Sacred Fire
In the fire of the Guru’s words,
burn everything that you own
without trying to hide anything.
When you sip the cool of the sacred ash,
what you could not see
will be manifest.
Who Is It in My Ear?
Who is it in my ear, who hears my voice?
Who is it that, after I speak,
keeps listening and listening into silence?
With the Sun
What arises with the sun
is this weight under my tongue,
lifting with the bells’ clear, sharp rising.
What arises with the sun
is this letting go of things undone,
in which lost things find their purpose.
Ritual 2020
I light a candle,
then settle into my spot:
a cushion surrounded by books,
journals of itinerant dreams,
and this long, long
solitude.
I ask a question,
and watch the flame
open its heart of tongues,
folding me into the seat of a lotus,
in which I pray, pray,
wait and pray.
The candle flickers.
The grey sea of sky simmers,
hovering at the point just past
this wind-worn waiting.
Visiting St. John’s Cathedral as a Child
And light fell,
a shower of song
that caught me unaware,
and keeps on beginning.
In the slanted windows
I could see the feet of the saints
dimly walking, a chorus that fled
unbound in all directions,
a drop glimmering like the last cup
at the end of supplication.
Pressing both my hands together,
I vaguely spoke, and waited.
When we walked outside,
entering the courtyard,
I saw two birds taking flight,
each one lifting the other
like an ancient stone
upturned to fire.
The Shaman’s Sympathy
Under her hands,
the world again begins to move
and speaks out from within me.
Things that I dimly perceived
begin to arise, flashes of colour
illuminating an endless sky.
Things that were unheard
ring out with pristine clarity.
The universe rolls like a ball,
laughing with the shape of her hands,
and I cry like a child,
running with no place to hide
from everything that’s given a voice in my mirror.
For a moment, I can see
what I have long kept hidden,
a place where the other can shine.
Fearlessly, openly, I reach from within
as she reaches from within,
relinquishing a small bit of everything.
When I finally spread out my arms and smile,
a single seed takes root
and lifts the whole world dancing.
Hidden Fire
Slow steps take me to the edge
of the bank’s whirling waters,
where I listen to my thoughts
wrestling and diving down
into the voice of the forest.
A bare branch lifts in the wind,
as wordless winter begins
her calm descent into matter.
I watch leaves of the aspen fall
and crinkle into dark corners.
Picking up a leaf, the light plays
in my hand, like a page
opening and closing endlessly.
The cold grass warms beneath my bare feet—
melting tiny icicles turn into a river of fire.
Inside the dark of my own emerging
wholeness, I feel the sun, ringing
like a bell through every changing mirror.
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image: Pixabay
