Say You Are Lonely ~ William Stafford
More still than a star, one thought shies
by: what if the sky loved you?
But nobody knew? But that magnet in space
pulled hard? But you acted like nothing at all
was reaching or calling for you? More still
than a star going by, that thought stays.
A day at a time pieces of it glow.
Nobody notices: quiet days.
Growing up, I had the privilege of enduring several ingrown toenail surgeries, which culminated in having a third of the nail removed on each of my big toes. Of course, by that time I was reading a magazine and whistling to myself while blood spurted across the room like a Monty Python skit. Yet I was not always the stoic Sam Elliott of toenail surgeries that the doctor saw before him that day. I had journeyed down a long and excruciating road of impaled digits. I had paid my dues.
The first time I had it done, I yowled like a cat in heat right from the git-go. My dad – sitting on the other side of a drawn curtain – passed out cold. The doctor was administering the shot to numb my toe when, THUNK!, something hit the floor. The “something” turned out to be dad’s head. Thinking he…
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The mountains are alive with fire,
transcendent breath, vigorous and endless.
Though they have been given a name,
a part of them will always be nameless,
and I could say the same about myself.
I heed the call, after all, of mist-laden glades.
I walk among stones with broken blades.
I come to you, mountains of fire,
full of so many things that matter,
yet they will not matter to you.
I come to you as a whittler of days,
a world-worshipper who knows he cannot fool you.
I come to you as a man who has a boy still looking
out from behind the bars of his rib cage.
I come to you with an owl on my shoulder
who comes and goes as she pleases.
I come to you as a failed magician,
with iron, ash, light, dust, rain
on either side of my skin.
I come to you as a failure, but at least I am a great one.
I come to you with the meaning of my name,
do with it what you will.
I come to you as the recorder
of my small life, pockets filled
with scribbled notes
of little use.
From The Way of Zen by Alan Watts ~
“All one’s intentional acts, desires, ideals, stratagems, are in vain. In the whole universe, within and without, there is nothing whereon to lay any hold, and no one to lay any hold on anything. This has been discovered through clear awareness of everything that seems to offer a solution – or to constitute a reliable reality – through the initiative wisdom called Prajna, which sees into the relational character of everything.
With the eye of Prajna, the human situation is seen for what it is: a quenching of thirst with saltwater. A pursuit of goals which simply require the pursuit of other goals. A clutching of objects which the swift course of time renders as insubstantial as mist.
The very one who pursues, who sees and knows and desires the inner subject, has his existence only in relation to the ephemeral objects of his pursuit. He sees that his grasp upon the world is his stranglehold about his own neck, the hold which is depriving him of the very life he so longs to attain. And there is no way out, no way of letting go which he can take by effort, by a decision of the will.
But who is it that wants to get out? There comes a moment when this consciousness of the inescapable trap, in which we are at once the trapper and the trapped, reaches a breaking point. One might almost say that it matures or ripens, and suddenly there is a ‘turning about’ in the deepest seed of consciousness. In this moment all sense of restraint drops away, and the cocoon which the silkworm spun around himself opens to let him go forth, winged as a moth.
It is now possible to live spontaneously without trying to be spontaneous.”
~ Alan Watts (The Way of Zen)
Spirit of breath and practice, holy mystery of movement and stillness, grant me the discipline to just sit here, though the old fires still burn in me.
Grant me the wisdom to remain plainspoken at the doorstep of the mind’s entanglements. Let me keep a balanced, empty mind.
Grant me patience, not only for my own sake, but for the sake of others.
Wherever I am, may I not lose the sight to truly see the colors, forms, shapes, all around me, then and there.
And whenever I walk, may I have the sense to notice the soles of my feet touching the ground, meeting the earth – even when they are housed in shoes.
Will it only be a list of information, a collection of the external?
Born in so-and-so, to these parents of this descent, lived here and then here, and then here. Worked as a nurse, a cook, an accountant, managed a dry cleaning business, taught fifth graders or at the university, produced movies. (Your name here) loved dogs/cats, was notorious for having ice cream for dinner.
Or maybe include a little something more. How you used colorful expressions – I need a little alcohol in my radiator. I’d rather see the devil come. He’s dumb as a fencepost.
How you instilled in others a sense of curiosity, wonder. What your passion was, what made you feel most alive, what sustained you in difficult times? What drove your courage, your work, your will? What was the nature of your heart, your spirit?
In lieu of flowers, please make a charitable donation to the preservation of nature or the arts.
All the things you
thought were true
in your life turned out
to be built on it.
Even mountains
are sand yet unground
by water, wind, and time.
Use my bones, oh world.
Make a ladder
so that someone in need
may climb.
