I am mountain

I am budding tree

I am crumbling rock,

Raging river,

Ebb and tide.

I am moon,

I am fading flower,

Eternal dance,

Ephemeral song.

I am spirit hovering over the deep.

I am form and formless.

I am Alpha and Omega,

Beginning and end and

All the nows in between

World without end.

One day this form will pass away, but who I am can never die.

I am the cosmos,

the stuff of stars.

I am life,

the universal Christ in me,

Created in God's image,

part of all creation,

yet never ending,

always existing.

I am that I am.

I am, but though I exist now in this limited body,

I am eternal.

I am connected to the whole of creation.

We are one.

I am the wind.

I am the red-tailed hawk upon the breeze.

I am the awareness.

I am peace, stillness, joy, love.

I am my brothers and sisters and mother and father.

I am my "enemy".

I am all and none.

I am the dash on my gravestone!

I am the space between those etched, but fleeting years.

Knowing this, I am free!

I am that I am, now.

I always am.

Poetry in the fog

Lancaster, UK January 18, 2011.

Sweet hickory smoke wafts my way 

as I wander down a foggy lane, 

reminding me of a beautiful memory

I cannot name. 

The solitary moon and I are nearly 

invisible in this sleepy town. 

No one knows that we are here 

as we quietly wander our hidden paths. 

Song birds chirp, cheering 

the dark places, the lonely places,

the wandering souls like me. 

I wait for the sun to rise and

burn through this fog 

which has clouded my heart.

Can it burn my heart 

to feel once more? 

Oh, to be warmed

by love once again!

A Rhyme in Time

Oh for time to pen a rhyme!

Yes, that would make my day.

But there's no time and I fear that I'm

just a poser with nothing to say.

Ode to the Cockroach Coach

From Kanyakumari to great Madurai,

We count up the critters,

My friends and I.

Cockroaches crawling all over the train

As we play, “would you rather…”,

Bam! There’s a new stain.

There’s one over your shoulder!

There’s one in your hair.

Ewwww. Cockroaches, cockroaches everywhere.

Slap! goes a sandal.

Smack! The bug is down.

The travellers around us disapprove with a frown.

Gina got forty!

Matthew got ten!

How many want to play this game again?

Anyone? Anyone?

Anyone at all?

The train is leaving…final call.

No? well, don’t worry

If you didn’t play.

Maybe you’ll ride another day.

On the Cockroach Coach from Kanyakumari to Madurai,

We count up the hits,

My friends and I.

And as we pull into the station,

We heave a sigh.

Though no one is sorry to say, “Good-bye”

To the Cockroach Coach from Kanyakumari to Madurai.

Watchman on the Wall

(from a page torn from my India journal 2011)

Oh, to be a watchman on the wall,

waiting for the sun to rise!

To announce its arrival,

To see beyond the darkness which surrounds us,

To see through the low, menacing clouds on the horizon,

And to declare, rejoice, run up the flag and sound the trumpet at its first appearing!

I want to be a watchman on the wall,

who pronounces hope instead of despair,

who rejoices in the beauty in the midst of gray.

Oh, to be the kind of watchman who waits for the morning!

It will come. Though it tarry, wait for it.

I want to be a good finder.

Let others be the ones to sound the alarm,

to see threats in every shadow.

I will scratch for reasons to hope.

I will not dig for reasons to despair.

Oh, to be a watchman on the walls,

To wait patiently for morning.

Dadaism

A random ode to Dadaism:

Anti-values,

an anti-art absurdity

--tra la la lala.

The sky is down.

My shoe fell up, wordity.

Da da da dada.

Wanderlust...confessions of a nomad

The road is calling;

urging me, compelling me

to wander down its dusty paths,

the twisted tracks with all the mystery

of the unknown just around the next bend.

I am running;

a mad dash toward adventure,

toward life and light and color,

toward discovery and insight and being free .

I am ready to unearth hidden depths in a new friend.

I suppose that is the part which beckons me,

the call to explore new relationships,

to uncover the kindness of strangers

who soon become dear.

To journey this path with fellow pilgrims,

to find that we are different

and yet so alike is like unwrapping a present

each day with each new acquaintance.

We swap stories of hardships and laugh

at ourselves.

We trade remedies for blisters and then walk on.

We walk on.

The path unwinds with each step.

We walk on.

We find hidden strengths we never knew.

We walk on,

unmoved by fatigue or hardship.

We walk on

and are rewarded with views

and comradery and the comfort

of reaching shelter each day.

We walk on, sometimes alone.

Sometimes we walk together

and it is enough to know

that we are not alone.

The road is calling me to wander down

and I cannot escape its siren sound.

The Last Winter Morn

The silver sun is rising beyond the edge

of the world as I sleepily lie.

And I wonder as the first rays light my bed,

"What sorts of adventures are nigh?"

Will we run through meadows

or skip rocks 'cross a stream?

Will we read tales of princes

and mermaids or dream?

Shall we fence with pirates

or build a secret, sacred maze

where grown-ups can't enter

'cause they lack the pass phrase?

Oh, the things we'll do

when we're heads of state!

We'll live in treehouses

and no one will hate.

We'll be kings and queens

in the land of Imagining,

where a poor man can steward

a bit land for a bit of string.

Come! Throw off your bed clothes.

Kiss this wintery world good-bye.

Fly with me to the morning star.

And we'll have adventures, you and I.

