maturing poetry

The old poets of China

Wherever I am, the world comes after me.
It offers me its busyness. It does not believe
that I do not want it. Now I understand
why the old poets of China went so far and high
into the mountains, then crept into the pale mist.

by Mary Oliver

~

After a while you learn the subtle difference
between holding a hand and chaining a soul,
and you learn that love doesn’t mean leaning
and company doesn’t mean security,
and you begin to learn that kisses aren’t contracts
and presents aren’t promises.

You begin to accept your defeats with your head up
and your eyes open, with the grace of an adult,
not the grief of a child. You learn to build
all your roads on today because tomorrow’s
ground is too uncertain for planning.
After a while you learn that even sunshine burns
if you get too much. So you plant your garden
and decorate your own soul, instead of waiting
for someone to bring you flowers.

And you learn that you really can endure…
that you really are strong, and that you
really do have worth.

from Candide, the musical

Art of disappearing

When they say Don’t I know you? say no.
When they invite you to the party
remember what parties are like
before answering.
Someone telling you in a loud voice
they once wrote a poem.
Greasy sausage balls on a paper plate.
Then reply.
If they say we should get together.
say why? It’s not that you don’t love them any more.
You’re trying to remember something
too important to forget.
Trees.
The monastery bell at twilight.
Tell them you have a new project.
It will never be finished. When someone recognizes you in a grocery store
nod briefly and become a cabbage.
When someone you haven’t seen in ten years
appears at the door,
don’t start singing him all your new songs.
You will never catch up.
Walk around feeling like a leaf. Know you could tumble any second. Then decide what to do with your time.

by Naomi Shihab Nye

~

My eyes already touch the sunny hill,
going far ahead of the road I have begun.
So we are grasped by what we cannot grasp;
it has its inner light, even from a distance—

and changes us, even if we do not reach it,
into something else, which, hardly sensing it, we already are;
a gesture waves us on, answering our own wave…
but what we feel is the wind in our faces.

by Rainer Maria Rilke

One source of bad information

There's a boy in you about three
Years old who hasn't learned a thing for thirty
Thousand years. Sometimes it's a girl.

This child has to make up its mind
How to save you from death.
He says things like: "Stay home. Avoid elevators. Eat only elk."

You live with this child but you don't know it.
You are in the office, yes, but live with this boy
At night. He's uninformed, but he does want

To save your life. And he has. Because of this boy
You survived a lot. He's got six big ideas.
Five don't work. Right now he's repeating them to you.

by Robert Bly

A humbling path

Awakening is not a path for the faint of heart.

You will be humbled. Oh yes. Brought to your knees. Many, many times.

What you thought you knew will occasionally dissolve into nothingness.
Your most brilliant insights, your astonishing expertise, your life’s work, it can all crumble to the ground.
Sometimes without warning.

You will be asked to begin again, and again, and again.

And again.

(Did I say, this is not a path for the faint of heart?)

Oh yes, you will touch the bliss and joy of existence, for sure!
You will laugh at the simplicity of things, some days, of course!

But you will also be asked to confront your deepest fears, face the darkness and the night within, go to the places where the unloved creatures dwell.

You will step into pockets of grief you never knew were there.
You will cry a billion tears for the lost and abandoned children, within and without.
You will rage to the sky, to your parents, to all the teachers who failed you, to the lies you were fed, to the ones who never showed up when you needed them the most.
You will tremble with fear some days.

Some days the ground will open up and swallow you and spit you back out.

Sometimes you will think you’ve reached the end of the path, and then you will find yourself back at the damn beginning.

Sometimes you will feel like giving up.
Sometimes you will feel like you’ve made no progress at all.
Sometimes you will curse the day you started out on this journey.

But you are healing.
Yes, you are.

You are thawing, undoing billions of years of karma. Fear-based conditioning is melting away, and you are meeting life in the raw.

You are returning to nature, to the Garden, to the wild, where you were conceived.

It’s not always easy. It’s not always peaceful.
It’s not always the spirituality you were sold.
It’s not always love and light and joy and positivity and pure undisturbed Awareness.
(These are only dreams for frightened children.)

No, it’s an authentic awakening. You are a warrior of realness now, tired of the bullshit and the false promises, weeping and raging and laughing your way into the terrible, wonderful wholeness that you are.

All your old dreams have crumbled, but you have not.
The voices of fear and shame and doubt may still be with you, but you are bigger than them now.
You have days where you feel tiny, yes, but you have days where you can hold the whole damn Universe in the palm of your hand.
You have gone insane to be normal, you have cracked to be whole, you have traded the old security for a life of adventure, and given up the sad old dogmas for the thrill of not knowing.

You are finding safety in the darkest places, and beauty in the loneliest places, and love in the places you thought had been forsaken by love.

You are never abandoned by life, friend, for you are life, and even when you fall to the ground, you are completely supported by unknowable forces.

And so what. So what! You fall! You bruise yourself. You feel ashamed for a while. You weep out the old dream. So what! You cry out the expectation and you turn to face the reality and it is never, never as bad as you’d feared.
You pick yourself up, you dust yourself off, you get back on the path, and you walk on.

You never left the path, if truth be told.
For the path never left... you.

For the path forms itself under your very feet, in every Now, with each step that you take or do not take, rejoicing in your unique journey, celebrating you exactly as you are today, bowing to your failures as well as your victories.

So, begin again, friend.
Begin again.

And walk on.

by Jeff Foster

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others,
even to the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love, for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

by Max Ehrmann