Full Moon Tea

Like a Kiss

2012-02-16T15:07:00.000-08:00

"New Shanghainese" - Frank Yu

Poems based on images

Come to me softly

Like the moon

Like a dream

Like a kiss

Painting by Veronique Meignaud

Angle of light

Deep in the earth

The touch of your wings

Still haunts my dreams

How I long to find you

Painting by Veronique Meignaud

Your orange reflection

Drinks from my mind

Your lonely trees

Strangle my heart

Stay with me always

Painting by Veronique Meignaud

Circling fears

Startle the clouds

Broken waves

Awaken the blood

Please hold me close

Painting by Veronique Meignaud

Mermaid dreams

Drift past the sky

Watery thoughts

Ripples and sigh

Do you feel my love

Painting by Veronique Meignaud

Blue thoughts lap at our feet

Yellow winds darken the sky

The sleeping moon dreams

Of Cold rainy nights

Have you forgotten me already

yamabuki Zhou
Feb 2012

My thanks to Veronique Meignaud
For permission to post her images
See more at her web site
www.v-meignaud.com/

Death Cuts to the Heart

2012-02-14T19:10:00.003-08:00

"Shanghai" - Frank Yu

"The wound is the place
where the Light enters you."
-- Rumi

1.
The Oak stands strong
The storm rages
Lightning strikes
From out of the heavens
Death cuts to the heart

2.
Asleep she dreams
Even as He watches
In His pain He sees
In His sorrow He sees
Do you feel His love?

3.
When the midnight comets sing
Spirits' eyes drink the night
Oh you fates, churn the weather
In the falling of the moon
We expire

4.
This dream of love
All roses and gems
Will you remember
Holding my hand
When you awaken?

5.
Angle of light
Deep in the earth
The touch of your wings
Still haunts my dreams
How I long for you

6.
Your orange reflection
Drinks from my mind
Your lonely trees
Strangle my heart
Stay with me always

7.
Circling fears
Startle the clouds
Broken waves
Awaken the blood
Please hold me close

8.
Mermaid dreams
Drift past the sky
Watery thoughts
Ripples and sigh
Do you feel my love

9.
Blue thoughts lap at our feet
Yellow winds darken the sky
The sleeping moon dreams
Of Cold rainy nights
Have you forgotten me already

10.
The price of life
May be high
What do you see
What do you feel
Are we there too?

11.
Reflection takes us deeper
Their eyes multiply
Showing us
The joining
Of their dreams

12.
A woman in flower
Framed in light
Shadow people watch
In narrow concentration
Distant moons are crying

13.
Crossing margent shores
Hallowed spirits show the way
We walk on forgetfully
And she continues to sigh
Stoically awaiting our return

14.
Encroaching darkness
Curls in dying sight
Still we endure
Lost in thought
And fall into the light

15.
Each leaf the same
Each leaf different
Can you see it
There in their uniqueness
Their lightning veined viridity

16.
Yellow in White
Circling dreams
Not the moon
Not the stars
Our mind must wait
For meaning to appear
As we drink our tea

yamabuki Zhou
Feb 2012

Eighteen Poems as Fragile as Butterflies

2012-01-28T19:50:00.001-08:00

"Snowflakes in Spring" - Yamabuki

"Stillness soars as a mountain peak
Seeking its greatness in height.
Movement stops in a silent lake
Seeking in depth its limit.
The fish in the water are silent
The animals on the earth are noisy
The birds in the air are singing.
But man has in him the silence of the sea
The noise of the earth
And the music of the air."
-- "Stillness" Rabindranath Tagore

1.

Poems as fragile as butterflies
Thoughts as dangerous as sin
Your eyes linger lightly
In a river of darkness
That only dreams may explain

Passing hours keep watch
As death prepares the way
So brief the time
Before our return
And spirit once again takes flight

Beijing skies shine brightly
Dragons fly in the light
A cat's tongue flicks
Again and again
As I dream of Shanghai nights

I may look like a cat
A cat from Beijing
My hats off to you
My dear friends
Paw prints in the sky

Butterflies dance on brushes

Seeking to inspire images

Dark rainbows hide

Inside the jars

Awaiting your lingering smile

We are her eyes

We are her feelings

We are her thoughts

We are her bodies

She loves us all

Let us love her too

Our Mother Gaia

Shafts of light

In cloudly intent

Contrasts sharply

While water around us

Melts our savage eyes

Red inside red
Blue slivers of shade
My thoughts of you
Wrapped in the moon
Scatter once again on the wind

Devil in mind
Hidden in sleep
Outside the light
Reflects darkly
In Savage Stillness

10.

