Sandy at school

Sandy tells Ms Mirsha
all about the new baby
her mom says is coming home;
every other day Sandy talks
about the baby to Ms Mirsha -
maybe it’ll be a boy
maybe a girl, a brother or sister


Sandy at home

one day mom takes Sandy’s right hand
and places it on her tummy
and Sandy feels the baby kick


Sandy at school*

Sandy does not tell Ms Mirsha
about the baby no more;
two weeks on
and then Ms Mirsha asks Sandy:
“Sandy, how’s that baby you said
that’s coming home?”*


and Sandy bursts into tears
and she says: *“Oh, Ms Mirsha –
I think mom ate it!”

the gathering declares
with great sagacity
how one’s strength decreases
with age:
One is stronger when young;
Weaker when one is old

I disagree, says Nasrudin
I’m just as strong old
as when I was young

How so? asks the gathering
Explain yourself!

*Well, I cannot lift
the rock in my garden -
just the same as when I was young!

you got a face,
said little Tim,
like a rat

I cried, and I screamed:
you got a fish face!*

And along came Tom
with his cat face
and he ate up
both rat face
and fish face

And that’s why now
Tim has an ugly face
and I turned out to look
like the real me,
as you know,
with such an adorable face

times change
but it's always
the same old problem


The Past
"Grandma, I'm marrrying
a black guy," said Lucia
"What the hell!" cursed Grandma

The Present
"Grandma, I'm marrying
Mike,"  says David
"What the F^^^!" curses Grandma

The Future, c. 2035
"Grandma, I'm marrying
a robot," Lucy says
"What the #^@!" Grandma curses

1
Tom sits alone in the bar
staring at
his drink before him
The burly stranger comes in
stares at Tom and seizes Tom's glass
and finishes the drink in one gulp
Tom cries
and the stranger says:
'****! Don't cry!
I was joking
I hate to see a man cry
Wipe your tears off
and I'll buy you many drinks'


2
'No, it's not that, stranger, '
says Tim, still crying
*'I've had a ****** bad day
since the start
I went to work
and my boss fired me
And I went home
and my wife was with another man
I went to the park
and I got bitten by a stray dog
I went back to the car park
and just then somebody drove off with my car
And I came here and
at the exact moment I was going to have the drink
in one gulp
and put an end to my life -
you came in and finished my drink,
every drop of the poison
I had emptied into it'

Helen and Bill
were out camping
with their little kids
Annie and Sam

and Bill killed a deer
out there in the open
and his wife cooked it
and the kids
Annie and Sam
came after their swim
for their lunch

and the kids asked their dad:
“What’s for lunch?”
Bill hushed his  wife and he said
to the kids:
“Guess what meat it is,
children.
Here’s a clue:
Think of what mom
calls me other than my name”

And  Annie screamed:
*“Don’t eat it, Sam!
It’s an *******!”

you visit this disused Olde Gaol
remote, renowned
250 years old and now a musuem;
and rumoured to be haunted

you love the thrill but fear meeting
a ghost,  the one said to make
unexpected appearance in this prison
"I love the excitement," you tell the guide
"but I'd die if I met one"

The guide pooh-poohs your suggestion
and says: "In all my time here
I have yet to see a ghost"

"And how long," you ask, "have you
worked here?"

And the guide answers: *"245 years"

they came to me with Big Books
they came with appeals and threats
but I said:
Go, for
there is no philosophy,
no revelation
no dependence, no authority;
there are no terms
and one is free of all propositions;
there is none higher, none lower
and therefore all are same and even;
one does not slide to the past or tradition
and one does not idealize a future
and time is done and thought is observed;
there is no judgment here
no conditioning and beliefs
but one rests in what there is

where we are
each
past time and land
we’ll be there
in one space
and one loving ground
and we’ll love
like beasts on heat
we’ll know our love
and all time wasted burn
in one animal mate;
Oh, we’ll love first the body
and the mind
for we’ll have all eternity
darling, for the soul and such sweet things
but first we’ll transcend the time and place
that bind us to confines and unknowing
and we’ll be driven to the same mating ground
darling
where’ we’ll discover the temporal love
of the flesh and attraction and matter
and propagation
and leave eternal love for eternal times;
we’ll love like all our lives depend on it
darling
we’ll love like the very survival of earth
and the human race depended on it;
darling
we’ll love like
everything is dependent on
the way we rock in bed

