There are rooms and windows in my mind,
cavernous spaces, little compartments,
flowing winds, flowing water,
still places, darkness, light,
rooms as big as the universe,
rooms as tiny as a single thought.

I walk, or swim, or fly
through these infinite spaces,
sometimes in my body,
sometimes transparent,
porous, empty,
like a soft breath of air.

Sometimes there is nothing
but endless emptiness,
open in every direction,
and I am the formless observer,
as endless and open
as what is all around me.

This body of mine
is like a trusted old car.

There are some parts
that don’t work as well
as they used to,
but it gets me
where I need to go.

Every day that it takes me
a bit further down my path
is a gift I will receive gratefully,
never taking for granted
each moment
that I’m still here.

Floating,
floating down,
always down,
weightless,
like a feather on a stream,
always flowing down.

Sometimes slowly, softly,
sometimes hard and swift,
always flowing down.

A part of the stream,
a part of a wave,
always flowing down.

There may be a bottom,
an end somewhere,
but this flow,
right here, right now,
is all there is;
this is life.

If I did not have a Facebook page,
would I still be “me”?

Or could my sense of self dissolve,
and set my spirit free

to roam the world without the thought
that there’s someone I must be,

to see my world with empty eyes,
and be one with all I see?

There will always be
a little boy or girl
within each of us.

When we learn to connect with them,
there will be a lot of joyful play
and exploration,
and also an end
to a lot of suffering.

In the flow of energy
that we call life,
everything is impermanent,
and the things we love
pass in and out of existence,
along with everything else.

There is joy to be had
in what is present,
and grief in what is lost,
but what remains, always,
is Love itself.

If you open up your heart to grief,
it will open up to love as well -
love for what once was,
love for all that is,
and love for all
that ever will be.

A stream of water,
as it pours out of a pitcher,
has a particular shape and form,
as it it were a solid thing,
but, as our common sense will tell us,
it is a thing of that moment only,
and will lose its form
as soon as its flow ceases.

And how is the flow of life
any different?

Are we each not eddies
in the ebb and flow
of the flood of life?

In each of our fleeting forms
is a reflection of a great design,
an evanescent facet
of the gem of creation.

That is the gift we are given,
our each-ness in the all-ness,
and is that not enough?

Every one of us has an ego, and I think it’s fair to say
that that’s what creates most of the mischief in this world.
What would it be like, I wonder,
if we managed to reduce the hold
they have over us?

How much energy do we squander,
stroking the egos of everyone around us,
and defending our own?

Is it kindness,
to play the fan of all the stories
we have made ourselves the stars of,
or is it mere avoidance,
the sidestepping of our fears
of being disapproved of?

How different would our world be
if we were always ready
to give the truth,
and to hear it?

If we could trust ourselves,
and each other,
that much,
it would be a different world,
indeed.