• Bodhisattvacharyavatara
    • Introduction
    • Chapter 1
    • Chapter 2
    • Chapter 3
    • Chapter 4
    • Chapter 5
    • Chapter 6
    • Chapter 7
    • Chapter 8
    • Chapter 9
    • Chapter 10
  • collected works
    • 25th August 1981 – count Up
    • askance From Hell
    • Batman
    • The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford
    • Bob 1995-2012
    • Edward Hopper: Poems at an Exhibition
    • David Bowie Movements in Suite Major
    • Eglinton Hill
    • FLOORBOARDS
    • Granada
    • in and out / the Avebury stones / can’t seem to get / a signal …
    • Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters]
    • Miller’s Batman
    • mum
    • nan
    • Portsmouth – Southsea
    • Spring Warwick breezes / over Bacharach fieldwork and boroughs with / the occasional shift and chirp of David / in the pastel-long morning of the sixties
    • through the crash
  • index
    • #A-E see!
    • F–K, wha’ th’
    • L-P 33 1/3 rpm
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mlewisredford

~ may the Supreme and Precious Jewel Bodhichitta take birth where it has not yet done so …

mlewisredford

Tag Archives: acceptance

c’mon – keep up

19 Friday Jul 2019

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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2019, 6*, acceptance, career, change, CPD, identity, measure, music, Pink Floyd, principle, reputation, system, teaching, wind

                c’mon – keep up

                I was a teacher
                I was sometimes
                very good, I cut edges;

                things changed,
                (they’d never
                 quite coalesced)

                I stuck to
                principle, fatal
                to behold,

                couldn’t shimmy
                with the wind (there
                was never a wall

                that created the
                draft) I was
                still, sometimes,

                very good,
                but things just
                changed –

                                ~ O —

                wazzat I hear,
                music, far away,
                can’t make it out:

                “I don’t need no reputation
                  I don’t need no CPD
                  no starkly standards by which to measure

                  system leave them selfs alone … … …
                  hey, system, leave yourself alone …
                  all in all I’m just another brick in the wall”

 

from Bodhisattvacharyavatara, VI, 90-93: [90] And as for praise and fame and status, these will not necessarily affect my life at all; they will not bring me virtue or recognition, they will not extend my life-span or give me strength or free me from sickness or even make me feel good.   [91] If I truly knew what was of benefit and import to my life, what value would I hold in pursuing such things?   If all I want is some nominal, transient mental entertainment, perhaps I should just indulgently devote myself to gaming and getting high and such.   [92] And yet if, in pursuit of fame, I squander everything I have or even get myself killed for some point of honour, of what use would be the mere sound of words to anyone?   Once I am dead, to whom, of all the people I knew, would they bring satisfaction?   Can you eat words as if they were flesh?   When I am dead, what comes of my honour?   [93] When their mud-houses (and sand-castles) collapse, children spontaneously burst out crying in despair and anguish; and, likewise, when my approbation and renown dry up, my own mind reacts just like a silly child.

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: the mantra of Maitreya
career & change wormhole: Renunciation
identity wormhole: looking for the right exit
music wormhole: there will be ovations
teaching wormhole: my uncomfortable life
wind wormhole: the old man;

 

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the mantra of Maitreya

15 Friday Mar 2019

Posted by m lewis redford in poems, reflectionary

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2018, 8*, acceptance, anger, attachment, Bodhisattvacharyavatara, delusion, emptiness, falling, fire, flower, ground, life, love, Maitreya, mantra, openness, others, peace, sentient beings, suffering

                                                                the mantra of Maitreya

                                oh my loves,

                wriggling on the very thorns you couldn’t live without
                struck by the match over the gasoline you just poured
                falling like a stone through the emptiness you cannot evade

                you wave your arms at me
                you entice me in your dancing embrace
                you collide with me completely oblivious

                let me place the flower in the barrel of the gun
                let me accept-wide your disfigurement, your awkwardness
                let me be the ground, flat as the palm of a hand

                                open
                                open
                                open

                                SOHA

 

