Poems of Devotion

Namaste and Welcome

Welcome to the new page on the blog, decicated specifically to the Devotional Poetry I’ve been blessed to compose recently (and some not so recently).

I published a post recently called I Want to Sing Praises about my prayer and intention to write more devotional poetry. This page is a direct outgrowth of that post, so please feel free to visit for more information.

As I mention in that post, I’m aware that I share poetic efforts on the blog anyway, but I’d like to keep this page exclusively for the poems themeselves. 

I’d still like, with your permission, to occasionally feature a poem on the main blog, but coming to this page will allow you to see them all, featured or not.

Anyway, as always thank you for visiting. I hope you benefit from reading what you find here.

Love and Peace

Paul the Hermit

PS If you’d like to reach out to make a comment, please feel free. Just head to the Contact page.  Thank you!

THE HIGHEST LOVE

Bhakti, the highest love for God;
Intense love, love with the whole of Self.
And in that place of complete love
All else, all things, are forgotten.

So, who is God? What is God?
These are questions misleading.
There is no who; there is no what.
Who and what lead to more things.
True answer? You already know:
God is. Only God.
Nothing else.
   No
      Thing
         Else.

TO, FOR, AND FROM

Before. It’s been written before – at a  previous time:
I pray to dedicate my words, to craft my words
to the Lord,
For the Lord, from the Lord.

Words spoken, and words written;
Prayers to be composed, hymns to be sung
to the Lord,
For the Lord, from the Lord.

With heart wide open, all senses attuned,
I seek to percieve, to know, to give
to the Lord,
For the Lord, from the Lord.

To know all that is there, all that there is.
No longer lost in the mire,
the illusion that is the past and the future.
I choose not to live in Samsara.
No do my words dwell there.
My heart; my words. All
to the Lord,
For the Lord, from the Lord.

ON THE LORD’S TABLE

There is a plate,
sitting on the table.
The Lords’ table.

The plate, hand moulded and shaped;
you can see the maker’s fingerprints
baked into the clay.

They call it rough, pottery crude and primitive.
Yet, here that very plate sits on the alter of the Lord.
It holds apple slices. Nestled
in the maker’s fingerprints.

Apples offered to the Lord
to be made – to become – prashadam.
  To bless and be blessed.

BLANK PAGE DEVOTIONAL

Once more unto the blank page
I offer my obeisances.
And then?
I just sit.
What else is there?

I await direction
from my Lord, my Master, my Guru.
For I am a devotee
of the Holy Names:
Brahman, Krishna, Ishwara, Saraswati.
And my familiar, the Lord Ganesha.
There are many names; there are many forms.
All one.
All the Divine.
All God.
All the Lord.

Inward – look inward.
This is the direction
of the Lord.
Observe, breathe; breathe, observe.
What else is there?

A POWER SONG HAS BEEN SUNG

Rest is healing
– Probably one of the main things.
A truth imparted, a truth contemplated upon.
And then, the small winged one
– with the flippy tail
comes to my door.
Stands and stares at me through the door of the hermitage.
Wagging tail,
– it’s like a spinning wheel –
this messenger sings
a power song as if a proclomation
conveyed from the transcendent:
Rest in healing
– I sing this song to you, for you.
These words I hear
sung by this messenger
conveyed from the transcendent.

A CLOUD ANGEL SEEN
An angel wing
seen in a cloud, ephemeral, gossamer.
And the angel?
She stands concealed within the silver linings of clouds, neighbouring clouds,
heralding a soon to be descending deluge.

THE BEGINNING OF DEVOTION

Attention, paying attention.
It’s the beginning of devotion.
And when you see? When there is seeing?
Well, seeing is praise.

When we see, what we see,
is God.
Not the god, or this or that god.
There aren’t lots of gods,
or so it seems.
And in the end, there isn’t one god:
there is only God.
So it was said by the sages.

WE CAN SING

We can sing for the trees, and for the rivers
For Aranyani, for Saraswati
for all trees, for all rivers
We can sing, so we shall sing

We are eternal, we are unlimited
We are the trees, we are the rivers
We are the song,
so we shall be sung.

