Junk Yard Butterfly Revival

Junk Yard Butterfly Revival

2-Sept-2011

I can laugh with you.

With you I’d laugh my belly off in junk yards.

Kissing rusted car parts, stitching up torn and forgotten ragdolls,

Tying together every single foil gum wrappers we can find into a statue of the Eiffel tower.

We would laugh like children; we would find beauty in the subtleties.

*

How funny it is that that rusted blue bicycle and the limping red wagon found each other in this sea of discarded life, this ocean of forgotten junk.

They lay there side by side, immovable as mountains.

As the years go by they seem to bend into a closer embrace.

Beneath this growing heap of once cherished stories they sway into the soil.

Submitting to their burden, they lay their lives in this path, holding down the earth that threatens to swallow them, and holding up this collection of unlikely junk,

This heap of wayward loved ones, these lonely toaster, voiceless radios and sole less rubber boots.

*

And yes, we’d be laughing, because what sweet subtleties they are.

They are not lifeless; their wheels spin in infinity,

That bicycle rings its crocus bell until her rosy wagon cheeks are tulips.

They whistle lullabies into busted radio speakers and use toasters to make gum wrapper waffles which they slide into the heels of all the rubber boots.

*

And look at these butterflies, these fleeting angels.

They heed not their frailties.

Their eyes see only flowers in this desert landfill.

They know nothing of rusty joints and flat tires,

of burnt fuses, muddy puddles, short circuits and busted speakers drums.

But they speak fluent flowers and their wings tips swish to the ebb and flow of sea tides.

They are tender gardeners, generous.

Fully giving of their fragile frames, they carry mounds of pollen on their head tops,

And weave spider webs around watering cans,

Lifting them in unity, they quench the thirst of this flowering junk yard.

Giving life to beautiful subtleties, to love stories between wagons and bicycles, who carry mountains of adopted grandchildren on their backs.

*

We are cradled by them, these rapturous butterflies.

I am weightless in their tiny insect angle arms.

See me now; I am wholly rusted before you, laughing my belly off.

I am suspended between them in a spider web stretcher attached to my creaking shattered spine handle.

I am craning; being tilted into this, pouring forth what is not mine but is flowing through me.

Emptied of poisoning self and filled from the Invisible Source,

This is a vessel of sweet waters, a holy watering can, a clear channel, laughing its belly off. 

Learning to Love a God I Will Never Understand

A God I Will Never Understand – March 2011?

·         Sometimes I wonder how it is I believe in a God I will never understand

·         A God that sparkles with tear stained crossed fingers and wishbones

·         Like high stakes roulette with no bullets

·         I find myself loving more the memory of a God

·         A God of butterfly wingtip swishes and sweet cheek kisses

·         I can see it, this God of groping toddler fingers and tiger paws

·         Which loves to laugh with the heart broke weeping

·         In moments I find lights without sources

·         Reuniting divorces of faithless tired ones and hopeful twos

·         At other times I fumble broken light bulbs with bleeding fingers

·         Wielding pencils in the dark, ones from which every bit of eraser has been gnawed

·          by hungry children who no longer believe in making mistakes

·         Thanks to a God they will never understand

·         I give praise to the whispers without voices

·         The gentle nudges without elbows

·         And the armless embraces I find in the spaces between forgetting

·         Unquestioning my beating heart is useless restraint

·         Because it always seems to stop when I really listen

·         There is a pause between every breath and gaps in this prayer beaded rope to which I cling

·         “Step inside me and I promise to never understand”

·         I fish for stepping stone in a handstand

·         I walk on bleeding fingers because my feet lost root and fell heavenward

·         I  bleed freely a God I will never understand

·         Splashing crimson on emerald grasses I turn into this

·         I turn from within it, to without

·         Without the desperate clutching of panicked belief I question

·         “Where do I see you, O Invisible One?

·         “I can’t keep whispering silent proofs in crowded churches

·         “Free me from you, O Spirit, and I will find there is nothing else

·         “Please, drop out from me and leave me in my empty

·         “Turn out from me this blood, every drop, and I will beat on

·         “This steady throb will collapse heart chambers and vocal chord

·         “Bleed from me, O Spirit

·         “Teach me of the silence deeper the voiceless whispers

·         “I will clutch to your absence and sing ballads, endless and untold, for your presence again”

Moons of Change

Moons of change – Oct. 2010?

