End of the year...John O'Donohue

 

At The End Of The Year

— A Blessing by John O’Donohue

As this year draws to its end,
We give thanks for the gifts it brought
And how they became inlaid within
Where neither time nor tide can touch them.

The days when the veil lifted
And the soul could see delight;
When a quiver caressed the heart
In the sheer exuberance of being here.

Surprises that came awake
In forgotten corners of old fields
Where expectation seemed to have quenched.

The slow, brooding times
When all was awkward
And the wave in the mind
Pierced every sore with salt.

The darkened days that stopped
The confidence of the dawn.

Days when beloved faces shone brighter
With light from beyond themselves;
And from the granite of some secret sorrow
A stream of buried tears loosened.

We bless this year for all we learned,
For all we loved and lost
And for the quiet way it brought us
Nearer to our invisible destination.

---

Happy New Year..!!

 

Happy New Year..!!

The old story:

Out with the old

In with the new..

Illusory time

Provides the

Apparent

Separation of years

And scenes and colors

And seems as

Inexpressible

Joy dressing as 

What is happening

In exhilaration and

Shadow...

Empty Poems of This Love (Tim Cliss)

 

Much ink is spilled in attempts to explain what is called

"non-duality."   The non-dual (not-two) message is utterly 

simple..yet made seemingly complex by many, in their 

expansiveness of words applying to what is unexplainable.  

Tim's book of poems responds, inviting the reader to rest and

resonate with the paradoxical nature of his poetic and 

simple expression.  The book is a bridge to the peace which 

passes all understanding...

Red and blue..

 

Blue

Appears as red

And red blue..

There is no blue

No red..

Only the

Paradoxical

Appearances

Of each..

This

Already...

Wild goose chase..

 

Wild Goose Chase

Inspired by the erratic flying patterns of the bird, a goose chase was a game where riders trained their horses to conduct a series of difficult maneuvers, which others had to copy. Sort of like a game of HORSE, but with actual horses. In Romeo and Juliet, Mercutio mentions, “Nay, if our wits run the wild-goose chase, I am done.” Knowing how things turn out for the Mercutio and the young lovers, it makes sense that this phrase refers to a fruitless and complex (if not tragic) game of pursuit.

Decay

 

Decay

Seems as

A process of

Dying..

Life appears

That way..

Persistently..

Yet decay is

Simultaneously

Life and death..

Suggesting

The absence 

Of both...

Perception and conception..

Perception and

Conception..

Both are stories

Arising on an

Empty stage..

Inner and outer

Images 

Ways of seeing

Shaping of thoughts

Of explanations..

Yet..emptiness is

The only and

Inadequate

Explanation...

Metaphors mushrooming...

 

Metaphors

Often seen

As new aha's

In searching

Journeys..new

More satisfying

Versions of

A story..

These are

Many 

Mushrooming

Uncontrolled

Arisings of new

Searches for

Emptiness...

A floodgate..

 

A floodgate

Is opened in the

Meanderings of

Non duality

As THIS 

Resonates..

THIS excludes

No story..all

Stories can expand

Racing away as

The story of the

Expanding universe..

Words hang together

Somehow and can

Seem as infinity

Lives in each

Story as

THIS...

The thread of love...(Nancy Neithercut)

 Exploding Rainbows

Nancy Neithercut  · 

  · 

5.0 out of 5 stars The thread of love... 
By Charles R. Coon on March 3, 2022

Nancy is an unusual poet. It could be said that her poetry is
a reflection of what is called "non duality." However, she is
not bound to the same wordings and processes found in
modern non-duality, and prefers the sense of love as the thread
of all life. In "Just This Love" she writes: "this is a dance
without dancers... love without lovers... this infinite intimacy,
obviously without separation, without parts, without
being a thing called wholeness or one ness or any thing' at
all..." It might be said that simply absorbing her poetry,
without reference to ideas and constructs, will provide a
possibility of resonance with her message of love..which is
really the wishful goal of all searching. Nancy often refers
to a felt loss of solidity, separation, and boundaries..resulting
in a simultaneity and immediacy..and inviting participation

https://www.amazon.com/Just-This-Love-Nancy-Neithercut/dp/B09MYRFY6C/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

Christmas Eve...

 

Christmas Eve

With arctic air

Scurrying 

Failed plans

Gatherings

Smiles..

These snapshots

Are everything..

Which cannot

Be known..

Yet may be

A fulfilling

Story of

A birth of 

Peace exceeding 

Understanding...

Poet and poem...

 

No poet

No poem

But a showering

Of words

Of images 

Of a story

Not here 

Or there..

Spontaneity 

Playing 

With time...

DECEMBER 23

Wait and Gather

Poems don't come to much when they are written too soon. One should wait and gather the feelings and flavors of a whole life, and a long life if possible, and then, just at the end, one might perhaps be able to write ten good lines. For poems are not, as people sup- pose, emotions-those come easily and quickly enough. They are experiences.

For the sake of one line of poetry, one must see many cities, people, and things. One must be acquainted with animals and feel how the birds fly, and know the gestures of small flowers opening at the first light. One must be able to think back on paths taken through unknown places, on unanticipated meetings, and on farewells one had long seen coming, on days of childhood not yet understood; on parents one disappointed when they offered some pleasure one could not grasp (it was a pleasure suited to another); on childhood illnesses that came on so strangely, altering everything; on days in closed and quiet rooms and on mornings by the sea; on the sea itself, on all seas; on night journeys that rose and flew with the stars....

