Best Monk Poems
Wearing life as a loose garment
Enmeshed but not controlled
Stoically involved in every breath
Holding life within his cupped hands
Exhaling in sonorous agreement
A vibrational itinerant
Seeking the solace of the present
In an ever changing now
An Oak tree weeps with him
Sharing the endlessness of his moment
I am
in the middle
of meditation
in lotus position
I am
the reason
for you to leave me
Solitude
the big opera of God
a poets reward
You are
the unspoken complicated words
dancing far away
only dust and smoke
(Evolution pollution)
is on the way
and remembers
Big destiny waves
no one here
to see now
what I feel
I am a
Shanghai monk
in orange pajamas
standing in the air
III.
But I had a much higher purpose now,
damned or not, I would serve the True God,
for thirty years I served with my brothers,
upon a humble path I faithfully trod.
Maybe I wasn’t a miracle worker,
though I saved lost pilgrims in my time,
age etched lines in my brothers’ faces,
but it had no effect upon mine.
The abbot swore newcomers to secrecy
about the truth of my vampiric fate,
and I guess I believed I’d just go on
serving an eternity in this way.
But one day as the sun started to set,
I looked out upon a terrible sight:
A small girl running, screaming in fear
as a wolf closed on in for a bite.
I hesitated for just a moment,
the sun was high enough that I would burn,
but the terrified cries of a five-year old
were not something from which I could turn.
I sprinted out with unnatural speed,
instantly my skin erupted in flames,
raced past the girl, thrust my burning hand
to the wolf with jaws of snapping rage.
The fire seared both myself and the beast,
with frantic yelps of pain he then ran off,
I staggered back, my pale skin burned to black,
bits of flesh had flaked off and were lost.
I made it back to the small gatehouse
and I collapsed in the shadows within,
the abbot ran close, with my fading strength
I weakly tried to say goodbye to him.
But he just looked down, said,”We need blood.
Run to the chapel and fetch me the wine!”
A brother raced off, returned with the jug,
made no sense to my greatly pained mind.
He filled a chalice, look to the Heavens,
said,”Lord, I know that I am no priest.
But if he must die, let him drink of Your blood,
let him take part at last in Your mercy.”
I felt this would be a fitting way to die,
burned by the holy blood of my Lord.
But when I drank I did not feel the fire,
in fact I didn’t feel pain anymore!
I didn’t see it myself, but they say
that the charred skin beat a fast retreat,
and through the haze I managed to feel
a deep breath and a steady heart-beat!
When I sat up the sun came through a window
and it fell harmlessly upon my skin,
I felt true hunger, thirty years overdue,
by His power I once more was human!
They said In Him All Things Are Possible,
and I suppose I am the living truth,
strangest of all I still looked a young man,
blessed with the power and passion of youth...
CONCLUDES IN PART IV.
IV.
I believed I was done with the vampire ways
and gave thanks for all that had transpired,
but before three months passed, from just outside
I heard the vicious insults of my sire.
Cannot say what pushed me to go out there,
all my brothers urged me to remain,
just given back life by a miracle,
to face such a creature seemed insane.
But on I went to that familiar form
who sniffed curiously at the air.
He snarled,”How is it you smell like a man?”
I said,”His power lifted me from despair.”
My sire laughed,”Do you expect me
to believe you prayed yourself back to life?”
“It wasn’t my prayers, it was His grace
that saved me from this unholy blight.”
Then he roared loud, teeth flashing horribly,
cried,”Your god has just wasted his time!
I will not let him take you from me,
Your life and your soul are both mine!”
He leapt forwards, and I did not move
as his fangs sank deep and he started to drink,
in two dozen seconds he leapt away,
and back from my presence he did shrink.
He screeched in pain and shouted wildly:
“What’s in your blood! I can feel it burn!”
As his body slowly started to decay
I said,”It’s nothing that you haven’t earned.
“You know vampires have no blood of their own,
and must feed on others to survive.
I had none so the Lord lent me His,
it’s something holy that now flows inside.”
My sire fell back, and his body dissolved
to the corpse it long ago should have been,
the vampires he sired, they all died too,
except for me since I was now human.
A final weighed seemed to lift off my back,
and I turned without another word,
walked back to the brothers, glad that I had
three or four decades before me to serve.
I.
In the year sixteen hundred and thirty-five
I was a fool young man known as Ludwig,
back from the wars and flush with new money,
spent it on fine whores and copious drink.
One pale lady led me out into the street
where her pimp stood in shinning moonlight,
he smiled at her, said,”How nice of you,
I was thinking of feasting tonight.”
Before I could even start to react
his fangs had sank deep into my neck,
she joined in too, this woman I had held,
I black out and don’t recall what came next.
When I came too I was in a dark cave
and cried out, thankful that I was alive,
yet when I tried to walk t in the sun
it seared and sizzled my ghost-pale hide.
I’d never believed the legends were true,
but I now had no breath or heart-beat,
and when the sun set, I went out for food,
no meal would satisfy my deep cravings.
I made it six days, or should I say nights,
before the hunger overcame my will,
stalked a poor post-rider in the countyside,
recall the screams that came from my first kill.
I felt something within crumble that day,
a hollow emptiness grew deep inside,
knowing that with every kill that I made
meant another piece of my soul had died.
Before long I fled my Bavaria,
the peoples were getting restless and mean,
traveled across Europe, moving often,
forced to ‘live’ by acts heinous and obscene.
