A diary composing my life to file …
At a time like this I want to writeabout the joy of your life and not my pain.I want everyone to share your wisdom,hear your laughter, know your devotion to Jehovah,but all I feel is sorrow and devastation.I want to share stories of our closeness,the things that came between us and kept us apart.The things …
Continue reading "Wise Poets – Señor Tao – This Hollow Emptiness In My Soul"
Señor Tao (April 17, 1948 -) It was almost silentexcept for the constant buzz of life between my earsThen the cooing of the mourning doves perchedon the terrace looking for leftover seeds attracted me.They take flight and I hear the beating of wings against invisible air.I see the plants moving with the breezes but no …
Continue reading "Wise Poets – Señor Tao – The Sound Of Silence"
Books conversation breakfast in bed a rainy Sunday morning following an enchanted Saturday night— Please reply.
In this very breath that we take now lies the secret that all great masters try to tell us. —Peter Matthiessen There was no movement away from the sorrow in any direction. It was an uninvited guest taking refuge in my home, lingering like a fat cat sprawled out in the morning sun. What could …
It’s all very strange. You can be walking along, not thinking of anything in particular. Suddenly you’re reminded of a lost love. Charlie Brown (Charles Shultz) If you had not died when you did,so many things could have been shared.As it turns out I became a librarian.I had some love affairs butnever fell deeply in …
Tao Writer (April 17, 1948 -) **For my friend Bob McGuinn** Be careful of growing old, he tells me.It happens so suddenly over the years.One day you are young, in love, full of energythe next day you are old, loveless, lackingboth muscle mass and strength.The legs are the first to go, he continues,but from my …
I had just closed the door When it came from all directions A weight upon my chest A pain not previously known Caused by a swelling of my heart. The veins contracting down the back of my neck. My left arm, stiffens in pain. Training or memory I know not which... Aspirin I find the …
Confidence in daybreak modifies dusk. Emily Elizabeth Dickinson Tao Writer (April 17, 1948 -) It is that deep dark indigo kinda of blues The kind you will most likely get through if you just keep on digging Easier than trying to climb out of the hole you are already in In the indigo blues every …
Taken from my motherland in chains to travel waters unknown by me, to toil in soil unfamiliar to my hands. Forced to speak a language which does not sing. Exploited, enslaved, whipped and hanged. Defined in a constitution as three fifths of a man. I stood beside you in battle against common foes. I stood …
Continue reading "Esalen Stories – Stand Undiminished – The Poem"
Being fully present isn’t something that happens once and then you have achieved it; it’s being awake to the ebb and flow and movement and creation of life, being alive to the process of life itself. Pema Chödrön (July 14, 1936 -) You were here this morning when I woke lying somewhere between the rays …
Layers Of Memory You unfold in layers like the sheet, blanket, and comforter wrapped around me. You are a memory, alive from not long ago. Why now do you rise up from your nothingness to awaken in my mind. This body asleep? I would have remembered you in a time more suited to your grandeur. …
Manifest plainness, Embrace simplicity, Reduce selfishness, Have few desires. —Lao-Tzu It’s happening again— the swelling of waves inside this vessel I call my body. I become the ocean and the sky. I am the stars spreading light across this darkness. Everything is inside of me In this world where I am everything.
Of Love, Remembrance The smell and feel of sun dried sheets This Earth Mornings with nothing to do Freedom The serene silence of meditation Solitude Croaking of the evening frogs Words Rainbows floating across my room Imagination Waddling ducks along the stream Nature The sandbox where I play and dream Fun The whispered touch of …
Each friend represents a world in us possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born. —Anaïs Nin We met while walking in different directions going to and from a memory of the past on that bright warm January morn. It’s strange how life just …
A Speck Of StarDust I saw in a dream… Last night a speck of stardust fell through my closed eyelid and lodged itself, unmovable, into my existence. I woke this morning at a lost for words to describe the experience of this dream. What word could explain or extrapolate this feeling I am? Words would …
I Want I want to write more than words that say I love you. I want to write poetry that fills your heart with ecstasy, your mind with wonder, your body with burning desire. I want to write words which move your eyes to tears, fill your ears with the sweetness of the loon’s lonely …
A Serendipitous Occasion You ask where you will lie after your death? Where lie the souls unborn? — Seneca We exchanged our vows between a rising full moon and an ocean setting sun a top a dune made of sand, Two different points of reference, not an ending or a beginning, but a blending of …
Desires At what point do we no longer desire our desires? Like a dream forgotten in an instant. The details no longer alive— Hiding there in the corners of the foreboding dark shadows. Do we forget, So that we might dream again, of the things we so desire?
