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SIMPLE LIGHT #1
Starting mid September, 1990

HE HAS PUT HIS WORD UPON MY LIPS

Wind blows out of my mouth.

A River flows out of my mouth.

A Lamb springs forth from my mouth.

A Lion leaps out of my mouth.

Fire falls from my mouth.

Seven Swords piece my mouth.

A Lover bends and kisses my mouth

and ten thousand stars fall into

a still, lucid pool of light.

The pool blazes!

All the creatures of God

spring up out of that pool

singing forth their animal voices

like starlight.

THINK OF THE CAT

Sensitivities for the daylight

are developed in the dark of the night.

Think of the cat!

Be nocturnal with God.

Develop big eyes,

and when the day comes

light will ring upon nerves

like silver bells.

Ah! the musical ecstasy

of God's pattering light!

A MEDITATION ON MEISTER ECHART

Were we conceived in laughter

by Divine joy

down in the belly of God?

Is it God's holy laughter

which shakes out beings

in a discharge of clear light

--which act we call birth

and origin?

LIFE DEFINED

When we pour out ourselves as a blessing,

we are poured into ourselves as the blessed.

MANNA I

Last week's glory is already full of worms

and death-thoughts of knowledge.

MANNA II

How the worms hunger for the heavenly food.

No-eyed, their suction cupped mouths

cover little snapping beaks

which tear at the lacy white waffers.

They bore their bodies inside by devouring,

and wriggle, hidden in the food of angels.

UPON ART IN THIS WORLD

The blind singer sat dumb

and thirsting in the araba

until he ground dry bread into his eyes

and his mouth gaped upon the wind.

Then clear, honeyed water seeped out of stone.

Sucking water, he sang.

The dying drew near

and found the rock.

They drank and named it

the singing stone.

Spurning the dry bread

and the wind

they sucked upon the stone...

and soon died.

TO BE WITH EYES LIKE FLAMES OF FIRE

Make me to remember!

The smallest mouse of a meek soul

brown and plain, unassuming

not flashing in the eye its sinuous flesh;

but fat, pimply, unsure,

unable to meet gaze with gaze,

darting the eyes down--

this one is longed for by God!

This one is the greatest treasure of His graces.

This one is the very one He envisions everlastingly

bursting forth like a white sun;

clothed with silver moonlight;

with hair like falling fire;

with eyes like the bells of the Pleiades;

with nose like lilac blossoms;

with neck like Greek alabaster;

with breasts like bounding lambs;

with belly like thistledown;

with thighs like summer winds;

with feet like leopards.

UPON THE HIGHEST ASSURANCE

I am not like God.

I am not so secure in my own loving being

that I can withstand all rejection,

all evil blasts

until my beloved comes

to love me in return.

I am a wounded creature

who needs to be upheld

in the graces of love.

I need to be loved....

Yet I am loved!

Beyond all telling,

I am loved!

And as I face my deepest fears,

and as I face my greatest pain,

I know more fully

--into all freedoms--

that unfailingly,

I am loved!

Though my parents should forsake me,

God will bear me up.

Though a mother should forget her nursing child,

God shall not cast me from Her breast.

Though a man, out of hardness or pain,

should turn from a woman,

God shall never turn from me, His bride,

until I am healed and holy,

courageous and wild

in the disciplined beauties

of His free Kingdom.

WELCOME TO THE INNER CIRCLE

A starry sound

blows through the King's countenance:

every facial line, light etched,

every demeanor, demure.

This King rules

royal beings:

His ancient Kings

and young, ancient Queens

who have forgotten his face.

But he shall recall them...

through images, and shadowy illusions,

and unexpected flights of fancy,

and the numinous.

Therefore, the fun and frolic

of galloping bliss

is reserved for times

of stories and rhymes

with his princely child,

or that woman wild,

who can steal his heart

with a kiss.

CONCERNING COMPASSION

The turquoise sea flows up foaming to my feet.

Day after day, while it is today, it calls to me

to cease the island that has been my home

and wade into the warm waters

--that clear bath! All sea creatures

who are awake swim knowingly,

unbound in the limitless blanket of the sea

that is in all directions stitched unbrokenly.