Dad was dying, breathing his last -
would Mark be sad or glad?
Glad - why not? Since Dad’s
a multi-billionaire
and Mark’s the only child
and all things will go to Mark,
to no one else

Mark ’s happy the doctors
said it ’s anytime now
and he must make arrangements
so he asked his long-time,
indecisive sweetheart:
“Hey, Helen baby – my dad’s dying
and I’ll inherit everything
So you got to decide now -
come home with me?”
“Sure thing,” Helen said
as instant as noodles
And Mark and Helen got home -
and look, to make a long story short,
that’s how Helen became Mark's step-ma
And Mark’s sitting in the garden shed
still licking his wounds

Yes Sirs,
I know you teach
it is easier
to live the life of the unjust
to protect one’s own comfort
and powers and position
and seek to satisfy one’s own appetites
and be one with the group to secure oneself
and keep the less fortunate out
and to increase one’s own fortunes and ease
by increasing the powers of one’s group -
but Sirs,
I have taught my children
and I live what I teach:
Let justice be one’s way
and do good to all
though it may be inconvenient to oneself…
And now, Sirs,
you have come to teach me
for you would do good to none but to your own group
for the good you do your group will protect you
though others may crawl the earth in misery
but I, Sirs - I find it easier
to walk what you call
the difficult way of inconvenience

My sister wants to marry
a ghost – I just can’t work out
what’s possessed her

And my elder sister
she wants to marry Dracula –
now, what I’d like to know is what bit her

And as for myself,
I’d like to marry a zombie –
and listen, I’m dead serious about that

But most astonishing is my eldest sister -
she wants to marry a man
And the long and short of it is,
the family just can’t work out
*what’s got into her

I told my mind
(using the principles of creative bidding):
"All right;
let's two write
some nonsense verse
O Mind of mine, be silent awhile
and draw from the deepest recesses
of your profundity
some short nonsense verse"

and the Mind answered
with desperate urgency:
"But what have we
been doing all this while?"

you say you love
the earth
love the ocean
but you don’t really do
otherwise you wouldn’t
have ****** poison in there;
and even when you protest
you do, you do
you just love it for your own
and so I’m taking it away from you


you say you love
the skies
but do you really do?
why then do you spew
deadly gases into the air
and blow holes in the sky?
and even when you protest
love, love for the sky
you just love for your own
and so I’m taking it away from you


you say you love
the birds and the trees
and the creatures and the earth
but you don’t act as you do
for you’ve dragged them all
to utility and objects of desire
and even when you plead
you love them, love them all
you just love it for commerce
and your appetite
you love it for you
so I’m taking them away from you


and so I’m taking them all away
from you and you and you
and you can have yourself to yourself
for that’s all you really love
you love you
and you get what you truly love;
so you can sit there
in a cold corner of desolate space
with yourself for you

you know, dear moon
in the previous place
I used to see you
every night you wanted to;
see you out the window kitchen
or even as I went up the stairs to bed
or I would step out into the garden
and there you’d quiver in the sky
and shine in the river
and there was just you and I
and not a thought in my mind
and you’d even wake me
with your gentle fingers over my face

but now there’s no high window
to let me catch a glimpse of you
and the shuttered windows will not let you through

if I step outside,
the street lights are too bright
and the crude houses rudely prevent you

it is rarely I have a glimpse of you now…
is it any wonder, dear moon
I am nowadays described as grim-faced…
*and now-a-nights, what about you?

