By Higher Powers Spurred on by a driving force within I cannot rest in idleness and peace, There are fierce fires burning all to raze The fort of shadows and they will not cease Their cleansing till the inner work is done. For in the temple are unholy things And tear-stained statues that demand release, Idols of thought that have grown mighty wings And fly uninterrupted through the mind. Perhaps the demons of my darkest hours Who parry with their forceful night my prayers Can only be destroyed by higher powers; But I must fin

Transubstantiation of the Flesh I have drunk the sacramental wine, the bread Unleavened, eaten slowly that I might taste The essence of the message he had spread. A love divine through my body raced. Is He not born again and yet again In this seemingly inexplicable dream Of a world where rapture rules and grinding pain Is worn away as a stone in a rushing stream? And yet it is no dream that we have come To drink from the silver chalice, the soul refresh Our aspiration to make this world His home By the transubstantiation of the flesh.

The One Refound He saw the stars as Heaven's tears Falling one by one, For all that's lovely disappears And all that's made, undone. He wept for beauty that was lost Never to come again And built in time at a great cost His edifice of pain. One day his musing soul replied Go within and see The home of the eternal bride, Your spirit's destiny. He went inside the cave and found A fire on a stone, A temple on the sacred ground, He was no more alone. For there encased in mystic light A being strong and sweet, The One refound now claimed his sight, He knelt and touched His feet.

The Hour of God that Now Arrives In the closet of an ill-used mind I found a treasury of things, A thousand winters of delight, The laughter of a thousand springs. No spider-webs of thought were there No contraries that could not meet A melody upon the air A golden carpet for my feet. In an alcove of another kind, A space where silent beauty grew All sorrow fled as I reclined On flower carpets white and blue. In the body's house so fairly built By the architect who dreams our lives I saw transformed all sin and guilt In the hour of god that now arrives.

Youth and Youthful Dreams In a clearing near a dark inviting wood Strawberries grew like rubies in the grass, Red stains upon our knees, red juices ran From the corners of our mouths; our tongues turned red, Our fingers bled with stains of happiness. So through the years we followed Nature's gold, Blueberries like agates shone in light-starved swamps, Down the country lane and up the hill The apples reddened in the sunset glow. Hickory nuts along the roadside fell While mushrooms sprouted in damp autumn days. All giving things of earth recall to me Delight of seasons to my growing soul. All my youth and all my youthful dreams Found

All Things New Golden in the sunlight of Her smile Aspirants and devotees of light, Upturned faces opening out the soul Recipients of bliss in great degrees, Divine largesse the gift supreme on earth. Perhaps the legions of the darkness plan A final thrust before their fated end Or so appears this sad embattled world So full of promise despite the wrath of man Upon his kin, upon his very self, Denying Grace, abandoning the Dream, To self-destruct in some predestined hell Or cling to Truth as sinks the falsehood's night And the pain and dark necessity of death. But One has come and shown the sunlit path And sung of all the glory still to be,

The Dreamer April 15, 2012 I am silenced by life's beauty and I fear To sing aloud the melodies I hear, One life so little for the light that streams Upon the dreamer of a thousand dreams, Beauty that I see in all things dear And beauty in the darkness to which we cling, Beauty in our sorrow and the sting Of treachery, betrayal and abuse, Beauty in the gifts that we misuse And beauty in the leaping of the Spring. I see in children's eyes the ancient gleams Of warriors and acolytes; it seems We have known stars

There Is a Garden There is a garden waiting to descend And bring to earth all heaven's radiance, It seeks a human vessel to translate Its symbol flowers to experience And manifest the beautiful and true. Moving from consciousness to consciousness One shall walk within a landscape of the Gods, All doubt resolved, a focused innerness Replace the hurried aggregate we are. We will know bliss when we enter the Garden of Bliss Concretely feel the inner significance And physically absorb such force as this, To change man's nature and to light his path Exceed the limits of his form-bound soul Open to worlds above his hopes and dreams

Childhood Wanderings In secret haunts where fragrant lilies grew He walked beneath the sombre hemlock trees And brushed the scented needles rimmed with dew Through bogs that spoke of ancient mysteries. All heaven now was blotted from his view, He saw an earth ablaze with firelight, No moon, no stars dared to enter through The dense forbidding canopy of night. It seemed a land of secrecy and stealth Where strange perfumes wandered undefined, A place of unimaginable wealth A dreamscape of imaginative mind. In the child's diverse creative moods and turns Is there a world impossible to dream? His spirit sees in primal moss an

You Have Just Begun I found the holy city in the heart And it was aflame! All was fire and as I burned I saw Tongues of orange-gold. Seated in the ornate high-backed chair She watched the blaze She lit. As tears poured forth from revelation's eyes My being was consumed. How long I burned I cannot know nor say For there was no pain, And then the heatless flames grew brighter still, Blossoming from my heart. Higher and higher they leapt, I was engulfed And yet I did not die. And as they rose and soared from my breast She ever so calmly spoke, Resonant with love, a Mother's voice, "You have just begun, The potentialities are very