A Pilgrim

As I stumble along the rocky road I feel hesitant.
When pilgrims passed this way long ago, did they feel hesitant?

My unquiet mind overflows with doubts and tortuous questions.
My earnest goal of transformation eschews self-indulgent hesitance.

Unrelenting fear of inadequacy is like a hungry ghost wandering,
always wandering, doomed to walk to the threshold blocked by hesitance.

A myopic mind constricts one's broader horizons,
obliterating  others' needs and tolerance for their hesitance.

Inclusion and genuine acceptance of another's unvarnished self
is the first and greatest step toward a transformed life without hesitance.

Take one step, one step at a time, Clare, ahead not sideways.
The path is never straight, but staying the course transcends hesitance.

The Big Picture

What is the 'Big Picture'?

Legions of mavens of many persuasions now,

political, financial, religious, hordes of others

engulf us in a cauchophonous chorus.

They claim, with vehemence, that they alone know it.

Such has it always been throughout recorded time.

The dilemma is that many little pictures arise in time.

What determines the bigness of this metaphorical picture?

If pressed, could any of these autocrats define it?

True bigness is deeper than the quotidian now.

True bigness is not the basso profundo of the chorus.

True bigness does not divide earth dwellers into others.

For there is really only One, who enfolds all others.

That One has always been the 'Big Picture' for perpetual time.

Mystics and sages who spoke of it were muted by oppressive choruses.

Self-righteousness and fear close minds to the 'Big Picture.'

Crossing the threshold into Oneness is absorption into the eternal Now.

Leaving all of one's egoistic anchors behind is the essence of finding it.  

 A truly terrifying proposition, to trust in the Unknown's way of it.

It requires an extraordinary leap of faith, far beyond any other.

No matter what one's concept of the One, it dwells in the eternal Now.

The past is but a memory and the future, a chimera of time.

The Now is all we have, where we dwell, where resides the 'Big Picture.'                         To see each moment as divine and live it mindfully is alien to the chorus.

St. Teresa's epiphany, "heaven is now," is anathema to the chorus

because their worldly treasure is never enough to savor it.                                             

A grasping nature cannot conceive of a dimensionless picture.

Neither can it see the divine mirror in the face of another.

Old Blake beheld infinity in a grain of sand and eternity in an hour of time.

For what is time but a ciphering artifice in the transcendent Now.

 Not often, but when consumed by an incandescent moment, one tastes the Now.         

Earthly time stands still for a foretaste of the eternal, a voiceless chorus.

All mystics strive for these breaths of eternity that occur in earth bound time.

What about ordinary mortals?  Are we capable of attaining it?

Those who live in harmony with the world, themselves, and others

They see the Divine in others, mirrored in themselves, and dwell within the "Big Picture."

The eternal Now is always present to those who strive to reach it.

The ever present chorus of disrupters are Divine others.

After a lifetime of striving to reach it, we are already there, in the "Big Picture."

First Draft 3/25/12

Note: The reference to Blake is his lovely poem, "Auguries of Innocence"

Questions, a Villanelle

A child asks if there is a reason why
Small children die and suffer round the world
Old men reply that God alone knows why

We skim the countless numbers; few will cry
Untold lost legions' silent flags unfurl
The child asks if there is a reason why

We look, but do not see that numbers lie
Has numbing excess sent our minds awhirl?
Old men reply that God alone knows why

The wealthy spawn more wealth; the poor still die
Indifference has stony silence hurled
A child asks if there is a reason why

In time's ellipse we meet cruel fate nearby
Can empty hearts find solace through their worlds?
Old men reply that God alone knows why

Labyrinthine life presages plans unwise
Why do we see and still ignore such pearls?
The child asks if there is a reason why
Old men reply that God alone knows why

Note: last revised on 3/17/12. Revised again on 3/19/12 based on an excellent suggestion by my favorite cousin, Paul Kavanagh

Twilight Sonata

My fingers press on silent outstretched strings,
resounding  high as gliding bow descends 
I feel the wonder though my hands lack wings,
immobile due to palsy's cruel bends
My artist's soul is now bereft of hope
So many losses darken all my days
My friends depart in silence; who can cope?
I sit and ponder future's hidden ways
 
A living death's erosion must not root
Impaired confreres find strength to bear and grow
I think of Milton's witness, strong and mute,
He waits in hope, not fear for springs to flow
Acceptance brings forth many veiled guests
New birth can now reward real seekers quests
 
Note: last revised on 3/19/12