prisoner

today I am your prisoner:
bound and gagged.

today

yesterday,
besieged on all sides,
I attempted escape.
today lao tzu suggested surrender.
finally, finally, fool of a man!

there is only darkness still
but your voice is as unequivocal as it is hidden:
the darkness will thicken, you say.
blinded, how can I walk?
you must be my eyes.

this way cannot be a way of knowledge:
today's treasure is only tomorrow's unbearable burden

belonging

sometimes I think I belong when I don't.
sometimes I think I don't belong when I do.
sometimes I know that I belong.
mostly I just hope that I do.
[but what of the days when I walk away?]

despite my bids for independence,
the search is for the real home;
where I really belong;
not the pit-stops I cling to along the road.
but the place where I can say we
with a resounding, heartfelt joy

I did know this - from day one
not even knowing that I knew.
and even when life has laid it bare,
[as it often has]
I still forget, or would rather forget,
'it's now or never!' I say.
'what use is tomorrow's home today?'

falling in love has been a better forgetting,
when hope surges again:
this time! ! I cry.
though it dies as certainly as I myself will die,
yet each love is a pale reflection of truth.
furiously I fan the flames
until finally falls the rain.

this makes me sad only because I am looking upside down.
each love: a mirror.
darkly maybe,
but my best glimpse of you for many a year!
manna for a decade.

to see aright I must learn to balance on my head.

reincarnation

surely, this is another way
of coping with the problem of diversity

another problem with music

the temptation of the singer
is to drown out the birds.

mozart gets round this
by inscribing his music
into silence

bach dances daintily over the surface
beethoven pokes holes in it
and brahms swims about
rather slowly;
his beard like grey seaweed

the temptation

each of us have our own solutions to world problems:
from starvation, through war, to law and order.
but the real temptation comes
when, like oliver cromwell, or hezekiah,
we find ourselves in a position to act upon them.

mr dawkins' complaint about the god of the old testament
stems from the jewish belief in a political god.
he has made a covenant with the jewish people:
if they follow the law handed down by moses
and keep to his ways
he sustains the nation and wins them great victories.
if the nation suffers, it is because the people have fallen away.
this is the message of the history books and the prophets too.
however
running right through the old testament is a subtext.
job, the psalmists, and the prophets point beyond this tidy simplicity
toward another truth

the iscariot, judas, sought political freedom for the nation that he loved.
but jeheshua's kingdom of god is not the jewish nation.
jeheshua does not proclaim the tidy simplicity.
he proclaims instead the subtext.
[the christian might say that he was the subtext]*
and so it was judas who felt betrayed, not the other way round.

but mr dawkins could complain just as bitterly about the christian god
(I am sure that he does).
those who wield power rarely quibble over how they maintain it.
from the conversion of constantine to the reformation of henry viii
the temptation remains the same:
to fall back on the tidy simplicity of the old testament god:
the god who leads the nation to great victories.
I see oliver cromwell scouring his bible for help
but because the help that he seeks is justification for his own actions
that is what he finds, whether or no he does it in the name of christ.
the temptation of all who wield power is to use god to further their own ends.
and because we all seek power, control, security: call it what you will
we shouldn't be surprised when we fall over you;
our real beginning is hidden in our undoing.

*the stumbling block becomes the corner stone

three things

re: mr dawkins:
reading the old testament
is like panning for gold:
tiny specks of infinite value
amongst the sand and mud.

solomon asks;
will God really live with men on earth?
and earlier:
there was nothing in the ark but the two tablets
[2 chronicles]

re: reforming zeal
this is ok for some;
for my part, I must remember the plank and the splinter
for the moment at least.

might it be true to say:
those who live by reform, die by reform?

richard dawkins

yesterday, I put up a quote by richard dawkins
in which he describes the god of the old testament as
'arguably the most unattractive character in fiction'.
that was the polite bit. *
I was hoping to counter at least some of his accusations.
and it is distressing to find it so difficult.
so I took the quote down, not (I hope) because I couldn't counter it,
(I admit that I cannot)
but because, while there is truth in some of what he says,
it proved too difficult to sift out the reasonable from the rant.
but why the rant at all?
how is it possible to harbour such emotion
for a figure in which one has no belief?

keep silence you say

*(the applause is eery)

oliver cromwell

the old testament theology of oliver cromwell:
from the drawing of lots to ethnic-cleansing.
he also seems to prefer jews to catholics
and like many a good jewish king
his favourite pastime: the smashing of idols.

the ancient gods of the pentateuch
[baal, milcom and co]
become the demons of chronicles and beyond.

the ancient gods of the western world -
absorbed so gently by the early christian church -
are laid bare at the reformation
and wilfully uprooted in a frenzy of fire and destruction.

heavy seas

at almost every line today
I hit another wave.
remembered failures pile up
to batter me again.
of successes I see not a one
but surely,
there have been some
haven't there?

your answer
firm, unhesitating.
success and failure
the wrong way of measuring!

not really what I wanted to hear.
I was happy to wallow
like a sad hippopotamus

take up thy bed and walk

music

singing to you helps me jump high hurdles
but when the voice is too croaky and ugly
saying is enough.
yes and sometimes the singing stops me hearing.

when travelling, a full orchestra becomes a heavy load
and the symphony bars my way.

someone said

the key is the 'will'.
maybe, except that the key is something you gave me.
pure gift then.
all I have to do is put it in the door,
turn,
and push.
the things that prevent me?
fear of what's behind the door;
the desire to stay where I am. . . . . .

the longer I stay,
the harder it is to move on.
but it's essential not to get left behind;
then I really am on my own!

