Single Life Spans

"Right now I’m just spreading seeds. Some may sow and many will not." He told his friends such.  With Wisdom. Loudly. And his therapist too. Lonesomely. She understood. Actually.

Secretly, he thought, "I'm a withering seed, somewhere out there, underground and quite probably in my own backyard. A seed that just isn’t taking to life." Well, last night contained a happy sprout who descended hither to have a talk with a seed and its leaking life.

She informs him in a supremely private space that she is taking to life. She is indescribably bright. She dances and smiles often. And then she gives the losing seed a really big cuddle about the hard truth. That he isn’t quite taking.

She says she is flattered. She says he is sweet. She notes the scent of plum in his dry humor and his ability to dance so no one feels comfortable. The causes for thinking so. For being nice.

“I’m already married," she says.

"You're a rare bird. I'm glad I asked."

The dying seed will receive instructions in an email about what to do with his decomposing matter. Compost and pension plans. In a few generations time, the seed will take its experience of not taking to life and dare to become a big thing and a beautiful thing. That will touch the sky, as sentimentalism would have it. All humans will rejoice in its presence. It shall run $3.95 at the local drug store. Just you wait.

I really hate to tell you the ending so impulsively, but this seems like the right time: We win. We are all butterflies aging faster than rocks, but slower than single life spans. We're spasming and breaking up. Waiting to get nature's number done on us. It's a cocoon we don't even know about yet.

Crawling for now, we're getting together. Maybe not owning the day, but definitely the night. Like last night. A big win.

I can actually dance. I can actually hear no.

The night was 74 degrees. No jackets needed. You can either wear pants or shorts. Dirty sneakers or hiking sandles. I never know how to spell sandles right. And you might never be uncomfortable on a night like this. But I tend to think that I will. And when I dance, I hope that you might be too.

And let's not hold back. It will take the damages of war the same amount of years to heal as it took to fight the fucking thing. This is a simple and hard truth that most people don't want to face. That is because it might take another human history for people to altogether stop killing each other. I'm talking about taking to life. In just two-hundred thousand years.

This is the type of news that has to be broken to you by a dancing underground smiling sprout. After delivering the hard news, with shiny whites, she will add that it should start today. The not killing. Starting today.

Her lips look firm and her voice sounds the same. And I leak and I crawl and all no's become yes. "Just you wait."

Fishy and the Kosmos

This time he is trying to guide his thinking away from, “I got one.” Casting last bait, and wondering means how—enduring visions of her getaway on a loop. 

Because together they might come, but she will go like late day sun, if thinking like the fisherman who caught one too full of fight to stay.

Before him, he ties together, is this lovely creation “not far off from me.” Two creatures that see with eyes of a “striking blue,” and so are often told. And two that hold regard for wonder, and sing its praise slightly off-key.

She had once said her fake fingernails made her feel pretty and so now he wants to be one. Same time she offered up a nibble at dusk, when the blue eyes met. But soon another nibble in the weeds would obscure her look, slightly suggestive of maroon.

Sure as sun sets, red toenails sink into she-says smelly shoes. She told him she digs hands and how he touched each time with two. In secret he knows of his tendency to forget what hands are for. Not just entangling and untangling; in these matters, they are intended for much more. 

Disguised as a goodbye wrapped with caress, at last Fishy's hook hold wriggles undone. And off she swims, for the sinking sun, for the coming light, her eyes transposed with full moons. His memory of  absorbs her waves trailing behind; that refeeling of her long slither go. 

Thoughts fight back as they please while the moon takes the path of least resistance—how the celestial crows fly. Slumping shoreside, the man's eyes fix on the water's moment to moment uncertainty.

The mood is constant but with a chance. 

He summons the tenacity to consider if ever that fishy rose to surface, and lost fight in these two salved hands, then soft-lit circles might ripple out perfect. Like rulings made by moon. 

So the Kosmos be.

Late April

There was a plan to talk
Around It, over It, through It
And to savor a sympathetic ear.

Because whatever It was, boiled hot.
And you could hear its steam whistle,
even from a comfortable distance.

There was every reason to think
that there was a problem.
And so they walked to the creek to talk.

They did end up talking,
about water,
and he later gave some thought to it.

“Water that is clear and deep,
And can stay wtih you,
Is rare to find.

