breakfast

Tags

2019, 7*, blindness, blogging, branches, breakfast, breathing, canopy, coffee, dark, echo, energy, eyes, flash, gooseberry, ground, growth, jam, leaves, life, light, living, monkey, path, reaching, reading, samsara, seeing, shadow, sound, sunlight, toast, trees, walking, way, wind, woodland

                breakfast

                these shadows on a long walk
                through the woodland with only occasional sun

                all there, underneath the undergrowth
                cannot see the ground, the stems that grow from it

                branches reach, leaves envelope everywhere
                from nowhere; weave

                and grow round and entwine each other;
                if I lift the leaves to see my way forward –

                searching for light, searching for life
                to grow, to continue – and if I break the smaller branches to

                make way
                I will scratch my arms, sap will sting my skin, my

                eyes, I cannot see, I cannot see;
                and I won’t see; some trees

                are quicker and older (than me)
                they hold the path and reach wide,

                and creepers make them fat
                and vines hang like curtains of water;

                the canopy above, maximised
                to greatest energy, sent back down through rough wires;

                only when the wind leans
                or a monkey leaps, is there a flash of light, gone by the

                time I’ve looked back down to the path
                blinded, to see where I am

                there must be so much light somewhere
                out there, if only I weren’t stumbling around and bleeding

                … really; I come downstairs
                and breathe coffee and spiced home – made gooseberry jam on home – made toast                           

                while reading my posts … yes,
                a thousand hacks and sap in the dark

                where I cannot see
                and cannot know where I am

                a thousand ‘choks’ deferred
                the undergrowth too dense to echo

 

Bodhisattvacharyavatara chapter VI, verse 12: How can I attain happiness when the causes for happiness are obtained only through great effort and very rarely, and when the seeds­ of pain and sorrow are so prevalent, relentless and multifarious that they are realised easily and without any effort? And yet it is only from suffering that the thought and longing for escape and liberation from the suffering of conditioned existence will come about … therefore, O my deepest mind, hold yourself strong, patient, steadfast!

 

 

^{————w}(O)_{rmholes________________________________|—–}

branches & breathing wormhole: blue sky high
coffee wormhole: green and / luminant / to behold
echo & path & walking wormhole: the Bodhisattva set out / for the Seat of Awakening
eyes & life wormhole: eyes like petals
leaves & living wormhole: everything is caused by something, which / something is caused by something else, nothing / stands alone where all pass as phantoms
light & trees wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – sooner; / and later
reading wormhole: {reading right to left}
samsara & sound wormhole: at Kreukenhof
seeing wormhole: A Solitude by Denise Levertov
shadow wormhole: alabaster balustrade
wind wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – The Valley

 

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everything is caused by something, which / something is caused by something else, nothing / stands alone where all pass as phantoms

Tags

2019, 7*, Amsterdam, boats, buildings, canal, cause and effect, dome, facade, leaves, living, passing, phantom, possession, Spring, time

                everything is caused by something, which
                something is caused by something else, nothing
                stands alone where all pass as phantoms

                                from the canal boat
                                spring leaves turn before
                                centuries of storey

                                facades pass fixed
                                in blanked pageant,
                                with protruding girder

                                with which to reach-in
                                with what to stay and
                                intermittent egress

                                whose iron pins will hold
                                the sides, and only domes
                                will not turn

 

a trip through the canals of Amsterdam where the audio commentary didn’t work forcing the mute passing buildings to do the work instead; the title is from Bodhisattvacharyavatara VI, 31

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

buildings wormhole: Great Bridge, Rouen, 1896
leaves wormhole: blue sky high
living wormhole: looking for the right exit
passing wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – sooner; / and later
Spring wormhole: prose piece 2 from POEMS 1927 by William Carlos Williams
time wormhole: beneath

 

Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – sooner; / and later

Tags

7*, bridge, clouds, eyes, grass, grey, ground, leaves, light, mist, music, passing, rain, roads, silver, sound, starlings, sun, time, trees, water, writing

                sooner;

                occasional sun broke through
                splashed watery light on the road

                on the bridge gazing on the waters
                the flow      caught the eye upwards

                while the music scented of                 mist through the trees

                (grey light and silver hung
                 without movement in

                 folds) until
                raindrops drummed upon our capes;

                and later – jotting

                in the note-book – each blade of grass
                suspending a drop

                (pearls waiting on the
                 clothes-line for the starling’s quickfeet),

                then, when
                my sleeve touched a leaf

                and three drops merged and rolled down
                into the soil down

                through the years, there where
                clouds draw scent from the land, there,

                when a spark of light jabbed
                into my eye

                bright as solid substance cupped
                within a lupin leaf

 

read the collected work of ‘Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters]‘ as it is published: here
this is an appliquiary to: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Rain

 

 

^{————w}(O)_{rmholes________________________________|—–}

bridge & leaves & mist & rain & roads & silver & writing wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Rain
clouds & eyes & grey & passing & sound & sun & time wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – The Valley
light wormhole: light of all interaction
music wormhole: c’mon – keep up
trees wormhole: Candaka
water wormhole: boiled spangle with soft centre

 

THE ATTIC WHICH IS DESIRE: by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1930, 7*, attic, day, desire, light, night, poem, roof, streets, William Carlos Williams, windows

                THE ATTIC WHICH IS DESIRE:

                                the unused tent
                                of

                                bare beams
                                beyond which

                                directly wait
                                the night

                                and day–
                                Here

                                from the street
                                by

                                   *   *   *
                                   *   S   *
                                   *   O  *
                                   *   D  *
                                   *   A  *
                                   *   *   *

                                ringed with
                                running lights

                                the darkened
                                pane

                                exactly
                                down the center

                                is
                                transfixed

 

from Poems, 1930: the word becomes the poem, nothing beyond the word itself – cf. * SODA * – but everything in it just the same; WCW was an atomist, a catalyst and maybe, even, an alchemist, but he was not a dogmatist or a fantasist and definitely not a rhapsodist, although he was a poet, and very often-enough, didn’t know it

 

 

^{————w}(O)_{rmholes________________________________|—–}

light & windows wormhole: window
night & william Carlos Williams wormhole: 11/1 by William Carlos Williams
roof wormhole: Cote des Bœufs à l’Hermitage, Pontoise, 1877
streets wormhole: Great Bridge, Rouen, 1896

 

the Bodhisattva set out / for the Seat of Awakening

Tags

2019, 7*, Arya Lalitavistara, Bodhisattva, Buddha, calm, dark, demon, earth, echo, elephant, food, ground, happiness, light, lion, lotus, mindfulness, mountain, omniscient, past life, path, plateau, power, river, samsara, spontaneity, stars, step, three poisons, Tree of Awakening, view, walking, wheel

                so he bathed in the Nairañjanā,
                he ate the food, his strength

                returned, and he began the walk
                toward the Great Tree; he walked

                with easy gait, grounded
                as a mountain, each step gained

                and graceful with no fight, dream
                or idea; the placement pad of a lion,

                the calliper-swing of an elephant,
                a stride that touched not the earth

                but left perfect wheels
                upon the ground, a step that echoed

                across the plateau, a step that
                levelled mountain paths, each step

                that lead to happy lands,
                each step sprung from past lotuses

                of love and stable intention,
                that rendered demons powerless

                that calmed all view, that evanesced
                the darkness and stopped the

                endless endless rounds; his
                walk outshone the distant stars,

                his walk becalmed the rulers;
                the walk spontaneous, the walk

                omniscient, the walk mindful
                of every ancient step, with such a gait

                the Bodhisattva set out
                for the Seat of Awakening

 

from the Arya Lalita Vistara Nama Mahayana Sutra – the life story of the Buddha – originally using the words from the translation by the Dharmachakra Translation 84000 Committee which is freely available online here (for which thank you, thank you) and then other words once my gaze had settled into the image; the ‘Nairañjanā’ is the river by which the Buddha practised his austerities, the ‘food’ was that given to him by Sujata

