He’s always smiling, the damn fool
Sometimes veiled as a new moon
Sometimes bright as the midday sun,
And always right there with me
Right in front or riding my shoulder
Good old Death, so patient and kind
Giving me another day
Waiting for that one last dance
As I work the steps, again and again
Wanting to get it right
This one last time.
What do I see in that face anyway?
All that I have been
And all that I may yet become.
(9/11/26)
(“Before the Door”, 2023, original encaustic)
Chance Meeting
Where were you when we met just now
In something of a hub,
Airport terminal or hotel lobby,
As you walked right by
And our eyes met
Yours growing in shocked amazement
As you exclaimed,
“What are you doing here!?”
And we hugged in warm embrace.
You now long gone
And yet still we meet in transit
Each of us on our tangential ways
The years between us now stripping away
All the layers those years built
As we are left
More ourselves than ever
Revealing what was always
At the core.
(6/17/25)
Resting in our natural state,
as both feeble form and vast space,
mood and mode, release and embrace,
we watch thought forms rise and abate,
soon doomed to die, for that’s their fate,
doing nothing steps we retrace,
back to heart where boons of God’s grace,
bestow bliss as our soul’s true trait.
Life as impulsed still continues
but now in this dream we’re awake,
at ease in this world’s shifting hues,
in time stretched peace, calm like a lake.
With light of Self to us revealed,
no secrets are from us concealed.
It is at eventide
When scarlet turns red
We feel the light of God inside
Our presence by bliss beats led
Rests in the toroidal heart
By soma nectar fed
Stillness is an art
Requiring identity to recede
That flow of magnetism may start
Negating desire, living as of need
Light within heart is revealed
Seeds of love thus breed
Drenched in bliss, soul is healed ~
Such is the power, God does wield
Through all of this noise
You came looking for me, and
Here we meet at last.
(2/25/24)
With no agenda in our shelf,
having become the witness self,
our gentle touch and mindful eye,
allows life to flow by itself.
There yet are moments when we sigh,
since thought tempests take time to die
but for the most part, we are still
and in the vast void, wingless fly.
We sense in heart, bliss nectar spill
and drink greedily to our fill,
which is of course to steady mind,
surrendering to God our will.
Thoughts slow down and we become kind,
our head and heart, with love aligned
and as we slowly vaporise,
fears and desires no longer bind.
This oh monk, is the way we rise,
ceasing to weigh, measure or size,
merging soul with the all-that-is,
feeling each heartbeat in surprise.
Stirred from sleep, early this morn,
ego shorn, refreshed, reborn,
feeling within bliss humming,
as notes of rapture strumming.
I was then, the light of Self,
with no desire on the shelf,
for mind was as yet asleep,
which is how I went in deep.
Bliss froze time, that soul may climb
toward heaven like this rhyme,
frolicking about carefree,
unshackled from my mind tree.
("Through The Looking Glass", 2017, original encaustic)
Listen Now!
Listen now without distraction,
Within the endless cycle of distraction,
Recognize the pure forms
Of your projection
To be nothing
But the clear light
Of playful mind
Awakened One
Know this,
And only this,
Your true face
Greets you
In the illusion
Of death
Recognize,
Without fear emptiness
Cannot be harmed
By emptiness,
With joy
You are home
Again
(11/14/23)
("Nonbinary", 2023, original encaustic)
You’ll Never Come Back…
Thrown into an ocean
Deeper and vaster than thought
Carried on waves of sound
Waves of light
Propelled on waves of bliss
Through a portal
That has no name
No place
No time
But here and now
Washed up on a shore
After the storm
Bathed in warmth
Exhausted of all content
Left alone
At the heart of it all
Connected to it all
Without a doubt
Someone whispers
Somewhere
Just beyond sight
“You’ll never come back”
And in an instant
I am thrown into doubt
Back to what!?
To this timeless place
Or what I left behind?
And then in the next
Caught up in those waves
Propelled
Life goes on
Same as it ever was
Forever changed
Forever fresh
Forever
(9/27/23)
In time dissolved moments, early morn
Between the sleeping and waking state
In this bardo of pure bliss, we’re reborn
Love’s caress enlivens presence chaste
Each dew drop of joy, a unique unicorn
Aglow in our light, throbbing with delight
We are transfixed by soundless thunder
Feeling complete, heart refuses to alight
Savouring elixir divine in childlike wonder
Embarking fearlessly on a wingless flight
Nodes within form hum a tune in chorus
In rhythm with the music of the universe
Each pore a door, receptive and porous
Frolics with joy, without need to rehearse
At dawn soul thus becomes a bliss torus
Before moistened grief crystallised in eyes dries,
humming aliveness of our heart exhumes pain
and positioned thus in the bardo, we rise,
as pristine soul presence, free from ego’s chain
invokes bliss magnetism to gently baptise,
wholeness of being in Holy Spirit’s rain,
moment by moment thus, all moments entwined,
dwelling in love and light, each breath reassigned.
I look toward the sacred symbol
Displaying my ignorance
For where is God not
Stuporous awareness
Oblivious to warning signs
Is now consumed by fears created
Yet within each half breath cessation
When polarities interchange
We are in the bardo
I notice this lifeline
Provided by the universe
And meld my consciousness therein
02-June-2023
flickering awareness
an in-between stage
with knowing imbibed
but not yet assimilated
we call it the bardo
26-March-2023
Buddha numerics
Time between death and rebirth
cosmic waiting room
(bardo- intermediate space of time between
death and rebirth. Symbolically, 7 to
49 days in Buddhist time.)
sexy couple shooting pool
what was that covetousness rule?
when am i going to get over this?
in the back of my mind, memories of bliss
keep me looking, well attached
until this longing body is dispatched
to the dustheap, while this mind
propelled into bardo, still looking behind
at all the ties that bind...
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