Gabriel’s Tree

Doves hush the evening air. Honeysuckle

and sage exhale their golden charge.

Ali’s spent form, an orphan tree

the color of paprika, begins to move.

Soft sounds echo garden walls.

Ali arches, lifts, whirls;

Nutmeg, cinnamon, crimson, salmon - familiar

names cannot be used this day as

her remembrance flames: sweet-soft mouth

and shimmering eyes;

ivory breasts…seem close enough to taste.

His spinning still-point falters; delirium bells

tinkle. The world recedes as only rocks

and miniature sounds remain. Ali

begins again.

his burnished face and milky

eyes have seen a thousand moons.

Archangel Gabriel guards eternity

cloaked above this zikr-dance as

gods converse on distant hills.

La il’aha illa’lla.

Dust motes swirl the faded light.

The Angel stands, a trumpet blasts,

the Sufi laughs - as evening settles

lemon and emerald and plum.

A soul on the razor edge of dark

and light calls forth the golden horn.

La il’aha illa’lla.

Holy Mary

San Xavier Mission

Tucson, Arizona

January 2011

"nothing is born fully formed; nothing dies."

in silence

pray me into consciousness,

mother divine

pray me into dust and diamond - 

pray me into rocks and holiness

and rivers.

pray me raw into form.

pray the wheel a-fire,

dear mother.

pray me into formless annihilation

then pray me back again,

my mother.

pray me back again.

There is a sense, at times, that certain things seem to be illumined from within. 

And a ‘knowing’ arises from this.  It is a knowing beyond everyday thinking.  

There is another pattern at work here.  

The Sufi term ‘yaqin’ comes to mind.  At its most basic level, yaqin refers to
certainty and conviction.  

We feel this in our bodies.  And we bow.  Deeply.

Linville Gorge

North Carolina

October 2010

Hill Where the Lord Hides

Finger Lakes

New York

from:  Ramakrishna: His Life And Sayings

"God is the Absolute and Eternal Brahman, as well as the Father of the Universe. 
The indivisible Brahman is like a vast shoreless ocean, without bounds and 
limits, in which I can only struggle and sink. But when I approach the always 
sportive (active) personal Deity (Hari), I get peace, like the sinking man who 
nears the shore.

God is formless, and is with form too, and He is that which transcends both form 
and formlessness. He alone can say what else He is.

At a certain stage of his path of devotion, the devotee finds satisfaction in 
God with form; at another stage, in God without form.

The God with form is visible, nay, we can touch Him face to face, as with one's 
dearest friend.

As at one time I am clothed, and at another time naked, so Brahman is at one 
time with attributes and at another without.

As water when congealed becomes ice, so the visible form of the Almighty is the 
materialised manifestation of the all-pervading formless Brahman. It may be 
called, in fact, Sat-chit-ananda [being-knowledge-bliss] solidified. As the ice, 
being part and parcel of the water, remains in the water for a time and 
afterwards melts in it, so the Personal God is part and parcel of the 
Impersonal. He rises from the Impersonal, remains there, and ultimately merges 
into it and disappears.

His name is Intelligence; His abode is Intelligence too, and He, the Lord, is 
Intelligence Himself."

Sri Ramakrishna

~

...with special thanks to Tom H. for sharing this gem...

Florida

For Kathy

August 15, 1951 - March 2, 2011

~

"Once Ananda, his cousin, devoted attendant, and beloved pupil, said to the Buddha, 'It would seem one half of the spiritual life is friendship with good people, association with good people, and communion with good people.'

The Buddha said in reply, "It is not so, Ananda, it is not so.  It is not one half of the spiritual life, 

it is the entire spiritual life.'"

