On a road
we often travel,
each intersection
offers options:
the path well known,
paved by habit,
or a turn
not yet taken.

Mostly,
we forge ahead,
asleep at the wheel,
lulled by the familiar.

Until,
in an unexpected moment,
we are startled awake
by the vividness of choice,
the freedom of the new.

Then,
a universe opens,
our vision clear.

Until we see where we are,
we cannot see the way ahead,
blinded by where we’ve been.

A relationship
built on what we long for,
what we hope to be,
is an edifice
too weak,
too brittle
to withstand the throws
of time and change.

It is a castle
made of dreams and lies,
too fragile to stand,
flimsy
with unkeepable promises,
destined to crack and fall
with the seismic shifts
of craving and desire.

Only when we stand
with naked heart and soul,
sufficient and alone,
can we share our Selves
so that something new
may take root,
something supple
and strong enough
to bend with time,
and grow as we grow.

Outside my window,
as I look out
across the street,
spreads an Empire of Light,
as if Magritte’s vision
has come to life
before me.

And I wonder:
is this
like the painting,
or is the painting
like this?

The riddle of perception
lies in all our art,
as it does
in the world around us,
teasing our senses,
enlivening our vision,
awakening wonder.

You can never find yourself
in your memories -
they are only shadows.

You will only find yourself
in this moment,
flowing through
what is in you
and around you,
here and now.

Our myths
are the history
of how we see ourselves,
snapshots of a past
that never was,
the map of the territory
we build in our minds.

But there are moments
when life nails us,
and we stand naked,
without a story,
quintessentially alive.

If ego falls away,
and I am no one,
what am I then?

Alive and human,
I am a member
of Earth’s family,
a cell in the body
of our Mother.

Like a drop of rain,
falling in a forest,
I coud nurture
all that grows.

Or,
like a cancer,
I could suck the life
out of all around me,
claiming everything
for myself.

This is the choice life gives me:
to give up my reign
in my little kingdom,
and join a much greater one.

Certainty

There is nothing
that can be known
with complete certainty,
except what we find
within ourselves.

It is a river,
changing,
constantly.

Arguments

When the two sides
of an argument
clash so vehemently,
perhaps the problem lies
in the premise that
there ARE two sides.

Perhaps the truth
is too complex
to be seen whole
from any one
point of view.

The mind’s urge
to polarize,
to think always
in black and white,
in right and wrong,
can be our downfall.

Our world
is full of cruelty,
as it always has been.

Now,
we see each act of violence
in an instant,
splayed across the screens
of our global mind,
too vivid to ignore.

Thus,
we are cursed
to see our own brutality,
and challenged
to move beyond it.