Water that dares not alter your path,
But can stay with you,
Strikes me as courageous.”

This water soothed the boiling, and quieted the whistle.
And this water sprouted a terrified, trembling seedling
That seemed in no condition to survive.

A seedling too fragile. Too exposed. Too unsure of its roots.
It sprung across the mouth of a man who insisted
That something he could say might make its longing go away.

But the water insisted back, just then.
And the seedling was met by her clear and deep glance,
which seemed to say, our plan to talk about that is not for today.

Only the bold can teach the bold, and only with ears.
And what he saw was her whole heart giving to listening.
And what she saw was his courage to tremble.

And what the water found was something rare:
Two people sitting in union with its master plan.

Fact-Facing

»The essential quality of poetry is that it makes a new effort of attention, and "discovers" a new world within the known world. Man, and the animals, and the flowers, all live within a strange and forever surging chaos. ... But man cannot live in chaos. ... Man must wrap himself in a vision, make a house of apparent form and stability, fixity. In his terror of chaos he begins by putting up an umbrella between himself and the everlasting whirl. Then he paints the under-side of his umbrella like a firmament. Then he parades around, lives and dies under his umbrella. Bequeathed to his descendants, the umbrella becomes a dome, a vault, and men at last begin to feel that something is wrong.

Man fixes some wonderful erection of his own between himself and the wild chaos, and gradually goes bleached and stifled under his parasol. Then comes a poet, enemy of convention, and makes a slit in the umbrella; and lo! the glimpse of chaos is a vision, a window to the sun. But after a while, getting used to the vision, and not liking the genuine draught from chaos, commonplace man daubs a simulacrum of the window that opens on to chaos, and patches the umbrella with the painted patch of the simulacrum. That is, he has got used to the vision; it is part of his house-decoration. So that the umbrella at last looks like a glowing open firmament, of many aspects. But alas! it is all simulacrum, in innumerable patches.«

--DH LAWRENCE

Jaws of Life

Sure, the minds don't do anything but fear. Still, you can see one impossible glint cutting through their fogged up eyes. You sense a presumptuous faith and so commit to their broke down lives. And they say, "All's about I am right now is here." And you tell them, "Perfect, it's all just heart from here." You tell them, "Don't be scared. I know a smile feels more than far." And you say that the laws of people behaving are bigger than they are.

You tell them it no longer concerns the particulars you may think of you, but that the laws apply to them too. And that it's safe and free, to only be here. And you let them know how much bigger everything ever was than that little mind they fear. Even while out there, battling life's laws with an appetite for anything near. Beyond me, beyond you, and beyond us lies this Great Fact, which ever will be.

And first you tell them the bad news--that they no longer get to be who stands before me. And then you say the good--that the entirety they never saw, the light sky beyond the dark tunnel they are struggling through, it loves you, see. I can show you the way out. And then the sky. And shocker it was to me, it will be to you: see, it loves you. And I truly mean that, broke-down friend.

I'll be the first to concede that this kind of love's tougher than any man could bear alone. But you will behave in small monthly payments--a new lease renting to own. And then, in carefully minded increments, you will own It. And then there's the matter of the sky...Well, some days it will just feel so goddamned close.

So look now, here's my outreached hand. You have ideas about cheer, slipshod fears, and enough regret to fuel a rocket eons away...In my most plain voice, hope is where we begin. Drink ice water. You can't smell nor taste it. Drink up. Touch your calloused hands together, and lift that swelled up tongue. Pray. It won't work, but do it anyway. Wiggle your ears. There's a frequency so near that there's no way you will hear. But put that mind on firm notice: "There shall be nothing today."

There's no such thing as a prowess that can Unmangle the mangled. Nor can just one illuminate a tunnel. We have clumsiness. We have flashlights. We have each other and salutation--and don't forget about that sky. A sharp-toothed glint, drawing shallow breaths beneath story-cracked skin, shines its way through--somewhat resembling a grin.

