The woman in her cloud, where did her happiness go? Swallowed up, by what? Something troubled her. While before I felt she saw me, I realize now I'm no more than a shadow of a shadow in a dream she's dreaming. I'm often in clouds too, not seeing the cloud at all, perceiving instead only what I imagine to occur while the cloud envelops me, the cloud I can't see, an invisible smudge of mysterious origin.
When Buddhists talk about the emptiness of all things, I'm told this means that things do exist, just not as we think they do. But there seems to be quite a difference semantically between those two ideas. All I know for sure is that I most often miss the most important things, things that are more actual than the actual, that are the voice of the cloud disguised as something actually heard.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Welcoming the Wild One
Satanism is religion for novices. The real wild one is God, the one who arranged the ultimate inescapable sacrifice while retreating into sheer darkness. Who, when a certain ripeness is indicated, lowers the lathe, or shakes us awake. We are all asked to let go of these warm, attractive cloaks and bags of tricks eventually, to open to the infinite. He breaks our hearts open.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Unsayable Envelope
The envelope of no-thought has decisive form lately, warm, dark, an elegant non-local cavity. I've wondered how this pristine void of sensual nothingness as intimate as a slip has stayed close lately, as if it were dreaming me more than I've been dreaming it. What if you could unzip a pocket of the peace of darkness in the air in the room in front of you and slide into supreme stillness without a shard of me or it, subject or object, confidence or worry, determination or will? How has this happened?
I felt my access to peace would end and in fact I've had a hard day, a bomb of nothing blew up out of nowhere and somehow I lost the therapeutic voice I'd found comforting. This business of talking every little thing through. A nasty comment and I seethed all day, my voice fled to a distant planet. Perhaps this explains the dream I woke up to, of being in a plane plunging to earth. The pilot spoke quietly and contemplatively while we rode the horrible vessel, my daughter and I silently curled together.
I have been trying to recover from a foul energy all day, I wonder what shadow has turned up? Of course I am most concerned with losing my treasure, that warm envelope of conscious unconsciousness, supreme silty stillness, the breath of my heart dusting the pulse of the unknowable. Essence growing richly from the root. I pictured myself in the dark basement room, folding laundry, unable to slip into the darkness, folding sheets. For company I had a candle, and each moment I traced the reality of unknowing with my heart, the flame flew towards me as a luminous butterfly, a new one born every moment my heart turned again to the unsayable opacity that gives organs of light to the word darkness.
I felt my access to peace would end and in fact I've had a hard day, a bomb of nothing blew up out of nowhere and somehow I lost the therapeutic voice I'd found comforting. This business of talking every little thing through. A nasty comment and I seethed all day, my voice fled to a distant planet. Perhaps this explains the dream I woke up to, of being in a plane plunging to earth. The pilot spoke quietly and contemplatively while we rode the horrible vessel, my daughter and I silently curled together.
I have been trying to recover from a foul energy all day, I wonder what shadow has turned up? Of course I am most concerned with losing my treasure, that warm envelope of conscious unconsciousness, supreme silty stillness, the breath of my heart dusting the pulse of the unknowable. Essence growing richly from the root. I pictured myself in the dark basement room, folding laundry, unable to slip into the darkness, folding sheets. For company I had a candle, and each moment I traced the reality of unknowing with my heart, the flame flew towards me as a luminous butterfly, a new one born every moment my heart turned again to the unsayable opacity that gives organs of light to the word darkness.
Monday, October 19, 2009
What do I know
What do I know about the world?
Only stories, truths or dramas,
what bears repeating.
Something I know now,
about entering the dark closet of the mind
silently
and letting the will speak as water
that seeks the lowest point.
Without words it falls, saying, there you are.
As entering a thermal pool
I put my body and heart in the hands
of the unnameable
and let striving dissolve
among the heat and ripples
and the softness of silt.
Only stories, truths or dramas,
what bears repeating.
Something I know now,
about entering the dark closet of the mind
silently
and letting the will speak as water
that seeks the lowest point.
Without words it falls, saying, there you are.
As entering a thermal pool
I put my body and heart in the hands
of the unnameable
and let striving dissolve
among the heat and ripples
and the softness of silt.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Broken Bow
In a dream I found myself sitting on the lap of a friendly, tall young man, and torquing around to the left to kiss him on the lips, I think a total of 5 times. These were heart kisses, kisses of appreciation, kisses that made full heart contact. Then I looked down to my left and saw my violin bow on the ground, broken and covered with a thin layer of moss in the area around the break. In the dream, I remember clearly enunciating the phrase, "My bow is broken."
