all the low clouds keeping pace / through the train window, / always arriving, whether fast or / slow, but never actually moving

Tags

2018, 8*, arrival, being, Bodhisattvacharyavatara, Bodhisattvas, body, Buddhas, clarity, clothes, clouds, confession, emperor, falling, ignorance, immanence, mind, naked, non-duality, omnipresent, omniscience, Perfection of Wisdom, presence, realisation, self-image, self-indulgent, standing, stillness, time, train, ultimate reality, visualisation, walking, windows, wisdom

               all the low clouds keeping pace
                through the train window,
                always arriving, whether fast or
                slow, but never actually moving

                ‘I am always in the presence of all
                 the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas who
                 are always endowed with unobstructed
                 wisdom’; there is no ultimate

                difference between the body and
                the mind therefore those who
                walk about in that realisation are present
                wherever an omniscient mind is,

                throughout each plane of ten directions
                within each of the ten directions
                none of them safely away in far places
                of my mind (where I might just get

                get away with anything) and when I
                invoke them to come ‘here’, they are
                already always here, far more immanent
                than I could stand on my own two feet,

                far more immediate before I could even
                think to in-front generate, far more
                intimate than my dignity could allow …
                and then at and long and even last, I’ll

                recognise it all, all my rotting lacks and
                fetid habits (never successfully hidden),
                finally signalling that I get it – confessing
                it all, each writhing and breaking-up sod

                of wilful and peevish stupidity, undressing
                it all with lay-aside relief; and it’s not
                like I’m informing them, they won’t be
                shocked or recoil with disgust or resigned

                with disappointment, it is just me falling
                far short of being right, let alone clever
                or wise, unpeeling from myself all the
                lies I accepted that said I am right,

                clever and vindicated like an emperor
                with new clothes; this immanence of
                clarity, this confession that inculcates a non-
                duality rising to a Perfection with wisdom

 

Bodhisattvacharyavatara II 27; V 31

 

 

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

clouds wormhole: ‘when travelling astrally …’
mind wormhole: to arms, then;
realisation wormhole: polystyrene / boulderscape
stillness wormhole: cape and cowl
time & windows wormhole: … the underleaves show
train wormhole: mother and daughter
walking wormhole: amniotic avenue

 

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to arms, then;

Tags

1907, 2017, 8*, attention, Bodhichitta, Bodhisattvacharyavatara, body, carelessness, eyes, fate, fields, fire, focus, hell, ideals, identity, inner-self, karma, kleshas, laziness, Louis de la Vallee Poussin, mind, mindlessness, monster, mother sentient beings, narcissism, opportunity, over-reaching, phantom, practice, rebirth, resolve, smoke, staying, suffering, superhero, surprise, talking to myself, torture, translation, war, Warrior

                but there are plenty of opportunities
                to shave off indolence

                there are too many surprises
                to meet-off heedlessness, and stay;

                no use wailing and whimpering
                enfeebled by narcissism,

                when being unremittingly tortured
                of body and mind

                it’ll be way too late,
                I shall have nothing left but bad fate;

                the thing is, they don’t plot, they don’t
                manoeuvre and they

                hardly ever show
                themselves, so how is it I walk eyes-

                wide-open into each of their snare and
                realm; there, monsters

                slavering astride horizon cower me to
                craven identity, fires

                hot to match all my defences, afflicting
                me without notice

                or even much effort
                fires of the sun, fires of the atom, I’ll be

                engulfed but not
                consumed to blessed oblivion … oh, give me

                a break! – I’m
                ongoingly consumed even now, as long as I

                continue endlessly playing
                this solitaire, hitting the ‘new game’ button

                again and again
                until I … stop; but the cleverer I get

                with them the cleverer they already are,
                like shadow-boxing –

                these ancient enemies
                of mine; … to arms, then; not super-

                heroically, trying all the more better
                than I only am and

                then finding myself (on acrid fields –
                the smoke of fallen

                ideals and bombed aims) wanting, but
                inwardly, with

                attention and focus, the Way of the
                Steely Warrior; I shall

                be `ard with suffering, I can take it,
                I shall wear my

                oozed bowels and fallen head like medals
                in this, the War

                to End All Wars, not Mr Redfordman
                who is or isn’t

                good enough, but the wish and drive to fight,
                as long-suffering as mothers …

                … nothing to do with Mark Redford;
                ‘Je ne garde qu’une

                passion: celle de détruire les passions!’,
                these phantoms

                that stir the entire world; ‘dépouille-toi donc’
                the best translation prescribed

 

Bodhisattvacaryavatara IV, 43, French translation by Louis de la Vallee Poussin, Introduction à la Pratique des Futurs Bouddhas, 1907

 

 

