Monday, August 31, 2009
traveling sideways each unexpected disintegrating on the wind a variety of textures at this moment the process of—grains of wood long and fine spread across indiscernible movement the feel of time slowed this empty space of a single note lingering—a skin irritation a humming appliance an eyelash falls without warning this lesson (in)stilled no test no outcome—taste this permanent timeless circle frozen stop here—rest
Friday, August 28, 2009
fluted lyrics a day in rain flickering as if. as if announced, invited, or the entertainment swallows any serious discussion of rain or the correct calibration of. the correct calibration of nonsense, humor, desperation having intended to continue in an affair long awaited and yet, ever so gently. ever so gently a brush, silence the wandering or wayward ever on to something more poignant or flattering what could never be this or otherwise. this or otherwise he tried to articulate without agreeing to drink first, so clever or unannounced, a generic unfulfilled wish or constant repeating car tires through rain at street level, one last hope. one last hope negotiated over mundane sci-fi and casual brushing, after each syllable placed or replaced with personal expression, the sound of your eyelashes, fluttering, intoxicated.
Daily Tao
DailyTao.org
The Book of The Way, Day by Day
Friday, 28 August, 2009 :: 9
Fill your bowl to the brim
and it will spill.
Keep sharpening your knife
and it will blunt.
Chase after money and security
and your heart will never unclench.
Care about people's approval
and you will be their prisoner.
Do your work, then step back.
The only path to serenity.
Translation by Stephen Mitchell.
Site © Copyright 2003-5 Glen Sanford.
All Rights Reserved.
The Book of The Way, Day by Day
Friday, 28 August, 2009 :: 9
Fill your bowl to the brim
and it will spill.
Keep sharpening your knife
and it will blunt.
Chase after money and security
and your heart will never unclench.
Care about people's approval
and you will be their prisoner.
Do your work, then step back.
The only path to serenity.
Translation by Stephen Mitchell.
Site © Copyright 2003-5 Glen Sanford.
All Rights Reserved.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
act/abstract
Grace
to be born and live as variously as possible
--Frank O’Hara
circling around the finding is the part of (dis)grace, what is left in clutter or shredded notions of past ignited in present tense each word shaved off like curls of soap, carved wood ornaments, one stray hair after another. the intention of falling rock or (grace) hartigan’s colors swept into place among a social mess of history and the inevitable, each line feeling canvas on skin, each stroke trusting and failing simultaneously, collage parts into a new whole, spacing expressions of the everyday, among art or emotion, moving stillness parallel to any destination.
to be born and live as variously as possible
--Frank O’Hara
circling around the finding is the part of (dis)grace, what is left in clutter or shredded notions of past ignited in present tense each word shaved off like curls of soap, carved wood ornaments, one stray hair after another. the intention of falling rock or (grace) hartigan’s colors swept into place among a social mess of history and the inevitable, each line feeling canvas on skin, each stroke trusting and failing simultaneously, collage parts into a new whole, spacing expressions of the everyday, among art or emotion, moving stillness parallel to any destination.
pieces of reflection leading blue lines scattered stories only remembered in photos, an old farm, buildings now long gone, a single moment still and content captured before the storm before waves washing over distort everything underneath. having heard your voice in my head, resonating, hold each string for a moment longer listening to each note, a voice mingling the various sounds, sweet and floating, or the rhythms of a drum in sync, in my chest, an african drum beat in 3s, weaving waking the start of something. pieces mingling, scattering, finding new form, parts of moments captured, a smile, a touch, before this distance only leftovers, left, what always remained under, washing over, lines scatter delirious and blue water meets sky at the endless horizon. where once imagined scented ideas sent on the wind, this still collapse.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
at the instant of x
Brutes abstract not.