Broken like a horse, I think, broken to my heart's desire, as when the horse and the rider are absorbed in the passion of covering the hills. I've wrestled with the bow, forced its horse tail hairs over the notes, skidded it willy nilly over the strings striking freakish sounds, holding on for dear life. I didn't play for about a month, my neck and my arm and wrist were hurting me, so I just didn't concern myself with violin, I was busy with other things. I've come back to it to find my right side has figured a few things out. For instance, when the bow hairs hit a note, it's like the bow, through my arm, is giving the string a kiss, you could say it sweets it, and I have strength for all these kisses. That is until last night when I fell down the stairs, and now my arm hurts again. But I dreamed I saw myself playing, and I saw the way my bow arm was moving effortlessly, and was surprised because it looked right. And I think I was wearing a hat like Sam Duffy.
Broken like a horse, I think, broken to my heart's desire, as when the horse and the rider are absorbed in the passion of covering the hills. I've wrestled with the bow, forced its horse tail hairs over the notes, skidded it willy nilly over the strings striking freakish sounds, holding on for dear life. I didn't play for about a month, my neck and my arm and wrist were hurting me, so I just didn't concern myself with violin, I was busy with other things. I've come back to it to find my right side has figured a few things out. For instance, when the bow hairs hit a note, it's like the bow, through my arm, is giving the string a kiss, you could say it sweets it, and I have strength for all these kisses. That is until last night when I fell down the stairs, and now my arm hurts again. But I dreamed I saw myself playing, and I saw the way my bow arm was moving effortlessly, and was surprised because it looked right. And I think I was wearing a hat like Sam Duffy.
Monday, May 11, 2009
mud puddle
To whom do I owe my thanks? The Lares of the internets? For a while after mentioning my dissatisfaction with my marriage my husband and I had an amazing period of connection. Sweet it was. What explains it?
Now I feel like he's tied up with some foolishness, although apparently I wouldn't know folly if it hit me in the face. And I am also witnessing the emergence of a preconscious "I" whom I drag around with me like a corpse tied to my leg! When this "I" disappears, with all her discontentment and automatic resentment, what will be left of me? How many times have I skirted this idea that one can live at peace with a world full tilt with dysfunction, guiding and smiling but not reacting.
In a dream I dove into a mud puddle cheek first as happy as a sow.
Now I feel like he's tied up with some foolishness, although apparently I wouldn't know folly if it hit me in the face. And I am also witnessing the emergence of a preconscious "I" whom I drag around with me like a corpse tied to my leg! When this "I" disappears, with all her discontentment and automatic resentment, what will be left of me? How many times have I skirted this idea that one can live at peace with a world full tilt with dysfunction, guiding and smiling but not reacting.
In a dream I dove into a mud puddle cheek first as happy as a sow.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
death walk
Intuition told me not to tell him that I was leaving the job, but how could I not. His initial reaction was shock, this man so hungry to cleave onto a female cohort that he entered my mind and twisted it in his direction, this man who'd become my spiritual husband, even while I slept next to the physical one.
I felt the coldness start within a day, and was surprised and hurt. I thought we'd be friends, even better friends, for my not being in that situation. But what happened instead was that he totally shut down to me, and where subtle sweetness had miraculously manifested itself, filling up the emptiness in me which is the product of a relationship without passion, affinity, sweetness (that's another story), there were the barbs of abandonment and dismissiveness. The worst of it was that in his desperation he opened himself up to the influence of the arrogant elitists who plagued the studio. But I needed freedom and some space to follow the subtle trails of essence that would have been overrun in this man's arrogant self assertion and self grasping. I found my way to Buddhists.
Walking across the park to the first lecture I might have been walking along a high Himalayan pass, but the deep, dark chasms I felt around me were within. It is so painful to let a sweet period go, even if you must because of its corrupting, suffocating pitfalls. I felt I walked besides zombies, flesh falling off their horrible faces, the rank smell of death and malice wafting to me in unpredictable slaps. I felt punished and condemned to lovelessness, realizing I'd had to trade my beloved's kindness to retrieve my own soul and find the uncorrupted path. Losing the rich milk of his lovely mind and astonishing powers.
As I walked through the beautiful park in spring, uplifted by its air and freedom even while carrying this sense of death, I started to feel myself surrounded by a circle studded with flames. Each about the size of a large egg, 3 feet away, burning with a happiness and confidence I recognize as a thing of great beauty. I wondered at this appearance, and at the mystery of the source of these powers, and what they meant to say to me. When I needed hope, my mind found it in the form of the fires that burn with love, a love for me, a struggling, lost and sometimes wise flame myself, both broken and whole. I find that at my happiest times I burn like that too, with an incorruptible love that delights in people, in their beauty, wisdom, grace and talent, which whole-heatedly celebrates each burning flame and wishes each soul the ultimate treasure, only burning, not grasping.
