Wild Words: Ferociously Nourishing Poetry

The Worst Thing

9/11/2022

Photo by Harper Kendall/IG

The worst thing we ever did
was put God in the sky
out of reach pulling the divinity
from the leaf,
sifting out the holy from our bones,
insisting God isn’t bursting dazzlement
through everything we’ve made
a hard commitment to see as ordinary,
stripping the sacred from everywhere
to put in a cloud man elsewhere,
prying closeness from your heart.

The worst thing we ever did
was take the dance and the song
out of prayer
made it sit up straight
and cross its legs
removed it of rejoicing
wiped clean its hip sway,
its questions,
its ecstatic yowl,
its tears.

The worst thing we ever did is pretend
God isn’t the easiest thing
in this Universe
available to every soul
in every breath.

- Chelan Harkin

i thank You God for most this amazing, for Summer Solstice

6/19/2022

Dancing Tree Spirits by annie b.

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings;and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any—lifted from the no
of all nothing—human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

- e.e. cummings

O Sweet Spontaneous

4/24/2022

O sweet spontaneous
earth how often have
the
doting

             fingers of
prurient philosophers pinched
and
poked

thee
,has the naughty thumb
of science prodded
thy

        beauty      how
often have religions taken
thee upon their scraggy knees
squeezing and

buffeting thee that thou mightest conceive
gods
         (but
true

to the incomparable
couch of death thy
rhythmic
lover

             thou answerest

them only with

                              spring)

- e.e. cummings

Love Song

4/17/2022

Paintings by Jessica Watts

I hear other names for You – The Inviolable One,
God, Allah, Wakantanka, Higher Power,
The Ineffable. But why bother,
when You call to me by no name at all and I come.

Neither of us have a word for each other
save Us.
And even that is nobody’s business
but Ours.

So let’s forget such partitions as names
and discuss this April day within,
which captures birds in flight
and all their eggs and songs
in one straight deed of liberation.

The mighty have fallen around this peace.
But let’s not get into that, when every moment
is roses, and the scent You give off tastes
in my nose like Now.
Like Forever. Like Now.

All I want from You is nothing.
Peace is a dance, after all.
Peace moves. Peace laughs.
And Peace’s discussion is boughs of trees,
light, carriages, actors at their bent,
bravery in and out of action,
for after all, what, what, what
in this world is possibly not roses?

- Bruce Moody

We Live to be Near Her

2/6/2022

Painting by Cindy Wood
www.cindywoodart.com

When beauty walks into the room and sits
down close to you and is willing to let you
gaze at her as much as you want,

no one has to tell you all is alright now, no
one has to parrot again . . . someday your pain
won't exist.

For we live to be near her. She oozes grace.
Part of her benediction is that all the hormones
you want to come alive do.

Passion in full throttle says to the past, says to
worries--go fuck yourself, and the past will
crouch down or run . . . like a pup in the
presence of a fierce dog.

When God makes itself more known and all
our attention rivets on some aspect of Splendor,

all our internal dialogue--what can it do, but
cease to deplete one,

then something lifts our heart toward the Sky.

- Hafiz, trans. by Daniel Ladinsky

The Scripture of Circle

1/30/2022

Female Strength by Helena Arturaleza Schotman

There is no refuge
No destination
No resolution
Only This

Blessed are the fruit of my womb
Blessed are the cycles that have no end
Blessed is the Wound
Blessed is the Hole

Blessed is the space that holds you always
Blessed is this unfinished life
Blessed is the eternal and unchanging
Blessed are we who bear the unbearable
who carry our cross from first to last breath

Blessed are we who know the relentless mercy of the
Mysterious Other
known only when we sacrifice our reaching

There is no refuge
No destination
No resolution
Only This

To you who are the Birther of Samsara
and the doorway to Nirvana
To you whose Love
is the bridge that flows between them
To you who holds the mirror of perfection
inside the crack of imperfection
whose Road leads nowhere and is everywhere

To you whose breast is the refuge of no refuge
To you whose passion dissolves all ignorance
and whose innocence reveals unstained beauty

Enveloped by your Grace
With nowhere to go
Around and around
Heart to the Ground

Here
I
am

-Maya Luna

Everything I Have is Also Yours

12/26/2021

The World. Painting by Shauna Crandall

There are so many gifts still unopened from your
birthday. There are so many hand-crafted presents
that have been sent to your door by God.

The Beloved does not mind repeating, "Everything I
have is also yours."

So forgive Hafiz and the Friend if we break into a
sweet laughter when your heart complains of being
thirsty . . . when ages ago, every cell in your
body capsized forever into His infinite golden sea.

A lover's pain is like holding one's breath too long
in the middle of a vital performance, in the middle
of one of Creation's favorite songs.

Indeed, a lover's pain is this sleeping, this sleeping
when God just rolled over and gave you such a big
good-morning smooch.

There are so many gifts still unopened from your
soul's birthday. There are so many hand-crafted
presents that have been sent into your life by God.

And the Beloved does not mind at all repeating,

"Everything I have is also yours."

- Hafiz, trans. by Daniel Ladinsky

Tethered

12/12/2021

Huangshan, China. Photo by Maria Hernandez Gamarra.

The other day, our grandbaby Skipper
held on to her brother Mack, uncertain
of anyone less familiar, held on

like a weasel to her prey,
her teeth sunk into his shoulder,
reminiscent of a burdock seed on a sock

or a limpet on a rock--how
desperately I hold on
to what I'm already held by--tethered

like wave to water, sand grain to
beach, breath to air, held
by arms I can never

fall out of, and still, I cling
to the cliff, as if the ground
weren't what my feet are made of.

- Chuck Madansky

Holy Fire

11/7/2021

Painting by Erica Grimm Vance

Slow down....inside
I am right here
I am not where you are going
I am the place you leave to find me

I am Holy Fire
Do you trust me?

I am the One who makes your heart beat
and every heart beat
I am the Portal to the indescribable flame within you
I am every longing you have ever felt
and every passion you have ever suppressed

I am Aliveness
Open
Allow
Be danced
Do you trust me?

If you want to know bliss
to feel passion burn
You must become available
to be astonished and amazed
by the simplest things

Notice the way when you wiggle your toes
a tendril of joy quietly sprouts inside your chest

Notice how you can run your fingertips
on the edges of your skin
and rivers of desire become instantly fulfilled

You can take one single breath
and watch your body explode in gratitude for living

Then you can exhale and melt into the Great Fire
of life's fertile emptiness

You are the Portal

It costs nothing....except
everything you have ever dreamed you are

Your dissatisfaction is a dream
Your disappointment is a dream

I am right here
I have always been right here
It really is this innocent
Savor me
Enter me
Ignite

- a compilation of poetry excerpts by Maya Luna

Enlightenment is a Gamble

10/3/2021

Time to cash in your chips
put your ideas and beliefs on the table.
See who has the bigger hand
you or the Mystery that pervades you.

Time to scrape the mind's shit
off your shoes
undo the laces
that hold your prison together
and dangle your toes into emptiness.

Once you've put everything
on the table
once all of your currency is gone
and your pockets are full of air
all you've got left to gamble with
is yourself.

Go ahead, climb up onto the velvet top
of the highest stakes table.
Place yourself as the bet.
Look God in the eyes
and finally
for once in your life
lose.

- Adyashanti

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