These are the free creatures:

The red lobster dances out of his hole;

the blue and gold tropical fish

joyfully interweave in miraculous water patterns;

a small brown shark nuzzles the sand and is comforted;

the white dolphins are always laughing!

I must ease down into these waters!

Dark eyed natives on the beach scream out to me.

They are afraid I shall not return to them again.

The white foam caresses my ankles.

The light blue waters lap my loins.

The wet, warm embrace about my belly stuns me with peace.

As the flashing waters flood over my chest to cover my hair

I sense limitless music moving in wild currents.

It is the sea, the sea, the unbreakable sea!

ABOUT THAT WOMAN THE WHOLE DEAD WORLD FEARS

Maria lies in squalor,

big with child, panting;

sweat glistening upon her face and lips,

her muscles quivering, eyes huge.

Should a child be born into a cardboard house?

This one should!

Her cervix opens like the moon,

like the sun - and the killing child descends.

Water bursts out of the crevasse of her loins

into the arroyo of the world.

Flames lick in the water

and burn her whole house down!

Her flaming roof falls away

and the stars rush down upon her

to suckle at her large white breasts.

Her whole body tenses now like a hunting cat.

She arches up to look upon her loins

and shakes with pain and joy.

Her swelling opens like a bud.

She falls back upon the wet stones

and rests forever.

Her child breaks through singing.

The whole creation is in his voice.

The world dies!

GOLD WEAVERS IN THE MIRROR OF THE SUN

PART I. THE JOURNEY - DRINKING BLOOD

There is a revolution of Spirit needed!

Forgiveness! Grace! Justice! Order! Compassion!

Make your heart as clean as sea breeze.

Make your mind as clear as polished glass.

How? To the Holy things--lifewise!

This is a whole life's journey,

from the twisted gray labyrinth

to the mirror of the Sun.

But the juice, the red juice,

the warm red juice of God

pours into your mouth

and runs down your throat.

And you are fresh as a child

to leap through this journey!

*

The blood of God's Word

flowed through Christ's veins

and bled out in our world

to hover 'neath our brains.

*

Drink rivulets of cleansing blood

and find the royal son.

Drink deeply the sweet red blood

and be the radiant One,

the woman-child bride whose soul must sing

as her heart senses the King.

PART II. THE WORK - GOLD WEAVERS

*

"The whole creation labors together -

waiting, waiting, travailing in childbirth

groaning for the manifestation of the sons of God."

Paul of Tarsus

*

We are not envisioned as we are!

There are living ideas

inviolate in God's mind!

This God who sees dense, gray stones

to be as luculent as stars.

This God who sees that apple tree to be all afire

with the immanence of an inexplicable beauty.

Yet the tree is dying in time

for lack of some pure woven gold connection

to link it unbreakably to that clarity

which is deathless and older than the world.

*

See that man. He is a car salesman.

Yet God has made him to be a noble and just prince.

He has committed to him the golden threads.

The man weaves God's threads tenderly

into his children's hearts.

And he weaves to reunite an old dying woman

to the timeless girl she is.

Watch as he labors to weave gold into the stone mind

of a homeless man.

*

Let us who know her, dress in snowy ermine

that little sister who checks out groceries

for she is of royal blood!

She is already making some small connections,

newly being made a gold weaver and a mender.

She smiles openly into your eyes

for she has come to drink

the sweet, red juice of God.

It is the wine of Christ's blood.

She can drink it out of the light of her dog's eye

for she sees that dog is all love!

See, he laps up life from her eyes and becomes!

as she mirrors his mirror

in the mirror of the Sun.

THE HUMBLE WINDOW CLEANER

Polish and shine.

Spit and polish and shine;

upon the scaffolds of faith he stands

(polish and shine)

and sings his joy!

Polish and shine,

polish and shine

until an inwrought radiance

shimmers through the glass.

And its reflection is seen

as a diamond-like dawn

rising in every leaf,

in every eye.

SAY YES!

Say yes,

sinking down to the deep door.

At the slow rapping

of silence,

say open.

