I saw the lotus,
When it bloomed I stopped to stare
And I saw myself, rising

Buddha was the broken hourglass
that spilled seconds across my backyard.
Mother Earth scolded him for his slipup,
so I smoothed her over with my minute hands.
She told me that he who skips an interval
needs to double back his ticks
so, grain by grain, tick by tock.
She rewound my hands to round out
the stonewashed garden that was being fabricated.
So I steadily swept shards of seconds
under the rugged rug of ill will.
I riddled ripples within her granular skin,
skidded stones across her carved clock
face fitting ****** features together like cogs.
Buddha shook the soil off
and fixed his gaze on my clockwork.
He explained that patience is key
if one wants to harvest his feast.
Before the goods go about,
pivots and rivets need to tie together.
Mother Earth collected her thoughts
and agreed with his concept.
I finished my work, stepped back,
admiring the hourglass I rebuilt.

Come in, come in my friends,
Let us talk of gods and men.
But I must warn:
I ride the dragon Confucius cannot tame.
We soar on winds the Buddha cannot calm.
I frolic free on Jesus’ throne;
Secured in stone of my Olympus home,
Whose whence and why I can not know.

So come in, come in my friends
Let us talk of gods and men.*
If you come to teach and learn,
Come in, come in.
Let us share our common yearn.

Else go away so as not to waste my time with God.

                                                           ­             August, 2011

"Impulse is master",
said the learned man.
"It brings disaster
to a pondered plan."

But what about choice?
That's what I've been taught.
Trying speech, no voice
came, instead forethought

echoed through my head:
speak, and you'll be trapped!
I sat, mute as lead;
the man, smiling, clapped.

His eyes burned 2 holes in the mountain
when he sat for years, 'till
they let him in

He threw all your old books in the oven
saying, you can like the tales
but they ain't sacred

a commune back home not hippie
buy 300, no 500 acres great land
in Codroy or misty high hilled Avalon
built great big house wraparound porch
beset by rocking chair by the sea yet
in the woods at end of road all brown dirt

growing gardens, herb and vegetable
pulling weeds but keeping good green ****
brewing beer by own hand
group work but not always group think

friends lovers writers growers givers
all come to stay
making great pots of stew and strange brews
awakening brought far from Peruvian Torch homeland
telling stories all somehow great fables and anecdotes for life and living and love and everything that's good in the long run

at night over bottles on beaches by fires
we worry these are funeral pyres
for our great little social experiment
fear of leaving loving womb
of isolated salt fish by sea commune

real world so crass&brash; an unctuous affair
where here instead guitars, ukes
silly screaming little buddhas recite poems
by gleaming eye fireside

evening
my Japanese friend returns to his room
I sit in mine
listening to the sound of rotting wood
Then she comes again
sneaking past the sleeping attendant
she looks 14
‘You want make nice nice’
No, I don’t want ‘nice nice’, I say again
She laughs
I refuse, leave my gray fungus covered hotel
walk into a temple
Rows of orange robed monks sit all around
Death not a mystery
He lies in front of me
Burning in his saffron robe
Orange smoke spiraling up
joining night clouds and moon
At midnight
they will come and take his bones
Not a mystery
later, I sit with Buddhist children
playing a guitar
They sing melodies of the east
our voices spiraling up
joining orange clouds and saffron moon

It is not yet midnight

“The trouble is, we think there’s time”
Buddha said it so urgent
Complete with Sanskrit contractions
The baby delivering doctor saying we all have a cancer, no matter how slow
so pick up your passions with a god’s effortlessness
Play a concerto that makes your hair stand on end
because the music was more important than a reflective surface
Looking like a you were born in a stormy garret
Writing, thinking, and plucking, as if the gods set you there
instead of the million hopeless mediocre ones
No, instead you are brethren to those gods
All competing for immortal kicks – like mortal tail
Until the game board perspective ceases
looking down on the plebeian pantheon
and it’s just you and what you lived for