Hopelessly unfound remained my humanity

As tempests shipwrecked my prayer on the rocks of doubt

We clung to shattered bits of obligatory gifts and always forgot our blessings

I washed out three years of buckets and

Filled them grain by grain with the sands of certitude and devotion

But it seems I lost them in transference

Back in the narrow hall that has never been found by the stars

And has left the moon crying in her shattered silent love

She folded into her collapse, whole in the night sky

And as she did so she wept the purpose of her creation from wax to wane

Only in that final moment did she sooth

Passing into the death of a new beginning

One could just make out a triumphant gasp for breath

And a sigh so calming the world slept by her side

Waken to be reborn a crescent babe

Shedding no more than a fingernails light across the first sky

As we shook the dust of slumber from our sleeves

And resurrected the bits of Obligatory gifts to which we still clung 

Gold Dust

March 2010

I can taste your humanity in the floating gold dust that shakes from our dancing feet

I can smell you in the vapor produced by the first sunbeam that hits the first dew drop of every rising day

I find you waiting in not so awkward silences filled with genuine smiles

I know you from the residue of laughter you leave rippling in your wake

I hold you close with arms that will never be long enough to wrap you in them

I seek your shores with the hope of a thousand centuries, and the patience of a thousand more

I see your gifts and live grateful for your giving

A poem for all those seekers.

(entrance to the shrine of Baha'u'llah)

LETTER TO MY HEART

Dear Middle Distance Runner,

Middle distance runner you leave me searching

With collapsed organ pipes I gasp for a breath of fresh prayer

You have sweat dry every last tear we had collected

I am tired of the way you keep looking for God in finish lines

Yes I speak actions like empty waterfalls and all you ever do is run

My words ride high on a dead horse and we search for God in anything

Between us we’ve got nothing but empty tears and a dried out waterfall

Words alone can never bare fruit and this garden is a desert sand box

But I am ready to give them meaning, my words and my God, lay before me

I am open chested taking baby steps like deeds in hopes to marry them within you

I am not prepared for this, not by your heart ache or my rambling

So listen you rib caged thunder drum, you rumored want-a-be middle distance runner

You are needed for this, pound truth into these fingers

You pulsing even stepped runner there are no finish lines

I’ve sold your shoes we have no use for them, sit down and let me walk

There is a guiding rhythm in your heart beat footsteps, guide me home

I have carved from you a sanctuary; God sleeps within you and awakens me

There is a spirit that I must love and it is hidden within you

We searched it out, together we searched it out from you

With groping fingers we chased God like a finish line

And it’s left me verbless searching for the eternal noun, that illusive love

Pulse runner this is you calling, so let us pray

I do not mean for us to lift my words from before me and fire them singing towards our God

Let us carry them, let us walk my words and give them meaning

In the silence I will whisper them to you, you bleeding gentle giant “Let me love you”

I will beg them into the space behind your rib cage “Let me love you”

I will cry them to the spirit behind your eyes “Let me love you”

I will kiss them onto the air and breathe them deep into your blood stream “Let me love you”

“Dear God within my hear, have mercy, and let me love you”

To Swim With Scar Burnt Fingertips

With burnt and blistered fingers i passed the torch to you like an Olympian

Like you were the last and fastest runners of all

This poison dipped flaming stick of a torch was a legacy that, through you, would become a legend

Years passed since the blisters on my fingers have dried and you keep running

While the poison strips the sparkle from you eyes you run

I never saw someone run so fast while removing and reapplying neon toenail polish

Stamping painful request for forgiveness into occasional prayer slots is no way to live, I know

I've run torches through living rooms, I've burned houses and homes in their wake

I've cut life lines with blistered fingers and stamped hundreds of tattered infrequent envelopes filled with forgiveness prayers

But the torch has been passed and looking around, everyone has scar burnt fingertips

There aren't a whole lot of options are there, but there is always hope

So if i can my friend, i want to pass on a few more things to you

First is a prayer book cut into little strips of gauze that you can bandage your blistered fingers with every morning and evening

I'll show you how to call 95 lifelines a day even if you still have to hang up every once in a while

I'll ink spirals into you elbows and kneecaps, so when you fall and skin them you wont forget where your going, and you'll never get discouraged by how long it's taking

I'll pray detachment into heart shaped slippers that are terrible for running

But instead are more suited for the sandy shores of devotions where we walk the thin line

Where the Ocean of God's Law meets the desert we trudge through to get there

I don't care how long or hard you trudge in those sands, the hardest step you will ever take is when you lead to leave that shore behind and swim

For that my friend I can't prepare you, I've never swam there

But I've found that I can stitch obligatory gifts into a life raft just big enough to keep my head above water

Wait! wait, wait...

