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The Traveler Returns
This section was about returning to life after feeling depressed. The idea is that the person has taken a journey like the mystics who went off into the desert and now returns to humanity with new ideas.
| The Fish’s parade | Two forces | Red and white dragons |
| Halfway | Minoan Women | The puzzel |
| The compassionate heart | Phoenix | The edge |
Mesh like a huge fishing net
Stretched out across the ocean.
It catches facts and daydream notions
In the same net.
How could we forget?
So peaceful in our certainty,
That the edges of reality,
Lie beyond the touch of a hand
Or the glance of an eye.
All in this world is transient.
It blooms and fades,
In a ceaseless, changing parade.
Perhaps those Ideas which survive,
Are merely daydreams kept alive.
For it is the dream, the idea and even the love,
That lies at the heart of civilization.
It is a mutual adoration and
When the love is lost among us
And our humanity is rung from us,
Our buildings, our books and even ourselves,
Become nothing more than empty shells.
Monuments that may live again in other eyes,
Or gravestones scattered on the roadside.
We can never be as we were before,
There are only glimpses of what lies in store.
We tumble and fight in the dead of night,
In daylight we pause and sigh,
For what we see in each others eyes
Is reaching, imploring for more.
There are two forces fighting for assent ion in our souls,
Between and beyond, forever and more,
We do not know what we have become,
Have we been like this before?
Some reach back,
Some go on and
Some pause in between.
Half on the land and half on the sand
Gazing out to sea.
Then they turn and they burn,
Beneath the blazing sun,
Beneath the shade of a tree.
Walk up on the land
Or stay on the sand
Gazing out to sea.
Who knows which is love or hate
They are two sides and both reside,
Within the human heart.
The two of us shall turn and in each other burn.
When each way electrons flow,
Some things are lost and some let go.
We shall not be as we were
Not ever as we have been before.
In salt there lies the passions seed,
The anger burns in sin and deed.
Turn each way a subtle charge,
Power taken, then discharged.
Spin one way life’s sugars flow,
Spin the other they let go.
Between them there’s a constant fight
In one lies darkness the other light.
Fats and sugars, salts and oils
They each join in the others toils.
When science holds the world in sway,
Who knows who will go and who will stay.
I have the questions, you know the answers,
And though we can’t read each others glances,
In all the myths that we wrote,
A seed of science was awoken.
I saw the world when your eyes were blind,
You heard the music in my mind.
And heard the sounds I could not hear,
One was bold the other feared,
One laughed the other cried.
One breathed in, the other sighed.
In sleep there is a certain breath,
That calms the body but is not death,
In waking hours another type
That circulates from stripe to stripe.
Why are there stars in the sky?
Why is there salt in the sea?
How do we go where the rivers flow?
How do we fly on the breeze?
There is sand in my hair and a sea at my feet.
It doesn’t matter that life is brief.
There is a tree that lies half in the sky,
A longing that reaches back,
For each truth we take,
There’s one we forsake.
Stand together,
Each hand in hand.
Look up, look down
And gaze all around,
Then look into each other’s eyes,
Those are the windows of the wise.
The ear listens for a voice that we hear,
Did I tell you I loved you,
Perhaps I did not.
Did you know that I knew you
Perhaps I forgot.
For each person you meet and each soul that you greet,
Know this,
Take not, what is not yours to take,
Break not, what is not yours to break,
What think you my friends, will we meet in the end?
Memories that enfold are like hands that hold,
Let sadness pass,
Let it fall from you at last,
Let doorways open and choose your path.
Minoan women were as white as snow,
The men tanned by the sun.
One sat still in the rivers flow
The other went forth at a run.
Beneath the hot noontide sky
And under the pale moons light
Secrets were shared between their souls
In visions beyond mortal sight.
They paused and turn to ask god why?
The words came back on soft breath,
Which way does the white bird fly?
What omen the thunder storm?
Who was awakened by bright moonlight?
Who awoke with the dawn?
The answers came softly and silently back,
There’s something we share that alone we lack,
It lies in the touch of a hand
A silent communion we both understand
It lies in a glance and a circumstance.
The world of lovers is a jigsaw puzzle
Do our jagged edges match?
I’m searching for my other half
The one that steadies me.
Think of the single individual,
Two hands, two eyes, two feet
You would think they are complete,
They could be but most of us have missing pieces.
I know this, understanding is an act of balance,
It grows from knowing and feeling combined.
For all of us to feel compassion
We are learning one or the other.
I have spent so long on one leg
I only beg that you pull away gently,
Let me stay balanced.
One day men will talk about what they feel
Women will know their own strength.
A single person is trapped in the little ego but,
Their compassionate heart can free them
With a passionate concern for the welfare of the world.
Their family, friends and fellow citizens
Are seen as they are,
As fragile human beings acting out of need.
Not all words are meant to wound,
Not all actions were meant to hurt.
The compassionate heart allows for the others perspective
To be as bright and strong as our own.
To see ourselves and others with detachment
Frees us from the jealous eye of the little ego.
Compassion lets us know more closely where love was intended,
We can look without fear at the source of our pain
Aware that we are human and can be forgiven,
To truly see what we were and know that we are more.
The little ego has built a prison of it’s fears,
Compassion lets light shine on them
We can acknowledge, accept and finally step
Beyond who we once were.
The hunger that can not be fed
The thirst that can not be slaked
The soul awake and unable to name,
The truth of its need
To give and receive
To be balanced between these.
We are like a set of Russian dolls,
Or an onion with many skins,
Life and it’s fire burns one shell away
Our new self is soft and malleable to change.
As time goes on this self hardens and cracks
New aspects shine through.
Always waiting at the center is a dark stillness
Like the creative womb of the goddess.
Born again and again from the same place,
A phoenix alive on charred wood.
Consuming the air of the spirit
Eventually we will know it and name it
The one need, the one passion
The one true home of the soul.
Have you ever asked the question and watched a mountain step aside?
Have you ever walked in a wilderness for many years?
Followed the shifting sands over bone dry lands,
Then come to the edge of an ocean and felt
Like a child among the sea shells.
Have you ever asked these questions of your mind;
Where does the spring reside?
How do I grow wick in the wilderness?
Where are my children waiting?
Why is my heart breaking?
Have you ever seen the mountains in your mind,
Asked the question and watched them step aside?