*

Say thank you

and I love you

and listen to the eternal echo

say, "Thank you",

and, "I love you."

Then know that you too have been

a wondrous echo in time

of that eternal voice.

*

Say yes to your own back door,

--that place of hidden sunrise--

and flashes of eternal day will be in your eyes.

*

Say yes to night

and rest in starlight,

content in faint starlight,

loving pale starlight,

because, though it is dim,

it is ancient light.

And a light older than stars

shall rise.

THERE IS A MUSICAL WAY TO THE TRUTH

There is a musical way to the truth

for truth is musical.

As musical as God is.

Whose being harmonizes?

Who connects all things in wonder?

What spotless mirror

shimmers unbrokenly everywhere?

Light is silent music.

When light sings silently

through our loving eyes

all creatures join the song,

for every cell of every body

is made for the music of the light.

See the dancing dog

being loved into eternity!

See the swallow sing as it sails the melodious breeze.

See the leaping dolphin always laughing in its love.

Hear the whale's intelligent song--it is a lullaby!

The prayer that does not beg

but believes God courageously,

starts the prancing horse

dancing down trails of starlight.

Can you love a pig into heaven?

The Kingdom is here!

The Kingdom is here!

The music of God is singing clearly!

Where love burns in a tree:

that tree's leaves heal.

Where love flows within a river:

that water makes bind eyes see.

Where a farmer loves his little lamb:

that lamb saves him.

Were a lion is beheld in the fear of awe:

the King of Creation is revealed.

Oh Lord, Thy Kingdom Come On Earth

As It Is In Your Heaven!

Where God is all in all in all!

Oh hie dee-do dee fiddle dee dee,

the creatures of God are in love with me.

Oh hie dee-do dee fiddle dee gin,

creation is loved--Let The Music Begin!

THIN BROWN WOMAN WALK WITH ME

Thin brown woman

walk with me.

and sing your ancient earth song.

And listen to the wild geese in me,

tell you sky cries

and what is in the wind.

(Your warm brown eyes, they nurture me.)

I wish to slowly walk with you

that we might together tell

what things must happen

for high sky fire to seep into earth

and mingle with the deep fire

I see smoldering underneath

the thin skin of your eyes.

WAKE UP GRANDFATHER THAT WE MIGHT THINK

Wake up Grandfather

that we might think in starlight,

and in that soft, silver-light

talk of He whose flock is the stars.

We shall ask nothing of Him

but the beauty of His eyes

and that soft, feminine glory

of dark, moist skies.

WE MUST CREATE TIME FOR EPIPHINES

Down in the depths of all things

is the Word,

that seamless eternal miracle

which is the yearning,

the creative longing

of God to be enfleshed,

to be loved, known

and liberated freely

by his free creatures

into His own creation.

Dive down deep.

We must create time

for diving.

The sin of man

is the negation of the deep

and its luminous language.

Diving is God's way,

to find God's Christ

and to liberate Him

for the world.

For we are faith creators:

meant to liberate him into sky,

into the core of a tree,

into the eyes of a cow,

into the face of a lion,

and the heart of a child....

But we are a frenzied race,

water bugs skittering about

upon the surface of things,

enamored by shiny reflections

on the tension of the surface.

And so, we do not dive.

Down then together

to where the Spirit is surging up

freely through the depths

into the high pure longings

of the luminous Word.

Down deep, below forbidding icy currents,

divers know that waters turn warm and luminous.

There are soft, kind eyes watching there

when the ebony depths burst their bottoms out

swiftly into translucent skies;

when water currents become wind

and bright fish transfigure into birds.

We are a strange race,

so squared against our own good.

We are a bent race,

undone safety pins no longer holding up

the diapers of our minds.

We spill our mental load on the ground

and make the air feculent

with the waste of our lives.

To not think luminous thoughts

is to leave luminous deeds undone;

to silence light-born words

is bent!

Down to where the pearls are then!

Let us be pearl divers!

Breathe your breath and dive deep.

The priceless pearl is clear and silvery

in the throat of a yawning shell.

Believe in diving and dive

down to where turquoise waters break out into wind.

Can you hear bright fish singing?