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

attention wormhole: travelling // arrival
eyes wormhole: animus rises – powieview #37
identity wormhole: stuck in lower realm
mind wormhole: circuitry
practice & talking to myself wormhole: the turtle and the yoke
superhero wormhole: the quiet whale
war wormhole: looking ahead

 

animus rises – powieview #37

Tags

1971, 2016, 7*, adolescence, Allen Ginsberg, anima, animus, bliss, body, Bowie, broken, business, castration, chair, embarrasment, eyes, finger, genitalia, green, guitar, Howl, identity, music, open, rooftops, sex, touch

                ah, the lick the
                ahh-dolescence
                the rise of anima
                touched and sigh’d

                embodied, oo, I’ve
                got one of those,
                one of these, I’m
                one of them, wav-

                ing genitals to
                eternity from the
                rooftops until,
                embarrassed,

                animus rises
                statuesque to the
                cause, blissfully
                broken across

                open green eyes,
                easy shots from
                the swivel chair
                with cut-off finger

 

sigh‘d from the tumultuous adolescence of Ziggy Stardust, 1971 and Soul Love, 1971

Read the collected movements in David Bowie: Movements in Suite Major

 

 

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

Bowie wormhole: loss
eyes wormhole: coagulating
green wormhole: olive trees
guitar wormhole: in the Java ‘n’ Jazz
identity wormhole: it’s all about…;
music wormhole: quiet river
open wormhole: frame
rooftops wormhole: between

 

certainly a Captain, / but not America

Tags

1960s, 2016, 5*, America, authority, body, Captain America, eye, freedom, ice, light, movement, questioning, strength, thawing, time, walls, World War

                the body galvanised
                and plastic-strong hung

                for decades, walls of
                ice about his every

                frame, no space to gather
                movement no light to

                raise his eye, worshipped
                by the free who loved

                stature indifferent to
                wanton ministrations,

                thawed, at length, by
                paisley questioning,

                stoic non-authoritarian
                diminution, was released,

                certainly a Captain,
                but not America

 

 

 

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

light wormhole: river
time wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – reaping
walls wormhole: Batgirl –

 

om muni muni maha muniye soha

Tags

2015, 6*, beach, body, bones, Buddha, feet, fruit, gods, Gran Canaria, heat, identity, ink, knuckles, leisure, mantra, salt, Shakyamuni, sound, Spanish, stone, story, swimming, toes, water

                hola de nuevo Gran Canaria
                quiet crucible of dimpled buttock
                and all the beach furniture of recline
                balmy Spanish exchanged – warm water
                poured slappingly on hot languid stone

                om muni muni maha muniye soha

                hola de nuevo Gran Canaria
                with your reveal of dark ink identity
                your candid feet with no guile, each toe
                tells a different story to your tread – painted
                toes and slight bones between knuckles

                om muni muni maha muniye soha

                ah, you bodies you slink
                cool and day-glo all about me
                you bath-robe gods high above
                with your salt-water pools and fruit –
                the headland a giant sitting Buddha

                om muni muni maha muniye soha

 

 

 

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

beach wormhole: is there anything to write?
Buddha wormhole: child
feet wormhole: cinnamon / milkshake
identity & water wormhole: and // do your ears burn red?
sound wormhole: Plumstead – Woolwich – Plumstead 220211
stone wormhole: St. Mark’s flies flagpole upwards / with the forelegs hanging down obscene / reaching some height blindly to connect / out from the long-stalk tri-separating up- / to-seeded rounds of pod like acacia what / is it called “‘hogweed’ I-don’t-know- / what-it’s-called-but-goats-love-it-and- / it-makes-them-burp-a-lot”

 

traffic lights and broad avenue

Tags

1965, 2016, 6*, avenue, body, brick, buildings, clouds, Dr Strange, evening, eyes, face, grace, implication, manifestation, morning, mouth, place, realisation, storey, streets, sun, synchronicity, traffic lights, travelling, uncaused, will

                it is always the willed renege
                that let’s the face dislocate-
                hideous in full disclosure
                when implications emerge

                that the mouth no longer
                forms, the nostrils lose
                their boundary, the eyes no
                longer level, that the body

                fulfils its natural grace to
                tend to travel where point
                is cornered without street
                to edge and dwelling stands

                familiar as brick but
                stacked in storey and cipher
                whence cones and bolts will
                manifest but unoriginate

                `till squint is healed and
                morning cloud will shred
                the evening sun between
                traffic lights and broad avenue

 

not surprised by the camber of “The Demon’s Disciple!” by Lee & Ditko in Strange Tales#128, January 1965

 

 