Maitreya will be the next being to manifest as a Buddha in this world after the teachings of the current Buddha have been lost; the mantra is actually OM MAITRI MAITRI MAHA MAITRI ARYA MAITRI SOHA; insofar as it can be translated it reads ‘OM love, love, great love, sublime love SOHA’, where ‘OM’ is ‘regarding everything from the most-bottom line’ and ‘SOHA’ is ‘let it be so, as it already is’; the poem flowered quite petally from Bodhisattvacharyavatara, chapter VI, verses 37-38: [37] And like this, when they are so bewildered under the spell and influence of the kleśas, they will even destroy and, finally, take their own treasured life, then, how might it be hoped they would hold themselves back from harming or killing the bodies of others? [38] Even if I have lost, or cannot develop, compassion for these beings intoxicated and driven mad by their kleśas, who are engaged within their own self-destruction – lost in their own perdition, chained within their own fall – and who are, even now, committed to my destruction, then, how could I develop anger towards them? The least I could do would be to restrain from anger.

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: DANSE RUSSE by William Carlos Williams
emptiness wormhole: sun setting over a lake, 1840
life wormhole: it’s / not what you do or what you say / if it ain’t got that swing
love wormhole: the reach turned to love
Maitreya wormhole: birth in the world
openness wormhole: transferring
others wormhole: glamour of saṃsāra

 

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DANSE RUSSE by William Carlos Williams

14 Saturday Jul 2018

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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1917, 5*, acceptance, arms, baby, bedroom, dancing, face, happiness, loneliness, mirror, mist, shoulders, singing, sleep, sun, trees, white, wife, William Carlos Williams, yellow

                                DANSE RUSSE

                If I when my wife is sleeping
                and the baby and Kathleen
                are sleeping
                and the sun is a flame-white-disc
                in silken mists
                above shining trees,–
                if I in my north room
                dance naked, grotesquely
                before my mirror
                waving my shirt round my head
                and singing softly to myself:
                “I am lonelt, lonely.
                I was born to be lonely,
                I am best so!”
                If I admire my arms, flanks, buttocks
                against the yellow drawn shades,–

                Who shall say I am not
                the happy genius of my household?

 

from Al Que Quiere, 1917

Diaghilev, Nijinsky and the Ballets Russes were in New York in 1916, inspiring the abandon of conformity and the discipline of acceptance which were so necessary to the budding 20th Century

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: without any buffet at all
bedroom wormhole: between thoughts
dancing wormhole: Pilot 125 … // … being excursion in the interludes
loneliness wormhole: Cocktails in 1951
mirror wormhole: … the underleaves show
mist wormhole: mauve
sleep wormhole: after all
sun wormhole: fifty-eight // and silent prayers
trees wormhole: transferring
white wormhole: ‘the Bat-Signal …’
William Carlos Williams wormhole: LOVE SONG by William Carlos Williams
yellow wormhole: abandoned sound mirrors

 

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without any buffet at all

15 Monday Jan 2018

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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2015, 5*, acceptance, being, depression, green, identity, notice, panic, pointlessness, self-compassion, silence, surface, true nature, twilight, water

                                                surfacing
                                from a quiet sag – only noticed when
                surfacing amid the twilight sump,

                                                only
                                the silence of lapping remembered when damp seam and sole
                feel cold and slimely green –

                                                still
                                I do not know my true nature, panicking and gasping,
                wanting to float, wanting to hover,

                                                even,
                                without any buffet at all, without taint, and
                the local too close to distinguish

                                                myse-

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: prelude: // travel
being & depression & identity wormhole: lack of center
green wormhole: river
pointlessness wormhole: is this it // all the time
silence wormhole: the silent night of the Batman
twilight wormhole: and // do your ears burn red?
water wormhole: om muni muni maha muniye soha

 

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prelude: // travel

01 Thursday Jun 2017

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2013, 6*, acceptance, castle, coffee, compassion, doing, driving, dust, field, green, Have, mist, motorway, passing, people, progress, self-compassion, sky, steel, stone, sunlight, tarmac, travelling, waking, wood

                                prelude:

                had a day to myself
                no work to do no family no obligation
                I could have built myself a castle stony to the sky
                but I did nothing to make my mark in the world
                nothing to house
                the sky

                and I felt strangely accepting of that
                a sort-of love really

                                travel

                woke-up stupid lack-slept
                but I have a certain love for myself
                and I get on with last-minute packing

                people, slaves in so many ways to Have
                but I have a certain love for myself
                and can accept us all to suffer our own coffees

                there is steel in all the greens and mist in all the sunlight
                the harvester shaves the field to dust and someone
                burns the wood to waft across the motorway

                but I have a certain love for myself and
                I let them all pass and while the rubber turns
                the tarmac I progress to a destination

