What we are

When we think we are what we are not
We cannot be what we are

Baby chicken

There’s a dying baby chicken outside my window as I write this. Pale brown, her spine got snapped this afternoon during a food stampede. She’s still, immobile, yet she speaks. How unreal.

Life wants to move, but is trapped in an immobile object. So heavy. The spirit can’t move, so it speaks. It can’t get to where or who it wants to get to, so it speaks. It calls out.

But the spirit will stop calling out soon. I can sense it. It’s only a matter of time. And when it stops calling out, I’ll know she’s dead.

How many are calling out to you?

To the bankers out there

An overdraft
creates a debit balance
and a debit balance
is basically an overdraft

either way
we pay interest
we bear the cost
when we give freely
of that which we have not

one must love oneself
before one can truly
fully, completely
love another

What faces did you see yesterday?

There’s something about the way the human mind works
which I only just discovered yesterday
try it for yourself
attempt to remember the events of your yesterday
by playing the film of the day in your head
beginning from when you woke
and ending with when you slept
go ahead, try it, you got five minutes

…………………………………………

tough uh?
there are so many things that fall between the cracks
when you try to recreate your day using chronological time

but there’s another way
recall the faces you saw yesterday
the people you touched base with
on phone, by mail, via Skype
and as sure as night follows day
you’ll be able to put together
the events of your yesterday

So what faces did you see yesterday?

Balance

If you’ve ever walked a tightrope
you would know that balance is
somewhere in between standing still
and walking the unstable rope path
if you stand still
you just might fall flat on your face
and if you walk too fast
you just might fall flat on your face

To write or to observe, that is the question

Am I a writer
creating beautiful word paintings on paper
or merely an observer
taking dictation in life’s never ending presentation?

I think the latter
for what flows through me
is not created by me
I am merely a vessel

my purpose is to take the notes
and share them, as best as I can
let them flow, unimpeded
touch lives, if touching be allowed

I have written before
but experience shows me
that I am much better
at merely taking notes

Life makes my own creations
look like a bad painting
made with poor quality oils
on a torn shredded canvas

To life
the greatest artist of all
thank you for blessing me
with the gift of taking down your notes

What heaven must be like

Imagine you have six friends, like brothers
and each of them is never wrong
nothing they say is ever in error

ever
to them has been given the gift of truth
they see reality as is, no ether

now imagine these six never agree
amongst them is always dissention
even though close friends they be

how would you make sense of that
what logical conclusion must you come to
except to see the fact

that each of them speaks a reality
each sees a part, like the blind men and the elephant
parts that added together are sure to be

the whole, the truth…Heaven
that’s what it must be like
except we got souls numbering more than seven

Flat tyre

Driving down the freeway
listening to Sade
hear a honk from my right
loud, urgent, Japanese
“Your tyre’s going down” he shouts
I thank him
and slow down
need to pull to the kerb to check
he’s right
rear right tyre’s going down
must be a nail or something
no way I would have known
until it would have gotten noticeable
a sag to the right, the uneven drive
that chap just saved my tyre and rim
kind soul, I owe him
needed him to point out what I couldn’t see
same way I need you to point out the mistakes I make

Move over Visa (II)

This piece came to me from an experience yesterday. I stopped at the gas station to buy gas. A normal day. While waiting on the queue I noticed kids all over the place. Some begging for money. Some selling stuff - oranges, sweets, CD, what have you.

I've seen kids like this before, but I'd never noticed them. I did yesterday.

I noticed how these kids - both the beggars and the sellers - constantly looked around for someone to beg from or sell to. The beggars' eyes scanned every car, looking for a soft heart betrayed by pity in the eyes. The sellers' eyes scanned every car as well, but they looked for something else - desire for the items they hawked.

These kids were hungry. Not just hungry for food, but hungry for the things they wanted in life. They knew life didn't owe them a thing, rather it was them that owed life. Owed life to provide a return on what they'd been so freely given. They knew people didn't owe them anything, so they had to find ways to give to people, so people could give back to them. In exchange for money, the beggars gave a feeling of self-righteousness, and the hawkers refreshment and entertainment.

