Air Vent Requiem

His muttered dialogue with Jesus
was apologetic and respectful,
politely drawing that Deity’s attention
to cosmic oversights.

The supermarket cart,
full of strange lumps and extrusions,
seemed a natural extension of self.
His eyes never viewed
a potential acquisition directly:
they fluttered, like children’s wishes,
skirting the object of desire,
until, overcome by belief,
he would pounce.

The temperature drop,
that negated the meagre warmth
of the hot air vent that was his home,
temporarily interrupted
his celestial conversation.

In the thin morning light,
the cart stands guard
over the still and huddled body,
like some alien monument
commemorating a battle
few have known.

October Changes

Waking this morning, I felt
that all my nerves
were dangling,
quivering
like the last leaves
of some ancient autumnal oak,
awaiting the quick
sharp
merciful
breath of a north wind.

Later this morning, I felt
that all my senses
were growing
pulsing
like the first buds
of some young and vernal oak,
quickening in the warm
sweet
fresh
winds of spring.

Extrapolating this afternoon,
good humour recovered,
chuckling,
chortling,
at my germinating metaphor
on the oak of life:
my brain an acorn green,
small,
fragile,
but still to grow.

Not Unlike A Fruit Loop

(New to series:  Progression: These Are The Best Days Of My Life)

You can’t bring me down
with your tiny mind,
running around its hamster wheel.
You can’t harsh my buzz
with derisive words
of hate and dogmatic zeal.

You may think that you’ve found
an answer or two,
to invalidate all that I’ve said,
but your answers are stock,
without substance or proof:
now begone!  Get out of my head!

You tire me out, and I can’t make sense
of most of what you say:
your grammar and syntax abused.
Volume can’t replace content,
nor can myth replace fact,
but simplicity keeps you amused.

I am reminded of a fruit loop,
composed of nothing real,
and bright colours artificial:
one could eat the whole box
and be left with the thought
that this really is nothing special.

So I’ll just walk away and salvage
what little remains of my reason:
I’m not sure that you’ll know I have gone.
You will find some other ear to bend
and prattle away until it bleeds:
in the end, you will stand all alone.

Letting Go: The Lesson of the Mandala

(New to series:  Progression:  The Best Days of my Life)

Realities change:
the arrow of time is random
and chaotic.
Aging changes, often drastically,
the notion of self,
and to dwell upon what was
contaminates the joy of Now.

Release those acquaintances
who cannot become friends;
Cease endless dogmatic dialogues
containing faith, belief, and prayer.
Set free the essence of the young adult
you were so long ago;
Let go innate politeness
that makes excuses for the rude.
Dispense your focus on societal sadness,
embrace both love and peace.
Liberate your mind, controlled too long
by corporate Newspeak.
Unchain the propaganda
preaching tribal exclusivity.
Just let go
to Become.

Impermanence is the foundation
upon which each life is built,
and acceptance is to understand
the fullness of what is.
Letting go does not subtract,
but fulfills, enhancing
who you are.

Theoretical Paranoia

Sometimes, awake at night,
I fear that I shall find
my synapses all firing
in someone else’s mind.

As solid sleep eludes me
I can’t leave it unsaid,
through quantum entanglement,
I’m in some other’s head.

Or perhaps I could be walking,
just strolling with my dog,
visualizing strangeness that exists
in this quantum fog.

Is that a bird that I see,
or a leaf?  But then again,
it may be a weirdness peering
from a multi-dimensional brane.

With vibrating strings humming
through all that I’ve learned,
connecting the unseen and bizarre,
I’ll admit I’m a trifle concerned.

So many hypotheses in my thoughts
make me so tired and weary,
I’ll contemplate the Mandelbrot Set,
and switch to Chaos theory.

Elevation

(Further to the series:  On the Establishment, Care, and Maintenance of Personal Social Parameters)


The struggle,
and the weight
of trying:
reaching for a point
of departure.

Dropping the repetition,
putting away the routine,
the boredom,
the sameness,
of constant distraction.

Letting go of the spiels
of strident people
beleaguering their very own
hobby horses,
until the beast falls.

Unchaining from the distraction
of the reality of others:
setting aside the blackness
to which our masters
condition us.

Then rising, with song,
and a sense of joy
into the cool, crisp air of logic;
into the sunshine
that dwells within.

Sativa Cookie Moon

(Cannabis and Creative Cognition Series)


High above the silver-clothed bay
Selene rules.
She contemplates.
Several harbour islands
are black cutouts,
with scrub spruce 
starkly standing guard.
The stars are dimmed
with respect,
and more than a little awe.

The scene evokes
Black light posters
from the psychedelic age:
lifetimes ago.
All is imbued with a surreal peace.
One can sense the subtle presence
of a Universal Vibration,
and feel the sympathetic harmonic
of belonging,
while remaining separate,
and unique.

There is the sense,
the feel, of a shimmering curtain,
the nearness of another reality,
singing its own cosmic song
in the glowing velvet night.
The night breeze exhales,
and the goddess smiles
as the bay breaks
into silvery shards
of eternity:
reflecting past changes,
under far different,
and distant,
moons.

Greyhavens Meditation

(Anti)Social Media

(Further to the series:  On the Establishment, Care, and Maintenance of Personal Social Parameters)

This is my wall.
I hide behind it, peeking
timorously, eyes lowered:
hiding, not seeking.

This is my community.
My mask talks to your mask, 
reflecting nothing of self:
real exchange a traumatic task.

I have no idea who you are
if you should malign me,
but I don’t care: it is simply
my persona that you see.

We say, and we do,
and pretend that all is real;
but no emotions trickle through:
online just doesn’t feel.

I can blather on for hours,
and you may prattle too;
but exchange nothing of substance:
this is what we do.

Our faux avatars reflect
naught of whom we might be:
lost, lonely individuals;
anonymous, but free.

Graven in Stone

We are buried deep beneath
old tablets, made of stone.
These rules, made in another age,
command sinners to atone.

They teach us how to bear the weight
of suffering, pain, and woe,
by abandoning sense and logic,
for something we cannot know.

A stitch in time saves nine, they say,
and other folksy stuff:
and the tough get going
when the going gets tough.

It totals up to nothing
but a yoke to restrain your soul,
and make you more compliant
to those who would control.

There should only be one tablet,
(and it won’t come from above!)
and graven on it are the words
“Inclusion, Peace, and Love.”