I’ll Write

All my old accounts 
Of which they do amount;
There’s Instagram, Facebook, 
Snapchat in their rounds;
They’re really odes since been
To honour an old teen.
But now my consciousness 
Takes a liking to WordPress,
And since pressed into focus 
(And writing deeply from my locus),
I find there’s much more meaning 
Which I long to uncover,
A personal breach 
From this side of Of a Lover.
I ditched the clubbing-dress
And the pictures like fishing nets,
Which sought of the attainment
Of that which was not so blessed:
The one thing on all poor youthly mind,
Which does become an easily forgivable ‘crime’.
But these days, if I want to make use of some time,
To happily be led
For the sake of the poem,
And for nothing else thus fed,
Where I can tap my foot, 
Where I can take a flight
To honour breath, honour life
In imaginative sight…
I’ll write. 

A Scottish Purist

In a Scottish hostel in winter blizzards
A man was sat in amongst some listeners
To pick and philosophise thoughts close to him
And bring his evidence to all who cared.
Luckily, he was in a good place 
And thus this is what he spake:

“What have you produced?
What have you created first hand?”
And the room fell silent to his demands
Because, yes, who'd ask such questions as these?
Questions, not from someone dissatisfied... Surely not?
Questions? Questions? Which did not aim to please?
Can't trust those,
Goes against the code!
And his tone of voice
Was shockingly real
Almost urgent 
In the night so still,
That great cloak of ignorance,
Grinding our worries
In its day-time mill. 
He took many off guard 
For many sweet sleepers awoke
As he penetrated through 
This poor targeted folk.
The elephant in the room
Started to wear a tinfoil hat,
And people started to shift
On their sweet cushioned hips.
So he asked again, 
“What have you produced?
What have you created first hand?"
I, too, rallied through 
My poor excuses,
Black and blue...
I wanted to say, 'Love!'
Or my wine-box guitar,
But I knew he meant 
A different kind of rub...
Something independant 
Something ingenius,
That'd be too proud
And reluctant 
To pay taxes.
Preparing to speak 
Like a quivering leaf
But who's gonna get you?
The thought-police?
A young girl intervened,
It seemed just for me.
"What you ask of us is generalised."
"Generalised to what?" He replied,
"Simpler times?"
"Are you an idealist?
Can you walk the walk?
Maybe its best if you didn't talk.
Look at Musk, 
Where's he gotten us?
Is that what you mean 
As you try wring us clean?
What can we do
In this day and age,
When everywhere we look
Is a concluded page?"
"Break it", he said.
"What, reinvent the wheel?"
"Exactly not that,
Seek an appeal."
At this point
The elephant cleared right off,
Our debate was well and truly
At lift-off!
But I liked the girl
And her tone of voice,
There was something in it 
Wise and alluring;
More warming.
She had a point, too,
Be it a time for snoring!
"Lay fast asleep to the consumerist plots,
And while they're there,
Don't bend to their stocks,
But I have to say,
It'd be rude to not eat.
Blessings, 'tis a time so blessed.
And as for new and esteemed
Production, don't create more!
Seek an undoing,
The last thing we need 
Is more gluing!
Allow it to unbother us,
As long as we've had our luncheon!""
"Bravo, I say, much obliged,
Dear gal.
I often wonder, myself 
If it's better to whine.
Go without this,
Go without that,
Then we'd have to produce
From scratch." 
I nodded to him, 
For this was his point.
"After all,
We're very capable.
Look what we've created,
Far more than our staple!"
And to this he nodded back,
"Ye're right! Ye're right,
But what I meant was 
Produce... produce—
Yet with ye own might!"
"Ah, now that's a different story
For us to lift a finger
In all this glory?
What's the point?
That age has gone, 
And that age will come back along.
For now, allow
This time of confusion,
The globlists to dream their delusion
It will be upturned 
By my gal's sweet voice,
And the thundering echoes
And the shattering brooks,
In which everything will have no choice.
Submission, submission,
The sun will crash down
On all who frown
To what you believe 
For 'tis worthy, 'tis worthy
What you speak of, friend. 
Don't get me wrong, 
Dear Scot, you're very bright
About pure production 
And our own sight,
There's nothing scarier than
What's happening now
And you are brave to bring it 
Here and now."
"Aye, climate change, 
'Tis a big fat phoney.
They've got us all grabbed
By the short and curly.
That's what I mean, 
About production, clean.
Not this conceit 
We are forced to believe."
I turned to my gal,
She looked my way,
I said, "Gee, isn't it nice,
To have purists 
In our day."

