personal/social/political philosophy & opinion–sometimes in poetry
It starts a little drear and grey
beginnings of an autumn day
dew revealing spiders high
in fir and cedar against the sky…
Low-hanging cloud obscures the sun
but it will show before day’s done:
webs will move with rainbow glimmer,
leaves in breezes, flip and shimmer,
sunlight sideways gilds and limns
with memories of summer times,
even as the daylight’s going
making way for evening glowing.
2008
Oh I can sit in my warm bed
and feel my day
has been for naught
or worse
for I have fumbled badly
with a friend
and feel unloved and distant
from my joy
and happiness that filled
the hours before
the broken minute
when it changed…
I can sit glum
and nurse an ache
within my belly
and my heart as if
forgiveness cannot be
although this friend I know
is better far than that.
But then…
I think again:
remember that the world
is darker far and full
of deeper pain than mine,
and hungers that devour
soul and mind;
overhanging death
that mocks the goodness
in a simple human heart;
and children weeping
with no thought of being heard…
And thus my little glum
becomes
amazingly absurd.
2005
I’ve been going through some old posts on my blogit.com account, and came across this gem from 2009 when he was in college, age 24.
Got this email from my son in response to the query of what he plans to herd with the pair of 10-foot bullwhips he wants for Christmas. I guessed dinosaurs, and was on the money:
It only works on certain dinosaurs of course. Maiosaurs, Edmontosaurs, Corythosauruses, and such. You would think Iguanadons, but they have these pretty nasty thumbspikes they are not afraid of using if they get pissed off or feel threatened. And you always have to watch out and make sure you don’t create a stampede. Using a whip to scare a triceratops is just asking for a new chest cavity. It may run a raptor off for a while, but of course with them its the ones you see that you don’t really have to worry about. And then of course you always have to be careful not to let the big ones associate the whip-crack, which can be heard for miles, with food. Strangely enough it’s pretty good against baryonyx. They are mean but prefer fish. It is ideal however for running off Compsagnathi and squirrels both. Pops their little heads right off.
He currently writes and makes stuff as The Fire Thieves Studio here on WordPress, and on Patreon.
Walking in the woods of autumn fire
in my own autumn, wistful
heart to the colors lifts: All
the triumph of a spring advanced
victory of a summer lived
the flowers gone to fruit
and fruit to seed dispersing
on the errant winds that blow…
All finished now, and so
green departs the leaf and reed,
the wind whips over flaring brights
to muted shades, of rust
of faded pink, of watered red
and weeds are dead
beside leaf-littered
acorn-scattered path
where I slowly walk
in autumn of my own.
2009
Silly, hurting child!
Don’t you realize– Somewhere–
while you whirl entrapped
like furniture in hurricanes,
dancing grim and wild,
Thought, Emotion, Dream, enwrapped
together in your house
of angst and pains,
goose-stepping pas-de-trois
to old orchestrated sorrows–
Guilt and Disappointment tuned
to Loss and Shame and Fear…
that even so, the friends you’ve earned
by simply being you
are always very near!?
Hurting’s loud, belligerent–
intimidates
the deeper Truth:
Poor wee Child’s
beleaguered–huddled in
a room without a window,
wrapped in rugs
of intricate design and beauty,
against the raging hurricane…
He thinks he is alone
and that the Tempest–
that hardly knows that he exists–
has come for him,
destruction on its mind…
Truth may be–
It is the Rage, the Anguish
that’s afraid,
that seeks within
its battened, padded core
the One Who Is—
Who Knows– Who holds
in golden hands the Light
of All-Acceptance…
Who holds
within His shining face
the Peace that heals–
these things the wages of a life lived
in the key of grace…
Oh, hear, my friend,
in the bellow of the blast–
the beauty of the bellow:
the breadth of love,
the height of courage,
the adamance of life!
They lied between their teeth–
loving humble children,
and thinking to be making
macho men—
all those who told Thee
Thou were not
simply
Beautiful.
2005
I have taken a step back from commenting on Facebook and other social media platforms–even here, sometimes.
It isn’t that I am not reactive to some of the stuff that gets posted there, or that I don’t disagree strongly, or don’t see an opening for a really clever comeback. But I have taken another look at who I am when I get clever that way, and I am noticing that what I’d opine has already been offered, often more than once.
The thing that is getting to me most, though, is how it changes me to indulge in those clever retorts. I am adept with the language, I know things many people don’t about, for instance, science and the natural world, psychology and spirituality. And there is a word for when someone more able deliberately uses their skills and strengths against someone less able, less strong.
There is also the matter of all the things I think I know that maybe I don’t so much. Will Rogers said, “It ain’t what I know that gets me into trouble, it’s what I know that just ain’t so!”
And then, there is audience to consider. Am I doing anything more meaningful than just adding another voice to an established choir? What is the chance that my remarks will reach and influence another mind not of the choir? Who do I hope to reach? Are they even likely to see my words?
