The crowd
Of decaying walls
Whose roof that united them
In common interest,
Belief,
Prosperity,
Has collapsed into the ground
Leaving them stranded:
Searching for someone to blame
As they crumble in the rain.

Out of isolation come the walls
To stand in city streets
Chanting slogans,
Holding placards,
Walking alone
Though with each other.

Between them
All bonds lie broken:
Each one stands
In contradiction with the crowd,
But walks with it
In self-righteous anger
That divides them even as it unites.

This movement stands afraid
To question
To answer
To find
An answer to their anger
For fear of what it might unbind…

Feel the force of the broken ones
Blindly lashing at the branches
Afraid to strike the root and see
The end to their negative solidarity

Streets seethe under daylight’s pressure:
The negative solidarity movement marches forth.
But I remember as I stand here watching on,
That they say the night is always darkest before the dawn.

In fear the masses converge
Under banners devoid of vision,
Understanding,
And love.
No light of freedom glints in eyes
That look for solutions from above:

“The state will cure the sickness
of self-centeredness,
Greed,
And Lust,
It will bring the order to our lives
Our cities,
Our nation,
Our trust.”

But the state can protect us only
From the violence we cause each other
Its touch never brings the love we crave
From every man as our brother.

It cements its rule with force’s power
That in love’s absence, projects a veneer
Of a nation’s people bound together
Though, in fact, they’re bound by fear.

The state’s hand touches where we’ve succumbed
To the blind hatred that keeps us enchained
To our selfishness that preys on others
And acts on lies we’ve entertained.

The state lets us live with the sad folly
Of not looking our fellow man in the eyes
And knowing his pain, troubles and joy
While living with him every day of our lives.

I dream one day we’ll realize the truth
That our nation was not of fiat born
But birthed by freedom’s present light
From which the state has had us torn.

I dream one day we’ll see the truth
That love and freedom must lead the fight
Against state slavery and its chains
But ’till then we march:
Left, right,
Left, right,
Left, right.

Suddenly,
A loving smile radiated from his lips
Whose truth they understood more than his words:

“take,
eat;
this is my body”

Peter took the bread.
Peter put it to his lips.
Peter did not understand.

Puzzled stares
Dart towards each other
Finding no answers in their search.

The moment’s silence
Draws
Out.

(Though they felt his light,
they understood not his words.

But he could feel it in their eyes…)
His hands lifted the clay cup from the wood table.

“drink from it,
all of you”

Peter stepped forward.
Peter drank from the cup,
Peter felt the warmth radiate from his center,
And yet he did not understand

Still fettered in the shackles of his worldly birth
He watched
Puzzled
As the others put it to their lips.

The wine
Presented no sign to those expecting:
The simple drink from the rough cup
Sat humbly in the shepherd’s hand;
Worldly to those who did not yet know Him.

“This is my blood”
But no blood flowed from his veins.
No cut violated his body
And no bitter taste of salt and iron lingered in their mouths.

But suddenly Peter understood
As his thoughts brushed against God’s perfection.
Breaking free from the world’s tethers,
To accept his present, divine birth:

Given by Himself.
Given by Christ’s revelation:

He revealed himself in the cup,
In the wine,
In the faces of his followers,
In the dirt floor and thatched ceiling,

In the eyes:

For the first time
He shared the eyes of his beloved teacher
Who cast his gaze into the depths of his own.

Behind the eyes of the son of man
He saw the infinite identity of his father’s smile
That bore itself on the son’s complexion
Who lived there in his father’s words
As they were given to him by his faith
That kept him in the moment of his father’s unfolding creation.

He did not know what it was to be lost
Until God found him in his blind questioning
And struck all ego from his mind
And blessed his tongue with these words:
“This is Truth
This is God
This is Christ”

Inside the café
I look out on to the small portion of the city grid that unfolds before my eyes:
Beyond the softness of my translucent reflection on the window pane
Towards the sea of black coats, umbrellas and moving shapes that grace the landscape.

Another person,
Another life:
Another unread novel rotting on the shelf
Passed over by all who would read it;
Passed by on the city street.

Can you feel the rain between us
As you move on
Pretending not to see the face that stares past my prints
Shining off the window after these longing fingers pull away?

I have seen it in your face when look down or straight ahead
And pass by the others in your bubble as if living in your own dream:
Merely a distant gaze,
You face the throng,
Face desire
Face the unconscious need that drives the surrounding movement forward
Towards the discovery of its own emptiness that renews its search and its longing.

You do not share this longing:
Dwelling in this space between the others
Content to be carried along by the forces beyond your control

How I wish your calmness would infect the world around you
So as to part this ocean of desirous chaos
That I might walk to you
Look you in the eyes
And smile…

I give this poem to you.

I wanted to tell you what I am, what you are.

Though time and space seem to separate us,
I tell you:
We are together now.

It is Ourself that I’m trying to impress on you:
The now in which the words pass by
Contains our voice speaking these thoughts;
The future as it becomes the past.

We are this future,
Which consciousness faithfully reflects
As it leaves our unthought Self
To dance in the firmament of the mind.

This future is the One
That holds the present and the past
As it reveals itself as everything
When we glimpse its shadow.

So drop this poem from your hands
And drop these thoughts from your mind
So that the reader might take the time
To free itself of words and listen…

The inlets
Wrap around the water
Writhing in the fury of the ocean’s waves,
Obscuring the distance they reveal
To the eyes that gaze absent mindedly
Down their beaches and their cliffs.

Indifferent to the conflict below,
The sun blazes down
But the winds cleanse the skin of its heat
As they are driven from the sea.

The sea that breaks the stoic rocks
And casts the sand’s lonely grains
-Along with the many homeless winds-
Across the beaches which *****
At the feet of their stony bluffs.

But the cliffs stand in austere grandeur
Defiantly surveying the endless waters
Whose numerous, ceaseless, enduring waves
Are kept at bay by the towering unity.

I am of the wind that has no home
In the conflict of sea and land
I am the sun that lights this vision:
Firmament of hills, sea and sand.

Tides come and go but never leave me
Sands shift in time but never deceive me
As sun I shine light on all at hand:
This ceaseless meeting of sea and land.