This wave is of the ocean

The ocean is of the earth

In its grip

In the curl

The illusion is that the wave is yours

That your involvement with the wave is particular

That this wave turns for you

Is meant for you

The ocean is of the earth

The earth is of the sun

Our tumbling with the wave

The cutting, slashing, joy, and dumping

Is of the world

Is of the sun

We are nowhere

Unless we are everywhere

Into your pain

I wish admittance

Your ache becomes mine

Becomes double

You still suffer

But not alone

Your groping through darkness

Is now accompanied

And you are distracted

By wondering who is this idiot

Blundering through pain beside you

Hail! Dear friend from afar!

Can you hear me? I believe somehow that I can reach you.

My heart burns for news from you, for pictures, weather reports, statements of faith, ideas, sensations from your standpoint there where you live, there where you breathe, where you contemplate the movement of seasons, the tide of events. Speak!

I stand looking out toward you, toward where you may be, gazing with all my eyes to the outer reaches, surrounded here and alone, the ocean before me a desert of hidden life, deep, uniformly complex, unfathomable, insurmountable.

I sing my truest song in…

I love people I can’t remember

Like Paul, Annie, & Mahogany who we lived with in Michigan

Who I only stumbled on in my memory yesterday thinking of harvesting carrots before the frost

And there they were so wonderful

Which made me wonder how many others there are

Real people lost in my thoughts but alive and I love them

Not to mention the amazing friends I see every night

Those I risk my life with

Who surround and laugh with me

Who I know so intimately

Yet when I wake I lose

And don’t remember

But I love

Put pretending to good use. It is the power we employed as children to fathom the world. Use the power of pretending now as an adult to open your heart.

While walking alone on a trail, pretend that every plant you pass tells you what it can do for you. Totally pretend! You pass a weed and let your imagination jump to the idea that it would be excellent in soup. See an oak and hear the tree say that it’s good for tanning leather. A grass “says” it would keep you warm as insulation.

Let it be that within…

If we reach a new stage in our meditation practice, we really can’t talk about it. If we do, the person we talk to (our mom, for example) might say, “That’s nice, honey.” Our partner, with whom we may have a competition, might feel threatened that we are “getting ahead” of them on our quest, and tell us that if we’re so special why don’t we pick up our damn socks once in a while.

It’s also unlikely that anything we experience in meditation is “real” in the sense of “reaching a new stage.” From the outside, it could be…

Our souls do not age in one life

I have been here a thousand times

You, too

One life barely alters us

Yet you see me immature, adventurous

Then conservative

It is our contact with the body

The lightness to weight of physicality

Our greater perception

Experience

The motives of our fellow travelers

How many have become trapped

Waylaid

Turned completely materialistic

That hardens us

Why wise old people so love children

Spontaneity

Love

Signs that life has not forgotten

Its origin and path

If my words brought peace

If they raised us all to action

But words cannot bring peace

We cannot solve our strange inaction

I would explain how pain begets pain

How wounded people wound people

That to improve your own life

The lives of others must see improvement

That by giving is how we receive

That dignity, cleanliness, and education

Make your neighbors better neighbors

That all countries are our neighbors

And all people are universes

Never before seen or experienced

But all containing a superabundance

Of stars and mysteries