
                                        (from A Jewel in the Dust, 2011)