Songs of youth
Shared without words
Looking up in awe
She shows the way
To the music of our hearts

11.

Literally rolling out of bed
Figuratively speaking
Awake or asleep
When it happens
Or just another dream?

12.

Stiffly formal
Prim shod feet
Standing silent
Four full moons

Circle the sky

13.

The language of her eyes
The feel of her lips
Her hidden hands
Clothe my heart
In darker dreams

14.

fox and flower
unexpected
introspection
reflected
In yellow

15.

The clarity of emptiness
Echos my in mind
Speechless I sigh
Blindly I cry
Leaving nothing aside

16.

Silence is the light of the mind
Out of emptiness comes our words
Who really knows what they mean
Let us ask the birds
In their dark passage home

17.
Tendrils of dendrons
Incite the brain
Still she prays
While lightning strikes
Dare we meet her eyes

18.
The beginning of Art
The end of Art
Exposing herself
She paints her life
Clothed in beauty

yamabuki

Jan 2012

Death's Touch

2012-01-02T19:36:00.001-08:00

"Thunder Clouds" - Fernando Gros

Death pulls us up short, always
We have no answer for death
No answer at all,
But to keep on living.
Have you felt the electrical sharpness
That presages a lightning strike?
Surely this electrical worker did
But death, O death, your word is final.
Nothing we can say or do matters.
All we can do is watch,
Or cover our eyes
In our helplessness.
Shall we protest death's work?
Rise up 'en masse'
And strike a blow for life?
I think not.
We can only watch in wonder.
Chinese or American
Makes no difference.
Makes no difference at all.
Once we feel death's touch,
The game is over
Once and for all.
Shall we protest
At the wrongness of it all?
Shall we overrule death?
Or should we rather
Take the longer view,
Where 1000 years
Passes in the blink of an eye,
Like images on an old scroll
"now hanging in a temple in
the mountains far to the west."

-yamabuki
Jan 2012
Written in response to
http://www.asiancha.com/content/view/936/310/
And
http://finecha.wordpress.com/2012/01/02/robert-masterson/

Brightest Poem on Display

2011-10-28T07:51:00.001-07:00

Artistic Abandon - Hazel Dooney

You can pick the brightest poem on display
The reddest poem to be seen
Juicy with the flow of sin
Painful as the lash
Dark as a lover's bite
.
Have you felt the night
How it holds you captive
Binding you in heady pain
Grinding your thoughts
Blinding your eyes
.
Past the flickering moon
Through the startled sun
Deep down and deeper
To that Black hole
Full of blood's pleasure
.
Is this the brightest poem on display
The one you were seeking
The one that sways across the room
Laying madly in dark shadows
Awaiting your savage eyes.
.
yamabuki Zhou
Oct 2011

Flowers of Darkness

2011-09-16T21:28:00.003-07:00

"Shades of Light" - yamabuki

'What the fates decree

Even the gods must obey'

- maitreya bodhisattva

Necessity is wedded to Time

Ananke and Khronos

Weaving our fates

Rolling our lives

Into coils of Razor wire

Yet I choose to see it differently

I see three sisters

Older than time

Tired of their endless days

They shut their eyes tightly

Their sighs long for surcease

Yet we show them our lives

That repeat so endlessly

Continuous spirals of continuity

That drive the Fates to madness

They turn their vision to the sun

Our lives spin heedlessly on

Eggshell lives of light and yolk

Breaking endlessly to slivers

Shivers of shadowy compulsion

No need to compel obedience

We follow our downward path

As if our lives depended on it

We know the destination sure

In the river of our scarred lives

Yet these words too are lies

Seeking to trap and ensnare

I too look at the sun

Its' brightness burns with truth

More painful than darkness

Yet I cannot look away

For ensnared by this vision

I am surely lost

To the shades of darkness

That would claim my soul

yamabuki

Sept 2011

This poem inspired by

“Slivers of Necessity”

By Marousia

Cast in Blue

2011-09-06T13:41:00.001-07:00

Cosmic Egg - Maco Nishida

'The world around us
is very mysterious, " he said.
"It doesn't yield its secrets easily'
- Carlos Castaneda

