It Is Not Necessary

It is not necessary to demean yourself
Or to dramatize your life
(it is not a fiction
and neither are you).

The proliferation of things has brought us scant riches.

I grieve for the poverty of plenty,
for the ignorance of knowledge. 

Our souls do not long for complication. 

True nourishment is simple fare:
taste, touch, smell, sound, sight. 

The heart loves
The mind thinks
The stomach digests
You are the perfect orchestration of being,
an instrument of wonder. 

(It is not necessary to demean yourself). 

To Whom It May Concern

Stop. Just stop. 
Stop warring, aggressing and fighting. 
Stop pontificating, aggrandizing and diminishing. 
Stop consuming like you do
and stop despoiling the earth. 

Stop denying and lying. 
Stop killing, maiming, torturing, abusing and raping. 
Stop bullying, cajoling, intimidating, threatening, endangering.
Stop competing, favouring, trumpeting, boasting. 
Stop manipulating, disempowering, swindling and profiteering.
Stop terrorizing.like you do. 
You know who you are. 

Stop. Just stop. 

Still Standing

Without self-pity
Standing still, 
and still standing
having with-stood those waves
that threaten to obliterate:
shame, pain, grief. 

I simply stand
Not bowing, but willing
A stand neither rigid nor flaccid

I Am:
no more, no less. 

Water and rock,
we flow and contain
we are motion and stillness both.

All this life already come and gone,
and still you stand
because You Are:
no more, no less. 

The Walls of Jericho

What if we died to division,

to my-way-or-the-highway,

to squabbles, large or small,

to she-said-he-said,

feelings, good or bad

or memories, ditto?

What if we died to the sacred cows

of suffering, pleasure and pain,

to yes-but, if-only and not-now?

What if we died to the whole shebang?

To buying and selling,

to preaching and prostrating,

to taking a stance,

making a claim, or

having an opinion (right)

which makes yours (wrong)?

What if we stopped

and the walls of Jericho fell?

Iconoclasm

Body and soul were cleft,

cathedrals built on the bones of women

and wombs made unclean

Creation stemmed and stymied

by the sheer pain of denying that flesh is spirit

We went from true communion among us

to looking up to some idea of god

It is not that you are not your body,

for your body is the most sublime creation of what you are -

creativity made flesh

so that it may create -

Your constant companion through all your travails

The bearer of your sorrows

Worship not god but hand, eye, foot, breast

The true bringers of love and sustenance

Dismantle your temples and shrines

Make your icons ordinary

Tend to the divine in your midst

This wound runs deep in us all.