TO BE A MONK

If I were a warrior
words would be spoken.
Admonishments, shoulds, shouldn’ts,
faultfindings, all laid on heavy they would be.
All these, I seek not to speak.

For I am not a warrior.
Yet, even after all these years –
a lifetime of broken mind –
madness still leaves me breathless.

But I try. To be a monk:
turning inward;
minding my own business;
God’s business.

TRANSCENDENTAL INJUNCTIONS

I open my Bhagavat Gita,
and hold the opened pages to my nose.
I inhale India.
The scents embedded in these pages
take me to the shores of Maa Ganga

‘Restrain your senses,’ I recall His words,
read and treasured so often
from this very Song of God
I now hold close.
Be free, the Lord instructs.
From mundane concerns
from the material world.

Then, there is a voice;
I hear it with the ear of my heart:
There is no place to go;
what you seek is within.
There’s nothing to find:
God’s kingdom is within.

EVEN A LEAF

Leaves of the tree

brought to the gates of the hermitage.

Leaves of the Cosmic Tree,

delivered by the breath of Ishvara,

like the words of the old teachers.

I make my offerings

to the Lord of the Cosmos:

a leaf or two.Leaves from the Cosmic Tree;

knowledge transcendent

given and received.

HOMAGE TO LORD GANESHA

No self-flagulating thoughts.

Just bring my mind back to the Lord Ganesha

To the sound of His Holy Name,

to the perceiving of His beauty.

I ONCE DID SIT AS I STILL DO SIT

Still Buddha bellied
after all these years.
(I take no pride in such admissions)
This bodhisattva has learned –
a thing or two.

No longer smitten
with sittin’ at the feet
of golden arches.

There are still
days of poetics;
some things never change.

And, I confess, I’m still sitting.
Nowadays I sit at the feet of God,
of Brahman, of Atma.

I sit before You;
I sit with and before me.
Sitting now to praise Self,
to just sit, to just be.

A DHARAMSALA DHARMA DREAMING

The hand of the monk 
agéd, insistent, but gentle too, 
takes and holds mine. 
The monk sits, the Dharma before him, 
sacred texts resting in their saffron shroud. 
My presence completes 
this circle. 

Mountain monastery 
calling him; it’s not home. 
Other mountains 
he’s climbed. Escape. 
High places divide 
this world from that, 
that time from this. 

His loving touch, his smile, 
linger in rarefied air. 
Air drenched with the warmth 
of the Dharma, 
in this late monsoon 
restaurant of the Snow Lion, 
south of his land. 

HOMAGE TO RISHIKESH

Himalayan winds gust throughout the night.
Mountain air swirls round our sleeping forms
as we rest in the shadow of darkened foothills
that soar merely feet from where we lay.

Upon awakening as the sun rises over those    foothills,
we rise to stroll through sacred precincts to Maa Ganga,
upon whose banks we sip tea,
break our fast, and greet the day.

IF THE TEA NEEDS STIRRING: LESSONS IN PRESENCE

Just now, just here,
stirring the tea.
A flash, an insight;
in reality a realisation
dawned as the tea brewed.

Suddenly I’d seen the solution
to finding the real Self,
to success in the search,
to completing the quest for Truth.

Just keep doing this.
That was the sense of it.
That’s what I heard with the mind’s ear.

Stir the tea?
Yes.
Then? Keep on keeping on.
Step by step,
One task – or no task – to the next.
Just a wu wei flow.
In, through and on the ongoing moment;
on the path of least resistance.
But beware, take care:
That path is not the slippery slope
of apathy, of indifference.
It’s not the way of doing nothing.

It is  the way of being,
Of being within your doing.
Fully present, only present.
The tea needs stirring?
Then stir it.

Be the actor – the stirrer.
Be the spoon,
Be the tea.
That’s all there is.

IN THE HOUSE OF GOD

Here in this house of God,
God does indeed dwell.

Not the god of superstition,
nor of dogma and fear.
And not the god of men clad in purple robes
and swollen with stolen power.

No. Here dwells the god of the people.
Of all the people who, in this place,
have sat, stood, knelt,
and prayed.

