Showing posts with label Poem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Poem. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 28, 2024

The Waves Of Our Undoing

 


 

"Why Can't Everyone Just Eat Sensibly?"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed



Be Still

The only thing to be done now,
now that the waves of our undoing
have begun to strike on us,
is to contain ourselves.

To keep still, and let the wreckage
of ourselves go,
let everything go, as the wave smashes us,
yet keep still, and hold
the tiny grain of something that no wave
can wash away,
not even the most massive wave
of destiny.

Among all the smashed debris of myself
keep quiet, and wait.
For the word is Resurrection.
And even the sea of seas will have to
give up its dead.
 
 
~ D.H. Lawrence ~
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Sunday, February 25, 2024

Page From A Bad Horse Diary..


 

 

"Cold AF - Self Portrait at Gloucester Marine Railways"
Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed

 


A
esthetics of Harshness to a Horse

You should never be harsh
To a horse. A horse is always doing
Its best. Otherwise it is a bad horse
And harshness has no effect.

~ Kenneth Koch ~

  

 

 

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Tuesday, February 20, 2024

Tell

 


 

"Tell It Slant"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed



Tell all the truth but tell it slant

Tell all the truth but tell it slant —
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind —

~ Emily Dickinson ~



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Monday, February 5, 2024

The Ghost Of The Sea

 




"Shell - Parker River Wildlife Refuge"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed


 

The Shell

The sea fills my ear
with sand and with fear.

“You may wash out the sand,
but never the sound
of the ghost of the sea
that is haunting me.”

~ Ted Hughes ~





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Wednesday, November 22, 2023

Thanksgiving In The 2023 Empire

 

Cape Ann Museum 


Carved Wood Panel - Cape Ann Museum - Gloucester MA

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed



O
f The Empire

We will be known as a culture that feared death
and adored power, that tried to vanquish insecurity
for the few and cared little for the penury of the
many. We will be known as a culture that taught
and rewarded the amassing of things, that spoke
little if at all about the quality of life for
people (other people), for dogs, for rivers. All
the world, in our eyes, they will say, was a
commodity. And they will say that this structure
was held together politically, which it was, and
they will say also that our politics was no more
than an apparatus to accommodate the feelings of
the heart, and that the heart, in those days,
was small, and hard, and full of meanness.

~ Mary Oliver ~







 

 

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Monday, November 13, 2023

You Cannot Lay Claim To Anything

 

Late Day - Parker River Wildlife Refuge 
 
 
"Late Day - 40mph"
Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed




When near the end of day, life has drained
Out of light, and it is too soon
For the mind of night to have darkened things,

No place looks like itself, loss of outline
Makes everything look strangely in-between,
Unsure of what has been, or what might come.

In this wan light, even trees seem groundless.
In a while it will be night, but nothing
Here seems to believe the relief of darkness.

You are in this time of the interim
Where everything seems withheld.

The path you took to get here has washed out;
The way forward is still concealed from you.

The old is not old enough to have died away;
The new is still too young to be born.”

You cannot lay claim to anything;
In this place of dusk,
Your eyes are blurred;
And there is no mirror.

Everyone else has lost sight of your heart
And you can see nowhere to put your trust;
You know you have to make your own way through.

As far as you can, hold your confidence.
Do not allow confusion to squander
This call which is loosening
Your roots in false ground,
That you might come free
From all you have outgrown.

What is being transfigured here in your mind,
And it is difficult and slow to become new.
The more faithfully you can endure here,
The more refined your heart will become
For your arrival in the new dawn.


~ John O’Donohue ~






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Saturday, November 11, 2023

At Least Fifty Percent Terrible

 

 

Rockport 

 

"Rockport"
Nikon D800
Nikkor 50.0mm f/1.4 Lens
Lightroom
Snapseed



Good Bones

Life is short, though I keep this from my children.
Life is short, and I've shortened mine
in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways,
a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways
I'll keep from my children. The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that's a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.
For every loved child, a child broken, bagged,
sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children. I am trying
to sell them the world. Any decent realtor,
walking you through a real shithole, chirps on
about good bones: This place could be beautiful,
right? You could make this place beautiful.
 
~ Maggie Smith ~






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Tuesday, October 10, 2023

Re-Post - Again and again and again

 

Again and again and again 

 

"Again and Again and Again" 

Sharpie Ultra Fine Point on Rhodia Graph Paper
Canon Lide 700f Scanner
Snapseed, Glaze, RePix



Meditation

Animals full of light
walk through the forest
toward someone aiming a gun
loaded with darkness.

That’s the world:  God
holding still
letting it happen again,
and again and again.
 
~ William Stafford ~ 

 

 

 

~

 

 

Sunday, September 24, 2023

Don't Tell Us, Dear Friends


 

Thoughts & Prayers 

 

"Guns Are TheMostImportantThing"

ProCreate
Stackables
Snapseed


....