--John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
the way that I can put each number
against the cool of your skin
lingering above
cotton
the ratio matching nature
greek symbols across the sidewalk
like hopscotch for theorists
explaining each dimension
of yard grass limb
stretching over moments
from the very first
when you stood, brown corduroy
and i listed the mathematics
of inclination
--John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
the way that I can put each number
against the cool of your skin
lingering above
cotton
the ratio matching nature
greek symbols across the sidewalk
like hopscotch for theorists
explaining each dimension
of yard grass limb
stretching over moments
from the very first
when you stood, brown corduroy
and i listed the mathematics
of inclination
between the lines
i am running and think: if only, yes, this single drop of.
pacing the day. heavy under grey.
a placard reads: falter and save your ink.
what becomes difficult to read.
i want to say: please stop by every day.
write this into your schedule.
add: a trigger of lemon-scented products reminds me of you
and floss, flossing mint-flavored.
walking in the street. sitting.
out of ink, postage, shifting intent.
wanting to add: even in that case, it could be like this.
wanting to decide to paint lines on any court.
pacing the day. heavy under grey.
a placard reads: falter and save your ink.
what becomes difficult to read.
i want to say: please stop by every day.
write this into your schedule.
add: a trigger of lemon-scented products reminds me of you
and floss, flossing mint-flavored.
walking in the street. sitting.
out of ink, postage, shifting intent.
wanting to add: even in that case, it could be like this.
wanting to decide to paint lines on any court.
memo
these slender pieces
of
molecule
molecule
drip
gravity holds us together
his body was filled
with the chemicals that make up flame retardant
your black saturn
so shiny and new
forgive me
the plums i didn’t eat for lunch
not sweet
fresh from the farm
have we not (don’t say evolved, don’t say adapted)
been selected for this
all along
particulates
of a symphony for example (the one repeated/repeatable refrain)
can you hum the entire movement?
an ode
to an old
acquaintance
we swallow
and breathe
in a dangerously close space
proximity of red tiles
a recording device
lines on a road
separate me (green subaru)
from
of
molecule
molecule
drip
gravity holds us together
his body was filled
with the chemicals that make up flame retardant
your black saturn
so shiny and new
forgive me
the plums i didn’t eat for lunch
not sweet
fresh from the farm
have we not (don’t say evolved, don’t say adapted)
been selected for this
all along
particulates
of a symphony for example (the one repeated/repeatable refrain)
can you hum the entire movement?
an ode
to an old
acquaintance
we swallow
and breathe
in a dangerously close space
proximity of red tiles
a recording device
lines on a road
separate me (green subaru)
from
Thursday, July 02, 2009
from Odes
by me
8.
No more than subtext my/your own text under every word only words falling waiting characters casting letters under your breath above my words over under (knowing something waits under forgets to take) on the opposite of wondering the opposite forgetting, a springboard, no, sill of the flower pot. Placing one letter after another placing one letter after another placing each side by side (cleverly you thought but not this quickly may I remind you) if the pace precedes (I am) each character drifting into singular space taking shape.
8.
No more than subtext my/your own text under every word only words falling waiting characters casting letters under your breath above my words over under (knowing something waits under forgets to take) on the opposite of wondering the opposite forgetting, a springboard, no, sill of the flower pot. Placing one letter after another placing one letter after another placing each side by side (cleverly you thought but not this quickly may I remind you) if the pace precedes (I am) each character drifting into singular space taking shape.
Lorine Niedecker
from The Granite Pail
In the great snowfall before the bomb
colored yule tree lights
windows, the only glow for contemplation
along this road
I worked the print shop
right down among em
the folk from whom all poetry flows
and dreadfully much else.
I was Blondie
I carried my bundles of hog feeder price lists
down by Larry the Lug,
I'd never get anywhere
because I'd never had suction,
pull, you know, favor, drag,
well-oiled protection.
I heard their rehashed radio barbs--
more barbarous among hirelings
as higher-ups grow more corrupt.
But what vitality! The women hold jobs--
clean house, cook, raise children, bowl
and go to church.
What would they say if they knew
I sit for two months on six lines
of poetry?
In the great snowfall before the bomb
colored yule tree lights
windows, the only glow for contemplation
along this road
I worked the print shop
right down among em
the folk from whom all poetry flows
and dreadfully much else.