Prayed to their god,
and—perhaps—reflected upon
myths and dramas, memories and dreams.
Perhaps even upon life and death itself.

There is a light that streams
and fills this space.
It is a light of this world,
and it suffuses the space with a gentle, golden glow.

All is bathed in this glow.
All appears to have become gold.
Alchemy is taking place.
With this light, there has come magic.

Bird song (or is it the calling of angels?)
can be heard.
It too streams from the outside.
Golden sounds merge with golden light.

Here does God indeed dwell.

JOHN WROTE A LOVE SONG

John was a singer and a writer of songs.
John was a friend of mine – yet never known personally.
Yet known by me all my life.
A fab friend for everyone.

John wrote songs, songs he sang,
lyrics given life by voices
very few heard.
It was hysterical.

He wrote a love song, a song I heard and loved.
In fact, a whole lot of love songs he wrote.
One verse, in that one song, caught my ear, snatched at my heart.

This is the verse,
the stanza I love:
Love is you
You and me
Love is knowing
We can be.

No sickly, sweet sentiment this,
Not like some plastic bobble-head
lurking in some grubby rear window.
No, as the song he wrote says:
Love is real.

Love not for the sake of getting it right all the time;
Love not for the sake of always being the good guy;
Love not for the sake of a distant and cold devotion;
But love,
Love for you alone.

JUST PASSING THROUGH … OR SEEKING NOBLE TRUTHS

Many have been the nights 
I’ve trudged (and less often, strode) 
past illuminated windows framing. 
families sharing sit down meals. 
Or huddled worshipfully before 
flickering and silent (to my passing by ears) 
picture boxes in corners of cosy family rooms. 

I am just one more invisible (to most), anonymous 
drifter. Just passing through 
the empty nighttime streets of one more 
anonymous town. 
Longing to enter the illumined frame. 
Longing to share one of those sit down meals. 
Longing to worship at the alter of the flickering picture box. 
Longing is loss. 

The edge of town roadside summons 
this lonesome bodhisattva begging rides. 

It’s just one more quiet and cold 
semi desert night. A high moon in a clear sky 
casts ghostly shadows through Eucalypts: 
my only company as the waiting game begins. 
Waiting to see headlights coming and going my way. 
Waiting to be rescued from this lonely edge of town roadside. 
Waiting for another ride, to another anonymous town. 
Waiting is wasteful 

Better to be here, now, on this 
edge of town roadside. A place as good 
as any. Illumined by the moon, 
the ghostly gums create the frame 
in which this bodhisattva rests. 
And worships. 

LET ME BE AN INSTRUMENT OF YOUR GRACE

Let me be an instrument of Your Grace.
Who is this You to whom I pray?
What is this Grace I long to facilitate –
with Your help?

You is you. You note the capital?
And You are Me, and I Am You.
We are Self. You note the capital?
And what or who is this Self?
Self is all, all there is.

Grace is what? We have yet to answer.
Grace is lone.
Grace is truth.
Grace is Dharma, life itself.
Grace is all, all there is.
Lord, let me be an instrument of Your Grace.

NAMA RUPA NAME AND FORM

I thought I saw my Lofi.
But, alas, and no, it was simply a cushion.
Fallen over, at random, on the sofa.
So, if he’s not on the sofa, where is he?

He’s like me, Lofi is. Like you too.
He’s everywhere and he is nowhere.
He’s everywhen and has never been.
He’s everyone and he is no one.
He’s the how and why of all things, and he is the unsolvable mystery
of it all.
He is the Absolute Reality, and he is the grand illusion.
Yes, I think it is the truth:
I did see my Lofi,
on the sofa.

(In the lifetime I shared with him, Lofi was a cat. A cat I loved very deeply and with my whole heart as I still do and always will)

ON THE FLOOR OF THE TEMPLE I LAY DOWN

Om, the sacred syllable;
Brahman itself,
reverberates in my ears
and travels little further.

But

Brahman is not in me;
Brahman is me.
Brahman is not all around me.
Brahman is  the all around.

