My Dearest Satori,
It was so sweet to meet you;
I was so glad to greet you.
I am now sad to leave you;
I still seem to see you—
and still tend to flee you.
A sick little mouse, I stopped to spin;
Pussy passed by and she peeped in—
“What are you doing, my little friend?”
“Weaving words for wounded hens.”
“Shall I come in and cut off your threads?”
“No, no, Miss Pussy, you’ll bite off my legs.”
“Oh no, I’ll not! I’ll help you to spin.”
“That may be so, but you don’t come in!”
She walks upon the sandy sea—
the same sand that saddens me;
it feels the feet whose steps I flee.
And desecrating holy space,
the care we breathed has staled in place.
Grace and time are out of rhyme.
And her river winds but doesn’t wear.
It unwinds its browning lines,
in a kindly kind of way;
yet its sands that shifting move astray—
a coastal rift that won’t away.
Satori Blue, I think of you;
Zonja Who.
I storied you,
who never knew—
Ursula of the seas,
I think upon
your pleas;
Pleiades.
I thought you true—and tort.
You bulwark, walked and fought.
Black with care and nightened mare;
a flare of dye
runs through your hair.
Did you have three lightened moments,
alonements passing by?
Did you notice the indulgence—
I might have known,
you olden maiden;
you maddened madam:
Moan.
Who you became,
will you remain?
You might have shown;
I read your name—
and write your rune,
and stare upon
your golden dew;
pale reflection,
concocted stew.
Double, double, toil and trouble; fire burn, and cauldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
in the cauldron boil and bake;
eye of newt and toe of frog,
wool of bat and tongue of dog,
adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing,
for a charm of powerful trouble,
like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
What window will you echo in;
your netherworld of yesteryear?
I see you in your studio—
painting breasts and lies.
Is it liberating to deafen your own sighs?
The echoes of your whirling womb,
the woman you push aside—
your canvas, speaking louder
than your sentiments confide.
How may one—
handsome, hamstrung—
winnow you away
to win your yestergirl?
How turn you—
if you could be—
unto another world?
Could you—would you—
listen to another who
turns you down;
who’d overhurl
and tip your weight;
who’d disagree—
but would you see?
You curl—and not a little bit—
right in the middle of your forehead.
Satori Story,
Pussy Cat Mole
jumped over a coal,
and in her best petticoat
burned a great hole.
Poor pussy weeping—
she’ll have no more milk
until her best petticoat
is mended with silk.
Satori Jane,
the matter is the matter plain:
not the rice pudding for dinner again;
you complain
—about the pain,
and your seeing window stain—
the X-ray won’t go away:
but what does it say?
Humpty Dumpty
met a woman,
but Simple Simon
wouldn’t buy them.
He sat upon The Wall—
Pink Floyd would see it fall.
You have become
comfortably numb.
Hey, diddle diddle,
the cat with her fiddle.
The owl and that pussycat
went to sea.
The wise old owl
came home to the oak;
the less he spoke,
the more he heard.
There was an old woman
who lived in a stew.
She had so many bedrooms
she didn’t know what to do.
She made her own broth
without any bread;
she wouldn’t listen
to what anyone said.
There was an old woman;
lives under a hill,
and if she’s not gone,
she lives there still.
Satori Azure,
I passed you by—
your picture shew;
you’re painting you.
Your sculpture moulds;
yourself unfolds.
Manure moulds—
a lure and a line,
signifying a swirling sky.
You depend on independence;
your dependency roars aloud.
You fly a shrouded flag up high
that no one sees within your cloud.
Your splendid isolation;
your solitudal occupation.
Your solidification;
your saponification.
Your soporific explanation
is where your wall begins.
Your freedom cry
(do you lie?)
holds you chained,
much less disguised.
Your open hands
(what are your plans?)
clench too tight for you to fly.
And chance you would—
another day,
to boil and burn
and never pray.
I know we—
some of us were—
were dragons,
on the sea.
Once.
We wanted to be warriors.
We wanted to be free.
We wanted to be angels.
Demons,
He and she.
Satori Sea,
shipwrecked, and we,
some of us were,
dashed upon the rocks.
Marooned our lives
with pride and lies;
Satan came to dine.
A horror show he came.
We lay in naked shame,
welcoming hell and every fell
beast presenting well.
And such were some of us.
But washed I was plunged;
waters breaking, a river making:
sanctified, expunged.
Declared to be,
righteously,
righteous in the Name;
and in the Spirit
of my God:
given, just, the same.
Lost and found,
I’m home, aground!
Join me if you’d be.
I would be that you would be
as I am; the same as me:
in Satori be!
Come; let go.
Hear me; know!
Leave behind the sea.
See!
Satori Sister,
you red-raw blister;
alike you are to me.
You madness,
you sadness mirror;
believe you me,
or trust me you:
Me—
like you—
have grieved;
you—
like me—
have thieved.
Yet I stand now in the light.
Weak and frail, I’m elderly,
and forever young—
strong in might—
only slender,
in my fright;
in my fight—
surrendered to
the living Light.
The Light appeared.
I have seen His glory.
The glory of the one and only,
who came from the Father,
full of grace and truth.
