Tag Archives: poetics

Even a Leaf: A Poetic Offering

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Namaste and greetings my friends

Today, a poem for your reading and contemplative pleasure. The title of the poem comes references a verse from the Bhagavad Gita in which Lord Krishna talks about what are acceptable offerings: He tells Arjuna that God, or the Divine will accept even a leaf as an offering of devotion.

So, when I returned to the Hermitage one day recently to find two leaves on the ground at the front gate, I recalled that verse and decided to make of those leaves, just such an offering.

Allow me now to share that offering with you.

Peace and love

Paul the Hermit

Another Poetic Offering: Birds in the Bushes

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‘I like writing reverent things,’ I said to my partner Hermit. I’d just shown her a poem I had written about a walk earlier in the day on the track on the crest of the sand dune near the hermitage.

Yes, it’s true I thought later. I do write around themes of solemn respect, deep praise, of love, of appreciation of beauty, of devotional things. About my devotion to all that is Divine – which of course is eveything that is!

The walk began as a bit of a struggle, a bit challenging, though the challenge was eased somewhat by some winged friends. I know I’ve been writing a bit about angels lately, but this time the winged ones were birds. Mind you, angels can and do take many forms. Perhaps those birds were angels after all!

Anyway, as I recorded the original version while still ‘slogging’ through the sand on the track, I did so without intention. But, what emerged is, in my heart, a song of praise for those winged friends.

BIRDS IN THE BUSHES

Lumbering and stumbling, sometimes shambling
through deep and shifting drifts of sand
along coastal track
on the crest of dune.
Slow going on the track. Plodding.

But there are birds in the bushes
alongside the track.
Birds in the bushes twitter their encouragement.
Is it twitter? Is it tweeter?
Is it twirp? Twirping?
Are they twirping? Are they trilling?

In any case, there is encouragement in their serenade.
So, I continue on.
Plodding still
but a little lighter.

Poetics & Photographs: Shared Note

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Namaste and greetings

Another poetic and photographic note to share with you today. In the last month or so I’ve written two poems which are about angels. And both connected in some way with rain, or at least impending rain in one and actual rain in the other.

Initially I thought to just include the most recent of the two, but as I put my fingers on the keyboard it just seems to be emerging that I shall share both with you. And as you know I’m not one to ignore the demands of what types me!

Anyway, I offer them to your for your reading pleasure and perhaps cause for contemplation. Last shall be first in this matter I think. Enjoy please!

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

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.

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.

Spotted on a Sand dune: A Poetic Sharing

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With the current hermitage located not so much on the side of the road, as right on the side of a large sand dune system, you might imagine that I am at and on the beach every day.

While almost every day, I walk the track that follows the crest of the dunes in this particular area, I’ve only actually gone down to the beach itself a handful of times.

So, yesterday as start to my resolve to make amends for this omission, I climbed the dune, ignored the crest track leading left and right, and continued straight on and down the other side of the dune, and onto the beach itself. My intent was to spend an hour or so walking along the tide line.

And so it was.

Judging by such rare experience of the beach itself, I might easily say I am no ‘beachcomber’; no discoverer of coastal treasures, little natural beauties from the sea, or even the occasional oddity one might expect washed up. Until yesterday that is.

Not that I went to ‘comb’ the beach: rather I was there trying to put myself on the receiving end so to speak, to be a receptacle for what I might be blessed with (not to forget the need for exercise and movement).

And so it was.

This sense of grace and blessings, I hope I’ve conveyed in the small poetic effort (as well as its companion photo) that I now share with you.

SPOTTED ON THE SAND DUNE

Strolling (briskly mind you) along the sands,
There I was – deep in the liminal zone.
Ankle-deep – sometimes – seawater cooling my feet.
One way to receive Varuna’s blessings.

Back on dry sands (still in the liminal zone) I pause
to examine a spiral shell – an elegant and delicate sea creature.
It lives. Reverently, I move it to deeper water.

As I rise from my small task of union, of reunion,
I glance – still within the liminal zone – upwards.
There, near the crest of the sand dune sits a chair.
An armchair I spotted right there on the sand dune.

There it was, facing me – and the sea – in the middle of nowhere.
Though this is clearly somewhere for somebody.
The perfect perch for taking in
Pacific views.

Empty chair, lonely sight
overlooking the liminal zone.

Bright Lights on the Dunefields

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Namaste and Welcome friends.

A poem for your reading pleasure. Written on site today in response to an experience while out walking on the dunes next to the hermitage.

I’m including a photo I made a few weeks ago of the exact place where the poem was written,

And many loving thanks to my partner hermit for the sketch made in the same area today (synchronistically it was made unknown to me and vica versa)

Please enjoy.

Love from Paul the Hermit

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; they 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.

Details in the Dunefields

Sharing a Poem with its Photo

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Namaste friends, greetings and welcome

Today, a poem and a photo for  you.  I made the photo just over a year ago, and was very fond of it from the start. Then when I put into an editing app, it evolved to what you see today.

As well as that, as I ‘worked on’ the image, the little poem, (a kind of freestyle Haiku I think it could be called … sort of!) just emerged and I had to hurry to write it down.

Last night I was going through some poems of mine, and came across this one again. Not so much that I’d forgotten about it, more that I hadn’t thought of it since way back then.

So, I went on a search for the photo (also not forgotten, just buried deep in the hard drive!), so I could share it and the poem here with you on this blog. First the photograph:

Golden Light Reflections on the House of God

And now for the little poetic treat.

Please enjoy and may Surya illumine your day.

As Gaia Turns

Surya illumines

with his fiercely gentle life-giving light.

Gothic panes receive and reflect

golden impressions

                  as Gaia turns.

The Alchemy of Rain: A Poem & a Picture (or two)

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THE ALCHEMY OF RAIN


Surya’s life-giving energies shine upon
scattered and drifting, yet converging, patches dotting the clear blue sky.
Silver linings, so they say,
granted to those scattered grey clouds.

Those clouds, those grey scattered and converging clouds,
bless.
Bless the domain of Varuna,
God of the skies
with the potential for change.
All forms change.

Clouds, silver-lined or no,
are Varuna,
for he is also God of the skies.
And now, with clouds’ convergence,
the expectancy ends:
the change begins.

The Sun, still present, yet his light blotted out
by those very clouds – joins Varuna
In the form of the cloud. Alchemy.

From the convergence of energy and matter
water droplets emerge;
Varuna has remanifested,
and falls to wet Earth below.

To cleanse the dust from all things
living and non-living.
From the feathers of the winged-ones;
From the fur of the four-legged;
To quench the thirst of the Tree People.
And to moisten the throats of us, the Two Legged.

Thank you my friends.

May your day be blessed by both Surya and Varuna, in the correct measure and balance that is for the benifit of all beings.