I prefer them all in blue
Against a shadowy background
Do you hear them whispering too
Speaking their foggy shades
Against the night's dodgy dreams

And what have they become
These mind's eye mosquitoes
What meanings do they carry
What colors have they shed
What says the Delphic muse so sly

Speak up you say
Roll them around your tongue
Out and out they arrive
Limber of limb outspoken
spewed from a dead man's eyes

For I trust them not
That demon spawn that snares our cries
Gathering jealous books
They speak of truth in lies
Tattering cities in their wicked pride

I Trust not their bloody muse
With her lustful eyes of sin
She twists and scampers freely
Reading my blood and veins
And would steal my broken sighs

I've been over this bridge before
Seen Lethe's water passing by
Many times these words have been spoken
So many times have they arrived
As we lonely walked the path of graves

yamabuki
August 2011

Yokai Art Project

2011-09-05T05:47:00.000-07:00

What you see here

Is an art project

Created not by aliens,

But by a Yokai

Yokai are spirit creatures

Some are shape shifters

Like:Tanuki (raccoon dog)

Kitsune (foxes)

Hebi (snakes)

Mujina (badgers)

Bakeneko (cats)

Ōkami (wolves)

Tsuchigumo and jorōgumo (spiders)

Inugami (dogs)

Some are Oni

Ogre like beings

Some are objects

Old discarded things

That become sentient

like: Bakezouri (straw sandals)

Biwa-bokuboku ( a lute)

Bura-bura (A paper lantern)

Karakasa (old umbrellas)

Kameosa (old sake jars)

Morinji-no-kama (tea kettles)

Mokmoku Ren (Paper screens, with eyes)

Some are human

like:Rokuro-kubi (humans

able to elongate their necks

during the night)

Ohaguro-bettari (a figure,

usually female, that turns

to reveal a face

with only a blackened mouth)

Futakuchi-onna (a woman

with a voracious

extra mouth on the back of her head)

Dorotabō (the risen corpse

of a farmer, who haunts his abused land)

And some are just strange

Like: Azuki Arai (a yokai

who is always found washing azuki beans).

Akaname (only found

in dirty bathrooms and spends its time

licking the filth left by the untidy owners).

Ashiarai Yashiki (A gargantuan foot

that appears in rooms and demands

the terrified home owner washes it)

Tofu Kozo (a small monk

who carries a plate with a block of tofu).

yamabuki

Sept 2011

Shady Corners

2011-09-04T08:40:00.001-07:00

Who are these Catty cats

With their shady corners

Catty-cornered to reality

Who always are found on

Shady cornered days and

Round the corner nights

Though I always live

Kitty-corner to the

Local coroner's office

Just in case of trouble

With the local hello kitties

Who live catty-corner

To the station

Under the tracks

Drinking their Starbucks lattes

Yamabuki

Sept 2011

Her Left Foot

2011-09-03T11:47:00.000-07:00

Her left foot

Slightly bent

What is it saying

That she does not notice

Can you guess?

yamabuki

Sept 2011

Waiting

2011-09-03T10:59:00.000-07:00

Never speaking

Never moving

Ever seeing

Ever knowing

Neither alive

Nor dead

We shape the world

As you shape us

We dress the world

As you dress us

Having no thoughts

We know everything

Having no feelings

We are still here

In the light of night

In the shadows of day

Waiting patiently

yamabuki

Sept 2011

2011-09-02T07:00:00.000-07:00

Who is this mystery woman

Dressed in serious blue

No face to show us

She walks the Nippon path

Into the fuzzy future

- yamabuki

Sept 2011

Cast in Blue

2011-08-31T14:43:00.000-07:00

Cosmic Egg - Maco Nishida

'The world around us
is very mysterious, " he said.
"It doesn't yield its secrets easily'
- Carlos Castaneda

I prefer them all in blue
Against a shadowy background
Do you hear them whispering too
Speaking their foggy shades
Against the night's dodgy dreams

And what have they become
These mind's eye mosquitoes
What meaning do they carry
What colors have they shed
What says the Delphic muse so sly

Speak up you say
Roll them around your tongue
Out and out they arrive
Limber of limb outspoken
spewed from a dead man's eyes

