Gravity, all my body's water fills the vessel almost
to the top, cells separating themselves, disintegrating;

the waters settle down, and something else in me rises--
I move in two directions. I can't sleep. The heart

floats between this buoying, heavy joy and what is light above it;
it knocks against the breastbone like a boat against its moorings.

What is this? I fall in love again, and not all of me falls. Like air
that was hidden inside the seawater, I've been drinking freedom

all along when I thought I might be drowning--it rises to the head,
the wine or fire of creative surrender, and opens up an emptiness.

The sky is inside! So, too, is this ocean. The merlin and the marlin
exchange glances, two swords that pierce the same skin between.

You have been here all along, so close I did not know you. Now you
precipitate, and the world is manifest, every particle a particular beauty,

the gray salt, the moving waters, and the breath that rushes over everything,
coaxing music from our trembling. I do not know what I'm saying. The beloved

walks the world within me. He climbs into the rickety boat of my heart
and sets it loose on the waters. I will accept no apologies, when Shams returns.

Whirling, resolved.

Through nonaction
No action is left undone.

Posted my contribution to the Blog Action Day initiative: "Integrity, Nonaction & Living Green," on my Meadowsweet & Myrrh spirituality blog. Check it out. Here's an excerpt:


As you know, dear readers, this blog is devoted mostly to spiritual and philosophical explorations, often with a poetic flare and, every once in a while, with politics sneaking in just under the radar. It would be easy to write about the Druidic respect for and adoration of nature, about the sacredness of Mom Earth and the responsibility we each have, as her children, to care for and appreciate her; or perhaps to discuss the political nuances of the environmental and conservation "green" movements, the mythos of endless resources and a modern culture obsessed with consumerism... But then, I never do take the easy way in this little blog, do I?

[...]

Because the sage does not "detract from the Way with the mind," nor with deliberate action, she is able to live casually and harmoniously within it. Instead of futilely exerting herself in trying to preserve that which is naturally transient, she "unifies her nature, nurtures her vital breath, and consolidates her integrity so as to communicate with that which creates things."

I recently inherited a used digital camcorder from my parents (who have entrusted it to me with the promise that I will make DVDs out of the hours upon hours of footage they've filmed over the years of my brother playing soccer). I've been eager to find creative uses for it, but I've been running up against cinematographer's block. Today, an idea struck me: "The GodsEye Project."

The gist of this idea is to focus on capturing real moments in time, with as little commentary and editing as possible, focusing particularly on the various elements (spirit, air, fire, water, earth; or in Druidic terms, nwyfre, gwyar, and calas) with a brevity and tightness of focus that pushes visual imagery almost into abstraction--or, perhaps, a singular kind of intense clarity. Everything can be mated to poetry, in my mind, and so I like to think of this as a kind of video-poetry, if you will. What follows is my first attempt. It is, like all first attempts, shoddy and full of jitters. I hope to improve with practice.





For your added pleasure (hopefully), here is a short poem I wrote several years ago, inspired by similar subject matter.

I'm currently going through the process of "claiming" my various blogs through Technorait, which means I have to post this obligatory link to my Technorati Profile. If you're interested, though, please do check it out. I think my Aortography project is going particularly well.

I'm currently going through the process of "claiming" my various blogs through Technorait, which means I have to post this obligatory link to my Technorati Profile. If you're interested, though, please do check it out. I think my Aortography project is going particularly well.

Aortography Featurette: Dreams

A taste of my current Twitter project, Aortography, here's a series of dream bytepomes:

Dream: The cult of populist frivolity knocks the bread from my hands, again. Their justifications not always so chaste. (Food for thought?)

Dream: In the basement, I undress slowly, as tho I were blind, the cotton blouse snagging on the jeweled and fragile headdress of my mind.

Dream: The magi singing on the hill in short denim jackets, the cold river that cleanses us of gender, and the sycamore's mutual embrace...

Dream: Ride the gypsy cob across three rings of water, to the citadel, white feathers and orichalcum flame. Ride the gentle pen home.

Dream: Pacing slick obsidian shoals, hold back the storming temporial sea--the staff will make the shore, the name will save the child.

Dream: A few drops on the tongue, the tender bodies who smell of sweat, and a slow dawn's heat that seals the way between memory and waking.

Each morning's cells come screaming back from dream into the lonely gold, the skin less worn, untold and breathless. Death doesn't stick.


To read more bytepomes, and receive daily updates, check out Aortography.

I really am getting all enthusiastic about this Twitter thing. It always sounds boring when I try to explain it to people, but I think it has such cool potential. Or maybe it's just my association of Twitter with this idea of "aortography." As I was trying to explain to Jen yesterday at work, the medium that Twitter provides (the 140-character restriction, the posting to the web and sending it to cell phones, etc.) just evokes the idea that I first wrote about in a poem last June, that began with the lines:

That scarlet path burned white--devoted animal
etched on glass--teach me
to be still between this coming and going.

It all ties back into that phrase, "Narration is unnecessary." This notion of trying to capture a moving process--the ebb and flow of blood--in a still form, and how these byte-sized poem posts are similar, trying to trace the bloodflow of, for instance, my life through this oddly restricted and artificial form; the injection of a foreign substance into the body that renders normally invisible processes visible, like the pervasive presence of technology (in this case, cell phones) which is foreign to "natural" life but can be a means of rendering that life apparent and visible, because it is a means of communication.... So the challenge I've set for myself is trying to utilize that medium--the cell phone and the txt message--in a way that heightens the awareness of "real life" (whatever that is) through intentionally intense and concentrated language, providing moments of pause and stillness within the constant flux of chatter....

I don't know. It seems cool to me. I think I secretly dream of eventually having a nice, large group of "followers" on Twitter who receive my byte-sized poems each day, maybe even a network of byte-poets who all embark on similar projects and who share and respond to each other's work.

I also keep thinking of other cool things to do with the medium--things that would take more planning and time than I'm likely to give. For example, setting up multiple accounts and then holding "conversations" via Twitter in real time that others can follow along (I'm thinking something like the Socratic dialogues, philosophical/aesthetic but compact). It would take a lot of planning and coordination--plus, probably some PR before the fact to get anyone to pay attention at all.... I don't have the resources for such a thing.

Still, it would be cool.