I think there might be glue on my bum

manna

the first room:
crowded with speculators.
but on the other side of the locked door:
a quieter place.

so do not wait for the speculation
to carry you through the wall:
you will wait for ever!

go to the door and use the key.
there we will sit and, maybe,
eat.

tools

lying in bed last night:
doubts, imaginings, inferences,
conclusions, connections, reasons:
a tangled undergrowth,
clawing at body, legs, ankles.
the only way forward is to use a machete*
boldly.
it isn't a question of blocking my ears and singing tra-la-la;
it needs to be more focussed than that.

the space where I thought you were;
you still are.
this I know
the word 'nada': a mantra in my mind:
nothingness
hideous to me at the moment;
but look at it! look at it! you say.
nothingness: no-thing-ness.
don't confuse this with death!
the opposite is true!
meanwhile the only life I know:
an anchor tied to my feet.

one way forward
you have the key you say.
the key, the key - another mantra -
how many doors can there be?!
don't worry about the doors:
the doors are not to be looked at,
or admired
or pondered upon
or painted
or counted
or even touched;
the doors are there to be opened.

it's unhappy me searching again for the happiness of we:

* the two-eged sword?

doubt

'hope against hope' they say
but don't they really mean 'hope against despair'?

I fiddle repeatedly with my own tiny word order
as if my life depended on it
but why?
writing out the ugliness?
or scouring the inadequate randomness of my thoughts
in search of a more elusive truth?
perhaps, because of my very average intelligence,
real truth is so far beyond my understanding
that silent acquiescence really would be the better option.

and having read that last a few times to let it sink in
isn't it the same with my music also?
and with my piano playing too come to think of it
yes I could play . . . sort of.
I made sounds
but did I ever really make music?
and I composed sounds too
but did I ever compose music?
will I ever know?
does it matter?

irrelevance

the hardest lesson of all:
my smallness drives me to the edge.

but this is the key you say [so gently].
your smile is indulgent and infuriating

I chuck the key
and stomp off.
easy for you to say

but I notice the shrug of your shoulders
and yearn.
I know, I know
there is my own mossy gravestone

so death and life. which comes first?
there is only one and the other.
[something I cannot tidy away]
so say yes and be brave.

your hand is firm on my shoulder
look at the grave you say,
pressing the warm key into the palm of my hand
look at the grave.

something bangs upstairs.
I go to check.
the stairs are dark and cold;
like a tomb.

the tomb is empty

music

the piano distorts
at best: vapid cliche.
a dried-up stream

but this week: tell-tale pains:
green shoots emerge;
are these just weeds?

sing psalms yes
sing
but horns, trumpets, timbrels?

your silent music sang;
my contrived mechanics drown you out
banging away, how can I hear?

chicken and egg

what comes first: the thought or the words?
it's clear enough that one forms out of the other.

the likely truth: there is no first;*
there is only one and the other.

*and the first shall be last

truth

it would be so much easier if the Truth were a single point.
like that neat millisecond before the big bang.
[we like things tidy you see.]
unfortunately [for those of us who prefer packages],
Truth includes the totality of everything that followed.*
being a part of it, (and a tiny one at that) how can we encompass it?

somehow we keep our balance, walking gingerly amongst the debris

*as it was, is now and ever shall be

hypocrisy

we play at being your friends:
saying nice things and currying favour.
in our hearts we become your bitterest rivals
we fawn,
and plot to steal your throne.
love?
we talk about it with simpering voices
but all that is left to us now is power

focusing upon the sorry truth
sheds a helpful light.
you guide me out

phew

in your absence even our prayers become threats

darkness

I mustn't over-complicate this
but today I see things differently.
I certainly recognise this darkness:
this Somme-like place of death:
it seems real enough.
real enough to make me want to run like hell.
I've certainly done that before.

but before I do that I need to remember one thing:
if I run I can only run backwards
searching for another silly picnic.
ok so I have to stay here a while
but these things that loom out of the darkness:
I know they cannot hurt me (they never did before.)
in this make-belief battlefield
I have only to sit and wait for morning
[mourning]
and . . . . for you . . . . . . . . . . .
only . . . . . . . .
don't be long . . . .

picnic

yesterday I stopped for a picnic on a grassy knoll
today: mud where grass was
you left me behind

progress

starting at a and moving toward b,
I follow my progress on a map,
a smooth, steady line:
soon I will arrive.

my life with you is nothing like this.
we talk progress and make none.
we talk journey and stay still.
we talk growing and shrink,
we talk closeness and know distance.
we talk love and know indifference.

the reason is simple.
you said it yourself:
'my ways are not your ways' you said.
though I can't help wishing it were not so

priests

could it be that we are all priests
and yet none of us are?

when moses' arms grew tired
his followers helped.

nomads

we are nomads
and the journey is everything
so don't get too comfortable.

but to be a true nomad
stay put if you can

you offer me the text.
join in! you say

dreams

last night I examined an old diary.
on waking this morning, embarrassing memories
file up out of my dreams
and accuse me one by one.
pleading guilty on all counts
I wallow for a while.
the same temptation:
'there is no help in you'.

there are no guarantees
and no going back.
remember: this cannot be about the future;
(that's in your hands)
only about the now.
(still partly in mine)