The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge

~~Rainer Maria Rilke

Miranda's gift! (Amazon review)

 

This Terrible Love, a nonduality dreamlife...

The title itself is her message.  It is the paradox of terrible love, which 

can  incite the reader to new realization of the reader's own absence as 

a separate individual. Yet there is an appearance of life dancing.  It is 

a freeing message, in which the customary belief in separation ends,  

as the dance begins.  Her message might be heard by anyone, regardless 

of their life story, or their skills on the dance floor!  

Miranda's gift!

Mystery...(Tribute to Joan Muir)

Mystery

Appearing as 

Mysteries of her life..

Rich mysteries she says:

Lost in a cornfield

Age 4..with Burke

A venture too far

Into the mystery..

The mysteries of

Animals

Singing

Cycling and running..

And her children

Grands and greats..

Over 90 years..

An inspiration

Rising in this

Christmastime as

Mystery...

(A tribute to Joan Muir)

War...

 

Sinister

And attractive is

The rising of war..

It is the story

Of separation

Dressed as glory

And sizzle..

But also as 

Suffering in

The extreme..

It appears

On stage

Unexplainably

Spontaneously

To no one..

As do

Other stories

Of explanation

Of nations

Of alley fights

Of peacemaking...

Death of the storyteller..

 

We are

Storytellers

In our speaking

Conversing

Interpreting..

Seemingly

Making sense of

The indescribable

Spontaneity of this..

Death of the

Storyteller

Frees the story

Telling itself

With a character

Fondly

Known as the

Storyteller...

The shift...

 The Shift – Lisa Lennon

*There is a seeming shift that happens when a contraction that believes itself to be a somebody, drops away. Everything that I am going to say about it is going to sound contradictory because when speaking in the story happens, the contradiction is that it never happened.*

*There appears to be a moment when the feeling of being a someone seems to drop. This is not an intellectual happening, it's like a release from the prison of going from a contracted sense of being a me to it being seen that it's always, this. There seems to be a period or process of leading up to that time that can be really, really painful for the me.*

*What happens is there can suddenly be just what is, (this vast nothing) and then the feeling of losing it and becoming contracted again seems to happen*. What seems to happen is, when the contracted sense of self comes back, there's then a looking for this again. What's seen is that sense of having to look for it again was only what was happening in this; it's just a happening.

It can be so energetically strong yet it can't be looked for because it is no thing. Nothing here knows that. *Nothing here knows that there was a me that died. It's an apparent collapse of a feeling of being somebody. It's like having a hood on, and it's taken off.* Sometimes experiences can go with that.

Here, there was a very strong experience that I didn't know if I was actually alive. I thought I was in some sort of dead limbo land. It was very strong. I'm calling it energetic because it's not like an understanding, it's not understood because there isn't anything to understand.

*There is no me that knows it's dropped. There is no me that knows it's died. There isn't anything here that can know that it's died. It's simply a shift from the feeling of being me to what is. Just this.*

It's here before there is any knowing of it. Knowing, is just a happening. The shift does not really take place, it's an appearance of it taking place because nothing knows it.

There is a seeming process of there being a me and then not a me. That to-ing and fro-ing between me and this can go on but that too can be seen that it's just a happening. Then, it apparently drops away, which can happen in many ways; it can be cool and it can also be quite dramatic. *There are no rules to this because it isn't a process. It either happens or it doesn't.*

*There's nothing that can get anyone to this because there isn't anybody.* *There isn't anyone here that can know that anyone's died. It's very clear that there wasn't anyone really there. It's just what it is. This, is all there is. That's what's left and no one knows it. There was never anyone to know it.*

Even this quote from the bible speaks of this, interesting! 

Amos 8:12. And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the LORD, and shall not find [it].

Nothing..

 

Nothing 

Of importance..

This is

A concept

A story..

Perhaps

Breaking the

Seeming

Hold of

Separation..

Nothing is

Not-two

And two...

The brain..

 

The brain

Seems to arise on

The stage of

Life..

Appearing in

Various scenes 

Scientific 

Poetic..and

Everyday..a

Dreamt 

Tool of perception

For a separate

Appearing world...

A story among

Stories..

Expressing the

Not-knowing...

The cosmic all-at-once...

A cosmic stage

The evening sky

Time and space

In wondrous display..

Yet..the view may

Seem as

Emptiness appearing

All-at-once

For no one at all..

Tales and teachings

May seem to

Sequence and separate

Yet these too may seem

All-at-once

This as that...

 

The wild geese..

 

The wild geese do not intend to cast their reflection.

The water has no mind to retain their image.

Alan Watts

Communication..

 

Communication

Seems paramount

In the ways of

Individuals..

Reinforcing the

Seeming

Two-ness of life..

However..the word 

Also appears for 

No one...

In which case

Communication is

Not-two..

Language is clay

For a seeming

Non-dual sculptor...

Motion..

 

Motion

Suggests

A story of

Change..

A dance of

Separation..

The drama of

Wins and losses..

This beauty

And gristle

Of boundless

Life

Seems to be 

Inherent in

Motion...

Words cannot reach...

 

Words

Cannot reach

This..

Whether simple

Or complex..

Yet..words

Are This too

Already..

The Story is:

This

Appears as

Words which

Cannot reach

This...

Immersed in the story...

 

Immersed 

In the story..

And the seeming

Wish to escape 

Which is

Impossible because

The wish and attempts

Are the story too..

It's all story

But somehow the 

Empty nature of the

Story may be sensed

Which can seem 

As a bit

Of heaven on earth..!