1992 Sweet Oblivion

1992 Sweet Oblivion La Luna Portland Screaming Trees what the day brings ultraviolet elevated breaking free and breaking things La Luna October 92 Mark Lanegan whiskey bottle hand forgetting lyrics couldn't finish the set one of the Conner brothers took the mic Frank said the show got better after that if I could see backstage I see him falling over old stage lights hitting his head and finally passing out Uncle Anesthesia 4000 miles from pain

shiny metal balls in a massive roller disco pinball machine

shiny metal balls in a massive roller disco pinball machine 8 miles high with a shadow beyond the horizon i won't back down though the sun tugs the earth through space


a circle within a circle desire is suffering space within space remove my name i am i am nothing irregularity is beauty the milky way a cosmic nursery an untangleable knot precious mysterious everything


found Whitman's footsteps in grass green as split peas such was the light feedback perspective is widest right in front of your face dogs leave paws in the mud clouds have names dirty street puddles send sine waves harmonic chords if you can stop and listen

skull crossbones minivan tattoo

skull crossbones 
minivan tattoo 
mad libs 
burning sun 
booster seats

Sabbaths 1999, VII

By Wendell Berry
(1934 - )






Again I resume the long
lesson: how small a thing
can be pleasing, how little
in this hard world it takes
to satisfy the mind
and bring it to its rest.


With the ongoing havoc
the woods this morning is
almost unnaturally still.
Through stalled air, unshadowed
light, a few leaves fall
of their own weight.


The sky
is gray. It begins in mist
almost at the ground
and rises forever. The trees
rise in silence almost
natural, but not quite,
almost eternal, but
not quite.


What more did I
think I wanted? Here is
what has always been.
Here is what will always
be. Even in me,
the Maker of all this
returns in rest, even
to the slightest of His works,
a yellow leaf slowly
falling, and is pleased.

The Dagger

By Mirabai

(1498 - 1565?)

English version by Robert Bly

The Dark One threw me a glance like a dagger today.

Since that moment, I am insane; I can't find my body.

The pain has gone through my arms and legs, and I can't find my mind.

At least three of my friends are completely mad.

I know the thrower of daggers well; he enjoys roving the woods.

The partridge loves the moon; and the lamplight pulls in the moth.

You know, for the fish, water is precious; without it, the fish dies.

If he is gone, how shall I live? I can't live without him.

Go and speak to the dagger-thrower: Say, Mira belongs to you.

No tongue can tell Your secret

By Hakim Sanai

(1044? - 1150?)

English version by Priya Hemenway

No tongue can tell Your secret

for the measure of the word obscures Your nature.

But the gift of the ear

is that it hears

what the tongue cannot tell.

http://www.poetry-chaikhana.com/

clear start again see what you couldn't see before ring the bell








~me

East Coker - excerpt (from Four Quartets)
By T. S. Eliot
(1888 - 1965)


I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you
Which shall be the darkness of God. As, in a theatre,
The lights are extinguished, for the scene to be changed
With a hollow rumble of wings, with a movement of darkness on darkness,
And we know that the hills and the trees, the distant panorama
And the bold imposing facade are all being rolled away--
Or as, when an underground train, in the tube, stops too long between stations
And the conversation rises and slowly fades into silence
And you see behind every face the mental emptiness deepen
Leaving only the growing terror of nothing to think about;
Or when, under ether, the mind is conscious but conscious of nothing--
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
------------------------------------------------------------------------


Immovable Mind
By Yung-ming Yen-shou
(904 - 975)
English version by John C.H. Wu


You wish to know the spirit of Yung-ming Zen?
Look at the lake in front of the gate.
When the sun shines, it radiates light and brightness,
When the wind comes, there arise ripples and waves.


----------------------------------------------------------------------


Worship
By Dogen
(1200 - 1253)
English version by Steven Heine


A white heron
Hiding itself
In the snowy field,
Where even the winter grass
Cannot be seen.