Shortchange

“How is Uni?”

“Uni is … manageable. But only just.”

“Awe.”

“Not having lectures anymore really blows.”

“No lectures?”

“There still are. But I am not one to sit in front of a computer for 1 hour listening to a lecturer. The rate of attendance, engagement, must be really low. Uni’s just focused on assessment now. Hardly anyone regularly shows up to tutorials — it’s taken a real dive.”

“When I was at Uni we had packed lectures and tutes! That’s very slack of them not to provide a live learning option.”

“Yeah… In all of those illustrious auditoriums.”

“What a waste.”

“Ever since covid.”

“Yeah…”

“I feel for the professors also. It’s not just a student issue.”

“For sure!”

“Imagine having a PhD and having to talk all your knowledge into a screen.”

“Would take so much of the joy out.”

“Yes… Absolutely. Uni has turned into an industrious do-your-degree-as-quick-as-you-can kind of place.”

“The end days of capitalism.”

“You’re right. Though a new sun is rising. The extra-curricula activites have snapped back their response to it all. Get this, I’m in a Kali Yuga group, a Tibetan Meditation group, and I’ve even had free pizza distributed in the good name of the Lord.”

“We never had meditation nights when I was at Uni. Oh and of Kali Yuga, more to the point.”

“This age will have capitalism crumble in its own way. Maybe it will even crumble with grace, through just a pure acceptance of the wrongdoings. That would be best.”

“Yeah. Big winds coming.”

“You’d hope it would crumble with grace… You’d hope…”

Drawn In Hiatus

Relativism beseeched my on-time entry
Into the theatre with my ears' gentry.
"Typical," I exclaimed, inwardly resounding
Booms of opinions in my head.
Comparing something to something else
To prove a point is nuance, but so very uninspiring.
Faces around say 'captain obvious' 
With bleak or next to no expression,
Copping coherencies from point A to B,
Interlinked in a hiatus plea,
To an already well-known idea!
And I wondered, after deflation, then inflation:
"Is the skill of being able to string information, 
To knit a pretty little vest, self-indulgent? 
One so tight it does not allow breath?"
Little bubbles, word-bubbles floating around
The orator, as he shuts his eyes, float only around him.

Between Man and Woman

To feel excited again, 
Though not with heat,
But light, at the steady transaction
Of offering glances, words, 
Between man and woman. 
The need and desire 
To work oneself up to this interplay, 
For it feeds the soul, 
And even to it the mind bows. 
Yet the soul is unfed when only the mind 
Finds its lonesome self amidst such an interaction;
So eager the mind is at thrusting forth insecurities,
Or a false sense of security,
All without the consent
Of the quivering person 
Hunched over or chest-pouted in their attempt.
And uncomfortable shifts,
Trying to manage the soul’s yearning,
As vitality and intrigue become blocked out
With shades of moments in the safety nets of,
‘I don’t deserve this’
‘I’ve fallen prey before’
And always on the back foot,
Unconsciously yet indefinitely 
Compromising to leave less room for life.
Though this is a sure pointer of how one spends 
Time on their own, obviously something
Incurring some guilt—some disappointment 
Of one’s own behaviour, or lack of,
Or expectancies too high to reach,
Or just the damn convenience of this age 
Proving too much in all its materiality 
For the person yet to divorce it,
As such materiality is so foreign to the self,
For never before has it been 
So bombarded with how time’s spent,
And the simple means of being inside on a rainy day 
Are simply no more, with leads now a screen away
To being greeted with literally any image
So easy to credit as more important 
Than even our immediate reality,
And we don’t even know we do it.
And so much different to a book,
For by the words on the page 
We co-create, but an image on a screen 
Is a served-up plate by which we’re forced to consume.
Use the mind, but by all means 
Don’t let it use you and spend up all 
Your urges while your healthy craving
For interaction becomes satiated digitally 
And unnaturally, making the natural
And analogue world feel too awkward and real. 
You must grow a harvest in your breast 
Of true worth for the sake of yourself,
So when you greet the pavement your interactions are
Not mere guesswork, but have passion
And purpose, and mystery after,
As not so much as mystery before, 
For unfounded mystery can be a false I.D., 
Used for protection against vulnerability. 
This vulnerability we seek to soothe
By gratification in the pull of media;
Social media as just being an unhinged
Morphed form of old televised media, 
Only less controlled, and I don’t even know 
Which one’s better, maybe even the latter.
Be fed on your own weaknesses, 
And abhor all cheap, external stimuli 
For your weaknesses in comparison
Are of something undiluted and pure,
Something as tangible 
As a knock on your door.

