Surrender Built Into a Building

1/16/19

My concern with tree planting in the winter

Is that all the newly planted trees will be hit

By freeze, an odd state that usually comes

At least once to foil all of the green papayas

To knock them loose if they are not picked

So this year, upon any threat of freeze,

Take to the ladder and take down the green

For salad that can be saved and shared.

Morning comes with the bundle of too much to do

Too much taken on, too much of getting something for nothing

Starting with the volunteers that come and want to feel good

And doesn’t everybody want to feel this way

About what he or she is doing for others.

The time of this morning is the hitting of snooze

How what hits you is all that you have to do

And you roll beneath the warmth and guilt

Rolls over in the moment of participating in what

Makes you feel guilty, what a strange notion

What a strange way that your mind should work

For you would think that popping right up, knowing

That it is the very sleeping that causes you guilt

Yet you cannot escape the comfort, not in the moment

And maybe tomorrow will be a day, to wake before the alarm

There are thoughts in those moments, before the conscious takes over

So what kinds of tricks might help in popping right up?

Some suggest cold water or jumping jacks or prayer

Any of these three could be tested

You know the latter works, for it has happened.

Responsibility, a schedule, being accountable

Taking on too much in the name of spiritual growth

In the name of honesty, in the name of questions,

In the name of being afraid, in the name of the holy spirit.

Seems different than those days inside the church

As a child sitting in wooden pews, and even recently

When there were iron pipes below the kneelers

Surrender built into a building

And that is what you have found in the later years

That all of spirit is a surrender to the universe

A surrender to what is and has and will happen

And yet how to balance this with the need of what has to be done

And how to know what has to be done and how to know

What is too much, when you sit on the end of this bed

And this gift of coffee could have come earlier.

Maybe this is the way, to pop right up, head for

The coffee machine, take some sips, and slip

Into the shower, let the cold water hit your pitta body,

And if all of this can come together with a step

Then what is left will be bereft of tears

Will be a new dawning of the rest that hasn’t felt

What it is to be alive and yet stuck

Between the examining table and the moment

Of operation, save for the heart is greater

Than the small intestines yet both must be served

And these intestines are responsible for happiness

The health that lives in the gut, studied more

Known to be true, the fat people walking through

And how do they wake, and what has happened that you

Have not ballooned, for your own eating is not perfect

Your ways of exercise are none, your morning routine

Has fallen by the wayside save for this writing

What Morning routine? You have not exercised since forced

Told yourself that after college football you would

Never again touch another weight, a promise you kept

Steadfastly until circumstances made it seem unwise

To absent yourself from the gym. A new beginning must be made

A commitment that starts with one day and one lift and one swim

With making friends of those that hit the racquetball, by letting

What builds up in the system be released, by studying words

That you don’t know and coming into your own forty-four

Year old body. An infant beginning to walk for it has been

So long since you knew that doing these workouts might bring a rush

And there is this dog scratching with the determination

Of Bill Gates, and a window, and you are filled with opportunity

Filled with thought, filled with the desire

To make a difference you must first stand

Up and away and into what exists next for every

Fish that has been caught first

Was tricked by what looked like a worm.

After meditation:

At a table, feet flat on the cold wooden floor

The opposite of curled up under sheep’s wool

A baby wrapped inside a bundle

Carried by the world, trusting the world

Knowing only the world of two arms

Enough for that moment, to suckle

To call out in cries, to hear but not understand

Language, this gift that we can use for connection

Or separation depending. The greatest use is sometimes

In the holding back of, in the pausing, in the not

Letting thoughts turn into words, into taking

Greater efforts to be with silence, to not need

To fill in those moments, to be with discomfort

To be with each other, to listen for learning

Not to respond, to let the cold wind in through the door

To be a part of the elements, and maybe

This will be the way that you thrive, to see fire

On a Wednesday. And this in the morning before

The flames have taken place, before the wood

Has been gathered, you imagine sitting alone

Yet knowing that this is the lie man tells man

This is the lie that causes mortgages to go to some

And not to others. The lie that causes fights

The lie that makes teenagers yell at each other

The lie that makes K call A a swear word in the cafeteria

And you can see A shaking, physically affected by emotions

So when she asks to take a break, you step outside

The classroom door. You share with her

Of when you were in 6th grade and anger made you hit walls

You share a secret that somebody once told you

About breathing and walking, consciously, at the same time

You tell her to breathe in for eight steps, hold for four

And breathe out for another eight on her way

To the drinking fountain. She is a different girl

When she returns you see that her body has changed

There is no more shaking, and she knows that you have something

She knows that we all have something, a pause

Inside each one of us, a gift to connect, and before

She returns to the next class, you say, “Remember

What I told you. You’re beautiful and strong and amazing

You have power that nobody can take.” Her eyes tear

And you turn so that she cannot see your own because

Society has taught that crying in public, teacher and student

Together is not only unmentionable, but unacceptable

Maybe this idea of what settles as norm need be examined

In every arena lies the ability for change, the ability to be

Better than what has come before, and so you see in the fire

The first time that fire was struck, you move past

Knowing only shadows, past reflections, past the burning

Of the flames and you take a stick, a piece of kindling

And offer this to one who has not sat, you offer

All the pain and confusion and fear and in this you offer

The notion that you and I are not different, that we feel

That this feeling can be examined and looked at from a deeper place

From the one that sits behind watching, allways

With eyes on the fire, always knowing that deep within:  

Shri ram jai ram jai jai ram

Is this. The perfection of being able to accept what is

The perfection of not needing to grasp in order to have

All is had, has been had; it is what we think we need to have

For happiness that must be examined, for when living with

This notion, only these things will bring truth, only the truth

Will be the shadows we have always known, stuck in the cave

We will never see the sunlight, and when told of its magnificence

We will attack the deliverer, but what about the one that knows the sunlight

And still sits, content in the darkness. Is this not the greater

Tragedy? Sitting there because so many others sit there

Because of the pain of being the only one, because of

The pain of truth that does not want the ego to see

For in this twisted sitting, the garbage men do not come

Mail is not delivered, gas stations close and there is simplicity

In the knowing and giving, in talking to Christian

About how all night long the subconscious works

And you wake with the subconscious having had a head start

But who wakes? Who is asleep? If you want to say the mind,

That is still working in dreams, still arranging beliefs

Still categorizing and sorting a myriad of details

And spinning them out in scenarios understood only by Jungian analysts

Yet some part is asleep, some part rests as god works, and if this be

The soul or atman or brahma, then would this not imply

That the soul is always sleeping? Is sleeping an apt description?

If the soul never dies then this could serve further examination.