For I trust them not
That demon spawn that snares our cries
Gathering jealous books
They speak of truth in lies
Tattering cities in their wicked pride

I Trust not their bloody muse
With her lustful eyes of sin
She twists and scampers freely
Reading my blood and veins
And would steal my broken sighs

I've been over this bridge before
Seen Lethe's water passing by
Many times these words have been spoken
So many times have they arrived
As we lonely walked the path of graves

yamabuki
August 2011

Eve at her least dangerous

2011-08-30T09:39:00.000-07:00

Eve at her least dangerous - Mich R

Blood red curls

Melting the cold sky

The stars overwhelm the night

What vision is this that shines

Do you feel her intense love

Her power and depth

Shaking our eyes

Breaking our sight

And what will we do

When she fully awakens?

yamabuki

August 2011

Fading Leaves

2011-08-30T08:26:00.001-07:00

What I love about random things ... - MichR

"To light a candle is to cast a shadow..."

- Ursula K. Le Guin

A Wizard of Earthsea

Yellow leaves darkening

Still a hint of green

Once so full of life

Now dying to brown

Wooden slats

So straight and narrow

Evenly cut to size

By saws of steel

So too the leaves

Exactly the right size

Working hard by day

Churning light to love

By night they dreamed

Or talked among themselves

Whispering in the wind

Those things only trees know

Now like gray old men

Laying in their graves

They have returned to earth

Back to their mother's arms

yamabuki

August 2011

Blood Secrets (revisited)

2011-08-12T08:23:00.000-07:00

"Stir it up" - by Hazel Dooney @DooneyStudio

"If you place a fern

under a stone

the next day it will be

nearly invisible

as if the stone has

swallowed it."

-- Naomi Shihab Nye

"Some people do. They sleep completely,

waking refreshed. Others live in two worlds,

the lost and remembered.

They sleep twice, once for the one who is gone,

once for themselves. They dream thickly,

dream double, they wake from a dream

into another one, they walk the short streets

calling out names, and then they answer."

-- Naomi Shihab Nye

Sighs and whispers drenched in blood

Wandering endlessly dusk to dawn

And like Vladimir and Estragon

Awaiting their final redemption

They hang upon their Woden cross

Yellow fog and red lipped poppies

Drenching us in a rain of sighs

Their blood entering our veins

In the needled thorns of their lies

Looking endlessly for peace

Do you long for peaceful sleep

That absence of malice and violence

Would you banish devils and demons

Back to their misbegotten hells

That we may live in endless light

But blood and sighs will not allow this

Tears and terrors live in our dreams

Pumping our heart and feeding our mind

Defining our chosen path

Through the mountains of cold and ice

What of the past that whispers

Such winds blow our words away

Where have they gone

Must we always start anew

Will dead voices never cease

Where is the division that speaks

Though all words divide meaning

Splitting the Is from Isn't

Why are we not deafened

By the thunder of such assertions

Take eggs as an example

A life straining to appear

Or giving life to another

We who would eat them wonder

Is the unhatched unworthy of life

I have in my mind a murder

Perhaps real, perhaps imagined

A beautiful loving action it's true

But a murder none the less

How do we judge such a thing

If this were a murder in a dream

Would it be any less real

Than a murder in a movie

Our soul has still been witness

To the reality of death's call

Our mind in its rationality says no,

Your eyes have been deceived,

Your heart has been fooled,

No one has died in that vision.

Why then don't I accept such 'truth'

In a novel I've been reading,

A mother dies of starvation

Giving what little food she had

To keep her grandson alive.

Do these words touch your heart too?

I've been told that even in games

When we 'kill' on screen avatars,

Computer generated characters,

We are creating violent energy

That effects the whole of reality

Do you know of Indra's net

The interconnection of all beings?

It sounds so impossible to our mind

That a butterfly moving its wings in Brazil

Could cause a Typhoon in Hong Kong

Maitreya received an invitation

To visit Quan Yin Bodhisattva

In the heaven realms

Upon arrival at Quan Yin's pavilion

Overlooking a placid lake

Full of fish, ducks and lotus blossoms

Maiteya bowed deeply to Quan Yin

She served him small cakes and tea

And they sat quietly for a short time

Then Quan Yin spoke thusly

"The old gods and goddesses

The saints and angels of the past

All have departed from the human world"

"Yes, this is so" said he

"I dreamed of this not long ago"

"Soon your time will arrive

And your star will ascend.