And we'll have adventures, you and I.

In a Drop

Perfect world in a miniature sphere;

beautiful tension, eloquent grace.

Incarnation of love's eternal face

wakes me from dreaming.

Deep calls to deep in a drop of dew.

Beauty in a tiny globe glistening.

My soul longs for deep listening

in the awful silence.

That's when my soul begins to see,

recognizes, names, and reflects beauty.

In naming, incarnation is empowered.

Do I have ears to hear

the message in that drop so clear

when words leave me empty, lacking, and deaf?

Sunday Morning Run

The road is moist beneath my shoes

as I run in a heavy, autumn mist.

My dog, Sam, is content as we slip

into a smooth cadence of paws and feet

on black asphalt and gray concrete,

broken by the yellow, brown, red, and gray

of fallen leaves being transformed by decay.

The soft sunlight filters through

a colorful ticker tape parade of fall foliage.

The wind swirls, the leaves dance and twirl.

My eyes trace them in their invisible path.

My own path is invisible, too,

yet it is solid, grounded, earthy.

I can smell the mustiness

of forest litter beneath my feet.

I remember that this is the season when

seeds lie dormant beneath a blanket of soil.

This death is not death.

It is only the beginning.

The past becomes food for the future,

nourishment for the soul

just as those blackened leaves

become nutrients for the earthy wood.

Is it odd to think of our inescapable end?

Is it bizarre to wish that my body would be burned

or buried directly into the earth,

free of chemicals,

free of preservatives?

Why preserve that which has already gone?

I wish that this body, when it is broken down by time and fate,

would nourish the earth from which I was born.

Out of the dust I came.

Into the dirt I will return,

so the circle of life may continue.

When I kiss this fragile, earthen vessel goodbye

and lay it down for the final time,

will this plastic generation recall

that there is a season for planting?

Will they remember to sow this poor seed

in the good earth?

Will they see that the end of all things

is really a new beginning?

The earth is soft beneath my feet

as I run through sunlight and fog;

my own Sunday morning ritual

as I meditate on life with my dog.

Aerial View of NYC

Jagged ice crystals spring from
sweltering sidewalks to form
terrifying towers of power.
Oppressive ice.
Oppressive heat.
Enough spoke, but her voice was drowned
by More's clamoring siren song.
Insatiable appetite.
Insatiable thirst.
Eden has long been forgotten,
relegated to myth and mist.
Man's tribute to self,
to domination,
to war,
to victory over...
Over universe?
Over life?
Over earth's web?
We slew Goliath
and Goliath was us.

The View from my Window (Rapunzel's Song)

Thick fog has crept in
to obscure my view
of the bustling city below,
while solitary I,
in my lofty tower,
dream of faces which I'll never know.

There are homes filled with families
and the merriest laughter
and inside jokes which they share.
There's a prince who rides
to the foot of my prison,
crying out, "Woman, let down your hair!"

Moonlight, so bright

Moonlight, so bright,

Reveal the three sisters tonight.

Shimmering beasts of the shadow realm,

jealously reach for the sky ship sans helm.

Seven sisters from their realm on high

jealously cast a longing eye

on the murmuring giants far below

as they timidly glimmer in the twilight glow.

Coyote Boy

Coyote boy came loping through the 'hood.

He was gangly, walking crookedly,

and howling to a tune

beneath the light of the rising moon.

Coyote boy preferred the shadows of dusk.

His hair was disheveled, his eyes dark.

But I held his glance for just a moment

as he side-stepped through my yard.

Was that a momentary flicker, a light,

a memory of being human behind that dark fringe?

It passed as he dropped his eyes

and dodged toward the next house.

Coyote boy, as if drawn by some primal call,

ducked into the shadows of the wood just beyond,

still howling a tune

beneath the light of the winter moon.

Pantaloons and Silly Buffoons

My teacher called me "Antsy Pants",
but I don't think that's fair.
I prefer to be called "Fancy Pants",
since I wore my favorite pair.

Dad says I should have tried to enhance
my education at school.
I should have worn my smarty pants
so I won't seem a fool.

But I'm not worried about my grade
though I'm not as smart as some teens.
'Cause Grandpa says I've got it made
since intelligence runs in my jeans.

H. Dumpty, Esq.

Humpty Dumpty climbed a high wall.
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
(I 'm beginning to doubt he's an egghead at all).

The Science of the Lambs

Jason had a little lamb
whose name was Sweet Clarisse
with fiery eyes and tiny hooves
and golden, wooly fleece.

The March of Time

Tic toc tic toc.
Seconds slip by my bedroom clock.
Minutes, hours, days and ages
vanish like the once famous sages.

Could the Mayans or Aztecs or Egyptian kings
have known the power of their time machines?
When did man become a slave
to calendars and schedules from birth to the grave?

Tic toc tic toc.
An epoch marches past my clock.

The Mongolian Steppe

My aunt Mimi's crazy and that's a fact!
She says she wants a Manchurian yak
and to live in a yurt, which is a kind of tent.
(I'm still not sure what she meant.)

But the thing that I don't understand
is why she'd leave our home for a land
where everyone lives in the open-air
and camps out year-round on a giant stair!

The Yurt

I found a cool place to rent.
It's a round Mongolian tent.
No, it's not a tee-pee.
When you visit, you'll see...
Though the floor's made of dirt,
there's nothing quite like my new yurt!