Old Ray gets up this morning
feeling a little bit let-me- fix-the-world
so he turns to his wife Old Mary
who’s reading the news in her iPad
and he resurrects his suspicion
she’s gone deaf recently

So he stands to her right and calls out her name
No answer
So he stands to her left and calls out her name
No answer
So he goes behind her and shouts out her name
and Mary, without looking up, says calmly:
“For the third and last time, Ray -
what do you want?”

And Ray
who has heard no answer thrice
thinks to himself:
*Poor Old Mary,
after all these years,
she’s indeed lost her hearing

Live, brother -
and go now, for
you must go seek mother;
seek her where she is abused
in Sato;
and Oh - what they have done
to our mother, a woman without her man
one cannot know
But O brother,
find mother and give her back her life
and as for me
our masters cannot extract any word
on where you hide and what you intend
and how you escaped
for all they will find
is water in my mouth and in my body
for I will be in water
as when I lived in mother’s womb
But live you brother, and flee
and hide till they think you are gone
and seek our dear mother
and free her
and give her back the life
give her the precious gift of life
the same precious life
she gave you and me

there is the spirit as they might say
and love is Divine as they might decree
in those Heavy Books -
yet there is the manifest body,
sweetheart
there is one that is you
and one that’s me;
and as ancient poets and seers have said
all the earth’s topography
its mountains and grass and lakes
and water and fire and air
all of the earth is here in the body
so it is only proper
we explore the body
wide and deep within
perhaps to see if we can catch the spirit

First and Second years
of marriage:
Man speaks; woman listens

Third and Fourth years
of marriage:
Woman speaks; Man listens

All Years of marriage after:
Man and Woman shout
and all the Neighbours listen

one must not regret
the days gone by
for though
all the years past
may appear
placed so full in one’s open palms
rolled in a ball
of hard dirt, pressures and carbon
yet one may find it
seeing within
precious and radiant
as the earth’s diamonds
in all their uniqueness

Poet A and Poet B
sat down to a competition
They had to improvise lines
ending in Timbuctoo

And so Poet A improvised with most
elegant and mellifluous voice:
O let us go over the vast oceans
and seek the exotic,  the mysteries
O let us trudge through harsh lands
till we reach the fair and distant Timbuctoo

And Poet B extemporised:
*Tim and I met three fair maidens -
we were eager and they were game too
so  I bucked one and Timbuctoo!

in those days
I scrambled like a rat
ran like a tiger, slithered like a snake
and I walked in the halls of awards
and achievements
and I made connections and I aspired
and I built from one link to another
and the ambition was the reality
and I ran swiftly, as the horse
and then time dealt its blow;
and here in seclusion
with the mountains in the elbow of the clouds
and the pine and dragon rocks all about me
here I am amidst its voices and stillness
and its melody or cacophony as it chooses
and here silence is become the reality
and often
often, when what is inside the mind surfaces
and time gone lingers awhile like a scent on a bush
*I stop to see what lies within
beyond one’s circumstance and conditioning

I will not tell you
nor will I envision how I shall love you;
for indeed I do not know…
so how indeed shall we love?
shall we love like the other-worldly
who say love is all spirit and so will not touch
and are afraid of the pleasures of thrusts and friction
but are all ecstasy in imagined future states
and have no sensations in present bodies?
how indeed shall I love?
I do not think I shall love you
like no lover has since the beginning of love;
I shall not declare such love
in unique ways and how I shall love
and how we shall dine, and eat and converse and be in bed
and build ourselves a home and castles in the air
that shall keep us for eternity
that shall thus render death incapable of doing us apart
I do not see how I shall love
and we do not speak what love will be:
I shall surprise myself;
indeed
we will surprise the moment,
that time itself will turn back and say: *Oh!