I was Blondie
I carried my bundles of hog feeder price lists
down by Larry the Lug,
I'd never get anywhere
because I'd never had suction,
pull, you know, favor, drag,
well-oiled protection.
I heard their rehashed radio barbs--
more barbarous among hirelings
as higher-ups grow more corrupt.
But what vitality! The women hold jobs--
clean house, cook, raise children, bowl
and go to church.
What would they say if they knew
I sit for two months on six lines
of poetry?
Lorine Niedecker
from The Granite Pail
I knew a clean man
but he was not for me.
Now I sew green aprons
over covered seats. He
wades the muddy water fishing,
falls in, dries his last pay-check
in the sun, smooths it out
in Leaves of Grass. He's
the one for me.
I knew a clean man
but he was not for me.
Now I sew green aprons
over covered seats. He
wades the muddy water fishing,
falls in, dries his last pay-check
in the sun, smooths it out
in Leaves of Grass. He's
the one for me.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
from The Wisdom of No Escape
by Pema Chodron
In Taoism there's a famous saying that goes, "The Tao that can be spoken is not the ultimate Tao." Another way you could say that, although I've never seen it translated this way, is, "As soon as you begin to believe in something, then you can no longer see anything else." The truth you believe in and cling to makes you unavailable to hear anything new.
Holding on to beliefs limits our experiences of life. That doesn't mean that beliefs or ideas or thinking is a problem; the stubborn attitude of having to have things be a particular way, grasping on to our beliefs and thoughts, all these cause the problems. To put it simply, using your belief system this way creates a situation in which you choose to be blind instead of being able to see, to be deaf instead of being able to hear, to be dead rather than alive, asleep rather than awake.
"When you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha" means that when you see that you're grasping or clinging to anything, whether conventionally it's called good or bad, make friends with that. Look into it. Get to know it completely and utterly. In that way it will let go of itself.
Seeing when you justify yourself and when you blame others is not a reason to criticize yourself, but actually an opportunity to recognize what all people do and how it imprisons us in a very limited perspective of this world. It's a chance to see that you're holding on to your interpretation of reality; it allows you to reflect that that's all it is--nothing more, nothing less: just your interpretation of reality.
In Taoism there's a famous saying that goes, "The Tao that can be spoken is not the ultimate Tao." Another way you could say that, although I've never seen it translated this way, is, "As soon as you begin to believe in something, then you can no longer see anything else." The truth you believe in and cling to makes you unavailable to hear anything new.
Holding on to beliefs limits our experiences of life. That doesn't mean that beliefs or ideas or thinking is a problem; the stubborn attitude of having to have things be a particular way, grasping on to our beliefs and thoughts, all these cause the problems. To put it simply, using your belief system this way creates a situation in which you choose to be blind instead of being able to see, to be deaf instead of being able to hear, to be dead rather than alive, asleep rather than awake.
"When you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha" means that when you see that you're grasping or clinging to anything, whether conventionally it's called good or bad, make friends with that. Look into it. Get to know it completely and utterly. In that way it will let go of itself.
