The Divine power
Lifts the supple clay,
To mold His image,
To imprint Her likeness.
The Divine breath
Enters the human shape,
Calls it to life.
The potter’s hands
Explore a lump of clay,
Stroke, press in
The hollow of the vessel,
Form the plump lip,
Extend the graceful neck.
The artist dips the brush
Now into paint, now into water.
An image blossoms:
Ocher and sienna blend;
The colors thicken —
Shadows outline the round rim,
The colors thin —
Light curves down the glazed flank.
You
Lift the clay jar,
Gaze at the painting,
Read these lines,
You
Have the power
To breathe into a creation
Awareness, thought, meaning,
Life.
It is possible to escape,
To hide from the darkness:
Squeeze your eyes shut,
Press hard on the eyelids.
Circles of phantom fire
Will blaze in front of your staring pupils.
Let us trade: I would barter
My past, my memory,
For a handful of stars,
For the dimmest of constellations…
But you drive a hard bargain
By simply refusing to exist.
In a blind rage
I splinter my heart into kindling,
Pour gasoline,
Set the whole mess aflame,
Watch as it burns to ashes.
But it keeps on beating,
It keeps on beating in the darkness.
There is nothing to do but sit.
Stare into the void.
Read the blanks on the empty page,
Over and over,
Till they form a pattern,
Till the repetition yields a meaning:
“Let there be darkness, for there is.”
There is darkness.
There is darkness.
There is darkness.
All there is, is darkness.
Until slowly, slowly
Contours form,
A faint outline emerges:
“Let there also be light.”
we create a thin veneer of simplicity and predictability
over terrifyingly unmanageable chaos
and call it reality.
Anastasya Shepherd
We call it reality
And consider the matter settled,
So we can turn our attention to
Making sandwiches for the school lunchbox,
Submitting the quarterly forecast report,
Walking the dog,
Writing the thank you note.
At least, that is how it is
For some of us,
Some of the time.
We collect data about it,
Quantify the uncertainty
Of our measurements,
Publish papers in academic journals.
We put ironic quotation marks
Around its edges,
Take selfies.
We blaze with anger about what it is,
Emblazon on our banners
What we want it to be.
We split into tribes, go to war,
Mangle and kill each other
Under the pretext
That there is one right way,
One right answer to every question
About the definition
Of a pin, a dance, an angel;
About the way to count how many…
We beat our heads against it,
Search for the path, the mantra, the koan,