Buddha, Samyutta Nikaya, Verse 2

+++

om mani kim-chi

Whereas, you, dragon are eccentric and your life uninteresting; and, whereas, you have a non-compassionate and obtuse nature and abundant ill-health; you should marry a monkey or rat late in life.  At all costs avoid the dog.  Whereas, you, monkey (1944, 1956, 1968, 1980 and 1992 or add 12 years), are not very intelligent and unable to influence people; and, whereas, you are an unenthusiastic underachiever and easily discouraged, you should seek a dragon or a rat and avoid tigers.  And finally you, rat (circa 1936 plus or minus 12 years) are un-ambitious and dishonest and prone to spend freely, seldom make lasting relationships.  In summation, you are compatible with dragons and monkeys and should avoid the horse.   

Whereas you, server five (chens restaurant shelby north carolina) have no ability to sense or know higher truth but your lucky numbers are 9, 12, 27, 36, 37 and 47.

west asheville

march 2011

~

yashica T4, 35mm, 200asa

Coltrane’s Freight Train

Over the sixth grade PA system they announce, right after lunch, they shot the president.  Then Ruby shoots Oswald on live television.  This sours little Sammy good and plenty.

Before that, Cuban missiles aiming at children.  Annihilation seems a difficult concept for Sammy.           

                 this is Coltrane's freight-train… 

Bobby lying in a black puddle on that concrete floor asks if everyone is all right.  Sammy starts to wonder, “I’m just trying to keep my side of the street clean.”

Martin and Malcolm.  Then real made-in-the-USA bullets kill real made-in-the-USA students in Ohio.  No words, Samuel.

…no going back and no getting off.      no words.

Sam speeds away from rice paddies in a sixty-seven Chevy, leaving his best friend MIA.

High    hard                energy                         speeding toward that dangerous wreck…

Soak in propaganda from the last good war and the endless stream of those who massacre and rape and torture other human beings.  Those who fund atrocities and those who make us look the other way, Sam.

…the one ‘Trane told me about.

Slick ones, profiteers and strap-on airplanes.  Intractable cruelty.  Sam shouts at traffic from an overpass through his hat.

it’s an all-night underwater swim

Kamikaze shrapnel long hidden in a dresser drawer is cool to big Sammy’s touch. 

no air                     no        map                 no                    time 

We were sunk the moment the grassy knoll lit up with carbine fire, Sam.  We threw a parade, remember?

it’s a cold frame    /          a-train

Then we had to get through the eighties without Lennon.  Now Samuel has to live with himself for doing nothing about it…. 

straight to the abyss. 

…a steaming bowl of nothing.

++++++++++

asheville - march 2011

(yashica T4, 35mm, 200asa)

+++++++

arizona 1911

when starting off to nail something grasshopper if you're lucky that is grasshopper you will eventually reach a point where the nail goes in perfectly with just a few hammer strokes.  tap-whap-whap.  perfection.  i like eight-penny coated nails myself grasshopper for all around nailing but keep an open mind.  finish nails are too finicky cement-coated (brutes ten-penny and above) are just too much unless you have a really big board grasshopper.  forget the times you hit your thumb grasshopper and you move to that unspeakable plane of consciousness.  never mind getting to perfection: tap-tap-tap-TAP to get started grasshopper then WHAM-WHAM-WHAM to finish with your teeth gripping your bottom lip for leverage grasshopper leaving the imprint of the hammer head in the wood.  but the fine economy of stroking the nail into place with three hits grasshopper is something you eventually zen-feel.  the nail reaches full potential and the wood is satisfied grasshopper.  even the hammer is happy.  practice this grasshopper and next week we'll speak of making love to a woman. grasshopper.

~

Yashica T4, 35mm

Oliver House, Bisbee Arizona

(still rife with that turn-of-the century bordello fragrance)

there is duct tape on the steering column, of course.

this ain't mine....but it fits:

