Tiredness
June 07
‘The path is to empty ourselves of false divinity, to deny ourselves, to give up being the centre of the world, to discern that all points in the world are equally centres.’ Simone Weil quoted in S G Reynolds Living within the mind of Christ, p206
And so with this tiredness comes fuzzy thought, aching eye sockets and another urge to close in on myself forever. The day was perfectly mellow, three counselling sessions; recovery from depression, living with chronic conditions and Aspergic anxiety, all held within the context of loving relationship suspended in a cool, quiet and highly polished room overlooking a spectacular garden and light grey lake once owned by an importantly busy 17th century general practitioner.
And now, after a night of fitful spare bed room sleep, I am too tired for speech, I can only immerse in the silent scratch of you, my most fountainous, most forgivingly favourite pad and pen………….
before each word
Silence
within silence
still these chattering noises.
how come?
how can these bedding down of desires still circulate
however much I meditate?
how can this resistance to wrest thoughts into Nothingness
be so beyond this mortal’s reach?
where are the rest of these roads to self-forgiveness
this richness to silence I so often seek?
this portal-less absence
these city curbs to this course over thinking
and throwing of verbs into the gutter all
searching for answers
to co-here and now to be
truly within a This-ness
fully beyond this heart and flesh,this body
this dirt ridden spleen of regret.
to coalesce, yes, to immerse I guess
in Breaths own breathing
in the orange and yellowings and driftings of
green as this vessel of vessels
these blood-lit pores, wait for
for wholeness to appear within the weightless of time.
for mists to swirl and fulfil in-between
flesh full narrations and this body most slain
to refresh into chanting enchantments again
to yearn for the Deepest of Breath.
‘do your breathing most breathing most breathing most best’
but
oh oh yes,
of course, off course I am surrounded again
succumbed once more to this thinking most brain.
Oh silence
soothe these aching taught abs
freed from these needs for solution
oh
Maaa-Raaaa-Naaaa-Thaaa
You distanced dream valley
with softening tones
whisper Loves balm
to these hum-drumming drums
born of a presence that never quite comes.
‘The action of grace in our hearts is silent and secret.’ Simone Weil Waiting on God page. 7
Rain
Rain
31 May
Refreshed or flinching into the mid-afternoon rain this is the choice of right now. Hunched while waiting I am reminded to stand upright, to remove my misting glasses, my damp leather shoes, open my chest and breathe into this ponderous dank odour, these re-infused leaves, these sweet perfumes. Toes rehydrating within the green and the softening transformation of sun drenched cracks. Wetness is earthed and electric.
As rain jumps upwards from this steaming manmade lake of Tetley tea, as my shirt darkens to mimic the flag stones, wooden benches silently sponge and seagulls swirl upon speeding wafts of invisible uppermost, weathering most, while at my side black shining ferns offer brushes of jazz percussion as they wrestle the drops to a smooth flow towards softer drips of reformation with the soil below. Children laugh, as I imagine their fights and falls into the sporadic backdrop of insistent sirens and the sedate melancholia of woodpigeon ponderings upon an a spindle of branch within this tree lined city centre refuge.
And now, I smile as beyond this rain, within and through this misting walkway a familiar if sunken torso appears. I replace my heal within my shoe. First the left, and then tottering slightly the right.
‘You ok?’ he asks
‘Yes great, you?’
And so to warmth of the hermetically sealed room and to my next jumper wearing, rain denying client. And so to the dance, the anticipatory anxiety relaxed by recounting of moments passed, relationship restored upon souls rehydrated within the connection of another 50 minute hour.
How far?
On this day and month in 1927 Gandhi wrote:
‘in spite of our knowledge of the danger and of our precarious existence, our indifference to the source of all life is excelled only by our amazing arrogance.’
And we have progressed how far?
stilled i long
Silence:
O h h
deep rooted kiss
gift me Your mist
within this
blandishment
of body and brain.
M m m
yes yes stilled i long for such and such a
feathering breath for
Prescience to soothe
this slightness of mine
enlightening tight fists
un-pounding pale hearts
to soften free beats vibrating in Time.