Yet, there is mind.
Spilling its random trivialities,
actual and invented memories,
and fantasies of unreal futures.

I focus on the vibrations
that echo through my ears.
I watch, intently, the in and out
of my breath.

Yes, that vibration, that breath, both Brahman.
The sacred syllable
that is all there is.
It is there that I rest.
It is here that I rest.

ON THE TEARS OF ANGELS

Is it good that angels cry?
Anyway, why do they cry at all?

To wash away all the sorrows,
to cleanse, to purify, to make new.
And to ease the world’s pain.

Then, there are those of us
who can’t conceive of ourselves
as angels.

For those ones – each and every one – the tears of angels
are cathartic; granting catharsis.

Angels, they are everywhere.
Perhaps there are more than we know.
Personifications of love, of compassion.
Of charity too.

OUT BEYOND CAPRICORN & DEEP WITHIN EACH HEART

Vaikuntha: Without anxiety.
Is there such a place? Free from worry?
Out there, they say, beyond Capricorn.
There’ll you’ll find the highest heaven,
the abode of God.

No need to look to the stars:
Vaikuntha is here. Vaikuntha is now.
Within and without you.

Vaikuntha is indeed beyond;
beyond the material world,
beyond the realm of bodies and minds;
beyond the illusions of places and spaces.
Atma – Universal Consciousness – you and me,
that’s Vaikuntha.
You and me, all there is. No anxiety

DO I LOVE?

Do I love the rain, watching the rain?
Do I love sitting on the sand, watching the waves?
Do I love the trees? Their strength? Their shelter? Their being?
Do I love the Sun with its warmth, Its light, its life?
And, all these things, are they the Divine?
Are they God?
All that is, is God.
One without a second.
So, yes I do; I do love God

YOU CAN SEE GOD FROM THERE

As she passed by she said to me:
‘You can see God from there.’
‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘and it’s also a good place for prayer.’
Knowing all this will set you free.

WE STAND ON SACRED GROUND

I planted the branch,
the branch of a fallen tree person.
On the beach,
in the sand of the beach.
And I built a shrine
around that branch.
A pop-up shrine.
Shells, stones, and a piece of coal.
A shrine to Varuna.
A shrine to Surya, to Saraswati.
A shrine to all the gods
of Earth, Sky, Water.
A shrine to the gods of all beings.
A shrine on the beach
is subject to tidal flow.
And soon, this simple shrine,
pop-up and temporary in nature,
will be engulfed.
Lord Varuna will make his claim.
What has emerged, must always return.

AS GAIA TURNS

Surya illumines
with his fiercely gentle life-giving light.
Gothic panes receive and reflect
golden impressions
as Gaia turns.

SAND DUNE KIRTAN

Perched upon the crest of a sand dune,
I chant the names of the Lord
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Hare Rama Hare Rama

I am still; the Lord’s names vibrate in my mind.
But Varuna’s energy washes saltwater back and forth
in the middle distance.
Sea waves manifest from depths unknown.
Sea waves dissolve on the shore
in the middle distance.

Now, in the near distance,
near to me where I rest and chant on sacred ground,
flowers with yellow heads, others with purple heads, wave in the wind
as if ecstatically dancing to a holy Kirtan
gifted them by the wind.

These myriad jewels in the dunefield join me in my japa.
Or is it that I merge with their sacred dances?

It’s neither, and yet it’s both:
The beautiful blooms are me,
and I am them.
We are the One,
Chanting and dancing
the names of the One.

SITTING, WITHIN AND WITHOUT

I sit
cocooned, protected,
within the walled enclosure.
I sit; I contemplate; in Paradise.

It might be true – but is it fact?
Body and mind sit on the Village Green,
Well, body, yes.
Mind doesn’t stop;
I can’t keep up.

Anyway, who is this ‘I’ that’s falling behind?
The witness; not the body, not the mind.
The eternal witness,
I am Consciousness.
Unlimited, boundaryless.
No beginning, no ending.

I sometimes imagine I am sitting within space.
Or is it that space sits within me?
Either or; neither nor.

So, it might be so:
I am sitting in that walled enclosure – the Hermitage;
I am sitting on the Village Green.
I am contemplating, praying for the world;
I am drinking coffee
       on the Village Green.

