In the Paddy Fields 10/31/09   I saw sorrow clinging to an aged face, The spirit captive in an earthly frame In the heat, humidity and monsoon rain; The poor like burdened beasts beneath the blow At labour in the sodden paddy fields, Their life-song spent and even more, the pain Of souls that never felt the hand of grace Uplift misfortune, break the grip of fate, Return to harmony discordant life, The soul to beauty and the heart to bliss.

God^s Design II.htm God's Design II 3/21/09 To lift the sorrow of the world he came, Transmute to joy our suffering and pain, Fulfilled his mission quietly he left Preparing his return and luminous reign. Now slowly we discard the old ideas And remnants of the past to which we cling, Each stumble and each fall upon the path Prepare us for the soul-awakening That we, immortal, learning still to be, Abandon outworn thoughts of 'yours and mine' Become a river rushing to His sea And find in conscious matter God's design.

Turning From the Light   He waits for a weakness then attacks; Even the smallest opening is enough A moment of forgetfulness or worse, The conscious turning away from the Light. In anger or under the heavy cross of grief The ego self in pity or in praise, It may even be the return of old desires Thought to be long dead but only suppressed Cravings of the body or the mind, Or worse, the turning away from the Light, To dwell in darkness of our nether selves, Content to live alone with nagging thoughts Of one's unworthiness to walk the path, Accepting that the climb is far too steep And fall back into psychic somnolence Pitying self

Vision in the Heart How strange this city of a thousand moods, Vibrant, throbbing with a hymn o f life, Sustaining energy its base and strength And yet the only flowers to be seen Peep out from store fronts on the crowded streets, Unless one counts the beauty in their eyes That blossoms beneath these masks of humanness, To those that have the vision in the heart.

She Grew in Beauty She grew in beauty as the years Caressed her auburn hair with grey. In silence she the quiet one Treasured beauty as the way Her soul would travel and her eyes of blue Held steadfastly an inner glow When cancer came so suddenly, Quietly the lethal foe To seal her fate on earth once more. We grew closer than the eye can see, Our life an offering and prayer, Our consecrated hearts to be Given in joy and no despair A foothold gained while we were wed But peace instilled above our fears, No sorrow, no uneasy dread, United we faced the pain-filled years.

The Soul's Need.htm The Soul's Need The silent staccato of emerging leaves, The pulsing of the earth as life breaks through As Beauty's debut consecrates the world. All here is sacred and all is ever new. Sometimes I simply walk among the flowers Speaking in silence a language that they know. What joy to be welcomed each year so bounteously With loveliness down every path I go. Day now stretches into languid eve, I kneel to see a bud or pull a weed, Alone I contemplate, alone I live Knowing that truth and light are the soul's need.

The Avatar (8/23/09)   They speak in muted voices of the day That he appeared on earth, the Avatar, The silent one who came to change the world. Worshippers remembering his words, The poetry, the books so filled with light That if read aloud would reverberate In flesh and bone infusing nerve and cell. Some, feeling him a bit too high would seek To bring him down to a more human scale Who somehow had achieved enlightenment Withantiquated notions and conceits. Yet in the end they fail, his soul too great, Compassionate, all-loving and divine. He is far from us and he is very close.  

Absent Malice An undercurrent of duress An emptiness that soothes us not, One cannot say that we regress But essential things we have forgot And religion holds no soothing balm To the wounded spirit in distress. Lacking will and lacking calm Alone in an age of nothingness A senseless round seems our lot. Commitment and a willingness A time to seek and reassess And find again why we are here Absent malice, absent fear.

Ballerina O lovely ballerina with the eyes That penetrate the very depths of soul, Your smile is blessing on the multitudes That pass unknowing wrapped in unfilled dreams. I who have seen your beauty radiate An aura of beneficence to all, Who looked on me and opened arms of joy To be enfolded in my heart of peace, Remember when the clouds of doubt descend Enveloping the faithless with their shade That in you dwells supreme delight, content To live and love embracing all the world.

Meeting Vishnu^s Mother.htm Meeting Vishnu's Mother I met her in my spirit's hour of dreaming, Those dreams that linger long in memory, More real than any normal act of seeing. She walked to where I stood, embracing me As one known long, met many times before. I held her close and then began to quote The mystic lines that open the soul's door. She interrupted me, a questioning note, Though not unkind, as if she somehow knew, "Not him again", that is the Avatar. I said, "Not now but following these few Vision-thoughts from St. Exupery, His realization of seeing with the heart." I followed with His words on Ecstasy That lift us to the planes of the Maker's