Don’t tell us
how to love, don’t tell us
how to grieve, or what
to grieve for, or how loss
shouldn’t sit down like a gray
bundle of dust in the deepest
pockets of our energy, don’t laugh at our belief
that money isn’t
everything, don’t tell us
how to behave in
anger, in longing, in loss, in home-
sickness, don’t tell us,
dear friends.

....

~ Mary Oliver (excerpted) ~
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
~
 
 
 
 
 



Saturday, July 29, 2023

Prophet

 

 

Prophet 

 

"Prophet"
(Not my image - NBC News Screen Cap)
Snapseed
Brushstroke
Hipstamatic


"Tyrants fear the poet.
Now that we know it
we can't blow it.
We owe it
to show it
not slow it
although it
hurts to sew it
when the world
skirts below it."

~ Amanda Gorman ~
Excerpt - "In This Place (An American Lyric)"



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Sunday, June 11, 2023

What you get....

 

Rockport


"Atlantic Ocean from Bearskin Neck, Rockport MA"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed
Glaze



....this is freedom. This is the force of faith. Nobody gets   
what they want. Never again are you the same. The longing
is to be pure. What you get is to be changed. More and more by
each glistening minute, through which infinity threads itself,   
also oblivion, of course, the aftershocks of something   
at sea. Here, hands full of sand, letting it sift through   
in the wind, I look in and say take this, this is   
what I have saved, take this, hurry. And if I listen   
now? Listen, I was not saying anything. It was only   
something I did. I could not choose words. I am free to go.   
I cannot of course come back. Not to this. Never.   
It is a ghost posed on my lips. Here: never.

~ Jorie Graham - excerpted from "Prayer" ~




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Thursday, April 27, 2023

Excuse me

 

 

 

 

~

 

 

 

 

Sunday, April 23, 2023

An Addition To Our On-boarding Process


 

Deep 


"Deep"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed


A Ritual to Read to Each Other

If you don't know the kind of person I am
and I don't know the kind of person you are
a pattern that others made may prevail in the world
and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,
a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break
sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood
storming out to play through the broken dike.

And as elephants parade holding each elephant's tail,
but if one wanders the circus won't find the park,
I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty
to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,
a remote important region in all who talk:
though we could fool each other, we should consider—
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.

For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
 
 
~ William Stafford ~ 
 
 
 
 
~
 
 
 
 
 

Head-shot & Bio

 

Dorothy's Flowers


"Head Shot"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed
Brushstrokes
Decim8



The Contrariness of the Mad Farmer

I am done with apologies. If contrariness is my
inheritance and destiny, so be it. If it is my mission
to go in at exits and come out at entrances, so be it.
I have planted by the stars in defiance of the experts,
and tilled somewhat by incantation and by singing,
and reaped, as I knew, by luck and Heaven's favor,
in spite of the best advice. If I have been caught
so often laughing at funerals, that was because
I knew the dead were already slipping away,
preparing a comeback, and can I help it?
And if at weddings I have gritted and gnashed
my teeth, it was because I knew where the bridegroom
had sunk his manhood, and knew it would not
be resurrected by a piece of cake. ‘Dance,’ they told me,
and I stood still, and while they stood
quiet in line at the gate of the Kingdom, I danced.
‘Pray,’ they said, and I laughed, covering myself
in the earth's brightnesses, and then stole off gray
into the midst of a revel, and prayed like an orphan.
When they said, ‘I know my Redeemer liveth,’
I told them, ‘He's dead.’ And when they told me
‘God is dead,’ I answered, ‘He goes fishing every day
in the Kentucky River. I see Him often.’
When they asked me would I like to contribute
I said no, and when they had collected
more than they needed, I gave them as much as I had.
When they asked me to join them I wouldn't,
and then went off by myself and did more
than they would have asked. ‘Well, then,’ they said
‘go and organize the International Brotherhood
of Contraries,’ and I said, ‘Did you finish killing
everybody who was against peace?’ So be it.
Going against men, I have heard at times a deep harmony
thrumming in the mixture, and when they ask me what
I say I don't know. It is not the only or the easiest
way to come to the truth. It is one way.

~ Wendell Berry ~






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Friday, February 10, 2023

This Is The Time

 

 

Lynch Park - Beverly 

 

"Lynch Park - Beverly"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed



This is the Time To Be Slow
 
This is the time to be slow,
Lie low to the wall
Until the bitter weather passes.
Try, as best you can, not to let
The wire brush of doubt
Scrape from your heart
All sense of yourself
And your hesitant light.
If you remain generous,
Time will come good;
And you will find your feet
Again on fresh pastures of promise,
Where the air will be kind
And blushed with beginning.

~ John O’Donohue - Book of Blessings




 






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Monday, January 2, 2023

Poem For World Introvert Day

 

Parker River Wildlife Refuge 

 

"Fallen"

Canon G7x Mark II
Snapseed



The Art of Disappearing - by Naomi Shihab Nye
 
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 anymore.
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. 