Discrimination’s Fine Inventory

Pexels.com

Don't give up hope while you start to see
That which you notice and is free:
When you read yourself, you'll read others
To match your values and your answers.
What you weigh and hold dear
Will be reflected in those who're near.
And if not, well, well and good—
It seems you’ve moved on from that look!
Practicing discretion is a near necessity,
So you won't be projected as an opposing adversary,
For this really is not some ill-polarity,
But is of discrimination's fine inventory.
After all, who you see
May only be where you've once been,
So give a smile — don't be vile!
Then you'll go the extra mile.
Wipe all smirks, don some dirt!
Then the other will see Real mirth.
Do all this without a care,
Without splitting a single hair.
Then such chimes, you'll pass to life
And before anyone, you'll see them, bright.

Frailty’s Prayer

I was submitted to the scheme
Where past-karma had me tailing,
To lead me down a path so free
Fit like a glove, or the dawn of spring!
And I waltzed so sadly in...
80% unconscious, 20% knowing
That some divine act was bestowing;
And what was left? No parts of me—
Only Frailty's prayer of the need to sing,
As the need runs great in all being,
And silent questions find answering.
So I met some souls I've ne'er forgot
And I also met me, and my lot;
It was a time so generous,
To assess these masks
I wanted off.
A time so serendipitous,
And for all its worth, there was no cost.
But you did need to work on your own private project,
So under the ferment of music-man,
I was really unravelling through inspired hands
What it took to make a peace 
From my frantic, rushing, youthful speed.
And mornings like these—some years now passed,
I still think and pick up the past
And how it did lead me from dark—
I see myself, still admiring the roses,
Chatting with Raphael in honest poses,
Walking out to fields and churches
By country lanes and woods' enclosures.
And what music! None in my ear
But celestial murmurs holding me near;
And what composure! But only just 
For scraping back layers of fear,
Through dreams of fear and concerned faces,
Yet all so friendly, as time, they knew
Was not to be wasted.
And working through the unconscious
To re-emerge back to self,
And learning to appreciate the haze.
This place had impact, you can see
It's still written on my face,
And who have I to thank but God
Who saw into my plight,
And placed me somewhere that I would like.
Whether it was He, or whether it was me,
He still approved it while I was weak,
And did not have the grounding,
Or the urge to speak.
So He had me surrounded
In a residency,
In the French country, especially. 

Learning: Theoretical vs. Experiential

Does the human make ‘seemingly’ accidental blunders in order to become affected by them, so to promote and agree upon a higher learning? To make a blunder unconsciously, in order to become affected consciously I think is for those introspective people whom hold self-inquiry so dear, and above all other learning. Such people never take anyone as seriously as they take themselves. So, does this kind of person do these kinds of things on purpose—do they let slip for a burning catalyst toward improvement? Absolutely.

This is what I’d call learning through experience. We can only ever experience ourselves and even experience others, through ourselves. Hence this type of learning is and must be, self-directive. Intimately, only we know our secret privies, attachments and disapointments in life, though the nature of that introspection may not always be kind, with time, does usher one along to Knowledge and emancipation from the old dreary deed, or sets of, or from what was just plain unfortunate. We are continuously faced with a decision in this regard, and however hard it is to accept initially, the overcoming is great as you take yourself forward. Very few do not take this route of, well let’s call it what it is, Love. It’s irrestible and the accepting of one’s own self as being foolish is too beautiful to describe, and it’s happening on so many levels, everywhere.