WORSHIP AT THE FEET OF THE DIVINE MOTHER

Standing before the Divine Mother
whispering a prayer of praise and longing.
She embraces the Holy Dove.
Heart of the dove to the heart of the Divine Mother.
I touch my heart, I touch her feet –
and bow.
I bow in worship to the Divine Mother.

MY PLEDGE TO MAA SARASWATI

Her Murti caught my eye
as I took my place before the alter in the Hermitage temple.
Saraswati, she required my attention;
And here I am, her willing disciple.

I recite her name, in truth the name of God:
Om Saraswati Om
She, the patron – no the goddess –
of the Arts, of Music, of Learning,
and by Her Grace,
these lines are made known.

She elicits a promise, a pledge:
She requests I follow Her.
And to follow Saraswati,
I must devote time.
Time to learn; time to know her more.
And so have I pledged.

HOMAGE TO HOLINESS

Threads harvested from threadbare clothing.
Pea-sized bits of bread, sliced from meagre rations,
Secretly hoarded for sacred purpose.

Mala makers work at night
in the dark of the stinking and freezing stone cell.
Chewed bits of bread become dough again,

and, by feel, frozen fingers knead the dough
Until tiny beads of bread emerge.
A tiny twig, again by feel, pierces each bead through.

Then in solemn prayerful silence and focus,
the nun passes her harvested thread through the first bead.
She ties a knot, no easy task with freezing fingers in the frozen dark.

And so it goes; all sacred duties take their own time.
One by one; one bead of bread threaded; one knot knotted.
The nun nears collapse. But now, at last, her task is done.

As the last knot is knotted, the last bead in its place,
The nun sighs and mutters, whispers, a prayer of thanks.
One hundred and eight beads plus one.
She has made her Mala.
      Om Mani Padme Hum

A LITTLE ODE TO VINCENT

Yes, you cut off your ear.
But you still could hear the whispers
of the gods. Still you heard
the drumming demands

of spirits unseen–and never heard–
by those with souls unawake.
Only you Vincent, only you,
could hear.
And then you gave your life.

HAIKU #3 CHANTING MANTRA

Chanting mantra to Lord Ganesha.
Out there in the darkness a dog barks.

HAIKU #1 I AM THE LIGHT

I am the light,
the light of the world.
Storm waves crashing.

WHEN TREES SPEAK

Vibing on the mystic trees,
their upside is downside, their downside is upside
selves telling me:
You’ve got to cut through the attachments.
Then, now a new, but old made new again, insight
confirms, clarifies, brings details to,
shines a light on the specifics:
Stop desiring what you already have.

RAINY DAY KIRTAN

Big rain today. Torrential
Not a day for walking, not for this hermit.
‘Least not along hermitage adjacent
suburban streets. Waterlogged.

‘Tis a day for Kirtan, ’tis for this hermit.
Retreat required – into the Hermitage temple.
Walking – not dancing – on the spot
chanting the names of the Lord.
Singing the praises
of the Lord of the Cosmos.

GOD IS MY ALL

Thinking thoughts
as if battered by demons.
Memories arising of my own evil deeds, selfish and cruel.
Right away I turn to God:
God is my all;
    Hare Krishna

Forego repentance,
relinquish regrets;
you are filled with God,
the supreme essence of life.
God is my all;
    Hare Krishna.

Through Papa Ramdas
I hear the Universe speak:
Forgiveness is from God;
and it has been granted.
God is my all;
    Hare Krishna.

IN ANY & ALL FORMS OR NONE

Divine Mother may reveal herself
in any form.
Or, in no form, she may be revealed.
At any and every moment; in any and all places.
Universal Mother.
Energy of creation and sustaining;
By the warmth of Her embrace
we are nourished and made alive.
Om Tat Sat.

DAYS OF AMSTERDAM CHANTING

Once upon a time
I hitchhiked to Holland.
Another mad attempted escape,
trying to leave the madness behind.
Amen.

Crashing in the park in the night,
beneath a bridge – when it rained,
behind the bushes – when it didn’t.
Amen.