~




Thursday, December 22, 2022

No Consolation

 

Gloucester Fish Pier 

 

"Grudges"

Nikon D800
Nikkor 50.0mm f1.4 Lens
Lightroom
Snapseed

 


Hammer is the Prayer

There is no consolation in the thought of God,
he said, slamming another nail

in another house another havoc had half–taken.
Grace is not consciousness, nor is it beyond.

To hell with remembrance, to hell with heaven,
hammer is the prayer of the poor and the dying.

And the wind in some lordless random comes to rest,
and all the disquieted dust within,

peace came to the hinterlands of our minds,
too remote to know, but peace nonetheless.

~ Christian Wiman ~
 
 
 
 
 
~
 
 
 
 

Saturday, December 3, 2022

Exactly this -

 

Big Sky - Parker River Wildlife Refuge 

 

"Big Sky - Parker River Wildlife Refuge"

Nikon D7200
Nikkor 10.00mm - 24.00mm Lens
Lightroom
Silver Efex



What's Wrong With Me


The end of the world
is not what’s wrong with me.

Old age, illness, and death
are not wrong. They just are.

A stone says, Wake up,
exactly this is all there is!

Everything says it—

a sick coyote crossing the field,
poisoned, injured, rabid, old,

the rest of the pack anxious,
yipping and howling back and forth
across the valley as dusk comes on.

What’s wrong with me is that
I find their music beautiful.

I dwell on it long after it stops
and in the silence afterward

I write down its words.
 
 
~ Chase Twichell ~
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
~
 
 
 
 
 
 

Wednesday, October 12, 2022

Love Letters

 

Danvers Community Gardens

 
"Queen Anne's Bones"
 
Nikon D800
Nikkor 105.0mm Macro Lens
Lightroom
Snapseed


If you're a Buddhist, you probably know the Heart Sutra, maybe even by heart. In it, the Bodhisattva of Compassion Avalokiteshvara, while practicing the Perfection of Wisdom, sees through all the bullshit and realizes that there's no "there" there. Essentially the sutra is a love letter to Sariputra (one of the Buddha's disciples who was with the B.O.C. at the time.) and to all of us.. 

A favorite translation from the Kwan Um School of Zen:

Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva
when practicing deeply the Prajna Paramita
perceives that all five skandhas are empty
and is saved from all suffering and distress.
Shariputra,
form does not differ from emptiness,
emptiness does not differ from form.
That which is form is emptiness,
that which is emptiness form.
The same is true of feelings,
perceptions, impulses, consciousness.
Shariputra,
all dharmas are marked with emptiness;
they do not appear or disappear,
are not tainted or pure,
do not increase or decrease.
Therefore, in emptiness no form, no feelings,
perceptions, impulses, consciousness.
No eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind;
no color, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch,
no object of mind;
no realm of eyes
and so forth until no realm of mind consciousness.
No ignorance and also no extinction of it,
and so forth until no old age and death
and also no extinction of them.
No suffering, no origination,
no stopping, no path, no cognition,
also no attainment with nothing to attain.
The Bodhisattva depends on Prajna Paramita
and the mind is no hindrance;
without any hindrance no fears exist.
Far apart from every perverted view one dwells in Nirvana.
In the three worlds
all Buddhas depend on Prajna Paramita
and attain Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi.
Therefore know that Prajna Paramita
is the great transcendent mantra,
is the great bright mantra,
is the utmost mantra,
is the supreme mantra
which is able to relieve all suffering
and is true, not false.
So proclaim the Prajna Paramita mantra,
proclaim the mantra which says:
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha.


Today, while reading the blog, "Alive On All Channels", I found a poem by Kabir in which he sounds an awful lot like the B.O.C.
 
Here it is:
 
 
"To what shore would you cross, O my
heart? There is no traveler before
you, there is no road:

Where is the movement, where is the
rest, on that shore?

There is no water; no boat, no boatman,
is there;

There is not so much as a rope to tow
the boat, nor a man to draw it.

No earth, no sky, no time, no thing, is
there: no shore, no ford!

There, there is neither body nor mind:
and where is the place that shall
still the thirst of the soul? You shall
find naught in that emptiness.

Be strong, and enter into your own body:
for there your foothold is firm. Consider
it well, O my heart! Go not elsewhere.

Kabir says: "Put all imaginations away, and
stand fast in that which you are."

~ Kabir
 
 
Not exactly what the B.O.C. was saying - but it's in the neighborhood.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
~
 
 
 
 


Friday, September 16, 2022

This Explains Everything

 

Amida 

 

"Amida"

Canon G7x Mark II
SnapSeed
BrushStroke



    Buddha is your mind
    And the Way goes nowhere.
    Don't look for anything but this.
    If you point your cart North
    When you want to go South,
    How will you ever arrive?

    ~ Zen Master Ryokan ~

 

One Robe, One Bowl - The Zen Poetry of Ryokan - John Stevens Translator



 

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