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

buildings wormhole: fresh destiny
clouds wormhole: did I get old?
Dr Strange wormhole: Clea
evening wormhole: the 19th century
eyes wormhole: adjustment
morning wormhole: magnificent salad
mouth wormhole: a crack of lightning / in the dark of night
realisation wormhole: just one, open, nerve,
streets wormhole: through the pane – poewieview #34
sun wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – I suddenly / remembered
traffic lights wormhole: Christmas lights / around the lamp post
travelling wormhole: “The Lady from Nowhere”

 

The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – On Doing Nothing

Tags

'scape, 1967, 4*, awareness, bees, bench, blackbird, blue, body, breeze, calf, clouds, colour, contemplation, cottage, cows, cuckoo, daffodil, doing, echo, education, foxgloves, garden, green, grey, knowledge, leaf, leisure, life, Michael J Redford, mind, morning, movement, nature, non-doing, now, puzzle, rhythm, shadow, sky, smell, sociology, Spring, summer, sun, the Boats of Vallisneria, time, trees, wood, woodland, work

 

On Doing Nothing

I wish I had more time in which to do nothing, but then I don’t suppose for one moment that I am alone in this wish.   I must however confess to liking hard work – a certain amount that is.   I like the resultant effects produced on body and mind of digging the garden or pitching bales of hay and sheaves of corn amid the shimmering heat of the summer sun.   The sweat oozing forth and leaving the inner body clean; the muscles toned up and aching with effort, the very rhythm of the work itself (I sincerely hope I can say the same twenty years from now).   Then at the close of a long day, an hour’s soak in the bath, an easy chair and a pint of beer, mundane items perhaps, yet nevertheless most satisfying.   The sweat has been replaced by the energy infusing rays of the sun that now emanate from the body with such a glow that you feel sure that those close to you must feel its radiant effect.   The mind is also cleansed, refreshed with the knowledge and satisfaction of a job well done.   On the other hand if total automation were to arrive tomorrow, I would not be alarmed at the prospect of so much leisure.   The future in this respect is viewed with some concern by the sociologist whose biggest headache is to educate the masses into finding something to do with their spare time.   This I should imagine, is one of the outcomes of our present way of life, the pace of which has accelerated to such a degree that one rarely has time to step off the whirling carousel to take stock of one’s surroundings and turn the eye inward upon the self.   How little we know of ourselves and our immediate surroundings.   There is enough untapped learning in my small garden alone to last me all my years without venturing further afield.   Even so, I don’t spend all my spare time digging, hoeing, planting and studying in the garden, for one can never come to the end of the toil produced when one steals a little piece of nature and imposes upon it the conformities of human requirements.   More often than not I am sitting, standing or leaning somewhere in the garden staring at a dead leaf sailing slowly across a sky-blue puddle, or a daffodil petal trembling in the breeze, or entering with the fuzzy humble bee into the heart of a foxglove.   I am not looking to learn, just looking, appreciating the colour and the movement, the scent and the touch, unfettered by a too enquiring mind, seeing the thing as a whole.   Study by all means, study deeply, specialise if you wish, but not all the time; come to the surface occasionally, sit back and view things as a whole.   Specialists we must have; the probing minds and microscopes of the entomologist, histologist, ichthyologists and all the other ‘ologists’ have benefitted us greatly and made us more aware and appreciative of the wonders and complexities of nature, but there is still, and always will be, room for the botanist who is like the manipulator of a jig-saw puzzle, fitting all the detailed parts together to form a complete and beautiful picture.

I find I am very contented when doing nothing and experience no sense of guilt if branded idle and time wasting.   If there is nothing of great import to attend to and I am in an idle mood, then I take advantage of the circumstances and indulge in idleness without shame.   Some months ago I made a garden seat of some timber taken from an ancient cottage close by that was being demolished.   Upon this seat, the wood of which must be some six hundred years old, I have spent many hours in idleness, fingering its rough grey armrests, unaware of time or responsibility; thinking not of tomorrow or yesterday, but experiencing with all the senses the eternal ‘now’; being aware of the warmth of the sun and the movement of the passing breeze; hearing the distinct low of a cow bereft of her calf, or listen to an echo mocking the cuckoo in the woods below.   I gaze at the coloured mass before me drinking in the riot of perfumes; look at the green pastures and the distant trees and see the blue shadows within.   The picture is complete, touching upon all the senses to produce a harmony that is deeply satisfying.   There is nothing out of place, no harsh discords, no roaring traffic or industrial smells.   Even the little cottage at the end of the lane, tree bound and heavy with thatch, gives the impression that it has grown naturally from the soil upon which it stands.   The senses and emotions are not funnelled into a microcosm but are given free range and allowed to accept all that comes within their range, creating in the mind an awareness and realisation of a complete and perfect whole.

