Dreaming Out Loud

To Be With Trees

2012-02-09T18:46:00.000-08:00

Sneakers have to be just right
Not too loose, not too tight,
Pedometer snugly on my hip,
Jacket and scarf for the long trip

Out I go, past the mailbox and laundry,
Past the playground and complex boundary,
Once on the sidewalk, with the cars whizzing by
I find myself smiling, not even sure why

Past the grocery and gas station, avoiding the traffic
I scurry across and get away from the racket
Up the steep road into back streets and then -
There it is! The oak tree, to commune once again

This old tree reaches stout branches up, up and up
And I lay my back firmly against its gnarled trunk
If I focus I see through the tree’s own eyes
Over rooftops and trees, to the mountains and skies

When the tree has informed me in her own language
I thank her and continue on down without anguish
I turn on the road and pass the house with the deer
It’s a fake one but it looks out at me with fake cheer

Then at last is the entrance to the pathway I crave
The trail which was once a railroad, now paved
But on either side of the path are more trees
More wise ones to talk with and hear their soft leaves

After some way, I stop to sit on a bench
There are insects and sparrows and even a finch
A butterfly colored in blue and dark black
Whizzes by as I get up and get back on track

At the end of my trail is a pond that in summer
Has two swans and ducks that are seen by all comers
But in winter, it sits under blankets of ice
And to watch the banks is still very nice

Returning the same way I came is my way
And I hope when I’m older I can do this each day
For now it’s a luxury only on weekends
But it helps me connect with the trees, my dear friends.

The Magic of Loss

2011-12-14T06:38:00.000-08:00

When something is lost

It’s important to see

What remains

This is a story about discovery

The bowl is more than empty

It's a chasm

And yet the swirling colors of memory

Are perfumed with a poet's music

No, let me explain

With scalpel in hand

The surgeon cut away

The pained and frightened queen

The young prince was left

To rearrange the pieces

In the tower of contemplation

He called the princess

out of her dark closet

To put on her gown and

Teach him how to climb trees

Together they are conjurers

Of magic swans and bees

They travel out to far off galaxies

And heal myriad spirits

Walk in dark places

Where wondrous beings perform

No one could have told me this before

That hidden behind every tragedy

Is a gift.

First Snow

2011-10-29T10:52:00.000-07:00

The first snow
like a slap on
a baby's bottom

The blushing trees
gazing on from
another world

The geese left early
and the squirrels
are abed

Only I am left
to see the drifting
flakes - and wonder

Warm glowing leaves
soon hidden, retreated
to their fairy realm

While evergreens
feel every needle come alive
in the magical air

Their green patches
sheltered by the canopy
like memories

And only I am left
to see the blanket
of white - and wonder.

The Art

2011-09-27T04:48:00.001-07:00

The need for interior
the dialogue with characters
discussing plans
now I remember a gray woman
in brown with indeterminate hair
talking with her hands
she gets my attention
but I don't let her know
this is the art of lying
the art of being

People try to explain
the main points
they effuse and importune
feeling their extremities
and the common earthly balance
but all too often these
efforts fail while
exposing the rest
in time it doesn't matter
and love spreads itself thin.

I Breathe Mountains

2011-09-15T12:09:00.001-07:00

I breathe mountains
sip trees
inhale highways

Tap out the beats
on the railroad
feel the pulse
of telephone wires

Dream in the uncut hedges
and high grass
scent pond scum

Feel the wind
through branches

Huddle up for buildings
where frozen souls
clench their buds
in perpetual
suspended animation

I find shade leaves
on the tracks
and boys running
in red shirts

Birdsong winging
Over buildings
curling treelines
reaching for the sky

On the train
from Poughkeepsie going south

I breathe mountains
and tap out the time
in the heartbeat

Of the sweet sweet land.

Dreaming in Venice

2011-08-25T06:30:00.000-07:00

I dreamed I was swimming
In the canals of Venice
With elephants
A dolphin
And my granddaughter
As a reformed mermaid
Or perhaps
Transformed mermaid
Would be more true

People were swimming up
To her
Antediluvian paparazzi
“Show us your colors –
Your colors!”
We laughed.
This was what they
Always said when she
Still had her tail

The elephant carried a baby
Curled up on her shoulder
To keep him dry
He was dark heavenly blue
With patches of gold
And rust red
Like barnacles
On his skin
He was smiling
As babies do

Behind the young Indian boy
Who swam like Mowgli
All arms and legs
Exuberant inefficiency
The dolphin glided,
I thought
If I swim closer
I’ll be able to touch its tail

It was mysterious
In shape
Its round tail oddly
Resembling a propeller
I could tell it had
A purpose and direction
It was dreaming too
With eyes closed
In the warm waters

My granddaughter's legs
Were long
As she managed the currents
Again I noticed the
Elephant’s smile
Where were we headed
So happily
And with such purpose?
Were we all psychic
Friends?

Mindfulness

2011-08-17T19:06:00.000-07:00

Thought is an ocean
Waves and swells
with influences
dissipates and subsides
on the in-breath
and crashes down
with the out

Mindfulness is
watching this
without attachment
or confusion
or agitation

Neither wave nor boat
nor whale nor bird
nor swimmer
nor the rising up
of water
into cloud.

For Christopher Cameron, one of the most graceful navigators of the mind's ocean I ever met.

Lights, Camera, Action

2011-08-04T07:29:00.001-07:00

Movie theaters, those giant ocean liners
Getting up, I’m searching for my land legs

Life on the big screen, the convoluted plot,
The probing characterization

We observers of drama
In the safety of the darkness

Must take off the 3-D glasses
And pick up where we left off

In the daily script
Of our dangerous lives

Outside where the bruises
are most lurid on the inside

We are all little mermaids
Who bartered our tails for love.

