Archive for Poetry

Enchanted Rock

{ 2007 September 10 @ 9:43 pm } · { Composition, Creativity, Design, Fiction, Meditation, Poetry }
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As great and ebon pillars frame
The vaulted granite and nurture the
Bell-watcher, so do overarching
Branches bower all I feel
From this bough-strung, airy cot.
Ah! God’s world! Yes, He made it for us
And lives astride it; and by prayer
And right living, from within
The forest grove we may yet
See him in our minds; crouched
Heavily on his gilt-leaden throne,
Dizzying white to even most-exalted
Human brain. O! Lord of lords!
Highest of the high! Thou art First
And Last, Means and Measure of ev’ry
Plastic, fallible thing of thy creation.
O! To live and be with Thee
Above this dreary world of decay.
To shine forever with the unfalt’ring
Blaze of motionless stars,
Ne’er to feel the pangs of love lost
Or unrequited; ne’er to see the last
Embers of a brother’s once-flaring
Vitality slowly fade into engulfing
Darkness; O! The mere hint of a thought
From thy most Perfect Intellect
Instantly manifests infinitudes of worlds,
Inhabited with creatures of Purity and Grace:
Great winged lions Pneuma-lifted,
Reconnoitre and pounce on the Imperfect:
Twisted, knotting flesh succumbs to
Tooth and claw; the loveliest of womankind
Stroll through fields of primrose, fine garments
Flowing about their bosoms; they help
One another out of their twisted tangles
Of fabric and one by one dive
Into wat’ry ablution, singing
“Hail Mary, full of Grace!
Turn to us thy Perfect Face!
When thou seest what we have done,
Thy wrath shall fall’st upon thy Son!”

O! were the base and lower creatures
Of this sticky, fragile valley grand
As that pinion’d enforcer of Heavenly Law!
Were men and women Heavenward lifted
And purged of whimsical carnal desires!
O! were the very ground upon
Which we standeth steadfast
As thy Word, O Lord! Through me
Sing thy empowering songs of creation!

Atop the precipice of this enchanted rock
I survey the confused maze of human
Order, god-like; from darkness beneath
My forward-looking eyes emerges
A pure, sinuous drone to which beats
The rhythm of my heart and synchronously
The receding ripples of hill and dale.
Obscuring a nearer peak, mists hover
And all signs of life smother:
Thick cloud of acid rain casts
Sheets of death over all it darkens;
But as it passes to a succeeding vale
The light of my seeing beholds a peak
Recreated: bright with new-budding flowers’
Open invitations to free-roaming bees;
New-branching trees reach out
To embrace and enfold the very reaches
Of Heaven; river trout play and burst
The dancing and splashy surface of bubbly
Bourne, drunk on crispy post-shower
Air. Spots of such cloud obscure
Variously among my vista, carried upon
Viewless, inconstant winds that now billow
Up from below, now beat me from beside,
Now tease nape-hairs in subtle desultory tugs.

O! Enchanted rock! Still
And silent forever in thy massive permanence!
Though divine breeze buffet thy barren slopes,
Though soft rain pound thy granite shores,
Though warming sun bake thy stressless crevices,
Still dost thou stand, irresponsive, silent
But for the moaning blasts that gust amain
Through thy mysterious caves and crags;
Still dost thy sheer mass and impenetrability
Impress upon this mutable earth
Thy imposing form, stamping thy design
Upon this world of immediate sensation.

* * *

Down into the hallows of the rock
We travel, disembodied and borne
Aloft by the selfsame wind that carries
The Word from its berth among inner caverns
Out into the world and now back again,
Having deposited in that soddy vale
The heavy crudities of its broadest meaning.
As we delve deeper into the ancient darkness,
The air loses its warmth and likewise
The caverns slow-shine of an alien light
Of unknown yet steady hue,
Like the chill, eternal night
Of arctic borea. Here are frozen
In perfect magnitude beauties in essence:
I reach to touch upon first sight
A band of pure gold inlaid with dazzling diamonds–
My hand flinches in quick retreat
From inhuman cold. Borne now
To a deeper, vaulted chamber
Which roof is crystalline to sight
Even at this impossibly eternal height,
Cistene figures imag’d of most brilliant
Shapes and colours caught mid-step–:
Beautiful serpent coyly coiled
Upon that cursed apple tree,
Fruit of Knowledge yet upon
The lips of ambitious Eve;
Damned, lonely Adam ever
Reaching, tantalised by God’s closeness,
The sight of whose Infinite Being upwells
In him an ever more aching hunger.