It was in Scotland three long years later,
hiding in the highlands from an angry mob,
unable to come out for days on end,
the growing hunger, it painfully throbbed.
When turned a vampire loses their blood
which causes their bodies to shut down,
I was so hungry I was driven mad,
in my mania I drained dry a cow!
Then to my surprise I felt the hunger
fade away and leave me feeling all-right,
it was any blood that would slake my thirst,
I didn’t have to take any more lives!
You think this would improve my situation,
but in truth it hurt me all the more,
couldn’t help but ask why had I never
bothered to ask this question before?
All the lives I had brought to an end,
all the families I had let bereft,
gad I the wits to ask these questions then
not a one would’ve had to face death.
The truth of these failings hounded my heels,
there was to be no peace within me,
until one night in France I came upon
ancient stone walls of a monastery…
CONTINUES IN PART II
Would it Have Ended Differently?
One
Raindrop falls,
Bare feet on stone.
Her silence, rain-soaked halls,
Prayers drift with the drizzle.
Candles flicker, uncertain, dim.
Her robe clings, damp against her skin,
Questions weep from the sodden silence.
If belief had bloomed, would she remain?
Or did her path always dissolve in rain?
If intent be pure,
outcomes as may be any,
oh hermit, all’s forgiven.
Nonjudgmental eye
observes waves in the ocean,
according no preference.
No one comes and no one goes
as Self dwelling in heart knows,
sipping love’s magic potion,
observing life in motion.
Passions squashed, ego exhumed,
presence with bliss mists perfumed,
nonchalant to quirks of fate,
the monk stands at heaven’s gate.
As bliss in-pours through heart’s door,
non-judging eye keeps no score,
holding all in embrace,
seeing in all hearts, God’s face.
With bliss as the monk’s consort,
stance erect without support,
attachments having let go,
his abode is the bardo.
Love is a ship
that already sailed
Once upon my lips
but in reality failed
I am not sad
It’s a super power
Experience that
Is a healing tower
Is better to love
Even if you lose
It builds you up
To skies of blues
I am content now
Knowing I am love
I write it down
All my tender stuff
The monk told me
It would distract
But I boldly
Didn’t listen to that
I’m a free spirit
Who’ll always love
I can feel it
From God above
Coffee is a reasonable substitute
for spirit possession.
Surely your heart will tremble,
open the gateway
for earthquakes to exist
within the fault lines
of your fingers —
but at least your pants will be piss free
when the officer asks you
to dance along the straight line.
And when he asks, “are you nervous?”
you’ll respond in the affirmative.
Explain how since 1996
you’ve been waiting for the day
an asteroid directly impacts your car
as you sip espresso
heading southbound on the I-10,
on your way to work.
And you won’t have to explain to your coworker
why your pants are missing,
ass in the air,
bad decisions spilled
on the fresh mopped floor —
dreading the ride in,
knowing he knows
you’d never compete
with his fresh ironed shirt.
This morning I chose slow drip,
because life moves fast enough.
There once was a monk with a wave
Who desired a head with a shave ...
Well, the barber was such
That she cut back too much
Thereby leaving his globus concave
When all around was cold and white,
The kindly monk set out that night;
His dogs were trusty, he was strong,
Prepared to search the whole night long.
He covered miles of icy ground
And wouldn’t stop until he found
The orphans stranded in the snow -
His dogs would know which way to go.
The blizzard blinding, muffling noise,
The friar prayed he’d find the boys.
His dogs discovered huddled forms:
The brothers frozen in the storms.
Alas, the monk arrived too late,
And wept about the children’s fate.
For Isaiah’s Let It Snow contest, inspired by the picture of a monk and his St Bernard dogs
The Monk and His Genes
George Gregor Mendel.
Socialized with beans and tendrils.
He never planned to marry
After he and genes did tarry.
© Dane Ann Smith-Johnsen
January 22, 2010
Poetic form: Clerihew
“The Monk Windows, Ravens, Angels and Embryos Forming”
Dawn arrives
in the black and white
misunderstood in the abstract
you can see the
embryos of thought forming
always inside us
the children
white angel wings
cover sleeping pages
where raven wings
spread like evensong
in storm clouds cutting
through the dissolving glass
lighter things
are never as they appear
like windows forming
where black monks stand
commanding their understanding
and the ghosts of the future
call the fallen years back in
holding court
staring back with their
vacant hollow faces
waiting for some repetitive
tiring confession from
the yawning windows
before their irreverent blessing
you listen for the sound
that follows the lightening
but all you hear is
the loud beating
of your heart
falling through
the soul’s hourglass
it’s over-percolated dripping
lighter things
are never as they appear
like windows forming
where black monks stand
commanding their understanding
Dawn arrives
in the black and white
misunderstood in the abstract
you can see the
embryos of thought forming
always inside us
the children
the message
sealed for breaking
through the glass house
and its never-ending ceilings
(LadyLabyrinth / 2022)
gvlm
“Window” / HVOB
https://youtu.be/rDNGrBY512w
I am like a Siberian tiger
Creeping through taigas
Looking for great power
A letter arrived one evening
Praising my hypnotic gaze
And you craving a carnal touch
I arrived with a prophecy
My magic cured Tsarina’s son
And led me up to autocracy
You can shoot me, poison me
But I will rise again, you will see
The evil protects me eternally