Here, particularly, several of the folks who read my stuff have expressed in their own posts a weariness and futility with the whole political scene. Some of them/you are on Facebook as well, where the parade/assault of atrocity and absurdity and falsehood is constant. There is no lack of sniping and smarm, of articles from unreliable sources, that are out of date, that amount to nothing more than click-bait playing on outrage, of declarations of problems without suggestions for rational solutions… So I’ve made it my policy to mostly share good news, hopeful reports, success stories.
Yes, if I feel strongly about something–like voter empowerment vs suppression–I still share what I’m thinking everyone should be aware of for their own self-protection. But mostly, honestly, it’s elephants and great apes doing better than expected, and kids being bright and funny. And, sometimes, just a little of someone being really, really cute–like a yawning sloth baby.
I am shying away from the clever, the mean, the bullying, the pedantic, because indulging in that stuff, I just don’t like who I am then.
Youth values cleverness; Age, kindness.
Here on Earth living in physical bodies, we are growing, learning, evolving souls in the greatest of all schools. In this school are many classrooms… enough to offer the lessons needed by each soul. And there are many grades, accomodating the very youngest in experience, and all, up to the most advanced.
The most advanced student in one curriculum, however, may be in preschool for some other line of study. It is not a linear system like a ladder.
We are all embarked, some say, no matter the field of concentration, on the most important scholarship: learning to make choices.
Now, some might make the most successful choices, those that lead towards the Divine rather than away from It, by nature, requiring no thought. That is a characteristic of infancy. But from that point on, the infant learns from the hardness of life in a body that other things factor into the choosing. What was once a clear and unconsidered action becomes confused, shadowed, distorted, distracted… Alternate choices come into play, different options to choose from as the world becomes more complicated.
What’s the point, if we as infants make the best choices from our inborn wisdom, our sense of connectedness? Why go through all the hell of the next decades, as we do, disconnected, uncertain, making choices that steer us away from Divinity?
It’s because the point is not the choosing: It is the knowing choosing, the exercise of our free will to choose what is connecting and affirming in the long run, rather than what gratifies, or solves problems in the short term. To do right by instinct is easy, is automatic, requires no thought or will. That is not what being human is about.
So we go through our lessons, we enter classrooms and choose our teachers, we choose paths to follow for as long as they take us where we believe we want to go… Some of us will abandon a path that seems to be failing; some will follow a path to perdition because they choose with faith, but not necessarily with awareness of truth or the ability to distinguish it from lies.
Lies, deliberate or not, simply misguide our expectations and distort our understanding. Learning to trust our own hearts’ wisdom, to listen to our own connection with the Divine–that is a difficult path, and it is easy to lean on a guide who claims to know the way. In fact, the path the guide follows may be the correct one for the guide, but not for the guided.
The cats have run away to hide.
They do not wish to go for a ride.
Oh, no I won’t! the wise cat sings–
Rides generally arrive at unpleasant things
like trimming of claws and shots in the ass
and minor surgeries… Thanks, I’ll pass!
The cats are crouching in unlikely places
with wide opal eyes and resentful faces:
Under the sofa they’d rather abide
than companionably get in the car for a ride.
2000
Merry to Pippin
You are a menace, Pippin Took,
the way that mischief follows you,
as impulse prompts the things you do–
Sometimes you’re begging to be shook!
Oh, Pippin, you are such a lad!
You’re never meaning to be bad,
You’re into every niche and nook
without a thought of what comes next
and when it does, you’re so perplexed!
You can’t not touch, you can’t not look!
You’ll burn those fingers, Pip, m’dear,
and mine as well, I truly fear,
And yet whatever schemes you cook,
you know I always will be there
to join the fun and have my share!
By me you’ll never be forsook:
I’m with you to whatever end,
your best and ever-lovin’ friend!
Pippin to Merry
Merry, my friend, great heart, old son–
easy for you to scowl and chide
but you can’t say you’ve just complied!
My deeds pale next to some you’ve done!
When you think up some loony scheme,
I go along ’cause we’re a team.
It’s you gets bored and wants some fun
exploring where we don’t belong,
or doing things that might be wrong.
Leisurely strolls turn into “RUN!”
when you’re involved, and that’s a fact!
I’ll try to say this with some tact:
Though, I admit, you’re second to none
at coming up with things to do,
this point I must make clear to you:
Merry, you’re not the tallest one!
But you know me, and come what may,
we’ll stick together all the way!
2005
I’ve been asking the Universe to explain itself to me since I was about 11 years old. I asked at that age, specifically, how to reconcile God with Science. I was raised in the household of a scientist and of a mystic, and both truths they offered made sense to me. I felt, even at 11, that there must be a reconciliation possible between them. All that is must have a place in the whole.
Over the course of my life–and I am now well into my 60s–answers to my question have emerged, undoubtedly more than I noticed. It’s a great, borderless, multi-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, with pieces coming from many sources, often from the collections of others on their own quests, solving their own portions of the Great Puzzle.
All that I write under this heading represents not Truth, but what I believe to be true. I have my reasons, and I like to believe, my reason. I offer my puzzle pieces for your consideration: some may be of use, some not so much. Take what you will, as the saying goes, and leave the rest.
Courteous comments and conversation are welcome, as ever!
LOOSELY SPEAKING...