We must dive down to save the one who saves

and liberate the one who sets us free.

He waits for us to venture down

to where He is manacled at the bottom of our sea.

We have bound him there

with the irons of our beliefs

for we have dreamt the wrong world!

Down then, come let us go together

to where the Spirit-tide is surging!

We will break His chains

and His ancient gleaming tides of light will

burst out into the world

and fragrant fountains will burble out each eye.

Then full tides will coarse

to uncrinkle every withered body,

and tides will surge through every crimped mind

unwrinkling crumpled souls

suddenly flushing secret spirit pains away.

And bright birds will burst out praising everywhere,

loosened in God's watery winds,

on drumming wings they will descend with sudden singing,

beating down into our throats!

Down then, let us go together

to where the Spirit is surging

from the depths

with the high pure longings

of God's luminous Word!

TOUCH ME

Touch me

and you will touch a miraculous

mask of flesh.

Love me

and you will uncover flashes and shadows

of my soul.

Love God through me

and I shall become

a momentary mirror of the sun.

A PRELUDE AND A MORNING PRAYER

A rooster strutted on a rickety fence.

Gray hush was on the fields,

broken occasionally by the dark voice of a bird.

The rooster opened his yellow beak, panting for the dawn,

and rolled his red eyes up to the dim morning sky.

Suddenly his crow zigzagged like lightning across the yard

and struck the ears of a young carpenter

whose eyes quietly rolled inside their lids

as his mind shifted from dreams to reveries.

Light was fluttering through his mind like pale birds.

He opened his eyes from that light

to the slow growing light of day.

"Ah, God again,"

he spoke, and the still air shuttered.

He arose, wrapped linen around his waist

and poured water from a pitcher

into a clay basin.

Rivulets ran from his hair as he walked out

into the first burst of sunlight

which painted the courtyard gold.

He stared briefly into the low streams of light,

water beads glistening in his beard.

Mary came from the house with his robe.

Her almond eyes were soft, still murky with sleep.

She touched his wet hair and smiled.

He took his robe and smiled at her,

then walked out into the gray mists

laying upon the fields of Nazareth.

*

"Hear, Oh Israel, the Lord our God is one!"

*

The Words leapt out of the dawn like golden lions!

He flung his arms to the sky as his knees sank into the furrows..

*

"And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,

and all your soul, and all your might..."

*

The great, golden lions were upon him, devouring him with light.

And throughout the town, which stirred awake behind him,

shadows of the words skittered about like gazelles.

"And you shall love your neighbors as you love yourself..."

the shadows quietly cried.

There, upon his knees, with his face upraised,

bathed in light, he outstretched his arms like wings

and let the lion's voices tear upon him, roaring louder, louder,

while the soft voices of the shadows

kept on calling, calling...

A FEW MORE COMMENTS UPON ISAIAH THE PROPHET'S VISIONS

When the towers fall and idols crumble

and all the haters of truth

shrink in the small dry shells of their illusions;

when the devouring beast is revealed to be the beast

as its surface beauty plunges away;

when the light of the sun shines seven times as bright

and the light of the moon blazes into the eyes--

then shall a still small voice shout

and thunder forth in absoluteness,

and the word spoken shall be real!

and turn the world upside down.

When the quiet King comes forth

in His full majesty beyond the shadows,

and the shadow land melts

in the fires of His Being,

and the dark spirit-masters of deceit

are blasted like billiard balls scattering

--swarming like mindless gnats

flung down an abyss of flames--

then shall children

sing to the sound of an angel's voice,

and it shall be of such pure beauty

that all souls will be recreated in the hearing.

Then shall eyes open like windows open

to the fresh wind and light of the golden rising.

And faces shall began their endless shining.

And bodies shall glow with the light of God's love.

And Holy light shall feast in colors,

and the colors shall weave into living garments

to bedeck royal children with King's splendors.

Then shall spiritual rivers flood down from the sky

and the peoples shall drown in joy

and die to death in the fullness of life

as the shadows of delusion are extinguished.

Then shall the merry Kingdom commence

in the presence of the Universal King, our Maker!