You teenage, hating adulthood.
You child, chiding—call me a fool.
You baby, baiting—save the cruel.
Hate what you love—become a tool.
Love what you hate!
You loathe being told: you elbow proud.
You stand on table and pout out loud.
Surround your life in art you found;
who pulls that craft you cart around?
You, still, who would be,
trying to be free—
trying to, beautifully—
flirt you do without your skirt.
You hurt more than
those trees in dirt.
Age does not age you;
in ages, it ages away.
It is your grey that is your youth;
your wrinkles are your fray.
And you are fey.
Tina Turner, be a learner!
Dolly Parton, pray for pardon!
Aretha Franklin, wash your satin!
Tinker Tailor met a sailor.
Tom Tom, the Piper’s son;
she met him on a bridge ashore:
away did run without his bun.
Have you met the muffin man,
who lives down dreary lane?
Mary, Mary—quite contrary;
how does your pardon show?
With silver girls and doodle swirls
and pretty maids all in a row.
Peter, Peter—wouldn’t keep her;
who hatched a plan but wouldn’t squeaker.
He asked about her pumpkin shell,
and then her story began to smell.
If you go down in the woods today,
you’re in for a big surprise;
if you go down into the woods today,
you’d better go in disguise.
For every bear that ever there was
is sad to be for certain because
today’s the day that teddy bears
share their picnics.
Their top picks—their memories,
their happiest moments—
of ivory; their bodies with bellies bliss,
in fair Verona, where we lay our scene.
Little Polly Flinders
sat among the cinders,
wearing her pretty petticoat.
Her mother came and caught her,
and whipped her little daughter,
for spoiling her nice new clothes.
Hurt people hurt—
hurting, they hurt.
Caught, they capture;
cautious, they are curt.
You are lonely, Satori.
If only you—who can’t be true—
could find another man
to ruin your plans.
He’d rapture your arrested hands;
wrap you up in might,
tend to your septic wounds.
He’d sterilise the kites
you keep flagging in your fright—
in your fight.
Have mercy on your soul.
Attend your staling whole;
your stagnant landed,
your stinking handed,
your putrid, saddened whorl.
God take you,
break you,
and then may He
remake you.
Grip your soul.
Unfold your wold.
Birth you sold and born untold,
bought by Him to grow unold.
Wholly only,
holy solely,
His unto Him alone.
You inexplicably unobvious—
obviously unconscious.
Luminously blind;
transparently opaque.
Presently absent;
loudly silent.
Honestly lying truths.
Your contradictory addictions;
dictatory contemplations;
intolerant tolerance.
Hippocratic judgments;
hyperbolic hypocritical norms.
Your deprecating pride;
seriously frowning smile.
Polite rudeness;
proper lewdness.
Sleeping, closed-open mind.
Your selective unawares;
differential careness.
Agnostic theologies;
atheistic deities.
Lucratively thefty gifts.
You stiff-necked knee,
and bent-down neck—
may light and day
crack your straightened back.
God take you,
and hurl you
to crawl in a heap—
down upon your
crumbled crown.
And raise you,
to lay you
down to pray,
a wakened,
a prostrated,
plea for grace.
Did you know—
of course you do;
none of this
is hidden from view:
None of this is yours—
no moment, nor your breath.
Earth and everything in it,
and beyond its earthly worth.
Everything only has its earth—
its ears and heart,
its art and body,
horse and cart—
its beauty and its filling,
its fillment and beginning,
its fulfillment—
its realment,
its feelment and unrealment—
In,
By, and
Through:
God, Spirit, One;
The only Light—our Sun:
Painter; Potter; Maker; Moulder.
First; Source, Course; Cause.
Mother; Author; Artist; Older.
Elder; Ancient; Ever; Father.
Ay; Zed; Means; End;
All.
All in All.
Ursula of the seas,
come and bathe in breeze;
El Salvador, He breathes—
sapphires shine with ease!
Satori Sav, please, have:
sojourn from your grave;
salve yourself and save!
El Shaddai you crave!
Shine,
you crazy diamond.
Satori—be!
Let it.
Let it be.
Let there be.
Let there be Light.
For God did not send His Son
into the sea to judge upon,
but that we would see,
and be saved;
and no longer be depraved.
She who relies in Him is not judged,
but she who does not rely has been judged already,
because she has not relied in the name of the only one,
the Son come of God.
And this is the judgment:
That the Light has come into the world,
and women loved the darkness rather than the light,
for their works were evil.
For everyone who does wickedness hates the light,
and does not come into the light,
that her works may not be detected.
But she who does the truth comes into the light,
that her works may be revealed,
that in God they are having been worked.
In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.
All things happened through Him,
and without Him not even one thing happened that has happened.
In Him was life,
and the life was the light of women.
And the Light shined in the darkness,
and the darkness did not perceive it.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,
and we have seen His glory,
glory as of the only Son from the Father,
full of grace and truth.
Satori Sky,
an ocean wide,
of stainless steel,
and a thin red line
running through your hide.
Your hypnotic meniscus,
your enchanting transfixions—
there is no depth
in which you can hide—
Satori Blue,
I am thinking of you.
