time lapse

saturday morning . . .the first of the summer holidays for me . . . the prospect of sunshine, biking, beautiful music, carefully cooked food, nice wine, craft beers and afternoons absorbing pastries and americanos in my favourite riverside cafe fills my heart  . . . . all the small joys . . . .

eternal ecstacy

there is a blessedness surely to be believed, and that is that everything abides in eternal ecstasy, 

now and forever

italicized words excerpted from the scripture of the golden eternity   by jack kerouac

one

when no one listens

to the quiet trees

when no one notices

the sun in the pool.

where no one feels

the first drop of rain

or sees the last star

or hails the first morning

of a giant world

where peace begins

and rages end:

one bird sits still

watching the work of God:

one turning leaf,

two falling blossoms,

ten circles upon the pond.

one cloud upon the hillside,

two shadows in the valley

and the light strikes home.

now dawn commands the capture

of the tallest fortune,

the surrender

of no less marvelous prize!

closer and clearer

than any wordy master,

thou inward Stranger

whom I have never seen,

deeper and cleaner

than the clamorous ocean,

seize up my silence

hold me in thy hand!

now act is waste

and suffering undone

laws become prodigals

limits are torn down

for envy has no property

and passion is none.

look, the vast light stands still

our cleanest light is one!

thomas merton

time passes

often

the time

passes

without so much

as a glance

at the clock

and somehow

i know

in not knowing

the time

that i've been blessed 

more deeply

real than me

this other

my shadow

my reflection

no more

or less

real than me

side by side

there was this sense

of purpose

hovering about their shoulders

a purpose

underscored by their questing eyes

the folded arms

their intimacy undercut

by the vastness of the space they stood in

piano wire

the shadows that fall beneath the wings of a first world war plane . . . 

war museum (i)

too long a sacrifice

can make a stone of the heart.

o when may it suffice?

from "easter, 1916"     william butler yeats

looking

looking for love

a strange passion is moving in my head. 

my heart has become a bird 

which searches in the sky. 

every part of me goes in different directions. 

is it really so 

that the one i love is everywhere?

rumi

the small skies

in the small skies where the starlings figure as major players and the crows sit on lamp posts cawwing to each other about the passage of the almost gone to bed little children or dogs.

in the small skies where the clouds jostle and push and billow minutely and without any real purpose but somehow in their creasings and furrowings find shape and purpose and even a slender sort of beauty.

in the small skies, i find myself searching for colour. tiny sweeps or startles of colour. and tonight i found some.

red and violet

burgundy

yellow

you and i

you      and        i 

hold this scene 

so 

closely

in its streaming entirety

i wonder

if perhaps it

is so close

to our perception

of ourselves

radiating

outwards

from a fixed point

and becoming so

expansive

so

unlikely

so very 

very

easily immersed in

glassless windows

i

whisper

in the hollow spaces

the glassless

openings

i hold

the ways

open for

those formless

desires

 as they

bend and sweep

and curl

like fingers

around the cold hard bricks 

of your sudden

emptiness

gone to earth

better late than not at all!

they seemed to tumble towards me as i walked past . . . 

flourish

walking through the streets just east of kensington market in toronto

a flourish of colour

jewelled

i watched

the telling of light's passage across

these

jewelled walls

they are alive

i am

reflecting

on the moment of this moment

peeling back

all the layers

of reflection

you always open

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though i have closed myself as fingers,

you open always petal by petal myself as spring opens

ee cummings

frail gestures

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near

ee cummings

their pink fullness

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in

my heart) i am never without it (anywhere

i go you go, my dear...

ee cummings

like continents

this day

entirely like this

entirely itself

clouds like continents

trees like hands and fingers

the blazed trails

this day was so entirely amazing

so very much

like this sky

steven

rheingold

if you are sitting in your studio and the day is unfolding as it should and your work is right there . . and you are right alongside it, then this might not be the music for you . . . but . . if you are at loose ends and wanting to feel the hairs on the back of your neck rise up then perhaps this longer piece of music by two of my musical heroes will bring some fire or edge or simple distraction into your day at just the right time.

 klaus schulze and lisa gerrard live at the lorely festival on the 18th of july, 2008 

the first poppy

in my mother's garden

among the embarassment of riches

that fluttered softly

in the rain

i saw

this lone poppy

so like a flag

for a country

so improbable

so unlikely

as to defy naming

the window in the door

i go to this window

just as day dissolves

when it is twilight

ee cummings

after school peace

last thursday afternoon

biking along the paths

that circle this widening of the river

and then

arriving at the silver bean cafe

i am sitting looking at this beautiful scene while drinking mango juice 

and eating a granola bar made by my friend andrea.

i am sharing this space with the best most beautiful people in my life 

and talking and laughing as friends come and go.

all this while

the little birds wait for crumbs to fall.

evening song

pjillip glass    evening song   from "satyagraha"

they are too near me

"in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near"

ee cummings

(excerpted from "small hands")