My heart cries out for the guiltless souls
Of physical First Man and Woman,
And though in Heaven ripe fruit ne’er falls,
On earth it does, and when it lands
In the lazy lap of a dozing poet,
The dreamer wakes and the hungry eat.

Earth My Body

{ 2007 August 27 @ 8:14 pm } · { Creativity, Love, Meditation, Music, Music Composition, Music Production, Peace, Poetry }
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My old friend Dell is helping me with “Earth My Body,” which is a song taught to me by this great guy Kaj (pron: “kai”) at the Kerrville Folk Festival back in, say, 1991. Simple words:

Earth my body,

water my blood,

wind my breath,

and fire my spirit.

For my first two years at Kerrville, drum circles were just kick-ass: very often, very nice, very humbling, spiritual, powerful, communal. Exactly what my soul desired at the time (and has been craving ever since). (Since the KFF is a "songwriter’s" festival, KFF, Inc. officially banned drums after my second year– quite probably as a direct result of our drumming– which was, to me, at least, and i know to most anyone who was present at this particular circle– among the most divine experiences in my life.)

One evening, on the back of Chapel Hill, the darkest, quietest, most sacred spot on the ranch…

…nice fire,

a dozen or more beautiful hippies,

clear sky, no moon.

lots of stars.

smallish fire.

 

Kaj starts this beat.

He’d taught me this song earlier,

so i knew it. Dropped right in with my talking drum,

got it going.

Organically, grows.

People join in as their spirit gets it–

“gets” it.

Groks it.

All of it going on: super-natural.

Kaj starts singing.

I join.

We sing in unison for quite some time,

and one by one,

people start joining in,

start singing in this unison, this one song…

Once this feeling, this communal bond, is established,

i add a harmony,

the 5th,

very quietly at first,

blending it in as just an overtone.

And it grows.

Soon others join in the harmony as well.

i add the 3rd,

quietly at first,

and soon all three parts are going,

and everyone is feeling it,

knowing,

that–

this is something special!

Everybody knows it, is singing,

playing, harmonizing,

the spirit of the song so growing organically,

moving us all

from the inside

to play as IT

–the SONG–

wants to be played, to be manifested in this plane of reality…

for she is the message,

and we, the messengers…

And i’m on fucking autopilot–

dun-dun talking away–

talking with–

–holding conversations with–

every individual musician/instrument-combination in the circle–

taking turns, listening, responding–

listen/reply–

hear/say–

joke/laugh–

cry/weep–

bless/thanks–

spit/spat–

The spirit rises–

we are all orbiting Pluto–

the stars spinning round our heads–

the gods whirling ‘twixt our souls–

hearts beat in time–

the earth throbs with us–

fire-sparks join our spirits rising–

the wind sings harmonies in the trees octaves higher–

energies race to the farthest oceans of space–

brightening the darkness

all around us,

within us

…

eventually we drop;

we feel the spirit quiet.

As one, we fade,

leaving only the crackling of the fire,

the chirping of the crickets,

the wind, still calling our universal names…

In silence, we all exhale,

for the first time in 20 minutes

(though it seems lifetimes).

i look up at the stars and think,

“wow! look at the stars!”

i hear a voice across the circle whisper:

“wow! look at the stars!”

i think to myself, “this must be God,”

another voice across the way:

“this must be God.”

i think to myself: “I am THIRSTY!!!”

someone hands me a bottle of water.

Like that.

–

Anyway, it’s such a wonderful, meditative chant on our inner connection with our world. It’s always stayed with me, and I always wanted to lay down some kind of version of it. So, finally, in the summer of ‘05, i did. But I’m not perfectly happy with it, so just a few nights ago, I was iChatting with Dell, and he brought up again how he’d like to do some collaboration over the internet, like I’m doing with Jon. So, right there I tell him about “Earth My Body,” and he says, “send send.”

