Cleanse me of all affectations

Move away the dark clouds

So that I may see a clear blue sky

And know

Through such a seeing

That I now stand face-to-face

with a truer reflection of me.

 

Help me deny meaning

To the sound of my thoughts

And the words of my speech

So that I may understand

That these sounds belong not to me

But are the lyrical oracle

Of the whispering wind.

 

Reveal to me that my laughter

Is but the human expression

Of a gurgling, falling stream

That embraces every stubborn rock

With good humor, born from inherent faith

A knowing that no rock can stop

The powerful current of overflowing joy.

 

When I see before me

A sprightly bed of beaming yellow flowers

Do not fail to remind me

That although my eyes see

The yellow-ness of the flowers

It is really the flowers seeing

Their beautiful brightness through me.

 

And then

Why must I fear my desires

Or suffer them as a perversion

When in truth

They are the fire

Whose flames rapidly rise

In eternal longing of the highest virtue.

 

Lead me to realize

That the essence of my conflicts

Lies in my having made true

The non-existent, the false

The personal, the ‘me’

And that I have lived

In severance and in denial of the true.

 

I have fashioned myself

From the gift of your senses

And called them ‘mine’

But I exist not

Apart from you-

O Fire, Earth, Wind, Sea and Sky

I exist as you and for you.