One cannot be accused of day-dreaming under such conditions (though surely a little day-dreaming is not harmful) for no conscious thoughts are involved.   I have on occasions been surprised at the lightning passage of time during these moments, when the ‘moment’ has in fact turned out to be all of three hours.   This essay, which would normally have been written in a morning, has taken all day for this very reason.   Being a fine spring morning with but a few puffs of broken cloud adorning the sky, I took pen and paper into the garden, but despite my earnest intentions, I soon fell prey to the magnetism of a blackbird singing in the copse behind the piggery and my attention was lifted from the paper.

I walked through the piggery, crossed the brook and shouldered my way through the cow parsley towards the wood.   I didn’t meet anyone on my perambulation, I didn’t want to.   In fact I would have been most annoyed if I had.   I was perfectly happy in my immediate world of the ‘Now’; it was too lovely a world to let slip by unnoticed, or to be dimmed by the oppressive shadow of chores that had to be done.   Now, as I sit writing, the clock on the mantle shelf is striking eleven thirty p.m. but I am not at all alarmed at working until such a late hour even though I do have to rise early to milk the cows tomorrow morning.   At least I shall have the memory of a beautiful spring day during which I was alive and conscious, and will not be left empty handed as most of us too often are when we let the days of the living present slip through the sensory fingers to the dead past.

 

read the collected work as it is published: here

 

 

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

awareness wormhole: while walking
bench wormhole: up on the hill
blackbird wormhole: fine
blue & breeze & green wormhole: Elektra
clouds & mind wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – A Precious Moment
doing & grey wormhole: my seat // now
echo & morning & shadow & time wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] by Mark L. Redford – moment
education & knowledge wormhole: listen willya
garden wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – A Bowl of Gourds
life wormhole: Doctor Strange II – … things are the same again
sky wormhole: El Palacio, 1946
smell wormhole: The Boats of Vallesneria by Michael J. Redford – Autumn Thoughts
Spring wormhole: first Spring storm
sun & trees wormhole: one day / in 1956
wood wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] by Mark L. Redford – the soft canticle of the gourds:
work wormhole: ashramas

 

more than effigy

Tags

5*, appearance, attachment, Bodhichitta, Bodhisattvacharyavatara, body, Dharmakaya, emptiness, identity, image, jewel, quicksilver, Shantideva, tathagatagarbha, true nature, value, worth

                                   laying hold of
                                   all my like-ness

                                   with the grasp
                                   of quick-silver

                                   transforms my
                                   worth to such

                                   as it is, priceless
                                   as a Jewel worth

                                   more than effigy

 

Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra I, 10

 

 

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

Bodhichitta & emptiness wormhole: a crack of lightning / in the dark of night
identity wirmhole: reaching branch

 

organ / sunlight in all our eyes – poewieview #11

Tags

1967, 2016, body, Bowie, breath, buildings, creativity, dress, eyes, Hammond organ, rooftops, sky, smile, streets, sunlight, throat, world

                                when sky was filled with
                                building, on another street

                                corner in the other world:
                                new relief of outbreath,

                                slow smile rasps the throat,
                                casting across rooftops;

                                new `scape of torso roll-
                                ing beneath the dress

                                of old; a new happening
                                of fairground stance in all

                                of our midst with organ
                                sunlight in all our eyes

 

standing on the street corner looking at the traffic go by: I’m Waiting for the Man, 1967; Let Me Sleep Beside You, 1967; Karma Man, 1967; In The Heat of the Morning, 1968

Read the collected movements in David Bowie: Movements in Suite Major

 

 

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

1967 & Bowie wormhole: crescendoeing cascade of chordage – poewieview #10
breath wormhole: the breath of London
buildings & streets wormhole: 1966 … actually sic // of it allllll-bsssssssh – poewieview #8
creativity wormhole: ‘my best writing happens …’
eyes wormhole: the MagOO Effect Effect
rooftops & smile wormhole: finding my own true nature – Plumstead, Woolwich, 190915
sky wormhole: dog bark
world wormhole: London Hearts – poewieview #4

 

de Boeddha // of light

Tags

2014, Amsterdam, being, body, Buddha, compassion, doing, Enlightenment, giving, head, lifetimes, light, sentient beings, silence, time

 

 

 

                                                                                   de Boeddha

                                                     both clean and smooth
                                                     but wears limb and body
                                                     nonchalant and draping
                                                     sheer from head to toe
                                                     all ripples to behold
                                                     and wafting slight and
                                                     silent from time to times
                                                     through naked need

                                     of light

 

 

 

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

being wormhole: Eridge – Cowden
Buddha wormhole: Buddha / Shakyamuni
compassion wormhole: library: start where you are IV // all the distance I have travelled!
doing wormhole: exactly equal
giving wormhole: it is complete
lifetimes & silence & time wormhole: mauve / night
light wormhole: Railway Crossing, c. 1922-23