Let’s Not Say GoodBye Neither of us slept soundly last night You, thinking about your early morning flight to a place far away, and not wanting to oversleep. Me, holding onto and thinking about you...leaving. I tried to see you in the darkness but your closed eyelids protected your green, brown eyes from my wanton …
Dream of Dying It is difficult to distinguish reality in a dream. Last night I fell into a sub-zero chemical vat. I fought my way to the side and pulled myself out as the freezing death worked its way up my body. Colleagues froze in fear, as the outcome was certain. She cried, as I …
I Will Write All Day I will write all day, today, not try to squeeze creativity between a this or a that, between nowhere and somewhere to be. My imagination will stretch with the bright morning shadows creeping slowly across the green shimmering leaves. I will see a flower and create a dedication, dive into …
The Written Word I write because I am a lover of words. I want to breathe hope into this joy of being alive. Give it air to make a sound then shape and mold the sound into a word. Give it meaning, so one day I will read these words and remember, why I am …
Dream Of Execution I saw in a dream... That was me standing there in front of the firing squad, my hands tied behind me, an unlit cigarette dangling from my lips, reliving the story of a life which truly I did not know I had lived. Was I the General who lead the people's revolt …
This Love That I’m Feeling I awaken to your light, your smell, the morning dew. You are everything I love. My beloved, my life. You are the thoughts I string into possibilities. My dreams, the pages of a book. We fit together, intermingling ourselves into the words of the other's sentences. You are the verbs …
I Am Here! - The Poem There is one other thing to know...when you have expressed yourself to the fullest, then and only then will it dawn upon you that everything has already been expressed, not in words alone but in deed, and that all you need really do is say Amen! — Henry Miller …
Moments If I could master just one art, it would be the art of letting go: of people I have known and loved, of places I’ve traveled to and lived of sunsets and full moons I’ve witnessed. I would let go of this moment as quickly as it appears, faster if I could. I would …
Listening I have been listening my entire life First to my mother’s heart beat as I floated in her mixture of embryonic fluids. What else was there for me to do, but listen in amazement to the surroundings of my new self. To witness sound while my closed eyes waited to open. I listened to …
This Time Alone And so I spend my time remembering that brightness which fills my soul and tears apart my heart. The courtship of queen and king, the journeys shared and taken, the love which held us together when no hope could save us. I open each door hoping you’ll appear if only as a …
In The Absence Of Time I know a place where time has no points of reference to hold onto, no hands sweeps across its well worn face, no seconds eat away at existence, no flashing light marks the arrival or passing. Here, in this infinite space, all dreams live forever. Everything, is expressed in the …
Three O’clock In The Morning I like my coffee black, my whiskey on the rocks, my wine chilled in a flat bottom glass— the way they serve it in Italy. I like my woman in ecstasy, moaning my name out loud. My eggs, scrambled, moist but not runny. I like my sheets and towels made …
Wisdom The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common. — Ralph Waldo Emerson These things I know— The soft words of love. The solitary dreams of a poet. The song of a thousand crickets. The voice of a crying heart. The pain and serenity of death. The foretelling of dreams. …
One Word But above all, the poet, is he who names things... And that's the poet's mission, profound and sacred communication. And another word for that is love. – Carlos Fuentes If I could have but one word to describe you, it would not be a word like "love" or "God," for although both of …
If Anything you can think of is likely to pass away. —Rumi If I had held you more tightly, would you still have pushed me away If I had loved you more passionately, would you still have lied about him If I had given you all of me, would you still have held something back …
Take Me Death Like a ghost from times passed You creep up silently behind me. Unwilling to confront me eye to eye. You remain hidden in my blind spot. Then you tap me on my shoulder And quickly disappear back into your hell, As I turn around to find no one is there. Why do …
Song Of The Cricket It is only when we can believe that we are creating the soul that life has any meaning, but when we can believe it—and I do and always have—then there is nothing we do that is without meaning and nothing that we suffer that does not hold the seed of creation …
The Crushing Weight Of GoodBye She told him what had kept her away was Death. But he rejected that excuse—for Death, he said, can never come between lovers. — Maguib Mahdouz I never thought the last time we said, “Good bye,” would be the last time. If I had known, I would have done it …
Life’s Greatest Gift What keeps me alive is found between the images, between the words, between thought, the emptiness of feeling, and in the emptiness of the body...there arises the fullness and significance of life… —Basarab Nicolescu I have received so many gifts, appearing as presents from you. The still, shadowy, vapor filled clouds you …
Remember To Remember Me There is something in the pang of change — More than the heart can bear — Unhappiness remembering happiness. — Euripides When all that remains of me are my cremated ashes don’t store them in an urn upon the mantel. No love is in that stone — a shrine to a …