Seeing when you justify yourself and when you blame others is not a reason to criticize yourself, but actually an opportunity to recognize what all people do and how it imprisons us in a very limited perspective of this world. It's a chance to see that you're holding on to your interpretation of reality; it allows you to reflect that that's all it is--nothing more, nothing less: just your interpretation of reality.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Disclosures
by Michael Palmer
1
Beneath the writing on the wall
is the writing it was designed
to obscure. The two together
form a third kind
2
There is no writing
on the wall's other side
Perhaps this lack
constitutes a fourth kind
3
Some of the writing on the wall
will be designated as truth
some as art
4
It is said to represent a mirror
of everyday life in its time
5
"Fabius Naso
talks through his asshole
and shits out his mouth"
for example
6
"Foute les Arabes"
for example
7
Certain words and images
or parts of images
have been chipped away
These often turn up for sale
at sidewalk stalls
before the walls
of other cities
8
I too have an image for sale
It's the image of a poem
and is to be found
on the reverse of this sheet
1
Beneath the writing on the wall
is the writing it was designed
to obscure. The two together
form a third kind
2
There is no writing
on the wall's other side
Perhaps this lack
constitutes a fourth kind
3
Some of the writing on the wall
will be designated as truth
some as art
4
It is said to represent a mirror
of everyday life in its time
5
"Fabius Naso
talks through his asshole
and shits out his mouth"
for example
6
"Foute les Arabes"
for example
7
Certain words and images
or parts of images
have been chipped away
These often turn up for sale
at sidewalk stalls
before the walls
of other cities
8
I too have an image for sale
It's the image of a poem
and is to be found
on the reverse of this sheet
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
from The Wisdom of No Escape
by Pema Chodron
Our life's work is to use what we have been given to wake up. If there were two people who were exactly the same--same body, same speech, same mind, same mother, same father, same house, same food, everything the same--one of them could use what he has to wake up and the other could use it to become more resentful, bitter, and sour. It doesn't matter what you're given, whether it's physical deformity or enormous wealth or poverty, beauty or ugliness, mental stability or mental instability, life in the middle of a madhouse or life in the middle of a peaceful, silent desert. Whatever you're given can wake you up or put you to sleep. That's the challenge of now: What are you going to do with what you have already--your body, your speech, your mind?
Here's something that's very helpful to know about now. The biggest obstacle to taking a bigger perspective on life is that our emotions capture and blind us. The more sensitive we become to this, the more we realize that when we start getting angry or denigrating ourselves or craving things in a way that makes us feel miserable, we begin to shut down, shut out, as if we were sitting on the edge of the Grand Canyon but we had put a big black bag over our heads.
Life's work is to wake up, to let the things that enter into the circle wake you up rather than put you to sleep. The only way to do this is to open, be curious, and develop some sense of sympathy for everything that comes along, to get to know its nature and let it teach you what it will. It's going to stick around until you learn your lesson, at any rate. You can leave your marriage, you can quit your job, you can only go where people are going to praise you, you can manipulate your world until you're blue in the face to try to make it always smooth, but the same old demons will always come up until finally you have learned your lesson, the lesson they came to teach you. Then those same demons will appear as friendly, warmhearted companions on the path.
Our life's work is to use what we have been given to wake up. If there were two people who were exactly the same--same body, same speech, same mind, same mother, same father, same house, same food, everything the same--one of them could use what he has to wake up and the other could use it to become more resentful, bitter, and sour. It doesn't matter what you're given, whether it's physical deformity or enormous wealth or poverty, beauty or ugliness, mental stability or mental instability, life in the middle of a madhouse or life in the middle of a peaceful, silent desert. Whatever you're given can wake you up or put you to sleep. That's the challenge of now: What are you going to do with what you have already--your body, your speech, your mind?
Here's something that's very helpful to know about now. The biggest obstacle to taking a bigger perspective on life is that our emotions capture and blind us. The more sensitive we become to this, the more we realize that when we start getting angry or denigrating ourselves or craving things in a way that makes us feel miserable, we begin to shut down, shut out, as if we were sitting on the edge of the Grand Canyon but we had put a big black bag over our heads.
Life's work is to wake up, to let the things that enter into the circle wake you up rather than put you to sleep. The only way to do this is to open, be curious, and develop some sense of sympathy for everything that comes along, to get to know its nature and let it teach you what it will. It's going to stick around until you learn your lesson, at any rate. You can leave your marriage, you can quit your job, you can only go where people are going to praise you, you can manipulate your world until you're blue in the face to try to make it always smooth, but the same old demons will always come up until finally you have learned your lesson, the lesson they came to teach you. Then those same demons will appear as friendly, warmhearted companions on the path.