*

He who was crucified has fulfilled God's Word:

the humbled are set free in a disciplined wind,

and the pride of all evil is gone from the mind.

UPON GOD'S PRESENCE

Comfortable in flesh or out

the flame sits silently.

A wind blows over rocks and sea;

the child plays carelessly

as the spirit banters about.

HUMAN THOUGHT IS NEVER TRUTH ITSELF

Thought must partake of that shimmering fountain

beyond all thought.

The naked bride simply

dips into the sacred stream.

Limpid waters flow over the thighs and breasts

of her mind--

and she is clean.

A SONG AT THE EPOCH OF AGES

Sing the holy peasant

and the place of his work.

Sing the board and bed

and those who prayed a radiant book.

Sing those alive, though dead,

and what they've found and what they seek.

Sing of ages gone,

(and the common sin in which they floundered),

make your song lean

with truth and beautiful things remembered.

Recover where we must be going

from a dim, yet luminous past...

the values we must be

for our world to last.

DAY SLIDES IN

Day slides in as a smooth blue beauty

amidst the silent sound of a final star.

Cattle resonate the air with nasal noises.

An audible weaving is observed:

the burping of a bird;

the sharp rap, rap of a dog;

the creaking of duck wings in the cool yellow distance;

a coughing, black, "Caw, caw",

and then... God's alarm clock crows!

By creation's magic

the heart unfolds into a natural worship

as God designed.

I observe it in deepening sensitivities.

Yet, what is this? But how can this be?

Is this my own heart that is being poured out

as a smooth blue beauty

amidst the silent roar of a star?

IT ONLY TAKES LIFE AND DEATH

It's so simple

and so profound -

It only takes the fully unleashed working

of life and death:

God in my thinking;

God's order in my logic;

God's purposes in my reasoning;

God's wings in my imaginings;

God's truth in my speaking;

God's self in my longings;

God's care in my feelings;

God's works in my memories;

God's dreams in my hopes;

God as water in me cleansing;

God as rest in me refreshing;

God as fire in me burning;

God in my choosing;

God in my yielding;

God in my responding;

God in my doings;

God's glory in my creating;

God as my breath;

God's blood in my veins--

God as my life!

A WIND SONG

The wind blows out of the gates of the heart

and into the gates of the day

and the lonely heart is blown apart

and the sad heart withers away.

For this wind laughs and this wind sings

with all the good things that it brings,

as bursting over the country side

it pours through gates that open wide

to take it back from where it starts,

this wind that blows through the place of the heart.

So back it flies through secret places

where heart gates open to wind-blown graces.

Then the wind blows out of the gates of the heart

and into the gates of the day,

and the lonely heart is blown apart

and the sad heart withers away.

THESE ARE MEDITATIONS AND ARE PRAYERS

These are meditations and are prayers,

hot to hew slick stone

in the places of the heart;

to crease earth like the crooked plough

and furrow deeper into the dark.

These are meditations and are prayers

with an inaudible roar, like a slight sea shell roar,

yet sounding somewhere like blood frenzied bull rings.

This is a bellowing below to the brilliance

of He who broods above

the terrible blinding sapphire of a flashing firmament:

He whose fire-filled face has flooded

out full-blooded creatures through the laughter

of his lips; He whose being burns as burnished copper:

for in his loins, and above his loins fumes a fire,

and below his loins, flames fragrant fire!

These are meditations to the mysteries there,

where a crowd of inconceivable creatures fly full-flung

like bolts of lightning in white oil.

Six winged they are, and bizarre in meditations.

The full force of a light-breathed wind bursts from their faces

and exalts their piercing pinions heavenward.

Ox-faced, they patiently plow the human heart.

Eagle-faced, winds erupt up limitlessly

under their wings to fling them unfurled

through the radiant back-diamond-doors of wind-blown souls.

Lion-faced, they pounce upon the sleep of us

to devour our savory flesh and bones

until light leaps up like a wounded tiger torn from the carcass.

Man-faced, they graciously gather us in the quiet Kirk

of kitchen gardens

to tell us tales of momentous mundaneness

which serves to steady the meticulous movements of stars.