“One final paragraph of advice: Do not burn yourself out. Be as I am-a reluctant enthusiast… a part time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it is still there. So get out there and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, encounter the grizz, climb the mountains. Run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, that lovely, mysterious and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to your body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much: I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those deskbound people with their hearts in a safe deposit box and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this: you will outlive the bastards.”...Edward Abbey

doorway in asheville, nc

march 2011

stock tank, Dragoon Mountains, AZ

from here to eternity

Head north on North Carolina 9, go 23 miles.  Take the exit onto I-40 West toward Knoxville, go 97 miles. Behind these doors the floor is worn from dancing.  Slight left onto Winfield Parkway.  Go 4.4 miles.  Counter-vibration has loosened the floorboards and light leaks upward.  Turn right onto TN-338 South Boyd’s Creek Highway.  Vivekananda visits on Monday nights when the gospel choir sings.  Turn left onto Gibson Circle.  Ray Charles lives in one room out back.  Take the first left onto Paradise Way.  Go 0.4 miles.  I am the organ-grinder’s monkey, swallowing shiny objects whole.  Take the first left onto Eternity Way.  You laugh while jumping backward from the spattering fish-fry of karma.  Arrive Eternity Way, Seymour, TN in 2 hours, 31 minutes.  Only Ray can see the others who worship here.

~

Asheville, NC

spring 2011

P+S Fuji 35mm, asa200

this be not chaos, but mystery

not absence: fullness

this be not unholy, but sacred

this lives inside me.  same window / different view.

this does not deconstruct me.  it defines me

that I may love more.

call my name, walk with me,

make love with me

inside this mystery.

Hi, my Name is Jake, and…

(Jake no longer dreamed of cheering crowds, nor of women, nor of cheap bourbon, nor of great poker games, nor feats of hell-driving, nor of his ’57 DeSoto. At hospice, he dreamed only of moments now and the electric pulses flittering up his arms toward his torso. They danced like miniature bullet-trains and he loved them as he had loved the bourbon.)

~

(apologies to Hemingway)

Nothing could match the sheer excitement and anticipation of the Wayne County Fair in Palmyra, NY in early August.  We made our way to the fairgrounds on Friday night, parked in a well-worn field among the dozens of family sedans, walked through the midway, past the 4H stalls, the carnival booths (ring-toss for a dime) and found our place in the bleachers for about 90 minutes of drama on the dirt-track oval in front of us.  The gasoline smell, the sounds of the crowd and the crackling PA system - and the unmistakeable roar of American V-8 engines without mufflers (without license plates).  This was almost better than sex.  "Bumper-to-bumper, wheel-to-wheel over the first elevation..." as the announcer revved up the crowd.  All summer long we had shouted that phrase with serious glee while riding our bicycles over homemade plywood ramps.  Our hero was Jake Plumestead - the greatest Hell-Driver of them all (ever, and all-time).  Jake did the ramp-to-ramp, the T-bone crash and the best reverse-spin of all the drivers.  He never flinched, he never sweat bullets, he never failed to win the girls and he never backed down.  Each year he grew larger and more brave in our imaginations and in stories told to our girlfriends.  This is how we talked about Jake.  This is why we wanted to be Jake.  All winter long.

Echoes

Yachica T4, 35mm, iso400

It was Tibet, 1964.  As I slogged along with the Red Army down the muddy road outside your hamlet, I caught your gaze.        Boom.              You were just a little girl following after your missionary mother, teaching villagers how to grow potatoes in rocky soil.  I was seventeen with only an ill-fitting uniform to my name.             Boom.              You had lost your sandal.       Boom.                          I saw you again in Paris some years later.  I had lost my arm.  You had new sandals.    Boom - Boom.  

We walked all the way to Cloud Mountain.

(Reuters) – Mudslides engulfed a town in northwest China on Sunday, killing            at least 127 people and

leaving nearly…

Plum trees were in bloom.       We brewed tea and shared three almonds.  

…as rescue teams…    Boom.

Then we wrote everything down.       After the blossoms fell I dreamed of sandals every night. Boom.

~

Dining Room / Oliver House

Bisbee, AZ

January 2011

~

Yashica T4, Fujifilm 35mm, iso200

"Like vanishing dew,

a passing apparition

or the sudden flash

of lightning -- already gone --

thus should one regard one's self."

~

Ikkyu (1394 - 1481)

The Poetry of Zen

Shambala Library