Would you have my blessing?" she asked

"I would have you with me

For compassion is needed

Now more than ever

In the realm of humans"

"Truly spoken are your words,

But my time on earth is over for now.

The twilight of the gods is real

The wheel has turned.

Another spoke has ascended

And I have left the earth."

Maitreya said nothing for a while

Thinking on Quan Yin's words

Feeling with his heart

The flow of blood and time

And Quan Yin spoke further

"You are to arrive alone

In the human realm.

Yet my hands and eyes,

That live on in those who follow me,

Will help you as they are able"

Maitreya watched the ducks

Speaking nothing for a while

Then reached into his robe.

He brought out a begging bowl

And set it on the ground before her

"I saw the Buddha in a cage

And offered him my cell phone

That he might call his followers

To come and help him

He and the cage disappeared

leaving this begging bowl

Which I now gift to you."

Quan Yin asked quietly

"Is there any hope for the future?"

Maitreya smiled sadly

And shook his head slowly

"The future, which is my time,

remains a mystery.

But do not forget,

The human realm

Has always been violent

And thus doubly rewarding."

"Watch for me in the storms

Watch for me in the earthquakes

Watch for me in the fires

Watch for me in the floods.

When least expected

I will be there

Without fail"

yamabuki

April 2011

Taoist Tango

2011-08-01T08:31:00.001-07:00

Shadows - yamabuki

1. China

Do we always need to remember Tiananmen

Do we always need to remember Mao

Do we always need to remember Sun YatSen

Do we always need to remember History

ll. Curses, Histories, Memories

Cultural Revolution

Great Leap Forward

Great Firewall of China.

What are these to you or me

In the greater scheme of things

The Lower Depths of darkness

Lie beneath Graves of memory

China is not unique there

Yet China is uniquely old

5000 years or more of Tea

Confucius and Mao

Dancing a Taoist Tango

Ill. China Pop

Ai WeiWei

Would have us remember

But he seems to me

Much like Warhol

A proponent of Pop Culture

I have trouble taking either too seriously

I much prefer Chen YiFei

With his photorealistic paintings

That take us deeper into life

Still China is large

Big enough to hold many views

IIIl. New lamps for old

They have said

History is dead

What that means

Is difficult to say

But Like an old god

It must die first

Before being reborn anew

As a young god

With the end of History

All stories already have been told

All we can do is repeat the past

A deck of cards can only be

Shuffled in so many combinations

Perhaps we need forgetfulness too

A time to remember

A time to forget

History paints us into a corner

Where we can only rinse and repeat

Be they lies or truths

It's still the same story

Told over and over again

Can we never forget History?

V. A Chinese Curse

The Curse is said to be

That we are living

In interesting times

But if that is so

Then we are all cursed

All times are interesting times

But do we always

Need to remember

Everything?

yamabuki

Aug 2011

A different version

Was written in response to

An Editorial in AsianCha

China edition

This poem is also a

Font experiment

I am using a new font

Gilldyslexic

Which is supposed to be

Easier to read

Due to the spacing

and strengthening

Of the font

Along the bottom

yamabuki

Half Closed Eyes

2011-06-15T07:37:00.001-07:00

'June Morning' - yamabuki

“As we live

So do we die.

Life is the dream.

Death the awakening.”

-- Maitreya, Bodhisattva

Who has not yet been born

"Leaning into the afternoons,

I cast my sad nets towards your oceanic eyes.

There, in the highest blaze my solitude lengthens and flames;

Its arms turning like a drowning man's.

I send out red signals across your absent eyes

That wave like the sea, or the beach by a lighthouse.

You keep only darkness my distant female;

From your regard sometimes, the coast of dread emerges"

-- Pablo Neruda

"Leaning Into The Afternoons"

Deep and Dark the Muse

Whispering shadows

Into the frozen night

Lightly heating the way

Through the fogs

And whispering flames

We dare not look full on

To these terrible visions

Lest they haunt our days

Instead we sneak glances

With Half Closed eyes

And so I give you these

Twelve poems

In Seven Sections.