Among the Elders

2011-08-02T09:33:00.000-07:00

In my memory
She is always smiling
Even under the mask

Her heart is permanently
Broken open
She watches the children

Old and young
With the same patient care
She counts each day a treasure

Freed from the prison
From the terror
From the death

She carries herself
With a well-earned grace
And laughs at the devil himself

One cannot but smile
Emboldened by her courage
By her faith.

My painting of Ama Ahde (Adhe Tapontsang) at the Tibetan Reception Center, 2005. Working under her was one of the most inspiring times of my life.

In the Dark

2011-07-05T11:08:00.000-07:00

Sky bursts and blossoms

Orange!
Gold!
Blue!

Green!
White!

Ooooh! Aaaah!

A unity of pulse and pleasure
Massed together
in hope and human family

Happy fourth day
of July

Take Yourself Out of Context

2011-05-04T08:36:00.000-07:00

Take yourself out of context
That’s what meditation is

That’s how emptiness
Becomes your ally

Take yourself out of context
The job, the marriage,
The illness, the ambitious goal,
Even the summer vacation

It’s all temporary

When you remove the context
What remains?

Only a sublime luminosity

Then yes, the context
Is still there

But it’s in perspective
You can handle it

It’s out of your hands
Anyway … mostly

Coexistent truth
Paradoxical truth

Now you know
What home means

A supreme bliss

Then you have a new phrase
To thine own self
Be kind

It’s all ephemeral except

What remains.

In the Moment

2011-04-20T14:22:00.000-07:00

Whatever trust you find
whether in the heart or mind

Let it rise up slowly
like a dreamer's eyes

And inhale every petal
Let it magnetize

The confidence of wisdom
isn't gained in books
or even regal looks

But by the firesides of
vagabonds and in the
flex of magic wands

Find the trust inside your memory
and gathered as your legacy
in every figment of your past

And you will be elusive
and be home at last.

Just Spring

2011-04-03T09:46:00.000-07:00

Where are the birds?

I sense the sound of birdsong
The blackbird of the morning
But now the cold wind drives everything in its path

Where are the seeds?

I sense them sprouting
Underground, their soft green caps
Untouched by air or sky

Where is the snow?

The snow that blew across the window yesterday
Is gone, a distant memory
While April’s wind releases her winter madness

Is it truly April?

I feel the same as she does,
Wanting to stir the cold ground
And feel the first blossom of my creativity.

Dark of the Moon Goddess

2011-03-30T12:09:00.000-07:00

She has big legs
is tall and dark
with flashing
diamond eyes

When she opens her mouth
red flowers bloom, green leaves
frame her with their
rain-soaked fragrance

Her skin is made
from music sewn together
from the passion
of a summer afternoon

Her soprano scream
floats rippling down
the mountain stream
of primordial wisdom

I close my eyes
and feel her singing
in my blood
kaleidoscope colors

She is my secret
soul sister
the Goddess
of invisible women.

Mote of Meditation

2011-03-11T17:56:00.000-08:00

The winter sun
illuminating nothing
empty of self
empty of other

The luminous sun
white with fog
burning off the mirrored clouds
of mind

Removing obscurations
the air between
ourselves and the sun
light years vanish

Waiting for a Friend at the Diner

2011-02-06T10:08:00.000-08:00

In the circle of
voices many layered
a void
of course

To the rattle of
dishes
clatter of steel
mind flattened
at the source.

***

I really do write most of my poetry on napkins while waiting for friends. If she had not arrived so soon, this would have been longer.

Advice From the Dream Guide on Breaking Through

2011-02-03T08:36:00.000-08:00

Know where I’m going
my sense of last night
dream language
like getting pregnant, or want
underpinning what’s left
a social drive
thing that could
kiss someone
connect or deeply
procreate.

The sense of dreaming
the sense of having
my guides so close
wise beyond

I asked this morning
do you think
In terms of
back or forward
they laughed
you’re kidding
you’re asking us?
that’s who you are
that’s what you do

No going back
no worrying
very comforted

before I left
someone poked his head
admiring the photo
I said I painted
I need
do you have time
you’re here
there’s always
from my dream
the details

Break through
and finish
fix it
do a new
start a new
if what I’m doing
I can read through
and send it
I can edit
and send that
I can finish
or whatever
and publish
and whatever
who I am.

***
This is an experimental poem, using a technique whereby you write anything that comes to mind for five minutes, then stop and lift a phrase every few words or so and work into a poem.

In the Cover of Snow

2011-01-29T21:44:00.000-08:00

Like a mother
Blanketing her child
The snow fell
Over cars, houses, streets
Buildings where workers
Packed up their belongings
And trudged to their cars

Day after day the snow came
And when I woke the cars
Were not visible
Except as mounds
Like soft animals in slumber
All along Queensberry Street

Eric and I wrapped up warmly
And got the dogs
Corn and Blue
Their Beagle noses questing
Toward the outside
Where excitement always happened
Whether they created it or not

The whir of helicopters overhead
But otherwise the quiet
Buried under snow
The tops of street lamps showing
We made our way to the street
And walked, the dogs our companions

We saw some students on their skis
Whizzing by the empty streets
Laughter was in the air
Those few of us out for a stroll
Over mounds of hard packed snow
The dogs had visions of pizza
In their heads but even the garbage
Was buried

At last we reached Chinatown
My legs were tired
Feet were frozen
Laughter silenced by the trek
Eric never got tired
Fueled by methadone
And he stopped to watch
The dragon dance in the street
Because it was Chinese New Year
Of the Horse

And one café was open
Offering free dim sum to
Anyone hardy enough to be out
Cooked over Bunsen burners
Because all electricity would be
Out for two more days

We tipped them (I tipped them
Because Eric never had any money)
And then went out and bought
A dozen white candles
And a comic book for Miles
Who was visiting his grandparents
In Connecticut

And finally, back in the Fens, it
Was late afternoon and we took
The candles over to the old folks
Across the street where the
Famous radical pacifist lived
Who always wore a wool cap
A Sandown cap
That made him look rakish
Belying his compassionate heart

And we gave the candles to
The old woman who lived upstairs
And asked her to share with her
Neighbor in Apartment #1 who
Was deaf and never let anybody in
When they pressed the buzzer

That night the helicopters were gone
And even the dogs snored quietly
In the silence of the city
Under the blanket of snow.