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

Buddha wormhole: Sujātā
echo wormhole: so, how long is, a piece of string?
light wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Sky
path wormhole: alabaster balustrade
power wormhole: in turgid reflection
river wormhole: Great Bridge, Rouen, 1896
stars wormhole: 11/1 by William Carlos Williams
walking wormhole: Valentine’s Day 2019

 

Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – I took my camera into the fields

Tags

2019, 7*, birdsong, camera, clouds, corridor, dancing, drifting, elm, evening, faces, fields, focus, forest, gold, grey, hills, horizon, leaves, nebula, nightingale, photography, planet, purple, red, skeleton, sky, space, spire, stars, sun, thinking, trees, words

                                I took my camera into the fields

                but it was only after the
                purple-grey clouds drifted
                across the horizon and the

                wilted leaves had turned
                their face once more to the
                evening sky, when the sun

                broke low across the fields –
                old gold across the treetops –
                that I’d dansed macabre

                with the tripodial skeleton
                before the red hemisphere,
                reclined upon distant hills,

                extinguished like a farce
                and the populace of the
                heavens radiated above me

                and behind, the grates of
                all space between the two
                sentinel elms, it was there, I think,

                I left this planet
                at a tangent (glow of a
                lantern disappearing down the corridor)

                deep, until whole nebulae
                were within my pluck,
                but even before Antares

                had touched the nearby
                spire, the nightingale had
                been deep in construction

                of the following day’s forest façade,
                free free of all possible words and
                zoomed foci

 

read the collected work of ‘Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters]‘ as it is published: here
this is an appliquiary to: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Sky

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

clouds & evening & gold & grey & hills & horizon & leaves & red & sky & space & stars & sun wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Sky
dancing wormhole: Pilot 125 … // … being excursion in the interludes
faces wormhole: on facing the Have
purple wormhole: SPRING AND ALL I by William Carlos Williams
thinking wormhole: writening
words wormhole: A Corner of the Garden at the Hermitage, 1877

 

mandala offering

Tags

2019, 7*, cause and effect, doing, emptiness, eyes, giving, guidance, hands, holding, identity, interdependent origination, letting go, mandala, mountain, offering, orbit, pointing, selflessness, smile, society, water, waves, world

                not in water piled high in waves
                nor cleverly pointing

                to my own finger
                let’s just leave all that aside for the moment

                mandala offering

                but all that I let within and
                all that I give without

                without aim and with only
                slight smile and eyes

                that guides the lunge
                and holds for the whole of the fall

                flat as the palm of a hand
                deep as the highest mountain

                that the world will continue to spin
                in a palimpsest mark redford way

                and all might find their nature empty and
                centered around each orbit they make

 

                                                ___ ‘m‘ ~~~

a mandala offering is a ritual way of offering the whole universe to the Buddhas, a way of giving up everything for the sake of one’s essential goal in life; ‘is the universe mine to offer?‘ – my universe is, `bought and paid for; ‘but the universe is so big, how can you ‘offer’ it?‘ – easy, the whole of the universe is inside my head; ‘is your universe worth offering to the Buddhas?‘ – it could do with a clean up, which is why I imagine it buffed up with all the Mark Redford stuff cleared away; ‘why bother?‘ – it gives me a clean sheet with which to work on; ‘isn’t that just a bit self-indulgent?‘ – nope, self-indulgence is one of the things I hope to clean out of the universe in order to offer it, I’m hoping to invite a few friends and family around once it’s cleaned up; ‘`sounds rather limited‘ – you don’t know how many mothers I’ve got; ‘do the Buddhas want your mandala?‘ – the Buddhas are my universe, it’s just that I don’t see it yet, my damn ownership keeps getting in the way, and besides, I’m under universe-arrest at the moment … some stuff I did in the past …

