After awakening ... Make the Bed

Slowly, I am awakened.  

Not all at once -- no big ascending boom.  

Insistent whispers, heavy-lidded, 

pull me back.

Breath deepens. Feeling returns,

wordless, undeniable.

Here we are, awaiting nothing.

What would you have

that you don't have now.

It is written: The enlightened do their own laundry.

And so, awakened --

get up and make your bed.

Do it.  Now.

A stormy host of harried dreams advance,

anxious to cloud your sky.

Circle of Life

photo by GRW

Sword Play

I am ... not as a child.  Have I ever been?  

Is the kingdom of heaven locked unto me, as I lack those innocent eyes with which to see?

  

As if I understood innocence.  
In this moment, absent all there was and all that might become, what IS?  

Nothing? 

Purity?  

A room, swept clear, reclaims its dust, debris.  That same space, shrouded in returned detritus, may be clarified anew -- and again, and again.

Might I not be renewed as well?  

Revirginated, as it were?  Spiritually, as in born again --

unbourn, unbearing.  

Unbearable.

An old soul, some say.  Which sounds, somehow, comforting.  Surely, what with all its sojourns, the well-traveled soul would be wise.  Experience, experience ... the teacher;  but what have we learned here?  You can't take it with you.

And yet, are you free?  

The tension in your core has something to say to you.  

That venerable knot, awaiting Gordius,
if only he were present.

Voices In the Wilderness

photo by GRW

Conversing With Deities

Oh, you are a sly one, aren't you.

Never the open hand.

So collected,

you adjust my position.

You would top me from below?  

Try it.  

I might allow it.  

Juxtaposition

Photo by JCW

Prefer Me Not

How serenity becomes you.

My one, my only.

Were chaotic winds to scatter all surrounding; 

were cacophonous blasts to shatter harmony; 

would your leveling gaze remain 

so open, so wide?

For one who wields Occam's razor, 

is there any story left?  

Love, it's all there is, you say.  

That fondness -- just emotion.  

But truly, 

do you prefer me not?  

Perhaps I could be anyone

and you, interchangeable.

We would go there, do that --

Just the facts ma'm.

Excitement? We're so over that.

Details, details,

smothering the truth.

Please Allow Me To Introduce Myself...

photo by Thel

Bad Company

What comes up?  If we let it.  Which we might not, when it pops up at the corner of our eye, waving for attention, looking altogether untrustworthy.  That smile, it's off -- crooked, trying a little too hard.  Yes, yes, look at me, I'm here, I'm real, I'm of your now.  Would you deny me?  

That's repression, you know.  Because if that one has come around,  it is what is.  Now.  Was, but won't go away, so yep -- now.  Except now only as thought --  the thought we're having now.  Which isn't the now of here.   Isn't that present sort of now.  More like some trickster now. 

So nope, nope, not getting in, not into this here and now.  We can't hear you.  Can't see or touch.  Whew.

It's smug though.  I'll be back.  We aren't fooled, thinking otherwise.  Sort it out, or deal with it in some other lifetime.  

We close our eyes and feel it.  That ache.  It's deep and all too familiar, yet elusive, like a dream chased as light of day intrudes.  Name it, name it ... but we cannot.    

Afraid?  Not that.  Ashamed, maybe?  It's dense, that feeling, an ugly, irritating mote in the eye.  No, not ashamed.  Rejected.  Why hast thou forsaken me?  

If that thing comes around again, let's set up another glass.

We won't feel so alone.

Where Story Takes Us

photo by GRW

Deal Breaker

It's our old story, I keep telling myself.
Kept telling myself -- I'm over it now.
Or getting past it
(keep telling myself that one too)

Did I ever believe it?
Belief now being a suspect concept --
a cheating game of solitaire.

Another pretty picture, and I'm back.
The territory within the framework
is such a forgiving place.
I trust you there.  Don't I?
Trust -- again, our self-deceptive words at play.
I know you.
I know you are not there for me.

Sometimes we seem so close.
Why shoot such flights of fancy out of my sky?
What harm?  The if-onlys, the playful imaginings,
the comforting untruths.  

That would be hope --
cruelest escapee from the forbidden box,
the way it hangs in there.

Acceptance:  Now there's a deal breaker.

And yet, as ever,
I am here.


 

Reflection

photo by ...W

He Who Is -- Chapter One

I am.  She who provides has a primary name for me -- story dwellers name everything -- and I accept that.  Before her time, I had been called many things, most of them unwelcome.  She calls me many things, as well, and all of them are warm.

I am here.  Because this is her story, not mine, I will tell you that this was not always so.  (To her, yesterdays are real places, where she travels again and again. I have long observed this and have come to find it less astonishing.)  I was born into a place quite unlike my now.

It was wild, there were others like me, and the one who guided me.  That one also provided, she was also warm, and then she was taken.  Another kind took us all.

My place, then, became very small.  My kind surrounded me, but separately.  My one and I were kept apart as well.  I could hear the others -- sometimes, one would be taken past my space -- but my space was solitary.  I was.

Gradually, I noticed my growth, as everything became smaller around me.  Energy welled up inside my body, and what to do with it?  I observed. What else was possible?

You're thinking this is about me.  It is not.

When she appeared, this new one, the energy around me changed.  What? I was startled. What are you about?  She kneeled and looked into my eyes, a mirror reflecting: What?  What are you all about?  She took hold, walked me out, into sunlight.

Out! I reacted. Sunlight, wind, the enticing odors of so many others. Then, into another enclosure -- but so much more space, despite its boundaries.  I leapt, not for joy, simply an involuntary response.  I ran. I vocalized. Not for any purpose except that it felt good.

This new one, she watched me.  Not fully -- just seeing me, but from the periphery of a story.  (They do not realize how obvious this is to us, when their minds are elsewhere.  So this did not concern me.)