-- Half Light

Her Half Closed Eyes

She Loves me

-- Dream Light

Witches' Dreams

Dream Woman and the Jackal

-- Psyche and Eros

Immortality

Psyche's Eyes

-- Star Light

Shivering in the Night

Clouds Floating By

-- Nightingale's Song

Life is the Dream

-- Visions and Dreams

Angel Light

Three Dreams

-- Eternity

Time Was

yamabuki

June 2011

Labyrinth of Dreams

2011-06-08T12:26:00.001-07:00

Labyrinth of Dreams - yamabuki

"Sometimes I see alone

coffins under sail,

embarking with the pale dead,

with women that have dead hair,

with bakers who are as white as angels,

and pensive young girls

married to notary publics,

caskets sailing up

the vertical river of the dead,

the river of dark purple,

moving upstream with sails

filled out by the sound of death,

filled by the sound of death which is silence."

-- Pablo Neruda

"Nothing But Death"

Awakening

Broken Mirror 13

Dream lights

When the Stars Were Right

Who Are These Words?

Lost in a Dream

Smoky Dreams

Stolen Dreams

Twilight

Who Owns the Poetry of Clouds?

Darkness returns

Blood Secrets

Untamed Circles

Dreamless sleep

How Do I Measure My Life

yamabuki

June 2011

Poems Like a Spanish Dancer

2011-06-07T09:59:00.001-07:00

'Hand of the sacred' - @anjkan

"There are cemeteries that are lonely,

graves full of bones that do not make a sound,

the heart moving through a tunnel,

in it darkness, darkness, darkness,

like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves,

as though we were drowning inside our hearts,

as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul."

-- Pablo Neruda

"Nothing But Death"

preface

Light and Shadow

Dance of the Fates

How is Poetry Different

Day Dreams

Not Even a Poem is up to your Purr

Half Dreaming

Unseen Connections

Darks Stars

When the Stars were Right

Joined by Love

Lost in Dreams

Return

yamabuki

June 2011

Smoky Dreams

2011-05-16T07:58:00.000-07:00

"Light and Dark pass through"

- yamabuk

"Poppies

orange

fire

purple stamens

stems of wire

prickly leaves"

- One Stop Poetry Challenge

- Chris Galvin

"I know 'tis but a Dream,

yet feel more anguish

Than if 'twere Truth.

It has been often so:

Must I die under it?

Is no one near?

Will no one hear

these stifled groans

and wake me?"

- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Opium haze

Coleridge eyes

Dim lit halls

shadowy cries

Poppy dreams

poetic lies

Milky sap

Daylight dies

Beauty lives

Danger calls

Full moon visions

Dark rain falls

Poppies live

People die

Earth abides

Cold winds sigh

The dark side of the poppy

Opium, Heroin, Morphine

Addiction and stupor

These were often used

By Medical science

To treat hysteria

Mostly in women

To keep them silent

And under men's control

For as I am wont to say

The brighter the light

The darker the shadow

yamabuki

May 2011

Infinite Love

2011-05-03T08:13:00.001-07:00

"©" - @anjkan

"My love she speaks like silence

Without ideals or violence

She doesn’t have to say she’s faithful

Yet she’s true, like ice, like fire

People carry roses

Make promises by the hours

My love she laughs like the flowers

Valentines can’t buy her"

-- "Love Minus Zero/No Limit"

-- Bob Dylan

How much do you love me?

100 meters of love?

33 kilograms of love?

90 Liters of love?

If your two children

Fell into the river

Which one would you save first?

Who do you love the most?

Love cut into pieces

And in our insecurity

We want to ask,

Who do you love more?

This fatal question...

We've all heard it asked

Expecting more Love

Seeking the most Love

Love is not like money

We speak of it as if it were

In Truth Love is Infinite

Love has no limits

We as humans have limits

We have preferences

We choose directions

We limit our time spent

Love is the ocean

We see each wave

Separate from the next

We choose waves to love

We fear some waves

And surf on others...

In this ocean of waves

Who do you love the most?

yamabuki

May 2011

After El Collie Died

2011-04-28T14:54:00.001-07:00

'Twisted Nights' - yamabuki

"The new poets still quoted the old poets,

but no one spoke in verse

of the pregnant woman drowned,

with perhaps twins in her,

kicking at blank walls

even before birth."

