It’s in my nature
to want to know
to choose to ignore
to unconditionally accept and love.
It’s in my nature
to consolidate patterns into identities
frame experiences with knowledge
and compare the meaningful with the meaningless.
It’s in my nature
to write time as a document
of my ideas and my memories
…of the quality of my presence.
The only thing I know for certain
Is that I’m a partial being.
I fly with one wing
And yet a higher knowledge
Tells me that
Such a thing is impossible…
Then why can’t I see or feel
My other wing?
What else
Does this higher knowledge know?
How do I come to know
What it knows?
Why am I numb
To its existence?
I contemplate this Higher Knowledge
And I come to see Silence…
Words lose their voice
Their sounds dim into the distance.
I stand detached, dismembered
From the thoughts that were my breath
I now understand
That it’s their charm
I must reject
And their stories I must exit
I must do this knowingly
In the faith that I have another wing…
I will continue to fly.
To see that separateness is an illusion
And that we are the heartbeats of a single heart
See first
The joys and sorrows of others
What does their joy look like?
What is the face their sorrow wears?
You’ll see that their joys and sorrows
Are not different from your own…
And when there, please wonder
About our kinship and when it got lost…
I stopped sharing with you my feelings
And you stopped telling me yours
We speak through media and professional actors
Our own voices silenced in favour of
Sophisticated soliloquies.
The everyday has become a spectacle in the theatre
Which we have begun to dress up for
(so that we may look like we deserve the expensive seats)
In a simulated space, we cry simulated tears and
Smile simulated smiles…
We pretend that what entertains us
Also connects us
After all,
We live in a pseudo world
Where we are ‘informed’ that we are connected
But our frozen expressions
And gagged voices
Need the warmth of a listening heart
Before they can melt in human tears
I know for sure
That your tears and my tears
Have the same salty taste.
We are all in a sense blind
Without insight.
Understanding doesn’t follow the rhythm
Of day and night
And its own dawn comes after
Many troubled nights.
I walk on the earth
A soul tormented
By thoughts that are the machinations
Of an untruthful mind.
I know that I need saving
But don’t know who else can save me
But me…
This is the first time
I stand face to no-face
Challenging myself
To speak my truth
Or remain forever silent.
This is the first time
I wish to see myself defeated
By a higher truth.
For in that I know
Lies my return to a place that
I’m trying to create for myself
In an imaginary world.
My hands join in prayer
And a tear rolls down my cheek
Today I pray for silence
So that I may rest
And so that no thought
Can come in between me and myself.
It’s not about you
There is no ‘you’
There are only circumstances
So that desires may act
And through action
Be liberated from binding thought
But who do these desires belong to?
…They belong to me
‘Me’ is only a thought
A rather persistent one
It’s actually a misnomer…
There is no ‘me;’ but there is ‘am-ness.’
Sound, space and light
In their tireless play create
A world of forms, words and meanings
And become the experiences
That ‘am-ness’
Describes as ‘mine’
In repeatedly describing experiences as ‘mine’
It condenses into an identity
A limited being
Perpetually longing
For an abundance
That pretentious language has hidden away.
You and I
Can trace our ancestry to thought
The remnants of an inaccurate language
That didn’t have the words
To describe
The indescribable.
The true end of things
Is always at the beginning.
One day I shall cease to exist
Simply because I never did
to begin with.
I know you see me live
And ask of me all that I can give
But I’ve always wondered why
We don’t see each other die
Things often taken a turn
When the last remains burn
So easily we let go
Of all unworthy sorrow
And see clearly through moist eyes
That death claims us…
Long before we actually die.
I live in a mental asylum
With shadows for company
So powerful are my shadow-friends
That they’ve erected the walls
Of my asylum
For their existence
In its confinement
I yearn for friendship and company
Even if it is of the Unreal
The shadows beckon me to listen
Their amorphous forms speak in booming voices
That echo and resonate.
Their thoughts agree with my thoughts
That’s why we are friends…
We jog together in 10000-word dissertations
Or tickle each other with 140-character tweets
And I feel accomplished
That I now have friends in high places…
I now speak their slang
And their concerns
Are my concerns
Their outrage is my outrage
Happiness lies in the camaraderie
Between one bubble and another.
When you burst my bubble
I stand vacant
Alone in my madness…
And with this painful awareness
That I can’t see, or hear, or feel anyone
Outside of the thick walls
Of my mental asylum.
I have been shut in
To be protected from any contact with the breathing…
My walls are thick, impenetrable and safe
My shadow-friends erected them so that they could play
And oh yes, my walls have names
Please meet: Ideology. Fear. Pain. Self-loathing.
Within me
So many have lived
and scripted my story
Some have stayed
for decades
for years
Pined
Agonized
Washed away
by floods of tears.
Some come visiting
a month, a week
and leave soon after
they find their seek
Coveted guests
who appear
for a minute or two
Rejuvenate
Refresh and
Renew.
A residue of wisdom
on ways to cope
They leave behind
magical wings of hope.
My nothingness defined
by their very being
They’ve challenged what I know
of my seeing.
They’ve come to me
inhabited my space
They’ve shown their artistry
their canvas- my face.
Desires in search
for room, for chest
They’ve come to me
to manifest.
It’s in rare moments like these
I stand face to face
Watching in silence
My nothingness
My space.
I know now
I can clearly see
My space is nothing
But desire’s destiny.
Yes…
I would’ve liked better teacups
But here you are
Nevertheless
Forsaken or gifted
Standing before me every morning
And so…
Despite a petulant will
Everyday I grow to love you
And everyday
I get acquainted
With your unexpected beauty
Love and Beauty
You’ve taught me
Are not mere affections
They are the gifts of our attention
Joys that we receive
Not in our hours of need or merit
But in the generosity of our receptiveness
They’re never destinations
But journeys of long, slow acquaintance
Of discovering
And getting to know.
Wit. Wisdom. Wonder... 