one day the poet Herodia
of ancient Pincaeia
found in the garden
a note thrown in over the wall:

dear poet
do not sing us of unpleasant things;
do not make us think:
sing us of love instead
a poem about a kiss is far easier to read
(some *** would make it even more memorable)
and poems on light matters
are better on one's brains
rather than a poem
where one has to ponder over things


and the poet Herodia
of ancient Pincaeia
from then on
was never heard of;
nor, for that matter,
was ever Pincaeia

come on in, baby
it’s your world too
come in and have a seat
take your place;
it’s not just passive:
take what you need
and give what you can


there are no in doors
and no out doors
as you can see,
though each will have one’s time;
so come on in, baby
it’s your day to begin
any time you’re ready

you might think
it’s all good to go crazy;
or you might think it fit
to be fair, just
and moderate
to give and receive love

you choose there, baby
in your seat
you make your own movie;
and whichever genre you choose
one day, sweetheart,
you’ll be your own critic
you’ll write your own review

come on in, baby
it’s your world too
come in and have a seat
take your place;
it’s not just passive:
take what you need
and give what you can

is one capable of observing with no projection of one’s mind and thoughts and ideas onto the observed? can one actually observe?
or does one see what one wants to see? does one look and see what is before one, or does one drag what one observes into one’s belief systems and one’s vision and preconceived notions and philosophy?
one is conditioned
by beliefs and documents
and is shaped by culture and religions
and revelations and dogma
and one sees everything merely
in the shape of what one believes in;
but can one merely observe what stands before one?
is that possible?
is it possible for one to stand before the sky, before the colors, before the setting sun and the trees - and to see what is before one? or must one always interpret everything one sees, so that one never sees
what actually is?
can one see beyond one’s beliefs
and one’s faith and one’s conditioning
and beyond the forms
and beyond the shaping words of revered Holy Books
that the leaders and organization put into one?
can one see with a free mind?

when I was little
and learning
mostly being conditioned
and being shaped
in the image of my makers
I was in awe;
and when I dropped all conditioning
and all authority
now I know
one is equal to anyone
and there is no being
but acts according to its capacity:
there is not one more than another

This, children, is our dinning room
(Humans, as you know, have dining rooms
which are such dreary and un-lively rooms
to which we can add zest,
flavour and excitement
with a few clamorous apparitions) -
but this, as I was saying, is our dinning room
which is where you learn to howl and scream
so your performance at human dining rooms
will simply be tummy-turning
You see, you want to make humans feel
like they are sprouts in a Chinese stir-fry -
now, kids - *howl and scream!

1
stand up, children
stand up and wipe those tears;
smile and laugh
in your love
of the fields and the stars


smile and laugh
little darlings;
smile and laugh
in your love
of the birds and trees
and the streams
and the creatures
of the earth

smile and laugh
in your love of the clouds
and the sunshine and the berries
and the flowers
and the butterflies;
smile little children
with that love
that is radiant in your hearts


stand up, children
stand up and wipe those tears;
smile and laugh
in your love
of the fields and the stars



2

stand up, children
stand up and wipe those tears;
smile and laugh
in your love
of the fields and the stars


though all things may pass
and all things may change
and iron hands
and powder powers
bring chaos and bareness;
and these things may hurt
even those light hearts of yours -
still, delicate angels,
there is love
in your darling hearts


so bring them your love
of the sunshine
and your love of the trees;
bring them your love
of the land
and your love of life

bring them your love
of the skies
and your love of the bees;
bring them your love
of the streams, air and earth

for the love that you have
that is oneness
that love never passes;
that is the love
that abides always
in all change and passing


stand up, children
stand up and wipe those tears;
smile and laugh
in your love
of nature and the stars

"you got your horse...
it's well drawn
elaborate and real
little Vicky -
but where's the cart?"
asks the art teacher

"Oh", says wicked Vicky
drawing on a lesson from her poetry class
"The horse will draw it"

the snow is in your path and
the bridge is wet with slush
O young beauty
crossing the bridge

take care to cover your head
and walk
with eyes on the ground
with mind on your destination
for I am waiting
and when we are together, closed
I need to feel your warmth
and my palms and fingers shall journey
across the terrain of your white skin

take care and come in safe
to my room, fair beauty
for I have I need of your love
and your delicate frame in my hands