-- "A River"

By A. K. Ramanujan

"Hoson zes, phainou

Meden holos su lupou;

Pros oligon esti to zen

To telos ho chronos apaitei"

"While you live, shine

Don't suffer anything at all;

Life exists only a short while

And time demands its toll"

-- 'Song of Seikilos'

(Ancient Greek Melody,

c.100 BC)

You see how the colors twist and curl into each other

This is one of my favorite Photoshop tools

I learned to use it in my pictures

After El Collie had died

And I had come back from death's brink

For another cup of bitter tea

I cried and cried that deathly time

But she had told me I had to stay

I still was not finished with my work

So I created music and pictures

To reconnect me to this crazy life

She had had a dream of dying

In which she crossed over a bridge

I tried to follow her across as well

But half way over I had to go back

She continued on, leaving me behind

We both knew what this dream meant

We looked at it with our magical tools

And then buried it away in the earth

Next to the Palm tree that she had planted

And hoped that we still had more time

Life and death twists and curls

We eat and die, around we go

Coffee and bread are not enough

Not even meat can fill my need

As we continue to follow life's flow

Death's angel still follows us all

When I was young I looked at the stars

And as I watched them in the sky

I fell up into them in the swirling night

Yet still I remained in my young body

Only just barely just arrived

Only just awakened to this dream

My mother told me I had cried and cried

As a young baby still new to this world

I could not remember this, but knew what it meant

All the suffering of being born, and dying

Once again the wheel was turning

The Fates were spinning their stories

And we were the threads they wove

Today I had another dream

That woke me from night's bed

A palm tree had died in the light

Cut off at the knees as I watched

And chopped to pieces with our eyes

Another piece of this twisted dream

Around goes the swirling mist of dreams

This blue and emerald shadow we live in

Eating and breathing each day's joy

Pulling out the unwanted weeds of pain

Tending our foolish gardens of hope

Can you see why I cried and cried?

yamabuki

April 2011

Surreal trees

2011-04-26T12:33:00.000-07:00

'Surreal Tree, Sleeping' - yamabuki

Beneath the Stars

2011-04-23T20:13:00.001-07:00

'Blood Moon at the Solstice' - yamabuki

"So long was I on the northern frontier,

Even my dog growls at my footsteps,

I had hoped to sing with my friends

Beneath the stars on my return,

But some have died,

And two have moved to Pyongyang,

Much the same thing."

-- Hong Ki Bo (1665 - 1710)

Is this the hidden side of the moon

A strangeness taught from an early age

teaching a new song of desire

That school and language force feed

Our children remade into something new

We learn to eat up the world with our words

Breaking up the mountains and oceans

Shattering their wholeness into pretty words

Making bird song a kind of blasphemy

And banishing our soul to the moon

II.

Trees and birds light up the dawn

Their songs covering the sky

Arching past wind blown leaves

Piercing the moon light

With their shadowy lines

Then the day begins again

Night banished to some other realm

We see that it has rained again

The worms and snails are frolicking

Soon the birds will have their breakfast

The fish by the lake still swim sleepily

Their watery dreams still fresh in their heads

Light on the water reflecting their moods

While thunder rustles faintly on the hilltops

A lone crane stands waiting

III.

Rasputin was sitting in a tavern

Lilith came over and sat down with him

Rasputin introduced himself

"I am no one special at all.

I'm here the same as we all are."

Lilith poured a drink for him and herself

Saying nothing she looked him in the eyes

When the music began, she asked him to dance

Back at the table they talked of small things

He winked at her shyly and she smiled

"They say I'm a temptress" she said

"But I just want to love you."

He reached over and stroked her hand

Sitting quietly in the soft light they touched

A sad song played as their eyes met again

Rasputin suggested a walk in the moonlight

Hand in hand under the stars they strolled

Cold clouds drifted in speaking of rain

Close by the river Neve flowed coldly

Singing a dirge of Rasputin's demise

Maitreya felt troubled by his future birth

Moonlight shone darkly from his eyes

Fear and sadness twisted his heart

Humanity's fate his heaven and hell

Beyond the perimeters of madness

Everyone would resent his strange appearance

His dark eyes hypnotic and sparse

His Cheshire smile of twigs and coal

Sharpened by lightning in dead of the night

More Abraxas than devil in his actions

How are we to judge the gait of his soul

How are we to know the currents in his skull

This madman of God who speaks to the sun

Disappearing at night in yellowing fogs

Traveling to hells where no one would go

Maitreya, The bodhisattva not yet born

Already here in the midst of our lives

He comes not to save or judge us

Nor wake us from our nightmares

He would sing with us beneath the stars

yamabuki

April 2011

Blood Secrets

2011-04-16T19:25:00.001-07:00

Hidden Sighs - yamabuki

"If you place a fern

under a stone

the next day it will be

nearly invisible

as if the stone has

swallowed it."

