“a heartbeat pulsating as living light
free from each and every limitation
I Am that dwelling in unbound delight
the source wherefrom arises creation”
My compass is set:
Forward alignmed by faith through grace.
I do not control life’s challenges,
but I command my response.
I am that I live for my purpose,
not for the world’s praise.
I do not bend;
I do not break;
I do not look back.
I am that, I am of a human sponge,
Whom listens, observers and absorbs lifes lessons and learn from its mistakes!
For this is my creed!
(“The Cave of Unknowing”, 2012, original oil)
In dreams the interface between known
And unknown
Is as clear and simple as turning a card.
What was previously unknown
Becomes revealed,
The dream simply a series of such moments,
As the unconscious unfolds each moment.
Waking life is different,
More ambiguous as if consciousness
Is just the tip of a mountain above a sea of clouds,
So much unknown, but yet accepted as such,
A background sustaining what is
Merely personal and fleeting,
Our place in the world,
Our steps on the path we travel,
But all too often with uncertainty,
Certainly without the clarity of a dream
Unfolding with each ripe symbolic moment.
And then in life death comes,
The ultimate unknown
Revealed at last
Personal and fleeting, or
Universal and eternal…
Revealed but perhaps never grasped.
Such is the difference in dreams
And waking life,
Although both are clearly determined,
The unknown becomes the known,
And known the unknown,
In completely different way.
(8/31/26)
as dreams within dreams unfold
teaching same, stories retold,
shapes shift, gripping us in trance
till erect becomes soul’s stance
earth life continues to test
but with consciousness at rest
we flow with ease like the breeze
mood and mode embrace release
Whilst here roomed do moor
Away from its shore
The true homeland's, are yet found
To be nowhere bound.
Warm, safe, life-rested
When for it hoisted
Strain against whose stress, ongoing
Blows for lost feeling.
Physical reality feels heavy, permanent and real,
but is actually a temporary form, like a dream;
the dreams feels real because our mind made it,
from the physical world- it is a trick in believing.
But if we chose to not conform we wake up,
the moment we stop clinging and striving;
and let go of attachments and ego desires,
the illusion fades- wake up from the dream.
Wake up to a deeper, more spiritual reality,
a reality where wants and needs are quiet;
we realize this temporary existence is a phase,
desires and attachments are powerful anchors.
Only in awakening and letting go of ego,
can we let go of the material junk in life;
life is an illusion, a misleading image,
it deceives like a magician's sleight of hand.
I didn’t earn the breath that woke me,
or the pulse that carried me through years
I never knew I’d survive.
Life arrived as a quiet God-given gift~
placed in my hands
before I knew how to hold anything,
before I knew how fragile a heartbeat could be.
Still it keeps unfolding,
a soft mercy that meets me
every new morning,
reminding me I was given this world
not to perfect it,
but simply to live inside it
with whatever grace I can give back.
Beyond the values of time
Beyond the mountains and the valleys
Through the caresses of the wind
You are invited home.
Beyond the grey walls
Beyond the heads bowed in innocence
By the sky’s candid bird
You are invited home.
Beyond the gaze, the frozen fountain
Beyond the church, our sorrows
By this hand shaping the stone of the past
You are invited home.
Beyond the paths where leaves lie hidden
Beyond the sky filled with golden dust
By memories faithful to our thoughts
You are invited home.
Beyond the sensations of what is already seen
Beyond the whirlwinds of what will not return
By the gentleness of a child
You are invited home.
Beyond all hatred and refusal
Beyond ignoble hypocrisy
By the one who suffers, cast aside
You are invited home.
Beyond hidden poverty
Beyond revealed wealth
By the silence that lulls our will
You are invited home.
To avoid the worst, anger
To convince, beauty
To soothe, silence
To be fair, equality.
For all this and much more
Nature keeps Freedom.
Joël Charvillat
As I awake each morning, it’s a new day, for me to learn,
as I walk through the fires, my soul does not get burned.
I am no longer, the man, I use to be,
for as I rise daily, the fires now strengthen me.
The trials and tribulations, of this day, that I must face,
going through the refiners fire, I am saved in Mercy and Grace.
In the truths that He has shown me, as I walk in this light,
I’m guided by His Spirit, to be that which is right.
For, He’s an ever consuming Fire, burning off all my chaff,
allowing me to join in, with the Angels, a Holy laugh.
For things are not as though, they appear to be,
once I was blind, to these things, but now I can see.
I now seek those Spiritual things,
which keeps me from, these deadly stings.
Giving love for hate, peace for strife, I turn myself around,
I begin walking, in the truth, that I have found.