Though they sought different things in the eyes they scanned, they applied the same principle of tenacity. They didn't take rebuffs personally. A rebuff was just feedback from a would-be victim (for a lack of a better word) that he or she wasn't interested in buying something or in giving away money. A rebuff was just a hint to move on to the next car, to move on to the next opportunity. Simple.

Two simple things - tenacity and the ability to scan the environment constantly for opportunities. Two things that are not taught in school. Two things that are essential for ultimate achievement in life.

These kids had large helpings of these two things. And I, despite my expensive local and international education, did not.

I thought about this all the way home. I realized that I still drove my old 504 because I wasn't hungry enough. Wasn't hungry enough to demand from life what I wanted. Or was it that I didn't know what I really wanted. The thoughts played over and over in my head. I felt ashamed.

Given so much, yet doing so little with it. The very gifts that were meant to assure my success in life have dulled the twin attributes that are more important than all else. I looked at those kids with so much envy. I would not trade places with them, no, but God, what I would give to have their hunger and tenacity.

Move over Visa

How do I see life
as a daily opportunity
to move closer to my dreams
or as a daily grind
a pain, if you will
to bear and live through?

Do I take my days for granted
because they come free
and no price is paid upfront
to arise anew each day?

If a price had to be paid
to wake up each morning
and that price was
progression towards my dreams
would I pay it
or would I let life be

Such a simple thought
but so true
for that is the irony of life
the price is paid, must be paid
but we realize too late
for it is paid at the end
interest must be paid
whether in regret or in fulfillment
payment must be made

Move over Visa,
Life's the universal credit card

Obvious translation

I want to taste you where you want to taste me
I want to kiss you

Mend and continue (Haiku)

Mend and continue
when love leaves you down and out
be like J. Walker

keep on walking son
do take time to understand
what lead to the pain

but once you done that
get back up with a firm stride
mend and continue

Funerals make strange bedfellows

Funerals make strange bedfellows
and death does bring together
even as it painfully separates

spirit-filled Christians
income driven bankers

friends from childhood
acquaintances made in the last month

grave diggers hustling for loose change
grieving family members asking why

funerals make strange bedfellows
and death does bring together, somewhat
even as it painfully separates

Adieu Yinka
For you its bye to the things of this earth
no more pushing of Letters of Credit
confirmed or otherwise

To Yinka, a colleague that passed away last week, ten days short of his 31st birthday, leaving behind a wife and a two month old daughter. Rest in peace.

Equilibrium!

Our very attempts to close space (in sex)
create space (in birth)
while our very attempts to create space (in wars)
close space (in death).
Equilibrium!

God...me, you, them, us (the perfect, ever widening circle)

We all have God in us. Or better said, God/life flows through all of of us. The whole moves through the parts, but is greater than the sum of the parts. The movement adds to its weight. Hence the parts cannot experience the whole fully. It's just not possible.

Think of a hose, that midway branches out into a million sub-hoses. Is it possible for one of the sub-hoses to say the pressure of water coming out of it is the same as the pressure going into the single hose at the other end? No, it's not.

Each of us can experience a bit of God/Life/Bliss, which is infinitesimally smaller than the sum. Infinitesimally smaller. Yet as small as this is, some people never taste it. They walk through life unaware of what is theirs for the taking, unaware of their birthright. Their right just by being born.

What a shame. But means exist to help the soul that craves to know its source afresh. God is expanding further outwards. (S)He will not be held back. S(H)e needs us to move along. But this movement must be relearned. We once knew it instinctively, but it is a dance many have long forgotten.

It is uniform. Always has, always will be. It is eternal. Always has, always will be. It is steady. Always has, always will be. It is deep. Always has, always will be. It’s a vibration, a hum. A sound so low it is silent, so strong it is pure. So pervasive, yet hidden to most. It’s the spine that books' pages are bound around. It’s the white that is born when all colours unite.

It, he, she, is…we, you, they, are…GOD

Calling things into being, or calling being into things?