Prelude
by Michael Palmer
The limit of the song is this
prelude to a journey to
the outer islands, the generative
sentence, waltz project, forms,
qualities, suns, moons, rings,
an inside-outside then
an outside-inside shaped
with her colored clays. The days
yet propose themselves
as self-evident, everything there
everything here
and you are reading
in a way natural to theatre
a set of instructions
that alters itself automatically
as you proceed west
from death to friendliness, the two
topics upon which you are allowed
to meditate
under the first broad drops
of rain. The planes
will be piloted by ancestors
who have come back to life.
Why the delay.
The limit of the song is this
prelude to a journey to
the outer islands, the generative
sentence, waltz project, forms,
qualities, suns, moons, rings,
an inside-outside then
an outside-inside shaped
with her colored clays. The days
yet propose themselves
as self-evident, everything there
everything here
and you are reading
in a way natural to theatre
a set of instructions
that alters itself automatically
as you proceed west
from death to friendliness, the two
topics upon which you are allowed
to meditate
under the first broad drops
of rain. The planes
will be piloted by ancestors
who have come back to life.
Why the delay.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Thinking about Socrates
"Perhaps someone might say, “Socrates, can you not go away from us and live quietly, without talking?” Now this is the hardest thing to make some of you believe. For if I say that such conduct would be disobedience to the god and that therefore I cannot keep quiet, you will think I am jesting and will not believe me; and if again I say that to talk every day about virtue and the other things about which you hear me talking and examining myself and others is the greatest good to man, and that the unexamined life is not worth living, you will believe me still less. This is as I say, gentlemen, but it is not easy to convince you."
Apology: The Examined Life
Because of his political associations with an earlier regime, the Athenian democracy put Socrates on trial, charging him with undermining state religion and corrupting young people. The speech he offered in his own defense, as reported in Plato's Apologhma (Apology), provides us with many reminders of the central features of Socrates's approach to philosophy and its relation to practical life.
Ironic Modesty:
Explaining his mission as a philosopher, Socrates reports an oracular message telling him that "No one is wiser than you." (Apology 21a) He then proceeds through a series of ironic descriptions of his efforts to disprove the oracle by conversing with notable Athenians who must surely be wiser. In each case, however, Socrates concludes that he has a kind of wisdom that each of them lacks: namely, an open awareness of his own ignorance.
Questioning Habit:
The goal of Socratic interrogation, then, is to help individuals to achieve genuine self-knowledge, even if it often turns out to be negative in character. As his cross-examination of Meletus shows, Socrates means to turn the methods of the Sophists inside-out, using logical nit-picking to expose (rather than to create) illusions about reality. If the method rarely succeeds with interlocutors, it can nevertheless be effectively internalized as a dialectical mode of reasoning in an effort to understand everything.
Devotion to Truth:
Even after he has been convicted by the jury, Socrates declines to abandon his pursuit of the truth in all matters. Refusing to accept exile from Athens or a commitment to silence as his penalty, he maintains that public discussion of the great issues of life and virtue is a necessary part of any valuable human life. "The unexamined life is not worth living." (Apology 38a) Socrates would rather die than give up philosophy, and the jury seems happy to grant him that wish.
Dispassionate Reason:
Even when the jury has sentenced him to death, Socrates calmly delivers his final public words, a speculation about what the future holds. Disclaiming any certainty about the fate of a human being after death, he nevertheless expresses a continued confidence in the power of reason, which he has exhibited (while the jury has not). Who really wins will remain unclear.
Plato's dramatic picture of a man willing to face death rather than abandoning his commitment to philosophical inquiry offers up Socrates as a model for all future philosophers. Perhaps few of us are presented with the same stark choice between philosophy and death, but all of us are daily faced with opportunities to decide between convenient conventionality and our devotion to truth and reason. How we choose determines whether we, like Socrates, deserve to call our lives philosophical.
from philosophypages.com
Apology: The Examined Life
Because of his political associations with an earlier regime, the Athenian democracy put Socrates on trial, charging him with undermining state religion and corrupting young people. The speech he offered in his own defense, as reported in Plato's Apologhma (Apology), provides us with many reminders of the central features of Socrates's approach to philosophy and its relation to practical life.