Until Now If we fall in love deeply enough, we fall through our sense of two, into the One. So if you fall in love, fall totally into love, so you fall into the One. — Adyashanti I never understood the meaning of love poetry, until now. I never cried so many tears for any …
No Escape There are as many nights as days, and the one is just as long as the other in the year's course. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word 'happy' would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. — Carl Jung It was one of …
I Am I am here I am male with a strong anima I am Black, connected with a minority culture and race I am the son of a loving mother and an absent father I am human, a multidimensional being I am a loner, preferring my own company to that of others I am a …
The Wild Mushroom Omelette ...Then the caterpillar got down off the mushroom, and crawled away in the grass, merely remarking as it went, ”One side will make you grow taller, and the other side will make you grow shorter.” “One side of WHAT? The other side of WHAT?” thought Alice to herself. “Of the mushroom,” …
Here, Dreaming Of There The highest and most beautiful things in life are not to be heard about, nor read about, nor seen but, if one will, are to be lived. — Søren Kierkegaard Have you ever dreamed of being in a different time and place? Was the setting large and empty, the windows covered …
I Know You Have A Beautiful Body You ask me how it is I know, you have a beautiful body when my hands have never caressed the small of your back. My lips has never sensed the nape of your long flowing neck. Our bodies have never laid silent in our shared sexual sweat. I …
The Last Time We Touched All these words are just a front. What I would really like to do is chain you to my body, then sing for days and days and days. — Hafiz How could I have told you the first time we met, that you, had preceded you. Your smile seen through …
Imprint Women, poets, and especially artists, like cats; only delicate natures can realize their sensitive nervous systems. — Helen M. Winslow Your entry the night before was almost silent, except for the brush of your body against the screen door. Walking across the room on cat paws hoping not to awaken, then gently creeping into …
Invisible Hands There is only one success... to be able to spend your life in your own way. — Christopher Morley Whatever it was that caused me to believe I am different. Whatever it was that guided me to choose solitude over crowds. Whatever it was that persuaded me to seek wisdom before profit. Whatever …
The First Time We Touched All these words are just a front. What I would really like to do is chain you to my body, then sing for days and days and days. — Hafiz How could I have told you the first time we touched, that you, had preceded you. Your smile seen through …
The Ritual Any serious attempt to try to do something worthwhile is ritualistic. — Derek Walcott It seems almost ritualistic, the way I step across the bench, face the sky, squat down, adjust my hips, straighten my back, and breathe deeply. All to just sit— and listen to the sea.
Here We Are, Again The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances; if there is any reaction, both are transformed. — C.G. Jung I don’t know where you came from — a dream I had long ago, now remembered? Perhaps we met as travelers do at a crossroad between destinations. Maybe …
The Knock At The Door The truest philosophy, is not to long for anything in particular, but to accept everything as it comes, and find out the reason of it coming. — Marie Corelli The unexpected knock on the door awakened me from a late afternoon nap. I heard your voice call my name but …
I Remember And it is not yet enough to have memories. You must be able to forget them when they are many, and you must have the immense patience to wait until they return. For the memories themselves are not important. Only when they have changed into our very blood, into glance and gesture, and …
“Say it,” came a voice from everywhere with a body nowhere. “Say what,” I questioned. “Say I am Love,” the voice replied. “I am Love,” I whispered in a thought not moving my lips. “Say it louder!” the voice exclaimed! “I am Love” I spoke in a sound greater than silence still less then audible. …
A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.– Oscar Wilde Last night you broke into my room with the skills of a thief and looked for something or someone to reflect upon your own reflected light. Finding …
Alive On The Edge Of NowHere! There is no death. What we think of as death is merely one of life's greatest transitions. — Marie Corelli I am here, alive on the edge of nowhere with a mind full of almost forgotten memories in an aging vessel of an uncertain duration. I have lived my …
We don't learn the word ‘dream’ by being shown a dream, the way we learn the word ‘apple’ by being shown an apple. — Anonymous I sit up startled, curious, wondering how I arrived in that world from this one, and back into here from there. The transition was so easy. like falling asleep, requiring …
StarDust Upon hearing of your death I searched the home where we shared so many of our moments together for some sign that you might still be here. I stretched out on the bed which held us in dreams hoping to find some solid part of you to hold on to — But you were …
What Shall I Do Now? I walked through town alone this afternoon without you holding on to my arm the way you once did. I did not feel important, or special, nor loved. I was simply alone. The way I, of late, have been. I had grown use to this state of being solo after …
Shooting Star Sometimes I watch for hours and nothing, nothing happens. Then out of nothing— A flash, a breath. And nothing happens, again.