What to do about these people, these sexy witch-like men with their strange and charming powers, who seem like they themselves fashion creation while they dream. Whose love and approval means far too much. Will I always take the bait? Haven't I learned that Binah will always tease me with the comely, magical ones, only to take them away, as if I will someday learn that the only one with true existence has no face. The one whose essence is true freedom.
I felt the coldness start within a day, and was surprised and hurt. I thought we'd be friends, even better friends, for my not being in that situation. But what happened instead was that he totally shut down to me, and where subtle sweetness had miraculously manifested itself, filling up the emptiness in me which is the product of a relationship without passion, affinity, sweetness (that's another story), there were the barbs of abandonment and dismissiveness. The worst of it was that in his desperation he opened himself up to the influence of the arrogant elitists who plagued the studio. But I needed freedom and some space to follow the subtle trails of essence that would have been overrun in this man's arrogant self assertion and self grasping. I found my way to Buddhists.
Walking across the park to the first lecture I might have been walking along a high Himalayan pass, but the deep, dark chasms I felt around me were within. It is so painful to let a sweet period go, even if you must because of its corrupting, suffocating pitfalls. I felt I walked besides zombies, flesh falling off their horrible faces, the rank smell of death and malice wafting to me in unpredictable slaps. I felt punished and condemned to lovelessness, realizing I'd had to trade my beloved's kindness to retrieve my own soul and find the uncorrupted path. Losing the rich milk of his lovely mind and astonishing powers.
As I walked through the beautiful park in spring, uplifted by its air and freedom even while carrying this sense of death, I started to feel myself surrounded by a circle studded with flames. Each about the size of a large egg, 3 feet away, burning with a happiness and confidence I recognize as a thing of great beauty. I wondered at this appearance, and at the mystery of the source of these powers, and what they meant to say to me. When I needed hope, my mind found it in the form of the fires that burn with love, a love for me, a struggling, lost and sometimes wise flame myself, both broken and whole. I find that at my happiest times I burn like that too, with an incorruptible love that delights in people, in their beauty, wisdom, grace and talent, which whole-heatedly celebrates each burning flame and wishes each soul the ultimate treasure, only burning, not grasping.
What to do about these people, these sexy witch-like men with their strange and charming powers, who seem like they themselves fashion creation while they dream. Whose love and approval means far too much. Will I always take the bait? Haven't I learned that Binah will always tease me with the comely, magical ones, only to take them away, as if I will someday learn that the only one with true existence has no face. The one whose essence is true freedom.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Rumi on Refinement
An Invisible Bee
Look how desire has changed in you,
how light and colorless it is.
with the world growing new marvels
because of your changing. Your soul
has become an invisible bee. We
don't see it working, but there's
the full honeycomb! Your body's height,
six feet or so, but your soul rises
through nine levels of sky. A barrel
corked with earth and a raw wooden
spile keeps the oldest vieyard's wine
inside. When I see you, it is not so
much you physical form, but the company
of two riders, you pure-fire devotion
and your love for the one who teaches you;
then the sun and moon on foot behind those.
* * *
While I typed this poem, which makes me feel like the difficult soul work that's gone on in me was more than grandiose delusion, I felt the warmth in my heart grow and break into my chest with tiny cataclysms of ecstasy. Through 9 levels of sky.
This translation, by Coleman Barks, is part of a collection called The Glance, Songs of Soul Meeting.
Look how desire has changed in you,
how light and colorless it is.
with the world growing new marvels
because of your changing. Your soul
has become an invisible bee. We
don't see it working, but there's
the full honeycomb! Your body's height,
six feet or so, but your soul rises
through nine levels of sky. A barrel
corked with earth and a raw wooden
spile keeps the oldest vieyard's wine
inside. When I see you, it is not so
much you physical form, but the company
of two riders, you pure-fire devotion
and your love for the one who teaches you;
then the sun and moon on foot behind those.
* * *
While I typed this poem, which makes me feel like the difficult soul work that's gone on in me was more than grandiose delusion, I felt the warmth in my heart grow and break into my chest with tiny cataclysms of ecstasy. Through 9 levels of sky.
This translation, by Coleman Barks, is part of a collection called The Glance, Songs of Soul Meeting.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
sub basement
R was upset at me for the longest time because I forgot to bring his DS so he could play with it during N's swimming lessons. It's true, the devil exists, in the form of electronic games, or at least the stupidity which allowed me to let this into his life. Short live the game!
After about an hour and a lollipop he started to forgive me, to lean against me as we sat poolside encouraging Nora, his chest bare and cheeks pink from the heat, skin slightly moist with sweat. I see clearly what I don't want to see, his path to transcendence is disappointment, and I suspect he'll be less of a baby once I grow up, too.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
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