***

(Poem based on the Blizzard of 1978 in Boston.)

Twigs

2011-01-24T06:23:00.000-08:00

The twig is so brave

No matter how much snow or ice

It puts forth a shoot

Takes the risk of life

The tree itself reproducing

Despite the cold, the chill

With faith that spring will come

The twig emerges strong

even sprouts a berry

for the hardy birds.

***

I've been taking long walks almost every day, except when the snow is falling hard. This has given me a chance to see so much more of the natural world.

The Rock

2011-01-08T18:53:00.000-08:00

Through the lawn between the flower beds

To the summer house

Stone tea house with its winged roof

And open windows

There I sat imagining I was a gypsy

In the woods, my horse somewhere grazing

There I would have the fireplace

And there, my bed and table

There the shelves for food and clothes

Maybe one box for sheets and blankets

I had it all figured out back then

And beyond, just over the fence

Our rock sat half as high as a man and wide as a bed

At the top of the field

Surrounded by tall grass

Climbing up on the rock

My brother and I would sit and dream

Looking down the hill all the way down

To the road, to the trickling stream

That elsewhere was a river or a tumbling falls

We’d talk of who we were in our past lives

He was a prince in one life,

A blue djinn in another

I was a fairy nestled in my flying bubble

That made all the world look magical

The waving grass surrounded us like a sea

Caressed by the warm wind

Our rock where we could always

Tell the truth.

The Changing Sky

2010-12-14T10:40:00.001-08:00

The sky went from blue gray to gray
not a big change really
but a subtle change
that turned the hillside back ten more years

This morning it was white and brown
those clumps of soft furze
against the snow

You could feel the crows hidden
on their branches
beneath the intermittent sun

But now I think of budding childhood
when the idea of sledding
was more fun than the sledding itself

To walk along the treeline
inhaling the fresh cold air
arms open to tomorrow

That magical grayness
alive in the crunch of snow
beneath my feet

Time Traveling in My Room

2010-12-11T17:53:00.001-08:00

When I lived in the orange building

I watched the sun rise over the mountains

the mist come up in the valley

like being in a sea of clouds

My little dog woke me each morning

tail wagging pioneer

I always followed exactly where she led

When I look across my room

at the painting of my home

I feel a peaceful comfort

and miss my dog

Once in Arabia I walked

two days without water

sometimes sliding down the sand dune

enveloped in my white cotton robes

A few people would wonder

about this maybe

but still to drink that fine

water from a pale hand

was paradise at the end

I don't have a painting of those two days

except in the cavern

of my mind

with its fat golden candles

Musings While Waiting for a Friend

2010-11-23T05:23:00.000-08:00

1

The green passage
you stoop down
and undulate
the rushes wave
and part for you
faint music
emanates

it's always been there

2

Center plum
black agents
of dawn

We think too much

The drum beats
all by itself
under sporadic hands
cadenced for two
the human way

Forborne / forlorn
eeeeks emerge
along the space
between the ears

it feels good to say that

3

Ummm is a specific
word to use
for conveying
reassurance

4

In my sneakers
under the socks
is a certain memory
when I was young
and thought myself old
I used to push
just one more mile
to please the color red

5

White wine is a
crisp occasion
if jazz
if poetry

(not this poetry
especially but any kind
where you can stand on the
stair step and
look down into dark
fecundity in all its
senses)

if art.

There are Worse Things than Death

2010-11-18T11:40:00.000-08:00

So here I sit, while aging gracefully
In three rooms that suit me very well
Wondering what will happen in the years ahead
When Social Security dies or is taxed beyond
The cost of necessary rent and heat
Will we choose between food and vitamins?

When Medicare doesn’t cover a massage
New glasses, reflexology, or natural remedies
Will we sicken soon and die?
When we cannot pay the rent will we go
To nursing homes with chemical food
Stale air, vile medicines and shots?

Perhaps our generation is scheduled to die off
Infected by selfish corporate lies
Working until 70, just to live
And then no recourse but to heel
Beneath the wheel of the AMA,
The FDA and the other evils of the empire

Our ideas have always been too wild
Our passion way outside the box
Once retired, we might actually do some good
Write plays or music, books and stories
Even a well-inspired painting
Can change a world

Maybe I’ll go back to northern India
And live in a one-room shack
Where the nearest Ayurvedic doc is a block away
Where the night is dark and everywhere is music
I shall miss my friends and all the other
Seniors living on the street.

Apocalyptic

2010-10-28T09:13:00.001-07:00

High functioning disabled
Habits ingrained just wrong
The gamut of mental gears
Once removed from a love song
Incipient tears
Somewhere to belong
In the dream real or fabled

A resounding call
To sanity once remembered clear
To be or not to fight
Mine fields in fancy dress appear
Attempts to etch in stone take flight
Wind scours the radiant fear
Chameleon on the wall

The promise of all art
I cling to truth
The book unread
In unrepentant youth
the lady with no back inside my head
The pirate with his sharpened tooth
Come fill my heart

It's not so far to fall
the inspiration so enabled
Deep inside the mind
The answer many-gabled
the pride, the price, the path to find
with all my horses safely stabled
I come on foot or not at all.

This is an experimental stream-of-consciousness poem with a recurring a-b-c-b-c-b-a form. Feel free to leave a comment if you wish.

Breathe

2010-08-31T07:40:00.001-07:00

The stark white sense of place
What else is there
Not quite emptiness

The end of innocence
The end of death
What else is there

Many are called and
So few chosen
Who can decide

Fate reaches out
We grasp the hand
That’s closest

The Road Home

2010-08-30T12:18:00.000-07:00

The golden clouds
Tease the landscape
With their fond reassurance

How I remember the road to
Nam Tso in the summer –
The crashing stream
Running happily beside us

No Nepali music
Will ever sound
So good –

The road beckons
Longingly with
The summer’s heart.