I propse there are two types of living by learning: this actual kind, self-inquirying, innately progressing; and a theoretical kind, which makes a mere shadow of life in comparison. The theoretical is attempting to live and learn by something outside of you, and I have come to know this through a real-life example. I’m studying to be a teacher, and generally, my teaching preparation seeks to even, dare I say, ignore the self, and favour theory.

In studying teaching, we love theory, worship it nearly; however I prefer experience. And you could say, theory is developed after experience, yes; but it is not our experience, and how do we know if it has not been manipulated, and how can we trust it if it has not come from us? In a sense, depriving the greatness of experiencing for ourselves, by ourselves. And upon observation, when I look around the room, it feels like deep down we know it, and upon reflection with myself, I definitely know it.

Theory is not entirely bad, however, for it offers reflection upon itself; it leads one to introspection and opinion; yet, going back to my position of academia, when we are not graded or even allowed to have an opinion, that’s when I bite my nails and churn over its worth. Theory without reflection is ephemeral, for reflection on theory gives it substance and even its own occurance. It is the actual that responds, yet the theoretical in itself does not, unless our attention is funnelled into it. We are in charge of the actual, only nowadays you can only so hope. For this reliance on theory is positioning us farther and farther away from managing our own actualness, almost to the point of our immediate agreeing, and if we don’t have some kind of reference point as which seems now is a necessity to equate a meaning, what is our meaning? By associating with that which is not our own, then do we trade it, give ourselves and our meaning away? Are we afraid of who we are, or just lazy?

Our meaning, without any interference from the esteemed, unmet other, would be a pure, undiluted breath of relief — and your breath, at that. For the audience, at beck and call of the self-realized or self-realizing, would not have to adjust to something outside of you, but only experience that which is you. Shamanism comes to mind; shamans are channellers of things which are beyond normal planes, yet which are all present within us, for how else would we know of them? Because our selves, being capable of housing everything, are capable of also housing the divine, that same divine which intervenes at every moment in its carefully suited shades, each to our own capacities; is there truly any better teacher? Yet how can it luminate if we cling to constructs, mere templates which in no way present themselves to metaphysics?

This theory type excuses itself of life being very real and useful and joyful, and I sometimes feel, that yes, in the actual, the limits of what we perceive as fair are pushed to extremes, but that fairness is only seeking new territory, to make us a better understanding human being. To come to know ourselves better is the agreement. It’s a kind of deal, but the limits of our own relationship we have with ourselves ultimately seek a larger moral ground, otherwise fairness would be out of the equation, for we are all equal and deserving. Given that, the subject is always the outcome to best suit humanity at large.

Bias Only Exists In the World of Representations

There is something so fine about a mind
That does not count on representations;
A mind which seeks its own representing
By the appreciate miracle of its bare existence. 
The mind is very capable of ensuing 
Independent ideas by its own moral code, 
Or The Moral Code of Everything. 
Coded to, which the mind may be inescapably
Or irrelevantly bias, depending on point of view,
Has now sufficient and useful judgement,
Even of its own nature; capable of say, jeopardising 
Its own pride, for such a growth
Led by intuitive knowing, often symbolized 
& recognized as real, tangible conviction,
A tangible thread to the rest of the fabric.
The fabric of the Universe also being made of such.
It is as natural, then, for such a constant to go unnoticed, 
As it’s as natural as always having been there,
Since always feeding into our consciences,
A thread of deep Benevolence.
Anything else mortal runs a risk of obstructing,
Or at best, may serve to point back to this innateness. 
It is as that saying goes, “his intentions are pure”,
Meaning, the stream of reason is natural. 
Those who cling to representations 
Fall prey to some foul adjustment, 
Which play second fiddle to their ear, 
Corrupting that innate wisdom, since near.

Fructose

“Swamp Legend (1919) Paul Klee“/ CC0 1.0

Dare I say it? Aye! I shall—
A closure dawns—a curtain calls...
There are no dreams of you left;
The last dream-fruits were squeezed and drunk,
But as for no hunch, so no action;
Entertained that as much as I could,
Until roadblocks infront of me stood;
No matter how I admired the fruit,
Some are best left just to look. 
New life now awaits me,
I've made space for it so to place me.
But I'm no spring chicken,
No dandy doe.
I have lived and I have loved.
And though it might have made me slow,
May I be quick to what I know.