Led by His Spirit, the Truth, becomes my stand,
and when I touch the darkness, my fire’s, now get fanned.
So what if I die—
not too soon,
not the way I expect,
but suddenly, without warning?
After a quarrel with Mom,
storming out with a burning face,
cursing and blaming—
will heaven still accept me?
Or after my wife is pregnant
with a boy who must learn
how to exist in this edited world—
will he live to see the man I hoped to be?
Or after graduation,
my parents proud,
friends and teachers full of praise—
would my death make their sacrifices wasted?
Or at old age, past eighty-five,
dreams fulfilled,
a happy family and shelves of trophies—
is that the right way to die?
What if I died before five?
No dreams yet, only a small bright face.
The sorrow would belong to family—
would I be a forgotten dream?
Perhaps no death is planned.
It never knocks; it breaks in
and carries the soul away,
whether young, too young, old, or old enough.
Death knows its hour,
decreed by God.
So when a soul leaves the body,
do not cry too long.
Pray that the soul finds peace in the grave
and paradise in the hereafter.
The weapons of mass destruction, is in the hearts of men,
living in the darkness, festering up our sin.
When hate, hurt, and anger, are the stressors of our day,
when our hearts are disturbed, the world is gonna pay.
All these things are boiling, stirring in the heart,
the weapons of mass destruction, about to do it’s part.
Anger, hatred, and revenge, begins to take it’s form,
arising up inside us, is a very toxic storm.
The power of our words, the weights that they bare,
weapons of mass destruction, now flying in the air.
There is power of life and death, in our tongues you see,
with weapons of mass destruction, we destroy both you and me.
As we live daily, in this world you see,
somethings are not, as they appear to be.
Some people have masks, they wear very well,
the evil in their tongues, in their lives, you can tell.
The words they speak, from the company they keep,
kills the hearts of those, who’s counted as Gods sheep.
With their words as weapons, their tongues made of steel,
roaming about, but to steal, to destroy and kill.
To put out the light, that shines in the world you see,
all the goodness thats inside, of you and me.
To wear us down, in the webs that they weave,
in our heart, the stings it truly leaves.
The stings of death, while we yet live,
till from the heart, love is hard to give.
To intertwine the good, and evil’s, again you see,
how it truly kills the light, in you and me.
The light is the Truth, that guides our path,
it keeps us from being, a creature of wrath.
To be different, a creature of Gods beauty, we are to remain,
as from the ways of our own darkness, we refrain.
For the masks, are many, and true people are few,
and when the time of our darkness is over, the sun drinks up, it’s mourning dew.
Take my savory words you, I’ll take yours if kind,
let go the ways to wicked wharfs, the way putrefies
away from stagnate depths of opaque layers grind
for those without weakness those of you rise
without the wormwood spells of bitter taste
Kind ways stagnate weakness and bitterness
Phoenix Sixain excerpt from The Pathless Path 5/20/26
When we kill, hurt, and wound, with our words you see,
then also by the words of others, affected we will be.
To stop the fiery darts, them we should not throw,
whatsoever we give out, inside us begins to grow.
How can we play with a hornets nest, and not expect to get stung,
how can we not be affected, by the words of our own tongue.
How can we find peace, when we’re so willing to put up a fight,
how can we not get bitten, when we’re so eager to bite.
When we walk willingly, with the bitterness you see,
one against another, is how it will always be.
Destroying one another, and casting our shadows of death,
instead of giving life, we take each other’s breath.
Living in this way, to us all, brings death, inwardly,
if we can help each other die so well, then why not to live, you see.
When we give life, to those things, that only bring death,
then we are truly, killing our life’s breath.
It turns our hearts, toward the darkness, you see,
when with our words, we bring forth misery,
We then destroy, our own hearts, as we live,
as we are judged by others, in what we give.
If we don’t change, the way we live you see,
then this life, will change you and me.
Deeper and deeper, in despair we go,
when, in this life style, we choose to flow.
Trying to live, and never understanding, how or why,
when we speak those things, that only bring death, we also begin to die.
Life or death, is set in front of us you see,
those things we speak, come forth to be.
Begin to speak only words, that brings forth life,
and in our hearts, the truth, will overcome the strife.
As I journey through a path of thorns,
angels with pruning shears clear my path!
They clear the way and sound the horn,
as I journey through a path of thorns...
I’m reminded of the crown He’s worn,
when He saved from sin and Judgment’s wrath!
As I journey through a path of thorns,
angels with pruning shears clear my path!
Sub Categories
Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.