How does it know the time
Will flow to the end
Like a river?

Maxfield Parrish Sky

2010-07-26T09:36:00.001-07:00

Under the canopy of clouds
Where dreams migrate
Across the sky
Every possibility is rampant
Fishtailing with glee
Outwardly the quiet procession
Inwardly the explosive joy

In gold and white
Against a sea of blue
Those etched yearnings
Filter silver linings
Soft to the touch
Like the scales of magical fish
The present moment filled to the brim
With promises that need no tomorrow

The heart soars
All edged with grace
He knew he tasted he painted it
So well
Dear Max.

***
In honor of his birthday which was yesterday, July 25th.

Island Moment

2010-07-09T07:00:00.000-07:00

In the silence
chattering frogs
twittering birds
dog barks
fan whirls
faint steel drum
screechy parrot
dogs in chorus
insect song
trees' interior conversation
in a slower time zone
time dance
rain's a'coming
rain's over
wet and happy
Trinidad.

Turning Up the Heat

2010-06-28T08:20:00.001-07:00

Nestled in the creases
Salt and sweat
New dirt
How did we forget
This summer season
So persistent

Like a drunken mother
Lurching toward us
Speaking too loudly
Stumbling as she
Reaches to embrace
Not her fault
The poison

Love is there
As strong as ever
Maybe stronger
Tinged by panic
Underlying
Then – is that a shrug?

I see her cut her losses
Let it go –
Like childbirth
All the waves and storms
And fiery ruptions
What the hell
It’s meant to be
This purge
This cleansing

We may be ants
Upon the elephant
Stars in the distant sky
Embryos inside the mother
Our fate to sink or swim
Is it too late
To change?

Rationale Melting Into Synthesis: A War Story

2010-05-29T14:22:00.000-07:00

The enviable will
To withstand
When faced with doubts

Tough inner fiber
Locked hands a stirrup
For that leap onto the dark steed

Where soldiers stand
In bamboo armor
Let them free

To have one clear clean
Breath
Of indefinity

Peace we know
War we know less well
Both are fraught with bravery

Ask for no answer
From siege or calumny
The soul bears scars only it can heal

Long after dangers cease
The battle rages
In the struggling breast

Having lost the power to weep
May we still retain
The trembling hand of comfort

For the aging warrior
Longing for death
To be reborn

Shall the mind be stripped
And memory washed out
Or wrapped in the honey of experience?

The Sense of Suspended Time and Muddled Energy in the Vortex

2010-05-24T12:11:00.001-07:00

Swirls of brown and purple streaked with white
Like watching water curling down a drain
I see my life blood seeping out
Staining the carpet of past dreams

Angels stand arms folded frowning
Bodhisattvas with heavy-lidded eyes
Await my awakening
Not skipping a beat I sit abandoned

Sweetness in its true guise
Lashes my sleeping form
I dream, still clinging to my bitterness
Like the only vehicle that can propel me

Once I danced, was it yesterday
My shoes like second skin
Polishing the floor
But that was yesterday and I have nothing to show for it

The birds are my fondest remedy
Perching on the door frame
They seem to reassure my entry
Flying above my head or nesting

Shall I pick up my largest burden and walk
Will I fall again
It is a time of confusion which I’m told is worthy
Of the highest attention

Is passion surely leached from my bones
Have I nothing to wish for
Only now do I understand the snow mountains
Only now that I am exiled

Rockdale, Late Summer

2010-05-08T12:30:00.000-07:00

I'm leaning into the wind
listening to the molecules
bouncing against each other
quiet as a parchment yellow wall

I'm imagining the taste of wine
aging in the sunlight
infused with operatic twilight
the faint aroma of Kools

I'm writing poems in my dreams
in the light from an old flame
against the window facing south
remembering a play by Oscar Wilde

It's late summer and the tomatoes are ripe
the marigolds are fragrant
the frogs are loud, the crickets are purring
piano music rolls likes waves across the lawn

I can hear my grandmother calling
"Supper time ..."
I am on my way
ready for every future possible.

Hugo Alfredo Tale-Yax is Dead

2010-05-06T17:12:00.000-07:00

In the rag-covered body on the ground
A man died here, just incidentally
This is not his home
This street, this pavement in Queens
Perhaps his home is in some corner of the park
Or that shelter over on 64th
Or maybe the cardboard tent under the bridge

But not this condo complex
Where nobody stopped to ask
Nobody dared
Or cared
Or had the brass
Even when lifting him up to see the blood

As he lay face down on the pavement
The gray cement cooling his face
On the early morning of his death
After his heroic struggle
In defense of a woman
The frail ideal of helplessness

The woman who ran away to who knows where
While the hero stayed behind to fight for her
Was stabbed for her
And bled for her and for many who did not call 911
Who did not stay and speak kind words to him
While his life blood ebbed away

Though he died without a friend,
Perhaps he found some glory,
Perhaps he was feasted by the angels
And comforted by the djinns or bodhisattvas
I like to think he would never again
Be called homeless.

Dedicated to Hugo Alfred Tale-Yax, a homeless man who fought a robber for a woman who fled, and who died April 24, 2010 while people passed by without stopping to help.

New Wind

2010-04-03T09:00:00.000-07:00

The wind came out of Navajo country
across the plains
through the tops of the pines
sliding beneath the fur of
the four-footeds close to the ground

At first I thought it might be
the raw wind, the heartless wind
that lashes the elms and oaks
on its way from the gray-spotted waves
far to the east

But no, it was the kindly, deep, auburn wind
the wind with the talismans of deeds
the wind of the wise counsel
new responsibilities
the wind that confirms our ancestry

We belong to this land now
whether European, Asian or African orphans
the wind and mountains have molded us
the edges of the ocean have reminded us
of our origins

Boned by midwives
winnowed by witches
encased in hummingbird nest
struggling for purchase
on the tallest branch

Swooping down to the mole's lair
underneath the gloaming
eyes squinted at fairies
waiting for that wind - that prince of wind
to carry us off to our real home

In the arms of the new wind
not the wind of summer
mysterious blackness and crickets
dancing in the elven rings

Not the wind of winter
stern father to our labors
swallowing sound in a long whistle
weeping in ice dreams

We are lodged in the eternal heart
of mother wind like a walnut
that her owl will bear away
with secrets safe
in the moon's shadow.