Stand Undiminished — The Poem Taken from my motherland in chains to travel waters unknown by me, to toil in soil unfamiliar to my hands. Forced to speak a language which does not sing. Exploited, enslaved, whipped and hanged. Defined in a constitution as three fifths of a man. I stood beside you in battle …
Gone It is the knowledge of the genuine condition of our lives that we must draw our strength to live and our reason for living. —Simone de Beauvior Gone from sight but not from memory. In my mind, a picture of you remains. Although, now, more than a body, I cannot touch you. Although, much …
Grateful Being solitary is being alone well: being alone luxuriously immersed in doings of your own choice, aware of the fullness of your won presence rather than of the absence of others. Because solitude is an achievement. – Alice Koller It’s Sunday morning outside the first rain of Autumn soaks into a dry, brown earth the …
Now Not one of us knows what effect his life produces, and what he gives to others; that is hidden from us and must remain so, though we are often allowed to see some little fraction of it, so that we may not lose courage. — Albert Schweitzer It is just a moment not …
My Father’s Son I became my father’s son not borne from him, but from my mother’s womb. My older brother was his favorite, from the same mold they were made. He was distant from me and absent from us all. I hid from him in solitude, my mother in her Black woman’s pride. I was …
Morning Dance Love all that has been created by God, both the whole and every grain of sand. Love every leaf and every ray of light. Love the beasts and the birds, love the plants, love every separate fragment. If you love each separate fragment, you will understand the mystery of the whole resting in …
In recognition of Black History Month, Transformation Publications will present poems, essays, and other artistic creations by Black artists, musicians, and writers. Tao Writer (April 17, 1948 -) Stand Undiminished-The Poem Taken from my motherland in chains to travel waters unknown by me, to toil in soil unfamiliar to my hands. Forced to speak a …
Mix With The Infinite Earth does not run as a fugitive from the sky. Air is absorbed in the low moist valleys and penetrated with jutting peaks. On the sea’s horizon they meet and glow with new love. Sky’s torment, earth’s eruptions can not separate them. One never leaves the other but always they blend …
Some Wounds Never Heal Your absence has gone through me like thread through a needle. Everything I do is stitched with its color. — WS Merwin Some wounds never heal. There is always an indentation that remains in the heart, A scar across the skin to remind you of some event which happened long ago. …
Dreams Of A Kiss A Kiss is still...an osculatory apposition of the orbicularis oris and levator labii muscles with posterior involvement of the sternocleidomastoids, commonly in a dexterous orientation. —Onur Gunturkun of Ruhr I saw in two dreams... The first kiss, like that of friends, merely a meeting of lips. Even an accident, maybe..? A …
What Love Is? I know you must have felt it. Rising up gently with the sunlit, morning breeze, infiltrating your every pore. Your heart skips, then ceases to beat — you are suspended, floating lost, in a grounded feeling you have known all your life? The pure syncopated synchronicity, the instantaneous tranquility between hands, face, …
April 30, 1999 I never thought I would write a poem using a date as the title but… My best friend died today. Silently and alone, he vanished from this and reappeared in a different realm. You were needed to paint the flowers which breathe life into this earth, to color intent into the sky …
An Accident Can you imagine the possibilities? All the variant forces of nature converging on a single point— This point — in location, time, and space to enable the simultaneous falling of two coconuts from the same tree, precisely at the same moment, striking the same earth with a single ‘thump’ before rolling together? Now …
Epitaph Son to my parents Brother to older sibling Student to wisdom Husband to wife Father to daughter Beloved to some Enemy to none Loner to people Human to earth Dreamer to stars Life to death Dust to existence
About Last Night I enjoyed our time last night, the meal, the music, the shared intimacy, the kissing, the touching, the holding of your body. The way we lavished each other, before briefly falling asleep together
Magic I love the feeling when magic is inseparable from life. All the elements are in play. The ocean pulling silently upon sand. The moon, though there, is invisible. A wading bull seal watches his mate posing statuesquely, upon dry shore. We watch each other through a fog penetrable only by interception of blue, brown …
Being In Love ...When you are highly sensitized to love, when you vibrate deeply, sexually, bodily, ...the being is enlarged, its capacity highly increased. —Anaïs Nin I miss being in love, that sacred Logos between a woman and a man, a goddess and a god, between two souls unmasked. I miss the smile on …
Everywhere I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space. —William Shakespeare So I start again, as if for the first time to build my life from scratch. Without guide or map, except for a voice that speaks only in whispers with no distinction of wrong or right. Cast …