(i) (9/26/99)

To fly:
Free of the heavy Earth, tethered to it only by
the most tenuous of bonds, lifted and caressed
by air. Lazy floating with its currents, upheld and
supported, buoyant; or swimming against it,
muscles burning with a fine pain. Alive, that is what
it is, to be living, only a body concerned with
the expression of it's form's purpose. The soul becomes
the body, or the body, soul: it is all one. Flight is what you are, and joy:
doing what you were meant to be.

(ii) (10/12/99)

It is only you, and the rush and roar like surf in your ears.
Great white noise, obliterating thought. No space left
For earthly things. Bring such a burden up with you,
And you will only be weighed down; tragedy
Cannot soar. Only emptiness and quiet may remain.
You are not in the air, but of it, part of that immensity and weightlessness-
Fooling yourself, becoming the illusion of nothing.
You float, riding invisible currents. It is like being lifted,
But by unpredictable hands; every moment spent in balancing
Leaves no time for other worry. In the sparkling distance between neurons
You exist, pure thought embodied in each moment by
Refining a precarious but lofty position. Below
Spins earth, a distantly dangerous thing. All around is whistling
Emptiness that impresses in its vastness with a timeless sense of being.
While you are alone, you are the universe, this vast roaring quiet that is
Unchanging, merely there.