The Perseverance

2010-02-22T19:37:00.000-08:00

Plants are hardwired
to reach upward
they know
their destiny

They undergo all kinds
of hardships
to bathe in the
golden light

I see this green
amidst the snow
touch its velvet petal
speak in wonder

In its sleeping
determination
it only hears me in
its dreaming passage

I ask the nun
what is the hardest part
about retreat
what should I prepare for

She says "the perseverance"
there is nowhere else to go
just sitting
then the tormas to make

Always some work
some activity
prayer and study
very little free time

I understand that
kind of practice
but maybe not as well
as the plants.

Eclipsed

2010-01-14T16:07:00.000-08:00

Bouncing molecules
upon the planet
configuration

Ripples of uncertainty
land in random order
internal patterns
conjugating
conversations

Limited only by
dimensions of
light follicles

An old wound
has erupted
I stem the flow
I know the steps to take
but it still hurts

Haiti is a
torn hem
of the mother's
sleeve

I am less
than a bacteria

There is a
certain measure
of content
in not being
alone.

Happy Birthday, Bodhisattva

2009-12-19T12:32:00.000-08:00

I was just thinking about the celebration of Christmas, and the gift that Christ gave to us with his sacrifice and divine example. He not only died with his faith as his close companion, but he attained what the Tibetans call the "rainbow body" leaving nothing but a shroud to mark his place.

Most of all, he remained with us in spirit so that all who call upon him can benefit from his wish to ease our suffering and darkness.

I am so glad that at least one Bodhisattva is celebrated every year as we gather in warmth and love, and give each other gifts that symbolize the great gifts from Jesus to all of us here in our human cyclic existence on this planet.

May we truly open ourselves to his love and wisdom, and follow his example.

As the great Shantideva said,

"For as long as space endures
And for as long as living beings remain,
Until then may I, too, abide
To dispel the misery of the world."

Born to Write in Candlelit Cafés

2009-12-04T20:19:00.000-08:00

I am breathing
Aive and seeking
Purpose, worthiness to be alive
I am drinking chai
The spice tingles on my throat

The photograph of a thistle
Hangs above me
The thistle has more right
To be here than I do
My carbon footprint is large

My mind is a tumble of
Computer games and half-
Remembered dreams
And attempts to file everything
In folders tamed by
The proper color

A soft alto sings in the
Background about beauty and destiny
I have one and not the other
You can guess which
I am waiting for my Indian food

I may be no good for this world
But I will never kill myself
He said

I take his words as a benison
I remember them when I need
To take myself less seriously
I know he lives
Because I live

The music has changed
I can see the boy with his
Snare drums
I was born to write
In candlelit cafes

I was born to bring that
Novel into being
Even chased by the cowherd
With the leather whip
Even parceled into chapters
And campaigns

Didn’t I make it eat its tail
Like all good heavenly serpents?

I live, I breathe
And yet I have no
Union to this life
Other than the sculpture
I’ve assembled out
Of scraps of family,
History and friends,
My endless mistakes
And unquenchable hope

Despite my training
And my boring fear
I hope eternal
Like the wind’s soft lick
Of promise

I make a gift of that
To you.

The Magic of Hay Bales

2009-10-05T15:51:00.000-07:00

When I was growing up, I used to visit my Grandmother who lived on a place in Maryland called Rockdale. Although her genteel house never hinted of it, it was a working farm that ran to several acres. Over the years, there were a hundred secrets and mysteries for us kids to experience.

Down the lane there were apple orchards. In the front yard was a huge snowball bush and what used to be a fountain. A strange-looking gazebo sweetly rotted away.

There was a bridge where we used to play Pooh Sticks. The trickle of Winters Run went underneath, and all the way around the property. We could go swimming in it if we were willing to brave the steep climb down through the woods to the sandy banks below.

One of my favorite places was the summer house. It was made of stone and had a peaked roof and no windows. On summer nights, my Grandmother would have parties and hanging paper lanterns along the garden.

But during the day the summer house was unused. I used to sit in there and pretend I was a gypsy living in the woods with a horse. I would imagine my bed over there, my fireplace here, and in the nooks along the eaves I would place my treasures.

Beyond the fence was a huge rock that I called my dreaming rock. The field was rarely plowed and the grass would be waist high and blow in the wind. Sitting on that rock, it seemed I was in the middle of a huge ocean. Sometimes I could see cows in distant pastures.

My other favorite place was the top of the hill where there was a particular tree I used to lie under. It was a willow tree and I liked the patterns it made with the sun.

That was the hill where my mother would take us blackberry picking and raspberry picking with buckets filled to the brim and our legs covered with little red marks from the briars.

In the fall, we would play with the milkweed silks peeping out from their hard pods, and blow wishes to the wind. If I twirled around very fast, all the colors of the autumn trees would melt into a swirling rainbow.

I especially liked it when I would see bales of hay neatly stacked. It seemed like magic. Who did it - and when? It was always a question in my mind, "Will there be hay?" as I was climbing.

Only once I saw the tractor pull up and men jump off and load the bales onto a bed. The boy that drove the tractor was barely older than me. Maybe 13 or 14. I marveled at his prowess with the tractor and formed a crush. I named my kitten after him - Snooks.

I happened to see a photo of some hay bales today, and all these memories came tumbling out.

Dreaming in Technicolor

2009-09-11T11:39:00.000-07:00

I recently received an email with some dream research that made me stop and think. One of the points was about dreaming in color which was seen to increase in subjects tested after 1960 as compared with 1915. The researchers had hypothesized that the increase in people found to dream in color might be attributed to the switch from black-and-white images on TV and film to color.

