Good Medicine

Unbelief is good medicine, undoing belief

 better:

all beings free to leave their being

 and enter silence.

The nameless tree with its forest

of green, 

the endless expanse called

sky, beaks and

feathered wings with their urgent 

conversations; 

all around, the light that sets the vital body

to humming, 

and the dark of re-creation:

the world held for us in promise

until it is loosened from

our thinking.  

Andrew Colliver

Photo:  Peter Bowers

Light

But the mind always wants

more than it has - 

one more bright day of sun, 

one more clear night in bed 

with the moon; one more hour 

to get the words right; one 

more chance for the heart in hiding 

to emerge from its thicket 

in dried grasses - as if this quiet day 

with its tentative light weren't enough, 

as if joy weren't strewn all around. 

Holly Hughes 

Photo:  Peter Bowers

For the Traveler

Every time you leave home, 

Another road takes you

Into a world you were never in. 

New strangers on other paths await.

New places that have never seen you

Will startle a little at your entry.

Old places that know you well

Will pretend nothing

Changed since your last visit.

When you travel, you find yourself

Alone in a different way,

More attentive now

To the self you bring along,

Your more subtle eye watching

You abroad; and how what meets you

Touches that part of the heart

That lies low at home: 

How you unexpectedly attune

To the timbre in some voice,

Opening a conversation

You want to take in

To where your longing

Has pressed hard enough

Inward, on some unsaid dark,

To create a crystal of insight

You could not have known

You needed

To illuminate

Your way.

When you travel, 

A new silence

Goes with you,

And if you listen,

 You will hear 

What your heart would 

Love to say.

A journey can become a sacred thing:

Make sure, before you go,

To take the time

To bless your going forth, 

To free your heart of ballast

So that the compass of your soul

Might direct you toward

The territories of spirit

Where you will discover

More of your hidden life,

And the urgencies

That deserve to claim you.

May you travel in an awakened way, 

Gathered wisely into your inner ground; 

That you may not waste the invitations

Which wait along the way to transform you. 

May you travel safely, arrive refreshed, 

And live your time away to its fullest; 

Return home more enriched, and free

To balance the gift of days which call you. 

John O'Donohue

Photo:  Peter Bowers

Living Dharma

Why cling to some idea

or philosophy uttered

thousands of years

(or maybe just a moment) ago?

Why, when there is already

this explosion of life,

would we ever look back?

The real dharma lives here,

breathing as this that has

never been seen

or heard before - 

this symphony of sounds

and sensations right now - 

the rustle of leaves, 

a chorus of birds,

the ache in my back,

the rush of color everywhere,

this wondrous mystery of thought,

appearing then disappearing

like everything else...

This is the living dharma, 

this timeless presence

that welcomes everything

that has come before but

is defined by none of it - 

every teaching, every tradition, 

the words you are reading now,

all of them, gone, 

consumed in the fires

of this living truth...

John Astin

Photo:  Peter Bowers

...for this pure delight

the flower can only wait

for the bee to arrive

yet passion appears from nowhere

to play hide and seek with peace

all that is gained is lost once again

timeless dreams are swallowed 

in the yawn of an awakened sleeper

yet spring arises like a phoenix

from the ashes of winter

all that is lost was never real

is the heart big enough

for the source of weeping

is the heart big enough

for this pure delight

Nirmala

Photo:  Peter Bowers

This World

I could never choose,

Even if it were possible, 

A moment in which to leave this world. 

For there will forever be, 

Wonder upon wonder,

Beauty upon beauty.

And yes... trial upon trial,

Sorrow upon sorrow, 

And an ocean of those in need.

Unfathomable Beauty

Immeasurable Suffering, 

And the movement of Loving Kindness.

This stew of all possibilities.

Flowing like a river into form,

From the Ocean of...

Chuck Surface

Photo:  Peter Bowers

You Reading This, Be Ready

Starting here, what do you want to remember?

How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?

What scent of old wood hovers, what softened

sound from outside fills the air?

Will you ever bring a better gift for the world

than the breathing respect that you carry

wherever you go right now?  Are you waiting

for time to show you some better thoughts?

When you turn around, starting here, lift this

new glimpse that you found; carry into evening

all that you want from this day.  This interval you spent

reading or hearing this, keep it for life - 

What can anyone give you greater than now,  

starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?

William Stafford 

This...

This is now.  Now is, 

all there is. Don't wait for Then; 

strike the spark, light the fire. 

Sit at the Beloved's table, 

feast with gusto, drink your fill

then dance

the way the branches

of jasmine and cypress

dance in a spring wind.

Rumi