Illuminations

Car headlights

In the rain

Is it better

To make one too many compromises

Or better to be excluded

Streetlights

In the rain

I am a flower not a tree

I am fresh

Not decomposing

Security lights

In the rain

I reflect

I am not a reflection

I see those reflecting, clearly

Torch lights

In the rain

I do feel free

I am in a safe space

Which gifts me freedoms

Broken Calm

Instead of an evening meal, with the monks, which may well have consisted of bread and soup, or a salad, or some pasta creation, I had a roast dinner with my partner, using the Syrian potato recipe, from this morning’s meditation course.

Instead of quiet preparations for matins in the abbey I tried, unsuccessfully, to repair my cars rear light; I  have though cleared the utility workshop work surfaces so that now they are pristine and ready.

The potatoes, home-grown and with lashings of butter are wonderful; present moment, wonderful moment.

Instead of writing, in the dimly lit and empty abbey, I am writing in our centrally heated lounge, while listening to peaceful, harmonious music on the stereo; yet soon I have to return to the sangha, for my last spot of meditation on this good Saturday, that is good except for the football results.

Beware Of Taking Deciduous Actions

The leaves are leaving the branches

Those branches, reaching for the sky

Are the most vulnerable

There is less shelter at the extremities

We have lost the protection

Of the majority who shield us

The two trunks, of the tallest trees

Shadow and support each other

I focus on the autumnal leaf

Orange, and peach, and bronze, and green

Will it still be there tomorrow

Is each single leaf aware of the danger

If I take it from its present place

And press it between the pages of a book

Will I have saved anything

Or will I have lost all that I already had

Does the leaf hear the hum

Or the buzz of the distant machines

Which pierce through my headphones

And unsettle my once steady balance

Fortunately, up next is a mindful moment

Where first I stand on my right leg

And then change-over to my left leg

Both of which produce a sense of achievement

In The Present Moments

These are the lists

That the sangha gave me

These are the lists

From Be Calm Be Happy

I thank Laurie and Vari

and Katie; also

Thich Nhat Hahn, wherever

In the world our minds and bodies are

These are the lists

Which entering meditation gave me

These are the lists

Which the relaxation meditation gifted to me

I thank the earth, the sun

The moon, and the stars

I thank the air, the water

And the mindful ways of life

Spates

Should it be

An autumn Friday afternoon

With the river surging over

The waterfall, bypassing the fish-pass

Could it be

Thirty years, or more, before

That spring Monday morning

A walk on Dartmoor, to the Watercombe intake

Aqua oh aqua

Would it be

A winter weekend

At the moorland reservoir

Making a snowman on the perimeter wall

Should it, could it, would that it be

A full week in the summer

Climbing into waves

Washing toes along the seashore

Singing aqua oh aqua