I can offer some anecdotal evidence about color dreaming. Long before my family even owned a TV, I dreamed in color. In fact, until around the age of 4 or 5, my dreams were in a particular kind of color that is more saturated and beautiful than real life. The trees and grass, for instance, were in various shades of blue and red and purple and pink and orange - all sorts of colors. There was almost no black or brown in my dreams, only these brighter colors.

I actually recall the last "technicolor" dream I had because I was so sad afterward. I never had those brightly colored dreams again.

I was standing on the banks of a pond. It was winter and there were people skating on the ice but I didn't feel cold and I was not dressed in winter clothing. The trees and grass were brightly colored, as I have described. Then I suddenly noticed for the first time in any of my dreams a little house - it was a small, brown cabin made of brown wood. There was smoke coming from the roof as if a fire was burning somewhere inside. I noticed skaters coming off the pond would then go into the little house, so I became curious.

I walked over and went into the house and smelled hot chocolate. People were getting warm drinking hot chocolate. The colors inside the house were what I now think of as "normal" and I had never dreamed of normal every-day colors before. I went over and got some hot chocolate for myself and drank it, even though I was not cold.

After that dream, I never saw the "real" bright colors anymore.

This dream might almost be one of those cautionary fairy tales where the hero is supposed to take the worn, leather bridle instead of the the silver or golden one. Or perhaps even worse - the one that advises you not to open a certain door.

I have more anecdotal evidence about color. I was told when I had my son that babies see colors more brightly that we do, and as they grow up, they learn to limit their color palette to match the expectations of others.

My son is bi-racial (his father is (black) African-American and I am (white) Scotch-Irish-French-American.) So we had a lot of friends of all different races and my son would often draw pictures of them with his crayons. Whenever he drew a dark-skinned person, he would make them purple. When he drew light-skinned people, he made them orange. I am sure these are the colors he actually saw because when he was older, the colors became more muted.

I have only had one black-and-white dream in my whole life and it really scared me because I was afraid the colors had disappeared. It was after I had been given sleeping pills after surgery in a hospital. The dream was also frightening because I didn't have any control over my dream body. I saw my son playing on a sliding board and he was going to fall, but I couldn't run over and catch him because the sidewalk I was standing on began to undulate like the ocean.

I have never taken sleeping pills again.

Sun and Rain

2009-08-07T19:46:00.000-07:00

The rain, fond visitor
breath of warm
wet sky and
smell of trees
this is heaven's
kiss

All sensation
self-referent
enwrapped in
delusion
warm skin as
untrustworthy
as a cloud

The sun travels
across the sky
we abide
like helpless cattle
while seasons
revolve

All purposes
fleeting and empty
our teeming minds
dripping with
plans
we hardly
notice the
circle enclosing
our lifetimes.

I combined these two poems which were fragments I wrote in my journal in those moments while waiting for an appointment or a friend. I felt how much life is illustrated or demarcated by the weather and seasons, how much it informs our thoughts.

One Wish

2009-06-19T11:08:00.000-07:00

When I was a little girl my mother read me fairy tales from an old book that is now out of print called “Sven and Svea, or the Tales of Lapland.”

Few books stand out in my memory as clearly as that one. It could be that stories that are read to us sink in better when we are young, and particularly when we are in bed sick, which was often the case with me. At any rate, certain images and ideas were embedded in my mind.

One story was about a girl named Svea who with her brother Sven went on a perilous quest to convince the fearsome Bergsfrau to spare her family. The Bergsfrau (which I suppose might mean literally, wife of the mountain or woman of the mountain) lived way up high in the mountains in a cave and of course, it was snowing the whole time. Svea was often afraid but she was highly resourceful.

At the end, she succeeded in her task and the Bergsfrau offered to grant her one wish. She could be beautiful, wise or good. Without a moment’s hesitation, Svea requested to be beautiful. For, as she reasoned, anyone can become wise or good, but beauty is only given.

I may not have all the details right as my child’s memory is not as good as it once was. I wonder if we were given the same chance today, would we have answered as Svea did? Is the quest for beauty the ultimate goal? Or is wisdom? Or, perhaps goodness is the quality that will bring the most happiness.

I look around at my peers and especially fellow women in my country and I believe we are all under the same spell. We want to be young and beautiful and will do anything to attain such a state. Wisdom is debatable. One woman’s wisdom is another woman’s folly. Goodness is fine, of course, but in contemporary society, a bit tedious. The dangerous and the immoral fascinates us more, if you pick up any magazine or turn on television.

So, I wonder if perhaps we need to redefine what we cherish the most. Do the traditional values of compassion and kindness still hold a value for us? Or do we yearn for something more related to material success and well being?

Is mere survival enough? Having food, clothing and shelter might be the ultimate goal for the majority of humans on our planet. But for others, an elusive promise is always over the next horizon. It might be an award or honor or achievement, or challenge to be fulfilled. For some, a marriage; for others, a divorce.

All those superlatives are such slippery words. Goodness – wisdom – beauty. Everyone has their own concept. But when we are given images continually of what is considered beautiful by society at large, it is difficult to cling to one’s own conception. We each have to walk a dangerous path in life to find the true wisdom, and we each have to make a lot of choices to attain any measure of goodness. But beauty? I think we have lost the way.

What perhaps Svea knew better was that beauty is all the way through from the inside to the outside, like a perfect ripe apple just off the tree. I think she wanted what was inside of her to show on the outside. If we could apply that idea in our lives, perhaps we would have more than one wish come true.