                                                ___ ‘m‘ ~~~

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

doing wormhole: Entry to the Village of Voisins, Yvelines, 1872
emptiness wormhole: there will be ovations
eyes wormhole: my uncomfortable life
giving wormhole: it’s / not what you do or what you say / if it ain’t got that swing
hands & waves wormhole: The Atlantic City Convention: 1. THE WAITRESS by William Carlos Williams
identity & letting go & society wormhole: in deed
smile wormhole: …zzh-vvttP*–… … …
water wormhole: 10/22 by William Carlos Williams
world wormhole: A Corner of the Garden at the Hermitage, 1877

 

A Corner of the Garden at the Hermitage, 1877

Tags

1877, 2018, 7*, being, bench, book, change, distance, garden, ground, growth, meaning, Pissarro, quiet, seasons, shrub, sister, sky, speech, trees, words, world

                there are words in the book
                look, they match things

                in the world, the little sister
                was unconvinced and

                leaned on the bench
                to keep it on the ground,

                she knew the tree behind
                grew slowly in more

                than one direction,
                the tall shrubs all shushed

                in the distance, but the
                sky had already turned season

 

slyly, from the corner of A Corner of the Garden at the Hermitage, 1877 by Camille Pissarro

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

being & garden & meaning & sky & trees wormhole: threshold to behold
bench wormhole: snapshots about Totnes
change wormhole: so, how long is, a piece of string?
quiet wormhole: horizon
speech wormhole: The Atlantic City Convention: 1. THE WAITRESS by William Carlos Williams
words wormhole: my uncomfortable life
world wormhole: Batman: Oddysey

 

Boulevarde Montmartre, Evening Sun, 1879 // Boulevarde Montmartre at Night, 1879

Tags

1879, 7*, axle, boulevard, burn, carriage, chimney, evening, future, horses, individualism, lives, Montmartre, night, passengers, pavement, pediment, petrol, Pissarro, shops, skyline, sun, time, windows

Boulevarde Montmartre, Evening Sun, 1879

                each atelier window
                piled up above the
                pediment line,
                shutter-shut but
                lives to be told, each
                with individual chimney

                each carriage with each
                passenger pulled by their
                own horse evenly around
                an axle; fixed,
                only the boulevard proceeds …

Boulevarde Montmartre at Night, 1879

                … through time; but at night
                the shop-fronts burn and
                ignite the petrol pavement,
                there, under the rippled
                surface, the ache of things to come

 

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

chimney wormhole: Impression of Winter: Carriage on a Country Road, 1872
evening wormhole: Puerto del Carmen
night & skyline wormhole: intent
shops wormhole: pediment to behold
sun wormhole: Staffa Fingal’s Cave, 1832
time wormhole: the old man;
windows wormhole: Female Peasant Carding, 1875

 

10/22 by William Carlos Williams

Tags

'scape, 1928, 7*, barrel, bayberry, birch, dog, field, grass, green, leaves, orange, rain, red, water, white, William Carlos Williams, yarrow, yellow

                that brilliant field
                of rainwet orange
                blanketed

                by the red grass
                and oilgreen bayberry

                the last yarrow
                on the gutter
                white by the sandy
                rainwater

                and a white birch
                with yellow leaves
                and few
                and loosely hung

                and a young dog
                jumped out
                of the old barrel

 

out and not wet from The Descent of Winter, 1928

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

birch wormhole: Hastings: neither all or nothing
dog wormhole: London refugee march – 120915
field wormhole: ‘… plane is upright …’
green & water wormhole: Puerto del Carmen
leaves wormhole: travelling / back
orange & red & white & William Carlos Williams wormhole: The Atlantic City Convention: 1. THE WAITRESS by William Carlos Williams
rain wormhole: Rain, Steam and Speed – the / Great Western Railway, 1844
yellow wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – pageant of the trees