Squatting in the Square in the day.
Sometimes singing days.
Dozens of hippies, freaks,
travellers, and even a few tourists and locals.
Amen.

Many memories of those days remain. Like this one:
I was 17, you see, in those days, squatting in the Square – Dam Square.
Music in all directions. Truly surround sound.
Guitars, bongos, reedy things like flutes and whistles,
even a trumpet I can recall.
Amen.

Then, a chant erupts, and soon engulfs the gathered.
Amen … Amen … Amen, Amen, Amen. (as Sidney Potier sings in Lilies of the Fields)

And, now, I’ve joined the chanting,
maracas shaking held high, as if in exalted devotion,
as I sway to vibration overwhelming.
Amen.

This entrancing word, this creative vibration,
how long did it linger, permeating
the very air I was breathing?
Amen.

Memory informs: it was hours.
That is to say, it was eternal – or was it a mere moment? Same.
Of course, Amen – Om – the vibration of creation
was never born, is never changing, always existent.
Amen.

Always creating. Always dissolving.
Then again creating.
Making manifest that which was unmanifest.
Amen.

Or, is it a sound and light show?
Amen, the word, the vibration, the sound
shining a light on what is there already?
And what is there already,
is all there is.
Amen Amen Amen

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

Some will say. It is said by some,
Krishna is the name; the name is Krishna,
One and the same.
Hare Krishna is God,
God is Hare Krishna.

What a trip to truly realise
the Word is all there is;
All there is is the Word.
Om is all there is;
All there is is Om.
Om

Dedicated to the bugs. We’re sorry.

WHEREVER THERE ARE DEVOTEES

Wherever there are devotees
we can there find home.
To insist upon physical proximity;
to long and seek for material presence,
is to miss the point.

At all moments, in all places
devotees are chanting and praying;
praising and loving.
Keeping the Universe in motion.
It is the the truth of the law
of the Cosmos.

STIR THE TEA

Just now, just here,
stirring the tea.
A flash, an insight;
in reality a realisation
dawned as the tea brewed.

Suddenly I’d seen the solution
to finding the real Self,
success in the search,
To completing the quest for Truth.

Just keep doing this.
That was the sense of it.
That’s what I heard with the mind’s ear.

Stir the tea?
Yes.
Then? Keep on keeping on.
Step by step,
One task – or no task – to the next.
Just a wu wei flow
In, through and on the ongoing moment;
In the path of least resistance.
But beware, take care:
That path is not the slippery slope
Of apathy, of indifference.
It’s not the way of doing nothing.

It is  the way of being,
Of being within your doing.
Fully present, only present.
The tea needs stirring?
Then stir it.

Be the actor – the stirrer.
Be the spoon,
Be the tea.
That’s all there is.

WE SHALL SURRENDER UNTO WHOM?

To whom, or to what shall we surrender?
We are hermits; we dwell in a hermitage.
Here are our cells, our Paradise.
A walled enclosure unto which we may surrender.

THE HERMITS SLEEP TONIGHT

A creative way to start the day.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.

In Samsara’s jungle there is a village, suburban village.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.

Near the village – no, in the village
the hermits sleep tonight.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.

The walled enclosure,
their very own paradise,
like a castle keep,
keeps them safe.
A peaceful way, a peaceful way.

Hush my sisters; hush my brothers.
No need to fear the jungle.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.



Day breaks; Surya rises.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.
Sleeping hermits gather, to break the fast.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.
Fast broken, sacred tea imbibed.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.
The hermits begin, begin their day of prayer.
A creative way to start the day.
A prayerful way, a prayerful way.

PEACE PRAYER

The father, the husband, the man of the  house
He’s away. At the war.
Our Lady Queen of Peace pray for us.

Away at the war, yes,
In a far off land. Not his own.
Our Lady Queen of Peace pray for us.

Away at the war. “Incountry”.
that’s what they call it.
Our Lady Queen of Peace pray for us.

At home the chidren, the wife and mother wait.
Wait and pray.
Our Lady Queen of Peace pray for us.