I've gotten ahead of myself, this all begins with something you must do alone

Only you can find the pain in your life th cry the poison from your eyes, and then, alone, with new vision, you have to choose

To stop running, to let your blistered fingers dry, and put out that torch, once and for all

When you do I want you to call me, I'll come over with these things to pass on

I'll climb to my knees, take your feet in my hands, and wash away the dust from all that running

So call me when you cry, the choice is yours, and until them, so is this poem

Well Water

“You don’t miss the water till the well runs dry.” Its true you know, we often walk through this life without a moments consideration of the sweetness of that refreshing glass of friendship, or a steaming baths of homely comforts. Friendships of the higher nature, my yoga mat, peanut butter with one ingredient (PEANUTS!), grassy yards, clean water, poetry readings and alone time are just a few from my list of proverbial well waters that have, for the time being, run dry.

I recently found this saying in new light: If I was a yoga mat, my yoga mat, basically appreciated for its function, but perhaps never fully recognized for the fullness of its offering, I believe I would feel the lack. I would not mourn my plight nor focus of the superficiality of our relationship, but, one way or another, I would know something was missing. And, being that mat, I can just imagine the sweetness of the moment when someone prostrates themselves on my back, before almighty God, and find true gratitude for my gifts. They slip to their knees from the final postures of Surya Namaskar and fold into child’s pose. They lay their forehead neatly between my scapulas and release every muscle until they nearly kiss my spine. They will love the space I create for them because they have been without it for too long. They will root their bare feet into the earth through me, and bless the day they decided I was never to see the bottom of a shoe. While my true value will never be estimated, I will feel no lack and find a moment of fulfillment. I will be the well water, replenished.

So I am making another list, but this time I am going to record those things I do not lack, but will miss when I do. It will require a great deal of spiritual perception, reflections, and gratitude, to penetrate the veils imposed by everyday life and recognize the worth of those thing we tend to appreciate only after loosing. Essentially this task is to miss water… while drinking it.

What has inspired me on this course? Well, lately I’ve been feeling a lot like well water after a drought. We (Philip and I, as always) have returned to Kingston to find friends who treat us like prized yoga mats. I don’t know whether the reunions have given them an appropriate setting to express the appreciation they had all along or if the separation itself has increase the joy of our friendships, but the joy is there.

Friday night we arrived in the sandy park neighborhood right about sunset. Weaving between houses and shops we made our way along the narrow, uneven paths to the cluster of home where most of our friends are concentrated. We round the corner and start climbing the final steps to the first yard where friends live. We can already hear the sound of children playing, even over the loud hip-hop-dancehall beets being blasted out over the rooftops of the neighborhood. As we climb I can begin to pick out the voices and laughs of particular children as they echo down the steps towards us. The usual suspects alright, in all their wild-child-glory. “ah who dat de?...” one voice calls, but our reply is unnecessary. “See dem de, Philip an’ Mercy ah come!!” Crissy cries. A tidal wave of children and youth spill out of the yard and comes crashing down the steps. We are literally swarmed by children, jumping, hugging, yelling, high fiving, laughing and climbing up our backs. I expected such a welcoming on our first visit last Monday, but I kind of thought they would tire by the third time in five days. I was joyously mistaken. We spent the evening wrestling, dancing, handstanding and cartwheeling with Jr Youth, while carrying, tossing, flipping, and tickling the children. This poem is for them and their playful spirits.

***

I’ve found forgotten memories in untold futures

Searched for steady ground in hourglass sand dunes

Torn out wasp nests looking for honey and found it there

I’ve cartwheeled mud into the knees of my trousers at midnight with laughing children

You know, I’ve never lost sleep me following their spirit with them

And I’ve never lost spirit them following their dreams without me

They’re way too good at digging for wasp honey like it was forgotten pocket lint

Hourglasses might as well last an eternity because they’ve never seen the last sand fall

Their whole lives are untold futures, and they aren’t going to wait for someone else to tell it

Stories fall like sand and form honey combs under pillow cases where children rest their dreams and sleep their days into years

***

Cayman taught me many things, but from them all one in particular stands out. I was reminded of how rich and fulfilling the friendships we are striving to create must be. Even though my business is friendship, I don’t have to be so… “businessy.” Creating that richness is my responsibility, which I can’t expect anyone else to carry. I think that gratitude and compassion are two of the most might keys to the heart of a friendship. So, like I said, I’m making a list. I’m searching for the higher measure of gratitude that seems to elude us until the well runs dry, and trying to remember to some droughts never in this life.

If you think this is a "nice idea" make your own list, but don’t stop there. Figure out how you can express you gratitude for everyone and everything that you might not miss till they’re gone.

Warm regards, Your fellow soul, Mercy

Prayers with friends, as good as it gets.

Apparently Danae has some dance moves to show off.

"STOP TRYING TO CATCH THE MOTH! You've injured its wing and if you catch it again it will likely die. Look how beautiful it is when you just watch it, see it's landed on the wall just so we can look at its beauty. Everyone look at the moth and I will take a photo."