When you want to learn
don’t start with what you don’t know;
examine yourself.
Remember, your ignorance
begins at the beginning.
When you want to grow
don’t start seeking the sunshine.
Connect to the ground.
Until your roots are dirty,
you won’t need much chlorophyll.
When you want to love
don’t start with the external.
You won’t find much there
only the same emptiness
reflected in the mirror.
06 DEC 2024
So many words for such a thing so small
it barely leaves a ripple at the shore,
and all its no-so-grand comings and goings
are little noticed after, or before.
So brief an episode is this thing life:
a moment’s breath in an eternal now
that being full, is emptiness itself,
containing neither what nor who nor how.
What good is such a nothing span of time?
What works can be accomplished end to end?
Alone, it has no substance to speak of;
it makes no mark to show that it has been.
And yet without it all we have is words;
just rocks that never grow to become birds.
03 DEC 2024
Without gratitude
to season today’s living,
the soup of being
has little or no flavor.
Who would eat such a bland dish?
Without noticing
the beauty of this moment,
a colorless world
clothes our life in only gray.
Who would want such a sad view?
Without compassion
leaking from our open wounds,
life’s armor will rust,
making any movement stiff.
Who enjoys such a forced dance?
Without awareness
of the truth of emptiness,
we become so full
of our own self-importance.
Who finds joy so all alone?
27 NOV 2024
Just to speculate
on some ideal world to come,
that will not arrive
so long as “they” oppose it,
is a poor and fruitless game.
We cannot evolve
in the future, on our own,
without each other.
The true barrier to peace
is never your enemies.
What kind of a world
includes just one kind of thought,
one right and no wrong?
Imagine the scoreboard reads
Me one, everyone zero.
25 NOV 2024
The Tao that can be
spoken is not the true Tao.
So why speak at all?
These countless words are
like a high, thick, gateless wall:
infinite climbing.
If it’s just sitting
that does the whole trick of it,
who needs our talking?
Understand the question,
and do you need the answer?
Who is there to know?
24 NOV 2024
Look: your enemies
don’t linger outside waiting
while you are sleeping.
They’re not some hungry spirits
hoping to catch you napping.
We create Other
without even trying hard,
with just random thoughts.
Evil isn’t created
without our mind’s assistance.
The world mirrors us:
our fears, desires, compulsions,
imagined control.
So long as there is winning,
we are all destined to lose.
23 NOV 2024
We’re not as advanced
as we think ourselves to be;
that is obvious.
Evolution takes more time
if you don’t make yourself grow.
Don’t be self-righteous;
your mirror reflection lies,
seeing just beauty.
The blame isn’t just out there.
Admit your reality.
22 NOV 2024