In-dig-nance

RW Emerson on change in an individual, as pulled from Robert D. Richardson's biography _Emerson: The : Mind on Fire_:

"'Fear for ages has boded and mowed and gibbered," [Emerson] says. 'There is a crack in everything'; we face not only opportunity but 'this running sea of circumstance. [Change occurs]
in proportion to the vigor of the individual, these revolutions (changes) are frequent, until in some happier mind they are incessant, and all worldly relations hang very loosely about him, becoming, as it were, a transparent fluid membrane through which the living form is seen, and not, in most men, an indurated heterogenous fabric of many dates and of no settled character, in which the man is imprisoned. Then there can be no enlargement, and the man of today scarcely recognizes the man of yesterday. And such should be the outward biography of a man in time, a putting off of dead circumstance day by day, as he renews his raiment day by day."


That quote I very half-understand feels very deep. I have been told to surrender to life's terms a lot these past few years. Every day forever. I highly value this concept. Let's just say...to my friends, yes those friends....I totally get it, alright? I get happy I got to where I did and got to surrender at the tender young (but old enough) age of 28. Once I stopped fighting, everything happened for me. I was sick on a whole bunch of things I wasn't capable of understanding and yet still fighting like I understood them. I still don't think I understand a whole lot, but I understand what Emerson is talking about...in "Self-Reliance," in "History," and in "Nature." In "Love," and "Friendship" and "Circles." Certainly, if we have access to anything that is solely ours it might be the shaft of light that shines in and out of our inner-core upon our experience. How that light changes, extends into our environment, and how to use it are what I think about. I feel lately that it is merely those who insist on the simple fact that yes, I do have light and it is uniquely mine, who are able to forge a path based on that poetic, over-soul, unique sensibility, etc. etc.-thingy Emerson loves and that I just can't give up on. Can't surrender my desire to. And its insistence to be expressed, to OTHERS, drives me and frustrates me and separates me and makes me feel down and jubilant and so stupid-smart you wouldn't believe. The drive for the expression trumps all right now. Hungry lonely....Hmmm, that is interesting, what do I have to say about it? Insight to gain from it? I don't know why it doesn't feel real and the part of me that is what I'm supposed to be worries me, but the experience is beautiful too. There is always the logical worry. And just as I was taught, it's best to operate when under the impression that you have something to lose. Right? This is why it feels ok. I declare nothing. I have nothing, which isn't to say I don't have anything--but sacrificing more and more makes one think about these things. It starts to make one think that, well, whatever's lost, I am just OK. My light is OK. And something surely can be gained. Attachment to outcomes certainly bears less and less reason as it goes, and one starts to suspect, "...life may be much easier and more simple than we make it out to be." And that, "The way of life is wonderful. It is by abandonment." (RWE, naturally.)

I don't even know anything well enough yet, or any non-material things' actual application and value to life, but this little light that took glow and saw its capabilities upon a commencement of a more courageous angle on life is all that can afford to matter right now. And the state of the glow often feels like life and death. Not just to keep the glow, but to glow upon the glow, and to show the glow. To feel its warmth, to build upon. I am very protective of it. And the only real fear is not having it within me. I feel as though life cannot reject me, if it is within. It is ok to fear then--it is ok to fear the unified Universe, and to revere Her too. Hence the fear, and the drive. Sometimes I exist in connection with it for a few days at a time and those days dance. Mostly I think how to foster my light and how it shines upon my plot of land. How to nest it and nuzzle it, and most importantly, how NOT to bemoan it, and so it becomes the impetus for all this change.

Reading Emerson lately has given me a lot of renewed vigor in fighting for the change. Welcoming it, and loving it. Because it has wanted to stop for awhile now. Not stop as much as even out and plateau. My transformation, almost an entity of its own by now, was sitting in the in between place. Confused, doubtful and tempted to slow. That my wild passions (don't let exteriors fool) should be surrendered and refined. That the "society" man should take root and the youth shall fall away. But no! Instead I shaved my beard to feel like a kid again. I went swimming and started to feel timid and curious and natural in that state again. And then there's the wonder. And the refusal to figure out, but instead to ask more. Why? Why? Why? Why? Oh.....But why?