Ironic Modesty:
Explaining his mission as a philosopher, Socrates reports an oracular message telling him that "No one is wiser than you." (Apology 21a) He then proceeds through a series of ironic descriptions of his efforts to disprove the oracle by conversing with notable Athenians who must surely be wiser. In each case, however, Socrates concludes that he has a kind of wisdom that each of them lacks: namely, an open awareness of his own ignorance.
Questioning Habit:
The goal of Socratic interrogation, then, is to help individuals to achieve genuine self-knowledge, even if it often turns out to be negative in character. As his cross-examination of Meletus shows, Socrates means to turn the methods of the Sophists inside-out, using logical nit-picking to expose (rather than to create) illusions about reality. If the method rarely succeeds with interlocutors, it can nevertheless be effectively internalized as a dialectical mode of reasoning in an effort to understand everything.
Devotion to Truth:
Even after he has been convicted by the jury, Socrates declines to abandon his pursuit of the truth in all matters. Refusing to accept exile from Athens or a commitment to silence as his penalty, he maintains that public discussion of the great issues of life and virtue is a necessary part of any valuable human life. "The unexamined life is not worth living." (Apology 38a) Socrates would rather die than give up philosophy, and the jury seems happy to grant him that wish.
Dispassionate Reason:
Even when the jury has sentenced him to death, Socrates calmly delivers his final public words, a speculation about what the future holds. Disclaiming any certainty about the fate of a human being after death, he nevertheless expresses a continued confidence in the power of reason, which he has exhibited (while the jury has not). Who really wins will remain unclear.
Plato's dramatic picture of a man willing to face death rather than abandoning his commitment to philosophical inquiry offers up Socrates as a model for all future philosophers. Perhaps few of us are presented with the same stark choice between philosophy and death, but all of us are daily faced with opportunities to decide between convenient conventionality and our devotion to truth and reason. How we choose determines whether we, like Socrates, deserve to call our lives philosophical.
from philosophypages.com
Sunday, June 14, 2009
more Pema Chodron
from When Things Fall Apart
Having read this on more than one occasion, still, one always learns again and anew, upon going back, listening, reading again, about oneself, about the world, about presence.
Chodron:
What makes maitri (loving-kindness) such a different approach is that we are not trying to solve a problem. We are not striving to make pain go away or to become a better person. In fact, we are giving up control altogether and letting concepts and ideals fall apart.
The most difficult times for many of us are the ones we give ourselves. Yet it's never too late or too early to practice loving-kindness. It's as if we had a terminal disease but might live for quite a while. Not knowing how much time we have left, we might begin to think it was important to make friends with ourselves and others in the remaining hours, months, or years.
It is said that we can't attain enlightenment, let alone feel contentment and joy, without seeing who we are and what we do, without seeing our patterns and our habits. This is called maitri--developing loving-kindness and an unconditional friendship with ourselves.
Our personal demons come in many guises. We experience them as shame, as jealousy, as abandonment, as rage. They are anything that makes us so uncomfortable that we continually run away.
We do the big escape: we act out, say something, slam a door, hit someone, or throw a pot as a way of not facing what's happening in our hearts. Or we shove the feelings under and somehow deaden the pain. We can spend our whole lives escaping from the monsters of our minds.
All over the world, people are so caught in running that they forget to take advantage of the beauty around them. We become so accustomed to speeding ahead that we rob ourselves of joy.
Having read this on more than one occasion, still, one always learns again and anew, upon going back, listening, reading again, about oneself, about the world, about presence.
Chodron:
What makes maitri (loving-kindness) such a different approach is that we are not trying to solve a problem. We are not striving to make pain go away or to become a better person. In fact, we are giving up control altogether and letting concepts and ideals fall apart.
The most difficult times for many of us are the ones we give ourselves. Yet it's never too late or too early to practice loving-kindness. It's as if we had a terminal disease but might live for quite a while. Not knowing how much time we have left, we might begin to think it was important to make friends with ourselves and others in the remaining hours, months, or years.