They speak, and their words are simple wheat and butter,

silver needles slipping thread through garments,

the cut of carpentry tools,

the slice of a scythe through grass.

They appear in the earth fume and fragrances of a barn.

Hands from under their fabulous feathers

clasp the quiet cow's udder, then stroke the blue ears

and touch the matted muzzle of a mealy dog

as they turn their sunshine gaze

slowly up upon the cacophonous cries of the love-crazed children

hilarious and high in the hay.

All this constant, Yes! while the world spins on

aching sick and aweless

in a sloven slue...

These are meditations and are prayers,

to hew stone and turn the succulent soil

with words hidden in the hot, fleshly

flame of a human heart.

sloven: untidy, dirty

slue: to turn around a fixed point

I--BUT LIKE HAY

To start--the hay:

high blown--wind sought--

and born to climb cloud high.

I--but like hay--day gold

and yearning

of sun burning growth

to the green stalk--

till the dry

click of a sudden stick

of hollow hay

is wind torn

high

to the blue smear

of a sudden,

shimmering

sky!

LUST IS A CHEAP EXCUSE FOR NOT LOVING

Ice bright,

the bellowing eyes

blow beauty out,

as the honey-filled breasts

rest in a milky gown.

Yet oil from the eyes

makes goose wing winds

whip over buttery yellow coals

until, blown white hot,

a virgin bird springs singing

out of fire into ears.

Then, hearing collapses

cold, checkered floors

and ice walls drop

down into deepening fires.

IN LOVE FRESH ZEALS

(On Spiritual War)

We stood on cold, glass mountains

and cracked ebony angels

with innocent fire

and shouts of Hosanna!

Sleigh-bell winds

shivered us with joys.

When fire falls silently

through frosted glass,

it booms out word-wise

to mollify

till the child is fresh.

When big eyes sing of huge worlds

and hot miracle making

above the chilled, silent walls of glass,

golden balls break leathery skulls

to let harmless children pass.

SEVEN SACRED SPIRITS NOBODY EVER TALKS ABOUT

The seven sailing spirits

like silent candles stand

burning in the sweet mood

of God's good.

And in the uproarious light

of these sacred seven

God births beings

into bright Heaven.

TO THE RAPID RIVER 'ROUND US

Out from a quiet sea

flows the rapid river:

the motion of time’s change—

though now the secret, sacred center,

out of which God’s angels saunter,

to most of us seems strange—

still the rapid river runs

to merge with the quiet sea:

the source of all the Love to be.

MAN SHALL NOT LIVE BY BREAD ALONE

Can you smell the hot bread

of God's name?

Then let some warm, golden honey

flow from your heart

over His name.

Now eat the Name of God.

UPON MOUNTAINS OF GLASS GROWS A RADIANT FOREST

A soft, consuming fire

dreamt away the wood

until all that remained

were ashes, and the thought of wood.

And the thought of wood itself

was heat and light

and had always dreamt of fire

until the soft consuming flame

came to burn away the wood and find itself.

*

There grows upon high, distant mountains of glass,

a radiant forest.

I AM A BUSY SPIDER

I am a busy spider

constantly weaving the web

of my own bondage:

a silken thread coming from my bowels

made of knowledge, accomplishment,

the identities men would give me,

the ones I greedily snatch:

ambitions, pride!

I creep around in the dark,

ugly, six legged,

a fat and frightening spider

climbing bent grass and crooked branches,

catching flies.

And yet, even while I busily attach

new strands of sticky web

to sticks and stones,

I gaze up to the skies

and watch beautiful birds soaring.

I can hear their singing,

and I think,

"If only a bird would swoop down and eat me.

Then I would be happy."

But, I fear the birds!

AS SHE SANG GERSHWIN

She sang

and God took her apart,

flesh from bone before my eyes.

I saw her sinews,

hair, breasts,

the inner chambers of her chest

moving out visually in the stream

of her song.

I journeyed into the house of her body,

on the emanation of her soul

which was like a beam

of brown and golden light

slowly rushing into my eyes.

God was wholly loving her body

--and she didn't know it!

This was all I was shown,

there, inside the song house

of her soul.

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