Walking in Lhasa

2009-04-20T06:24:00.001-07:00

The street is bare today
I can see the blue sky
And hear the voices of the dakinis

But the shops are closed tight
Leaving only their two language signs
With the Chinese letters always bigger

Our syllables hang like prayer flags
From the mala of a million mantras
Echoing into each mountain pass

I never forget the juniper incense, forbidden now
The prayer flags on the roof
Where the red flag flaunts its yellow stars

I can’t forget
My husband prostrating along here
Before he went to prison

Sigh. How long ago was it that
They let him come home to die?
His black eyes still gleaming

The soldiers at the end of the street
Do they know where they are?
Lhasa, the holy place, where a god once lived

Where so many gods still live
Except the ocean of wisdom
Who fled so long ago

I touched his robe as a girl
My hair in braids so tight on my scalp
I yelped at my mother that morning

The khata in my trembling hands
How long ago was that?
I shall never forget

The crane never flies to the evergreen
Since the soldiers came
They ate him for dinner, that beautiful bird

The snow leopard fled
The eagles and elk and reindeer
All of them meals for the soldiers

Vultures and crows keep their vigil now
Wait for them to die and leave this holy place
The birds will eat up every scrap, all but the bones

There they are, all dressed in black
With helmets to protect them from virtue
Do they know where they are?

Or are my old eyes deceiving me?
Are they just pilgrims, my kinfolk
Come to celebrate Losar?

***

This poem and painting were inspired by a photo taken March 14, 2009 that appeared on the Phayul website. The caption read that shops were closed and paramilitary and plainclothes police had established patrols and checkpoints throughout Lhasa on the first anniversary of the anti-Chinese riot.

Boadicea

2009-02-27T21:14:00.000-08:00

You were always a head taller than me
Your slim, strong form
Perched on that fiery horse
Who was only gentle for you

In your presence I was brave and bold
In your aura I knew my worth
My words came free and easy
My thoughts skipped and danced

Your laugh made everything right
In your chuckle a million fairies gathered
Children reappeared like destiny
Grown men listened

Together we could ride into the country
Leaping fences, streams and boulders
Nothing too daunting
With you beside me

Because of you I think clearly
Find the options never seen before
Walk with grace and
Keep my eyes focused

Because of you I hear
The voices in my heart
And pay attention.

____________
This poem is dedicated to Rosa Fletcher, Stella Henderson, Annette Johnson, Margaret Ballew, Pose Crocker, Charlotte Silver, Miriam Robinson, Marie Stirling and Margaret Timmington.

Losar - Tibetan New Year - Earth Ox Year

2009-02-25T08:12:00.000-08:00

No singing, no dancing, no drinking of chang
Our prayers are sent skyward all the day long
For our lamas and kinfolk still in Tibet
We keep in our hearts and never forget

Oh, precious teachers and Holiness dear,
May you all be protected throughout the Ox year
You have taught us to keep our compassion alive
So that no matter what, Buddadharma survives

So we pray for the fallen and we pray for the jailed,
We encourage the diplomat whose efforts have failed,
We honor the ones who secretly pray
Who teach in Tibetan without any pay

We pray for the spirits of all the departed
Who died for refusing to be downhearted
Just as they did not give up, we also should strive
To keep the spirit of freedom alive.

May Tibet, the beloved homeland endure
And the dharma flourish without fear once more,
May the faithful whose hearts have been guided by grace,
Be rewarded by blessings and peace throughout space.

Valentine for the World

2009-02-14T20:37:00.000-08:00

It seems rather silly to devote one day of the year to Love when every day is an opportunity to love with a Capital L. Not the little, ego love that shouts from every popular song, that masks a need or want .. but Love that simply is. Love that encompasses all of us, all the time, everywhere, without exception. All sentient beings are loved.

So I reach out my heart to the world today, the animals big and small, from the mighty whale to the tiny ant, the plants and trees in every garden and forest, mountains, rivers, oceans and streams, volcanoes, deserts, stars and planets circling overhead. And even the people.

Let us cherish this beautiful blue green marble that we live on ... not just today but every day. May she withstand even our rude tenancy. Let us protect and maintain her for our children and their children.

My Real Job

2009-01-21T19:07:00.000-08:00

Ever since I was a kid, I've wanted to be a writer. Although I went on to write poems, stories and myriad thoughts on scraps of paper, there was one vision that remained in the background. It was something special that I carried inside like a potential embryo.

This vision that would steal over me at night just before I drifted off to sleep was a world underground where dark elves lived. I was very young and my imagination was pure and free. There were no boundaries or guideposts. I saw flickering lights as soft as milkweed silks, and messages floating in the air of this underground world with the symmetry of Queen Anne's lace. Sometimes the elven people flitted into the shadows by the pond at twilight.

Eventually, as an adult, the novel was born. The hardback came out last year, and now, here's the paperback. My latest book signing went quite well. I had a wonderful time, met a lot of writers and readers, and sold five books.

It was bitterly cold outside, we'd had three inches of snow the day before, and my car wouldn't start in the morning, so I'd had to get a jump start. I haven't made a living as a writer yet.

In a perfect world, my book would be made into a fantasy adventure film starring Iman as the heroine Tiala. Claire Danes would be the fox-woman, Patrick Stewart the blue warrior elf, Clive Owen the wizard and Linda Hunt the ironic General Gudrun. Brad Pitt would be Obsidian.

Wesley Snipes could play the evil Dekhalis with great aplomb. Grace Jones would make a compelling ancient Nightwing on her death bed. Wallace Shawn could be typecast as the likeable villain Prince Mischa. Other parts would go to Venus Williams as Eleppon the cavalry-woman, Halle Berry as the diminutive Noth, and perhaps some yet untried newcomer as the innocent Inuari.

So many parts to play - so many opportunities for great acting - would fall like ripe apples from the tree. But like many artists, I will probably not live to see my own success. Of course, as a Buddhist, I try to stay in the middle ground between success and failure, indifferent to both. To be honest, I rather like the ignominious status of the undiscovered. I rather like unborn fame.

It's just one more dream to dream.