-- Naomi Shihab Nye

"Some people do. They sleep completely,

waking refreshed. Others live in two worlds,

the lost and remembered.

They sleep twice, once for the one who is gone,

once for themselves. They dream thickly,

dream double, they wake from a dream

into another one, they walk the short streets

calling out names, and then they answer."

-- Naomi Shihab Nye

Sighs and whispers drenched in blood

They wander endlessly dusk to dawn

And like Vladimir and Estragon

Await their final redemption

Hanging upon their Woden cross

Yellow fog and red lipped poppies

Drenching us in the rain of sighs

Their blood enters our veins

In the needled thorns of their lies

Looking endlessly for peace

Do you long for peaceful sleep

The absence of malice and violence

Would you banish devils and demons

Back to their misbegotten hells

That we may live in sweetness and light

But blood and sighs will not allow this

Tears and terror live in our dreams

They pump our heart and feed our mind

Defining the path we choose to follow

Through the mountains of snow and ice

What of the past that whispers

Such winds blow our words away

Where have they gone

Must we always start anew

Will dead voices never cease

Where is the division that speaks

Though all words divide meaning

Splitting the Is from Isn't

Why are we not deafened

By the thunder of such assertions

Take eggs as an example

A life straining to appear

Or giving life to another

We who would eat them wonder

Is the unhatched unworthy of life

I have in my mind a murder

Perhaps real, perhaps imagined

A beautiful loving action it's true

But a murder none the less

How do we judge such a thing

If this were a murder in a dream

Would it be any less real

Than a murder in a movie

Our soul has still been witness

To the reality of death's call

Our mind in its rationality says no,

Your eyes have been deceived,

Your heart has been fooled,

No one has died in that vision.

Why then don't I accept such 'truth'

In a novel I've been reading,

A mother dies of starvation

Giving what little food she had

To keep her grandson alive.

Do these words touch your heart too?

I've been told that even in games

When we 'kill' on screen avatars,

Computer generated characters,

We are creating violent energy

That effects the whole of reality

Do you know of Indra's net

The interconnection of all beings?

It sounds so impossible to our mind

That a butterfly moving its wings in Brazil

Could cause a Typhon in Hong Kong

Maitreya received an invitation

To visit Quan Yin Bodhisattva

In the heaven realms

Upon arrival at Quan Yin's pavilion

Overlooking a placid lake

Full of fish, ducks and lotus blossoms

Maiteya bowed deeply to Quan Yin

She served him small cakes and tea

And they sat quietly for a short time

Then Quan Yin spoke thusly

"The old gods and goddesses

The saints and angels of the past

All have departed from the human world"

"Yes, this is so" said he

"I dreamed of this not long ago"

"Soon your time will arrive

And your star will ascend.

Would you have my blessing?" she asked

"I would have you with me

For compassion is needed

Now more than ever

In the realm of humans"

"Truly spoken are your words,

But my time on earth is over for now.

The twilight of the gods is real

The wheel has turned.

Another spoke has ascended

And I have left the earth."

Maitreya said nothing for a while

Thinking on Quan Yin's words

Feeling with his heart

The flow of blood and time

And Quan Yin spoke further

"You are to arrive alone

In the human realm.

Yet my hands and eyes,

That live on in those who follow me,

Will help you as they are able"

Maitreya watched the ducks

Speaking nothing for a while

Then reached into his robe.

He brought out a begging bowl

And set it on the ground before her

"I saw the Buddha in a cage

And offered him my cell phone

That he might call his followers

To come and help him

He and the cage disappeared

leaving this begging bowl

Which I now gift to you."

Quan Yin asked quietly

"Is there any hope for the future?"

Maitreya smiled sadly

And shook his head slowly

"The future, which is my time,

remains a mystery.

But do not forget,

The human realm

Has always been violent

And thus doubly rewarding."

"Watch for me in the storms

Watch for me in the earthquakes

Watch for me in the fires

Watch for me in the floods.

When least expected

I will be there

Without fail"

yamabuki

April 2011