the boy who was six
running over hills and jumping over streams
now he's nearly sixty;
and the girl, she too,
she who picked flowers in the woods
and who fetched water from the well
she too has seen time's movement
with all the joys, the pain
and the activity and goings on that come with it:
one strolls over the hill now in the quiet
and one sees the full moon
over the giant trees
the moon distant in the sky
and yet its gentle rays spread over the tree heads;
one sees all this calm and peace

is one capable of observing with no projection of one’s mind and thoughts
and ideas onto the observed? can one actually observe? or does
one see what one wants to see? does one look and see what is before one, or
does one drag what one observes into one’s belief systems
and one’s vision and preconceived notions and philosophy?
one is conditioned
by beliefs and documents
and is shaped by culture and religions
and revelations and dogma
and one sees everything merely
in the shape of what one believes in;
but can one merely observe what stands before one?
is that possible? is it possible for one to stand before
the sky, before the colors, before the setting sun
and the trees - and to see what is before one? or must
one always interpret everything one sees, so that one
never sees what actually is?*
can one see beyond one’s beliefs
and one’s faith and one’s conditioning
and beyond the forms
and beyond the shaping words of revered Holy Books
that the leaders and organization put into one?
can one see with a free mind?

I never speak of God
but people keep telling me about God
and they keep telling me:
This is the Word of God!
Or they brandish a Book before me
and they say:
This is the Final Word of God!

But I say:
Look, I've just had a Revelation;
God has just spoken to me;
it's the First and Final Message in One Word:
Love...
You see, there's only one Word of God:
Love...
and Love is unconditional
and you do not hate
and you do not ****, never...
That is the word of God, Love...
So take the Word of God: Love
and drop everything else...
So, there's just Love
and the word God is superfluous;
there's just one word, one reality:
Love

five fishermen
have finished
and they pack their catch
but seem to have lost something

for when the leader
lines up all five men
he can only count four
and so does each man
counting the others in a line

“Oh, no!
One in our team is lost!”
they moan
and though
they search high and low
search in the sky and in rabbit holes
search the oceans and in countries far and wide
the fifth man is not found

then comes a child
and offers to find the fifth man
and the child lines them up
and counts clearly to five
and the five men celebrate
the wisdom of the child

and thus it is, Punsara,
that we seek wisdom and truth
when it is always there
and there is nothing to be discovered

well,  let's stop at this motel
have dinner and a nice shower
go to bed early
and if we leave at about 10
tomorrow morning
drive in the general direction we took today
*we'll arrive nowhere...comfortably in no time

I accompanied my master
to the Town market
and on the way back
we had to cross a swelling river

A young woman stood there crying
and she knelt before my master
begging him to carry her across;
and with no second thought
he carried her on his back and took her across
the rapid waters

he left her on the other side of the river
and she bowed and went on her way;
and my Master and I went on our ours

But I was not happy
and did not speak
till we stopped to rest, and I blurted out:
You carried a woman across the river
and she clung to your back -
her body close and tight to yours!

And my master said:
*It appears I left her at the river bank
while you still continue to carry the woman

here is the forest
the world withdraws a little;
quiet, silent and calm
the trees wait in their own nature

The morning is beautiful, the progress of the day smooth and the evening pleasant and the nights pensive and still. Time moves slowly and thought is as radiant as the sunlight that streams through.

Let us dwell here then a while, where it is peaceful. Let us rest us here awhile where the world drops off, distant from one.

the path leads nowhere
one is drawn to silence;
the leaves glisten
and the breeze speaks
of things past words

*Let us rest then in this, where the clamor ceases, where beauty may keep one company.

Mr and Mrs Proper Smith
are at the gallery
and the next work in line
that confronts them
is a **** woman with green leaves
to conceal her privates

Mrs Smith moves away
with quiet and dignity
but Mr Smith lingers, eyes on the leaves
Mrs Smith clears her throat
and enquires politely:
What are you waiting for, dear?

