Long Tensioned Poems

Polypathic conversation with David Holmgren:

Today it is common to hear the suggestion
[cooperative] education and [therapeutic] training
is the [mindful] key to allowing people to contribute
to a more sustainable [ecopolitical] future.

Although I recognize the value of formal...

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Could we be doing our best
to invest in Earth's cooperative health markets?
While you sell our most competitive killing machines
to our Saudi Arabian cousins.

Referencing this touchstone as an ecopolitical WinWin,
unlike Parisian multicultural investments in climate health,
as...

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Once upon this time
I was listening to the Christian Fathers
retell traditional stories
of God's election and predestination.

Predestination
is like being born into royalty,
power,
privileges of humane Earth's regenerative grace.

Election is more democratic.
Selection based on God's vote for mercy,
apparently,
because...

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Pied tidings of suburbian 
Magpies,
Squawking and squabbling,
Quarreling ferociously among 
Themselves - 
Rush to steal
From off the beleaguered bird 
tables,
To the annoyance of all concerned,
A much begrudged meal;
Before scurrying away into 
Unfrequented woodlands,
Marooned like islands in...

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When I was a male child
I prayed to an eternally mute dualdark goddess,
Gaia was our name
for each Other's
secular
sane
sacred
sacraments to share passion.

And so I heard bird songs
praising each day's anticipated Gaian glory,
everybody playing cooperatively nice,
or at...

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Let's do a bit of sacramental gaming.

Oh no, Dear!
That smells and sounds coldly inappropriate.
What would your great-grandmother say?

OK, well...
how about a mutually refining discussion
about theological system development?

That might be alright,
although heavy.
But, don't you mean the...

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Cooperative kindness to others
is a fake kindness
if this liberating word or freeing action
compromises your own integrity,
which is disintegrating thereby,
an unkindness
to your own healthy Ego with Other relationship.

WinLose compromising kindness toward all Others
is not a healthy...

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As I age
the formerly wide chasm between ecstasy and despair
grows narrower,
deeper.

I had not thought this an attribute of maturation,
quite the contrary,
but perhaps an aging crevice,
a thinning fracture
between played-out manic bliss, over-extended harvest,
and depression
nondually faces two...

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Growing up in twentieth century USA,
without a recent immigrant history,
nor a Native American indigenous heritage,
just another in-between victim 
of Straight WesternWhite Male privilege,

I recall a smirky fuss 
about Eastern mind/body connection,
pseudo-science,
nondual
nonviolent
inscrutable
paradoxical
unrealistic philosophy,
meditation as if medication.

It...

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There's something to be said
for doing the right thing,
even for the wrong reasons.

Reasons are about becoming, a work in progress,
as doing is about living, a lifetime process,
both fully where
and when
and why
and what
and how we are
each...

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the outline of the silhouette suggests a torso 
but a torso is not a man
the concentric circle emerges from the surface of the lake 
and the insect revolves in the center
if the air had consistency...

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Chaste and more graceful
Than the white canvassed Dhow:
Reclines sweet Nefertiti 
Upon a Blue Nile breeze.
Fabled entity more whiter
Than the purest white snow
That thickly blankets
And folds over the wide Pyrenees.

Dipped is thy beak 
Into a harvesters...

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II

And did his rash actions give this prince
Cause, in moments of troubling quietude,                 
To ruefully ponder on all which...

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Gracious smiles, a waiter waiting.
The service: quite nice actually.
The drinks cool and food sating
My average appetite factually;

Who knew they had coca cola here
In the middle of the desert... odd
Isn’t it? I ordered water and beer
And...

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Youngsters ,  
how to wait
of young people
maturity,
if they were born
yesterday...?
restrained gestures,
calm,
silence?
If they are bodies
tensioned,
hunting traps
checked,
boxes of
resonance...
Wait for them to speak
any less,
shake less?
Whether they are amplifiers
street vendors,
are adrenaline
and steel,
volcanoes in
boiling...
barely even tired
beat them ...
They are...

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Talents hidden
Reflected on ones talents hidden
Yearns to find ones way to go
Within the worlds we know 
Between objective unknowns 
of subjective known’s
Perceptive to its elements
mastered needful inclinations 
through journeys deep and long

Maladapted to injustice
to gain...

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Archers ballad… 

My arrows take flight,
Steady, straight and true,
Measured breath, careful aim
Tensioned sinew over bone
Sun glistened on sweaty brow,
Sharpened points, purposed for difference,
I release you, release you,
Piercing air and realm of spirit, like you pierce...

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The intended was upended
by upshots unexpected.
Star burrts of ramifications
shot into the air
despite all efforts to stop them.
It was like trying to control
an armful of crazy cats 
frightened by a dog.
Cries and scratches flew
as intended harmony
became...

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She walks away.

Girlish and glorious
laughter
floats
through air
like a kite on a string
that pulls
tautly slipping through tightened fingers,
burning a little,
and slicing through 
if ever left unattended,

so preciously tensioned
against the cold
benumbing
wind. 

Tears begin to flow
but I do not...

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