So, I’m excited about music again. Lots of it going on in my life right now… just need some money to be able to keep it coming. Oh, Brotherhood of God, help me open the God-Mind connection, to manifest greatness and goodness, joy and health, for the greater good of the Universe and Everyone Concerned…

Kirtan: the Yoga of Singing. Of Course.

{ 2006 August 23 @ 12:05 pm } · { Change, Creativity, Family, Love, Meditation, Music, Music Production, Peace, Poetry }
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Just heard Jai Uttal and his group (Jai Uttal and the pagan love orchestra) singing “Om Nemah Shivaya”, a gorgeous Hare Krishna-esque chant from their “Nectar” album. Upon visiting his website, I’ve discovered that there is– suprise!– a “yoga of singing,” called “kirtan.” And here is some information about a workshop Uttal will be holding around the turn of the new year.

What a wonderful thing! As I heard the song, a call-and-response singalong, I just couldn’t help but sing along. And soon, I was picturing in my head “my people.” My future. The dream of my future, in a beautiful, natural setting, with my friends and family surrounding me, all of us singing together in this beautiful sound, feeling and sharing love and smiles.

Kirtan. The Yoga of Singing. Of course.

“Tree-House”

{ 2003 October 1 @ 11:45 pm } · { Composition, Creativity, Family, Love, Peace, Poetry, Therapy, writing }
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http://yugen.files.wordpress.com/2006/06/Milena-sm.png
M’s Birthday Poem- v2

Tree-House

This is our tree-house.
It asks nothing of us.

When i first saw her
i was enchanted.
My heart sang that night–
there was communion, there was community.

As we grew closer, her depth drew me in,
both strange and beautiful,
i fell.

At first the fear was too strong,
the mystery too dark,
the exotic too alien.

So i kicked her away, once, then again, and yet again…

But she was infinitely patient.

And now i find…

I want to crawl inside her,
like a seed,
that sprouts roots inside her womb and branches out her heart
to enfold the world,
to embrace the local and the lonely;
To bare our one soul
to whatever rays of sunlight find their way
to our green, green cells.
And like chlorophyll transform that warmth,
transform that light,
transform the shit,
the decay,
the death,
in which we are rooted…

And like the branch that lengthens,
buds,
grows,
reaches–
constantly reaches out,
i want to find that which isn’t me–
but in fact just may be me,
and in fact is me…?

And the strange and new become comfortable and home,
and what’s mine is yours and what’s yours is mine…

Our tree-house is equal parts darkness and light,
with a seedy underbelly dragging itself across mud & muck,
and a shimmering pearly-white pate shining brightly above the treetops.

And like our branches reaching up and away,
our roots, too, reach down and out.
They get dirty, get mean, get raunchy;
Squeezin’ that slime ‘tween their toes,
Grindin’ up stones;
Suckling sweet sustenance at the breast of the earth.

Out at one end of our tree-house
bubbles a cool pond–
spring-nourished, waterfall-fed,
nestled comfortably in a clearing
‘twixt our tree and a cliff.
And in the refreshing depths we sleep
and dream of golden-scaled mermen
and -women of silky sensuality carving curves inside curves,
while mer-children splash & play in the shallows,
and yellow-white butterflies dodge and dart
‘twixt the glinting droplets and rays.

At another end, a clearing,
where local two-leggeds lean
toward their thumping boxes,
then lean away,
lean toward,
and lean away,
in a twisting, writhing series of sumptuous thumps.
And others twist and writhe toward the sounds,
away and toward,
toward and away,
arms flinging, hands pushing,
at each other but not on.
And around a crackling fire they chant
and sing, and make joyful noises
at the fullest hours of night,
howling at the moon, lifting their hearts,
falling and flailing, twisting and turning,
until first light arrives,
and the noises of the day finally overtake their tired songs.

This is our tree-house,
situated softly in the center of the place where we are.
The tree asks nothing of us.

But we see.
We feel its syrupy veins,
and smell its sweet sap,
and slumber to the rocking
of its branches,
creaking in the night wind.

This is our tree-house,
which we have grown–
ourselves we have grown
this long and strong creature
with its reach beyond that of either of our own.

This is our tree-house.
It asks nothing of us.

– for M, 27 Sept, 2003