When You Wish Upon A Star

2009-01-05T07:07:00.000-08:00

Though I might be more cynical now, this old Disney classic still has the power to send me back to childhood. The first time I listened to it, I was about five years old. We had a new black-and-white TV and we kids were not allowed to watch anything except the occasional Saturday cartoon or Disney which came on at 7:00 p.m.

This song would come on at the beginning or the end of the program. I admit I don’t remember, it was so long ago. I think it might have been at the end, and I seem to recall being so sad if the song didn't completely finish or a commercial intervened, or my parents told me to go to bed.

I remember how small the TV screen seemed to be, and how hard I wished to transport myself into it, and away from my parents and brother and sister in that living room. I just wanted so badly to be in that magical world where wishes come true.

Of course, children know what’s real, what’s important and what’s possible, and maybe have a much better grasp of these things than adults do. Even though you may have promised yourself at age 10 or 16 or 20, that you would never forget the lessons of childhood, I would bet that somewhere along the line, you could not keep that promise. At least, I failed to do so.

When we look at the stars, we still see the endless possibilities as limitless as space. We still see the twinkling lights of the cosmos, a constant reminder that we are merely a speck in the eternal diagram. And in knowing this, we may feel comforted that there is a larger picture and our small actions fade to nothingness in comparison.

Yet, as Pascal said in his Pensées, when we look under a microscope and see the infinitesimal size of the tiniest cell, we feel enormous, and our significance in the world appears to be gigantic. And conversely, when we look at the stars, we understand our insignificance. Both are needed. Our actions are important and do have an effect.

Contemporary science proves that emotion that is heartfelt and intense, affects DNA even when split off and separated by hundreds of miles. When it comes to real feeling, there is no time or space.

When it comes to heartfelt wishes, we may find that the child becomes our teacher, and in the words of William Wordsworth, “My heart leaps up when I behold a rainbow in the sky: So was it when my life began. The Child is father of the Man.” Or woman.

My Fear of Caves

2008-11-15T17:11:00.000-08:00

When I first started writing my novel "The Nightwing's Quest" which was published in 2008, I was on chapter three when I realized I was getting too scared to continue writing.

This novel is about a world of dark elves who live underground. It all sounded fine until I got to the chapters about the underground. How would it really feel to be underground? Could I really imagine what it would be like to live in a cavern hundreds of feet below the earth?

So I started to paint. I got some watercolors and began to paint caves. And slowly, my imagination began to kick in. I felt better.

The cover of my novel was actually painted many years after I finished. I started writing it in 1989 and finished the last draft in 2002. The painting was actually done after my publisher Jigsaw Press asked me for an idea for a cover. I just dashed off this watercolor and said, "Here's a sketch you can use." I thought she must have a stable of painters on staff.

Instead, she actually used it for the cover. I was astonished. But somehow I think -- or hope -- that I conveyed the magic of the underground to the prospective readers of my novel.

It was a great experience writing my first novel. It was a little like exploring a cave with nothing more than flashlight. I would run home every few days with a new chapter to read to my son and husband, who were my first critics. It was around 1989 that I also joined a writer's group, having met a fellow fantasy writer at a workshop. This writer's group was also very helpful to me over the years - critiquing my work in a way that family can't really do. No one is more understanding or helpful than a fellow writer.

A writer will say, "I don't quite understand what your character meant on page 2 ..." or "Why did she say that?" A family member will more likely say, "That's great. I love it." Good for the ego, but not necessarily helpful.

So it's done. And now what? My publisher wants me to continue and write a new book about one of the characters that she really liked. Meanwhile, I am in the beginning chapters of a new novel set in the Inuit world.

My journals of my time in India are yet to be edited, and who knows what will become of the mainstream novel I put aside years ago?

Poetry fills in the cracks. A writer's work is never really finished.

The Streets of Mumbai

2008-11-10T10:38:00.000-08:00

I'm starting this blog after setting it up almost two years ago. I'm not sure why today. Maybe because of the dreams I've had the past two nights. I'm wondering if maybe this whole blog should be about my dreams, because they are my guide and my inspiration.

I just finished reading Rajendar Menen's book "Karma Sutra, Essays from the Margin." The book is a compendium of interviews with street people, and the vast majority are prostitutes, though not all of them. Since I've been to Mumbai, and to many of the places he writes about, I have strong images of some of the scenes he offers.

Two nights in a row, I have dreamed about characters who might have been in the book. I say "might have been" because they sprang from my dream world, perhaps not from the real world that Menen writes about.

The first dream was about a man passing his business on to his son. He was a truck driver, and his son didn't really want to become a truck driver, so he was posing difficult situations to his father, like, "What will happen if someone steals from me?" or "What will happen if I have a deadline and I need to sleep?" He wanted to find an excuse, but every objection he raised was answered by his father. "You will find a way. You will get the things back. You will drink strong tea and sleep later."

So finally, the son said, "You're right. There's nothing to do." It was his fate and he accepted it.

The second dream was last night. I dreamed about a gigolo. I remember him vividly because he was quite handsome with thick, dark eyebrows, dark hair and flashing eyes. He was perhaps Muslim or maybe from the South. He was wearing a bright royal blue shirt. He was trying to seduce me and get my money. And I had no money, although I looked rich.

So finally I went to him and sat very close so that our noses were almost touching. And I said, "Look, I know you're trying to scam me, but I don't care."

He said, "Really?" and I reassured him that it was okay. Maybe I was taking on the role of the reporter, like Menen. Maybe I was trying to answer my own questions, because I've been asking myself, "How did he do this? How did he support himself? How did he decide it was what he wanted to do?"

I've been trying to dream my way into a new profession lately (as if I could ever escape being a writer). But perhaps trying to dream myself into something more pressing, like working in one of Mother Theresa's hospices, for instance - anything that could take over for the kinds of boring day jobs I've consigned myself to over the years.

So as a fiction writer, I sometimes wonder how I imagine fictional characters. Where do they come from? I know in a way, they are real, somehow fashioned from the clay of those whom I've met or lived with or known. Sometimes I just pull them out of the ethers. Sometimes I dream them into form.