Friday, August 26, 2016

numbers taken from a convent column

    6

(soluble)

what divides equals
added to itself or its divisors
splits itself 
into portraits of

1
the bell rings once
flies the wind as doves do
    
     5

(west)

so

many suns and rivers in


1

the cow lows


    3

(34 degrees)

also known as

1

oil the hinge!

the cock crows

  2

there is no more twine to be had
two must do the work of 

1

(rural indicators)

an engine, a door 
closed for

1

Knows itself.

And then.





(smells of waste and generation)

Under the moon's last quarter
a triangulation of
darkness
earth
water.

The night air is an indigent meditation
on this day's focal aroma -

broken, tilled,

deceptively damp.





















Under the moon's last quarter
a triangulation of
darkness
earth
dew.

Composted night air is an indigent meditation
on this day's focal aroma -

broken, tilled,

deceptively damp.















Thursday, August 25, 2016

Not clinging to anything in this world or the next....
20.1 Dhammapada


Tuesday, August 16, 2016

confluencia actual

People give according to their faith, or as they are disposed to.  18.249, 250 dhammapada



Death 

(disposed of)

On Wednesday I discovered a tortoise in golden roadside weed,
mummified, head hollowed through the eye by an army of ants.

On Sunday. near a village wall, lay a headless unplucked chicken.
It was partially wrapped in a white bag - golden feathers,
beautiful rose-dimpled feet.


Birds

(disposition of)

Doves will not touch the remnant fruit I leave for them.

In early evening, swallows align in intricately spaced patterns, wings  all pointed downward,
on the stone face of the chapel.


There are hawks gleaning mice from the cut hay.


Owls. I find hair and bone pellets on the dusty roads.
Contained within them all moist life I seek midsummer.


A  Horseman Passed  By

(disposed to)

At dusk, a young man rides slowly towards the village.
He is on a chestnut Andalusian with a forehead star.
The horse has a band of 3 braided ropes hanging over the star.
The young man wears a red waistband, the colour of his flushed cheeks.

 Both man and horse keep eyes to the horizon , distant seeing, focused.

In rural Skåne län the rain fell on fields of them. 
Córdoba horses follow afternoon shadows, paddocks blanched by summer sun.


Imagine a piebald donkey pulling a surrey. Place it here, on the road to Belalcázar.

Roses

(disposition of)

They are watered nightly, after the heat subsides.
The soil is bare.
Bright blossoming, the petals desiccate quickly, producing the effect of a bush abloom with
textile and paper.
They are beautiful, I tell the sister.
They need water, says the sister.
Don't we all?

One should not be put out by others' food and drink. Root it out.

Painting

(disposed to)

I do it with my eyes closed. I follow the water. As it returns, I look. It's as much about what's left behind and erased as what remains. The paper rises and falls with wet and dry.
If I am lucky, I can see what I have done.

Chapel

(disposition of)

The highest window attracts my attention. I can observe it endlessly. If I follow the light, it leads me always back here, to this place.  What's up there but a hole in stone?

Tomb within, tomb without. Light will find us, as surely as a river seeking the sea.

Without discrimination following, out or in, achieving stillness night and day.


















Monday, August 15, 2016


Hail, Queen of heaven, the ocean star,
Guide of the wanderer here below,
Thrown on life's surge, we claim thy care,
Save us from peril and from woe.
Mother of Christ, O Star of the sea
Pray for the wanderer, pray for me.



Hail Queen of Heaven the Morning Star was written by Father John Lingard (1771--1851), a Catholic priest and historian who, through the works of William Cobbett, helped to smooth the passage of the Catholic Emancipation Act in England. Loosely based on the medieval Latin plainchant Ave Maris Stella, the hymn is generally sung to a specially modified traditional English melody.

a s c e n s i o n

...it is good to be contented with whatever comes...the elimination of all suffering is good.
23.331 dhammapada

The bells rang and rang. 
I wondered why on the 14th?
It is the 15th.
In my country, we obligate next Sunday and 
today the working work.
I lost thinness, presence, here... and feel it keenly.

Is regret an honour, or a gift?
Leave your suffering, and celebrate this day.
That is meaning in the hours...