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance & sky wormhole: stone
coffee wormhole: magnificent salad
compassion wormhole: so pleased to see you again
doing wormhole: wasted –
field & green wormhole: greedy
Have wormhole: beepbeep
mist wormhole: retirement
motorway wormhole: dawn
passing & travelling wormhole: handsome
people wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – agricultural show
stone wormhole: Salisbury Cathedral // suspended in everything
wood wormhole: the 19th century

 

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stone

25 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2017, 7*, acceptance, afterlife, barrow, breath, death, girl, hair, life, lost, parent, place, settlement, sky, speech, stone, time, world

courtesy of https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1010628 - hope she doesn't mind

courtesy of https://historicengland.org.uk – hope she doesn’t mind

                                there was
                                just out
                                and hunt
                                and gather

                                and then
                                we stopped
                                to keep
                                and found

                the whole world wider than the sky

                                that we
                                got lost
                                to where
                                we were

                                and time
                                which came
                                to late
                                and so we

                                hauled
                                the stones
                                to fix
                                place

                                and dis
                                covered
                                in …
                                and life

                                and death
                                the smell of
                                deepness
                                the breath

                                of stone
                “you know what they were talking about
                                in class …
                                Kirsty …”

                                scampering
                                sideways
                                down the
                                slope untied

                                hair waving
                                all over
                                the place
                “… they were talking about barrows, burial

                                chambers;
                                we’re standing
                                on them
                                now – ”

                                all over
                                the place;
                                I’ve come
                                from the

                                ground I’ll
                                go back to
                                the ground
                                when time

 

perspective; read the whole sequence as it treads sideways down through time: in and out / the Avebury stones / can’t seem to get / a signal …

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: Prajnaparamita // Maitreya
breath & hair & life wormhole: brown corduroy shirt / and dark redwine tie
death wormhole: where it has taken birth / may it not decrease …
girl wormhole: neither nude nor / descending a staircase
sky wormhole: ssreet chak-chak
speech wormhole: retirement
stone & time & world wormhole: weight

 

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Prajnaparamita // Maitreya

01 Tuesday Nov 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2013, 7*, acceptance, anxiety, being, claim, dust, embracing, emptiness, Enlightenment, envelope, fear, labyrinth, leaves, letting go, life, light, living, loss, Maitreya, myth, pointlessness, Prajnaparamita, shadow, smile, stage, true nature, words

prajnaparamita

                                                                                Prajnaparamita

                                                                acknowledge
                                                                accept
                                                                embrace
                                                the pointlessness all around
                                                there is nothing to claim
                                there is nothing to gain
                                there is not even anything to lose
                deep within the fear and anxiety
                                cast adrift
                                                soha

maitreya-face

                                                                                Maitreya

                                                                enfold
                                                                enhabit
                                                                ennoble
                                                the props all around
                                in the light in the shadows
                                even the dust and the leaves
                                and smile the tentative labyrinthine myth
                deep within the words and stage sufficient
                                unto itself
                                                soha

 

the mantra: thaya tha om gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi soha, is the mantra of Prajnaparamita, the Perfection of Wisdom; it can be somewhat semantically translated as ‘it’s like this: [everything is] gone, gone, completely gone, completely and perfectly gone with no loss, enlightened [dispersed, dispelled] all-right!’, where ‘gate’ means ‘gone’ – it originates from the Heart Sutra wherein Avalokitshvara has just systematically taught that nothing exists intrinsically (including the means to realise this), but not that nothing exists which is why it is possible to attain Enlightenment (‘bodhi’); Maitreya’s mantra is om maitri maitri maha maitri arya maitri soha, wherein ‘maitri’ means ‘loving kindness’; the Prajnaparamita image I found in http://meditationincheshire.org/courses-events/special-events/prajnaparamita-empowerment-saturday-14th-november-2015/; the Maitreya image I found from http://www.alanpeto.com/buddhism/back-to-the-future-buddha/; the poems are mine, trying to make sense of a thousand lives