A theme of late, besides I do NOT want your advice, is that I feel like my own spurned lover fighting hard to get me back. This is odd, a bit romantic, and self-centered, yes. But it is true. I felt myself not being genuine. I felt all my hot-centers sprouting uncomfortably from my head again when they were slip-sliding around in my heart just a few months ago. I'm thinking so much about being good enough or not--my mind tends to generate the same N-O with that one. I know what I have and what to own up to. None of it is material. But, hell, any criminal, Republican, suburbanite, or yuppie can have material things. It doesn't take much interesting to get things, so why for me then? What my thing, I declared in a happy daze, was--was an aim for sincerity. And still is. I need to aim for heart or I'm doomed to indecision and confusion. Fear has gibbered and mowed and here is the crack in me. Look at it. Opportunity. Summer of 2011 has been the summer when many of my imagined circumstantial fears came perfectly true. They weren't big, but scary movies being played out in front of my own pitted and powerless guts. Not only was I fine in the aftermath, it is turning out I am exponentially the better for it. I really mean that. It just doesn't mean there's not friction still. That there is thing called emotional tolerance--and feeling that I get to learn right now. That because they are feelings does not mean I shall feel bad about having them. That I have feelings, there is this blessing attached, and not a curse of shame. Of course I want to live my life like a man in love, at his highest point when in union with beyond-human things AND know how it will turn out--take a little insurance out that I'm banking on the right thing. But I can also just have heart, and see about it, feeling my way through outcomes with an appetite, and hitting a sleep every night feeling decent about my effort. There is nothing like the good feeling of effort. What a romantic, actualizeable, and hard-fought notion of living day to day, eh?

Well, in the present I am a bit lonely and restless and a young man healthier than ever--vital in body, fragile in mind, gentle in spirit, and so the possibility is real for this. It is not something to declare surrender to. To give up on. I surrender my mind about this. My need for outcomes. My past. But I want to have a very direct experience, moving forward, with my God-given instincts. I know I can still fight, and I can learn for the next fight. The instincts are not bad. It's just that THOSE are the things that need refinement, change, experience and missteps, and self-forgiveness. Those will send me spinning into a life I can bring my light to. And apply the type of effort and attitude that feels really good. And if I can believe that even though life often stays hard for a while, the specific issues of the present will change, will get easier. I believe this and so yes, count me in. I really had to be reminded that the context of right now it a season-- and seasons pass. And new things come. They will be hard too but they will be different. Life's not easy, and come to think of it, I don't know if I want one that is.

I wish that I could put somebody in my eyes for a day and explain to them how full and rich it feels sometimes, especially in these vague ways of how I am forming my relationship with the Universe. The transition of past state to new one is when I feel most enthusiastic. And when I grow. Then people might stop wondering and saying things like, I need to do it this way. It is complex. At times I do need a lot of guidance. But my beauty comes in flashes and disappears, and that is my work right now. I have been able to catch the star a few times here and there. Draw it out, name it, and build upon my general impressions of how to cultivate and tune my perceptions in to the rushing and natural speed of Life. And to glow. But not enough now not yet. More work. More sight. More sounds. Heart wide-open and exposed...faith it will weather fine and find more room to fill. It will. Because I am looking at the target and not the arrow.

"In the hour of vision, there is nothing that can be called gratitude, nor properly joy." I surrender to you big dreams, restlessness, and oversight. I will be dissatisfied and indignant until something says when because I am human. I am not satisfied by no other than the coming of the Lord. At least until a few more chips fall. Or my eyes or knees start to go. The heart can only gain acceptance certain ways--not by words, not by force. The gift of this all just still feels WAY TOO big to even out and settle.

The logic of Spiritual Assistance....

A person has just figured out how to wade water in the middle of a vast sea, and the person is not very good at it. They are tired, unsure if they are going to make it but pretty sure they can. The person is traveling with enough weight that it takes a lot of effort to just keep their head above water. A second person, with more weight, and even less experience comes by, asking for the first person to please take some weight off of their shoulders. The first person agrees, and takes on some of their weight. Upon doing so, the person sky rockets to the surface and floats, arms and legs resting and knowing they will make it somewhere safe and protected....

An experienced roofer brings an apprentice roofer to a new construction house. It is hot, the roof is at a steep pitch, and it appears to the experienced roofer that it's going to be a long hard day. He has seen these kinds of days before and knows they will need a lot of water and they will have to work through lunch, and so he goes to the store to load up on enough supplies for the unforgiving summer day. Upon returning from the store, the apprentice roofer has completed shingling the entire roof. The experienced roofer says "How did you ever finish that?" And the apprentice says, "I am not sure. I had spiritual assistance."