It is said that we can't attain enlightenment, let alone feel contentment and joy, without seeing who we are and what we do, without seeing our patterns and our habits. This is called maitri--developing loving-kindness and an unconditional friendship with ourselves.
Our personal demons come in many guises. We experience them as shame, as jealousy, as abandonment, as rage. They are anything that makes us so uncomfortable that we continually run away.
We do the big escape: we act out, say something, slam a door, hit someone, or throw a pot as a way of not facing what's happening in our hearts. Or we shove the feelings under and somehow deaden the pain. We can spend our whole lives escaping from the monsters of our minds.
All over the world, people are so caught in running that they forget to take advantage of the beauty around them. We become so accustomed to speeding ahead that we rob ourselves of joy.
Friday, June 12, 2009
from When Things Fall Apart
by Pema Chodron
In the teachings of Buddhism, we hear about egolessness. It sounds difficult to grasp: what are they talking about, anyway? When the teachings are about neurosis, however, we feel right at home. That's something we really understand. But egolessness? When we reach our limit, if we aspire to know that place fully--which is to say that we aspire to neither indulge nor repress--a hardness in us will dissolve. We will be softened by the sheer force of whatever energy arises--the energy of anger, the energy of disappointment, the energy of fear. When it's not solidified in one direction or another, that very energy pierces us to the heart, and it opens us. This is the discovery of egolessness. It's when all our usual schemes fall apart. Reaching our limit is like finding a doorway to sanity and the unconditional goodness of humanity, rather than meeting an obstacle or a punishment.
We might think, as we become more open, that it's going to take bigger catastrophes for us to reach our limit. The interesting thing is that, as we open more and more, it's the big ones that wake us up and the little things that catch us off guard. However, no matter what the size, color, or shape is, the point is still to lean toward the discomfort of life and see it clearly rather than to protect ourselves from it.
"This very moment is the perfect teacher, and it's always with us" is really a most profound instruction. Just seeing what's going on--that's the teaching right there. We can be with what's happening and not dissociate.
Awakeness is found in our pleasure and our pain, our confusion and our wisdom, available in each moment of our weird, unfathomable, ordinary everyday lives.
In the teachings of Buddhism, we hear about egolessness. It sounds difficult to grasp: what are they talking about, anyway? When the teachings are about neurosis, however, we feel right at home. That's something we really understand. But egolessness? When we reach our limit, if we aspire to know that place fully--which is to say that we aspire to neither indulge nor repress--a hardness in us will dissolve. We will be softened by the sheer force of whatever energy arises--the energy of anger, the energy of disappointment, the energy of fear. When it's not solidified in one direction or another, that very energy pierces us to the heart, and it opens us. This is the discovery of egolessness. It's when all our usual schemes fall apart. Reaching our limit is like finding a doorway to sanity and the unconditional goodness of humanity, rather than meeting an obstacle or a punishment.
We might think, as we become more open, that it's going to take bigger catastrophes for us to reach our limit. The interesting thing is that, as we open more and more, it's the big ones that wake us up and the little things that catch us off guard. However, no matter what the size, color, or shape is, the point is still to lean toward the discomfort of life and see it clearly rather than to protect ourselves from it.
"This very moment is the perfect teacher, and it's always with us" is really a most profound instruction. Just seeing what's going on--that's the teaching right there. We can be with what's happening and not dissociate.
Awakeness is found in our pleasure and our pain, our confusion and our wisdom, available in each moment of our weird, unfathomable, ordinary everyday lives.
Sunday, June 07, 2009
berlin wall 2009
history spaced across moments suspended
or a movement of color
shading every emotion
lines drawn across
tie together the complications
how one human can hurt another
how many destroy millions
sontag says this is what humans are capable of
and we see it, study the images
of brutality
transformed here
a material space both of history
and a living present, changing
away from popular tourist destinations
just this structure
along the water
next to a bridge
new artists paint over history
never forget
keep moving in every direction
this is what humans are capable of
new lines drawn
in color
paint a composition of chords
translates
hopeful
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)