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

anxiety wormhole: listen willya
accpetance wormhole: magnificent salad
being wormhole: I
emptiness wormhole: Doctor Strange II – … things are the same again
leaves wormhole: the too big moon
letting go wormhole: time
life & light & pointlessness wormhole: beepbeep
living wormhole: even / a second
Maitreya wormhole: quite simply
shadow wormhole: was there a moon / on the alleyway wall / confused in front of / the city skyline?
smile wormhole: passersby
words wormhole: cut while you’re ahead/cut while you’re a thread – poewieview #35

 

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magnificent salad

30 Friday Sep 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

2016, 5*, acceptance, Alhambra, almonds, apple, being, blue, brown, coffee, colour, custard, embracing, Granada, green, holiday, lime, morning, oil, openness, orange, peach, prunes, red, salad, table, time, walking, yellow

                magnificent salad

                you take diced red and yellow apple
                and sliced melocotone flesh
                a few dark-shredded prunes and a
                sprinkle of roasted abrezia nuts

                a lightwood table top to eat from
                in the lo-fat custard (with hint of lime
                from the pulled curtain) apartamiento
                and the blood-orange shirt discarded

                from the morning’s walk, in the burnt
                orange street of a constant 30º Granada
                of a currently perpetual 2 pm, then
                just a twist of no-tickets to the Red

                Castle all week; a cup of milky coffee
                waiting, but not before I drink the
                run-off olive oil and soy sauce from
                the green and bluely leafed plate

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: and smile / like a bud
being wormhole: cut while you’re ahead/cut while you’re a thread – poewieview #35
blue wormhole: hello, luvvey, do you want a cup of tea?
brown & red & yellow wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – … as the new town marches in
coffee wormhole: quick inventory after coffee
green & walking wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – A Sign of the Times
holiday wormhole: Granada holiday …
lime wormhole: AT-tennnnnnnn – waitfrit waitfrit – SHUN!
morning & table wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – Safe Home
oppenness wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – A Precious Moment
orange wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – Simon Upon The Downs
time wormhole: moment

 

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and smile / like a bud

31 Wednesday Aug 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

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2013, 5*, acceptance, awareness, balance, breath, clouds, history, posture, settling, shoulders, sitting, smile, voices

                and smile
                like a bud

there’s everything friendly
                in sitting
the half-lotus with a cushion
                for now
the straight back with a balance
                after all
the breath from the stomach
                actually
leaves the shoulders to hang like a
                coat hanger

                and then
you simply aware the natural lock
                like a cloud
       and like a cloud
your history and voices will swirl about and
                through
and eventually you don’t panic
                or fight
and you don’t even try to find your way
                through
but smile like an uncle as they turn and
                they tumble
and after any length of time you’ll find
                it is slightly
damp and chilly then it is time to get up and
                go indoors

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: need
awareness wormhole: trying to focus / on walking
balance wormhole: my seat // now
breath wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – A Precious Moment
clouds wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J Redford – Simon Upon The Downs
history & posture & sitting wormhole: AT-tennnnnnnn – waitfrit waitfrit – SHUN!
settling wormhole: no point
smile wormhole: Elektra
voices wormhole: hello, luvvey, do you want a cup of tea?

 

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need

23 Saturday Apr 2016

Posted by m lewis redford in poems

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2013, acceptance, allowing, beauty, being, career, defeat, doing, emptiness, identity, living, need, writing

                                                    I need to accept
                                               this emptiness
                                          not become it

                                I need to allow
                           this defeat
                      not fight it

                      I need to find my beauty and hide it
                      let it be seen and found as it will or not
                      but not because I have proffered it or

                                          worn it or
                                          dressed it
                                          in syllables

 

 

 

————w(O)rmholes________________________________|—–

acceptance wormhole: because
allowing wormhole: opening
beauty & being & doing & identity & writing wormhole: the writing’s on the wall
career wormhole: bavardage
emptiness wormhole: no one – poewieview #24
living wormhole: 1968

 

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  • Bodhisattvacharyavatara
    • Chapter 1
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    • Introduction
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    • askance From Hell
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    • in and out / the Avebury stones / can’t seem to get / a signal …
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    • mum
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    • Portsmouth – Southsea
    • Spring Warwick breezes / over Bacharach fieldwork and boroughs with / the occasional shift and chirp of David / in the pastel-long morning of the sixties
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  • paisley // implicitly
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