Kandinsky From the known to the unknown Three abstract dimensions resolves Into colours from a vision grown Dissatisfied with common things, When what we thought we knew dissolves, Tears off the uniform and brings To jaded sight a witness view And recreates the world anew.

O Flower-Heart 1/19/06 O flower-heart you have my soul betrayed To beauty with your almond eyes of love. O young and god-desirous dark-skinned maid Who travels through my life a pleasure-trove Of laughter that wakes the sunrise of the morn, Whose tears once spilled in rivers down your cheeks When parting left you desolate, forlorn. O child of timelessness who ever seeks The light it once had held that now seems lost In the turbulence of youth, the drama's flow, Around you the unnatural and forced Far from the golden path on which you go. But I have seen behind the human veil The Truth of you and know it cannot fail.

Gray Heron Gray heron skims The silent lake Lifting my soul to soar with his.

Love Divine and Infinite In the lily-scented grass Among the wayside flowers I Watch the eons slowly pass Look in wonder at the sky, Touch the dewy blades and feel The cooling soil beneath my feet. Under me the earth shall heal And bring forth blossoms wondrous sweet As I prepare my days to yield To beauty and the soul's delight And love that shall possess this field Of life, divine and infinite.

The Promised Fields of Peace Whatever suffering you have had to bear I too have borne, in other lives have known Irreparable loss and untold grief. You with your tears a silver thread have sown Into the fabric every living soul. The child cries out, the stricken parent hears Powerless to save he sees him die And grief like a mortal foe appears And down into the pit our lives are drawn. Joy is gone and all the sunlit days For one who is our life, our breath is gone Our hopes, our faith to darkness death betrays And we succumb to helplessness or worse Unknowing that the inner being grows Though painfully with every fatal stroke. T

When the Hour of God Draws Near Why should a stone be more than a stone Even in the poet's coloured eye, Is it not too a receptacle of God Breathing its days a measured Deity? Why should the water turbulent or calm, The soil, the body of our Mother, earth Be more than water, hold greater claim than soil, Aspire to be of more intrinsic worth? Why should a man be other than a man Who hoards his days a miser cheating death? Yet man contains the seed to transcend life To grow into a vaster, wider breadth Of being and acquaintance with the One Who lives in him whose voice he does not hear, And moves his life towards

Arunachala Shiva Tonight the Deepam festival, the moon On Arunachalam casts its glow On pilgrims called by the Maharshi's peace. They walk in silence round the sacred hill. I stood before the room wherein he lay And took his final breath upon our soil. A peace descended, vast, unshakeable, Down through the head and through the silent heart Resting at the navel's lotus base. Two years before I heard an aged man With toothless mouth intone a silver chant, 'Arunachala Shiva'. And as he sang He left this human field and for awhile Merged with the One to whom he offered his song. A companion behind his frail body sat And rarely have I seen such

The Near and Far of God Some go uncomplaining to their death Unconscious of the meaning of it all, Hear not the subtle voice that is their song Feel not the breath of God upon their soul. Content to be, to breathe and procreate Or monk-like live within the spirit's cave Astounded at the darkened state of man, As Illusion see the march towards the grave. Some are called a greater work to do, To free the spirit from the chains of fate And touch the soil on which the angels dance Or the secret find beyond the mystic state. Others destined to journey deep within Look on the paths that former births had trod Aware that life i

Museum of Modern Art They looked at paintings, sculpture, photography Intent to unlock meaning and to see, Some passed by without a second glance Others sought the illusive master key, Examined each stroke and marvelled or dismissed. Russian, French, Italian, Japanese Speaking a hundred tongues, their sentences Falling upon my ears like scented flowers Dropping from a clear and azure sky. I rested awhile and watched emotions play Across the landscape of each unknown face And yet I knew them all, descended here Into the oblivion of daily life. I saw them crowding down the subway stairs Or crossing without care congested streets, Ch

All Gratitude to Thee Nov. 28, 2006 All gratitude to Thee who having come A light into the chamber of my soul, Awakened one who slept unconsciously Dreaming blissfully of worthless things, Desire and the fruits of earthly life; One who descended from the heavenly realms Entered an earthly body and forgot. Through years of slow awakening thy hand Upheld, protecting arms enfolded me, To the spirit's aspiration gave consent Kept safe the troubled child that from thee strayed And nourished the spark grown now into a flame.