At home they wait yes.
Each night on their knees,
in a circle. Prayer circle.

Away at the war, he is fighting. For what?
At home, they are praying. For what?
Our Lady Queen of Peace pray for us.

A PRAYER FOR A HERMIT PILGRIM

The Lord is my shepherd
And I am the lost sheep.
The Lord is my compass,
So, to The Way I may keep.
The Lord is my strength,
For me no path is too steep.
The Lord is my protector,
over any precipice I may leap.
The Lord is my providor,
and many blessings I shall reap.
The Lord is my shelter,
in which I may soundly sleep.

BLESSINGS FOR LONELY HERMITS

The voice of Varuna blesses us,
lonely hermits who hear
as its sounds its multiple cadences
upon the tile roof of the Hermitage.
And the hermits listen with ear and heart
to the 1000 voices that are, in truth, one voice.

And they watch – with the eyes of the heart –
the sacred dance as Varuna touches Earth
out there beyond the glass
on the floor of the hermitage garden.

BRIGHT LIGHTS IN THE DUNEFIELDS

Today. On the Ocean Track.
Daily hiking across the top of the dunefields.
Not so sure-footed,
I trudge heavy-footed.

As I pass by, there are bright lights in the dunefields.
I pause in my passing as my eyes are drawn
(or is it my heart?)
to the bright lights in the dunefields.

I feast my senses upon
the bright lights in the dunefields.
They bless me, these bright lights.
They sing to me; the speak to me.

In my silence, I hear them.
But I hear not voices.
I see them.
But I see not colours, shapes or forms.

What I see, I see.
I see me, I see you.
They see me,
the bright lights in the dunefields.

They see you; can you see them?
These bright lights in the dunefields.

We are all bright lights in the dunefields.

EVERYDAY REWARDS

Everyday is not always what it seems to be.
Everyday brings us often a lot more than we can see.
Everyday – almost – we are deluded, living in delusion.
Everyday – almost – leaves us paralysed in confusion.
Everyday – almost – what we think is real hides from us what is true:
Rewards, that’s the truth. Everyday rewards granted to me and you.

I WANT TO SING PRAISES

Devotional poetry.
That’s what I want to compose.
Actually, is there a calling to such composition?
Yes, for I do hear the call; it resonates deeply.
But, my ego-mind, it’s not listening.
Anyway, composing poetry devotional
is of the heart;
It leaves the mind behind.
Looks like one more ‘make the mind your friend’
moment.
Praise be all that is.

MAY AS WELL STARE AT A BRICK WALL

I can’t see anything, you know –
except for the brick wall.
Learned persons, you know,
would never be deluded.
They see the shadows passing
across the brick wall.
They know they aren’t real; they know they’re shadows.

And, you know there are those who stare
open-eyed at the brick wall.
Ignoring the shadows; ignoring the wall.
That brick wall, for rhem, is a portal
to the within.
To see their own minds.
To stare at the brick wall?
Is it Zen?

With thanks to the café seating arrangements, and to Plato too

SHALL IT BE FOUND?

There is a quietude
I cannot seem to find.
Not within, and not without,
Nowhere can be found he silence
I seek.

Is not such seeking futile?
Is it not a search for a phantom?
For a thing that’s not a thing?
No. Silence can never be found.

It – silence – is not even an it;
there’s nothing to find.
Silence is nothing – no thing.
And yet …
Silence Is

WHAT IS THE TENDER MIRACLE?

Wear the tender miracles.
I heard it so clearly,
from somewhere within? A message from Self?
But, the meaning, what could it mean?

And was it wear –
as in we wear our body; we wear clothes;
we even wear hats (not me)
Or is it we’re – as in we are?
As in, we are the tender miracles?

Perhaps both; a pair of meanings.
But maybe more: one more meaning
to add:
Wear as in admit; wear as in own; wear as in own up.

So, what to think? What to say
in conclusion?

Admit, accept, own
the body you wear.
It’s yours – like your clothes.
And your hat.

Admit, accept, own
the other truth, the other you.
Sure, your body? It’s a miracle, a material miracle.
But, you, your Self, who you really are?
That’s the tender miracle.