And comes swiftly
the reply, equally polite:
*Autumn

the dark-thought clouds hang heavy
above
and on the heads of the trees
that stand like lanky children in assembly
the sun spreads its end–of-day grace;
and so you will remember, perhaps
oh end of day and sun and trees
and the pensive air that envelopes all this evening -
you will remember, perhaps -
to conspire forth such an evening
the last hours of my days
if you will remember, perhaps

he loves me
I know
of all the women
he’s seen
I don’t know why
but time seems
to have shaped his mind and heart for me
and the days
they seem to have set his feet
on the path towards me
It’s clear as daylight
he loves me
of all the girls
and the women
he’s got his heart for me
he just loves me;
and I just him

the asteroid came
unexpected unheralded unprophesied -
it didn't think, it didn't have theology

it put a hole through the earth
it implied: "I'm in a hurry;
not going anywhere in particular though
and all of you making all those plans
you got all those birthdays
and your Grand Days
and New Year's Eve  to celebrate -
you can go, you're just dust"
and it waved goodbye with its tails as it left
*"goodbye, spoilt brats -
you can go, you're each just dust"

sometimes I wonder
in the loneliness of night
where you are
and then I see you
bouncing off the moon;
*ha!
she rejects your advances

this evening, O gentle moon,
this evening you
preside over calm, dearest moon;
you bring quiet
and sweetness in the cool air;
and the trees rise to kiss you
and the sun sets like a dying soldier
in the arms of his love;
this evening you bring stillness
and contentment
and end of thought and conflict
and you bring
seeing of things as they are

the evening comes in
and the sun sinks, the sun goes
and says its goodbyes in radiant colors;
and the night comes in
and envelopes the trees
and it will go up and kiss all the earth
and it will kiss me too
(and you too, if you behave)
and it will say:
*Good night, darling child;
sleep well and you’ll see Sun again
tomorrow morning

well, my friend got a role
in a movie  (it should have been me -
but that's another story)
and, all proud and puffed up,  he told his dad:
"Dad, I got a role
in a movie: I play a man
who's been married 25 years"

And his dad told him
right up to his face:
*"Keep at it, son -
you might end up
with a speaking role some day"

I walk alone now
unlike as in the days of long ago
when there was company and the crowd
and there was clamor and noise…
but smiling time dispersed all things and beings;
time forked the paths
as many as veins in a leaf
and made each man and woman and child
shake hands or hug and wave goodbyes;
and so I walk alone now
in solitary ways


I let all things go
the past and pain and sorrows
and the yearnings and mind's hustle and bustle
And so one is on the path that opens at one's feet
And the earth and the trees
and the air and sky and the water and clouds
keep the still heart company
in one's long walk to one's own shed

would you believe?
my parents told me
they brought me to this world!
Now, would you believe that?
and wait, it gets better -
my sister and my brother,
they say we three are related!
And hang on, hang on -
there's more;
my wife, she says
she and I are married!
And what's more, there are two boys
who live in the same house
and they look like me
and they call me 'Dad'!
Amazing!
And hang on, hang on -
what's wrong with you, gentle reader?
why are you so impatient?
there are more astounding things
yet in this world
than your pea-brain can fathom:
strangers
( you know, people I've never met before ) -
would you believe? -
they reckon my name is "Hi"!
I don't know about you,
but I think it's an amazing world,
for want of a better word to describe the world...

we trembled in our nights
in the wild
and you shattered the darkness
dear Sun
and you said:
Behold, Creatures -
Behold the Earth!

Come, we shall rest here
a while
and slip into the quiet and calm
and peace of the hills
and the trees and the streams;
we’ll live into stillness and silence
and see what it is to die to thought
and to the day and night
and to each past and intention;
here we shall abandon left and right or center
and all the million causes
and concerns and justification and structures
that we always gave attention to;
we shall have natural pace here
at least for the while
and see what it is to be away
from the roles and formations we are seduced into
and to be dead to all things that form
human exchange and all ideas and established creed
and convention and sanctity;
and see what it is to be dead
to all things that **** life;
we’ll be here a while and possibly
for some time as it pleases one
and shall return perhaps not as the regular sun
but as a cloud unexpected, irregular and in its own time