My pastor says we should call things into being
That we should have faith
and act like what we want is already ours
he says its the way of faith

Does he have it backwards?
it's a possibility, me thinks
perhaps we are not to call things into being
but call our being into things

A thought rises in my sub-concious
my inattentive mind misses the moment
of freshness, newness, divine birth
evidence that I am far from congruent

not acting as a whole
against myself, divided and torn
like a ship lost at sea
in the middle of a raging storm

But when I revisit the same moment
with my whole being, my full attention
with the whole of me, heart, mind and senses
in there lies potential for true creation

I approach each situation with my intention clear
with real knowledge of my self
and the connection I share with others
the storm passes away, all by itself

I tap into the energy that holds the heavens up
I reclaim my rightful position as a child of light
I create...powerfully...purposefully
and cause my maker delight

Meditate

Time was woven into creation
to keep souls unprepared for the truth
anchored to this plane, to protect them
from knowing the infiniteness of God

The experience of time
is the proof of separation from Him
from which all things flow

It is the evidence
that we are in exile
far from home
away from the domain of spirits

Sperm and egg collide
nine months before a soul arrives
desire brings two bodies together
nature and time do the rest

Desire...joining...merging...passage of time...life

But in our home country
the land of the eternal light
beings exist outside the context of time
we as exiles know this instinctively

Eternity is always now. No then. No before. No after. Just now. All the time.

Return home. Stop time. Meditate.

The sphere

Jasper: You quiet son. What you thinking?

Joybringer: Man, it just occured to me that if God keeps moving the way he's doing, he's going to have to move in on himself sooner or later. Like, how many planes and dimensions is he going to create? Sooner or later the axes planes are going to intersect, form a sphere, all wrapped in on itself, moving in on itself.

Damn son, that's the big bang theory right there. Big bang starts the universe expanding, and in the end the whole thing will end with it collapsing on itself. Big bang, then big collapse! Trip!!

Jasper: (with a blank look on his face) Yes, you have now officially lost it. It's no longer a possibiity, it's a reality.

View from the edge

Imagine infinite, never ending space expanding outwards. If you can imagine that then you're seeing what God sees.

The Universe/God is expanding. Get with the program.

Let him flow through you. Give. Of yourself. Of your passions. Of your means.

Expand. Touch lives. Give.

View from the Sun

From the Sun, a car travelling 400 km/hour on Earth looks stationary. From God’s view, all our struggling and striving for material things looks like nothing. God beckons us to come see from his view.

If I could...

I would spend more time with my baby sister
follow my real passions, my heart's desires
take that trip to Asia I've been dreaming about
apply for the PhD programs been thinking about
throw caution to the wind, release the vice on my heart
and love her like she seems to love me
and that goes for either of them

But I won't do any of these things
I seem intent on piling up to-dos
need more for future regrets to chew
if I could I would, but I won't

Heaven beckons

We gots to get free
open your eyes
can't you see
there ain't no you
there ain't no me
it's all us
there ain't no family
and no non-family
it's all one
the human family
the mind's got to expand
beyond 3D we need to learn to see
before this earth we leave
we must find our place
make it a temporaty home
before we leave for that which is eternal
heaven beckons, "come home"

Everything but brown

Everyone's beautiful in God's eyes
but I ain't God
and I still think you're the bomb!

You heart is pure
your mind is sharp
but Imma focus on your body for this one

You fine girl
the spark in your eyes
the heart warming smile
that striking blend of black hair
and lovely chocolately brown skin

Ha, your skin
don't know how you do it
but Mars bars ain't got it like you do
The chocolate layer that is your skin glows
it invites me to touch
to kiss
to stroke

Otto tells me your skin is the way it is
coz it reflects brown light
and absorbs all the other colours

well, I ain't no biology professor
but I do know this
You don't need no make-up
that your lovely smooth skin can do without
your skin, the colour of Mother Earth
and when I kiss you
it's like returning to her
you are my earth
the foundation on which I rest my heart
the place to which I return
when its all said and done

I cherish you
I love you
I adore you
You who are everything but brown