To better understand the following poem, it may be helpful to read (or re-read) my blogs that immediately precede this one.
From the poet Wallace Stevens:
Theory
I am what is around me.
Women understand this.
One is not duchess
A hundred yards from a carriage.
These, then are portraits:
A black vestibule;
A high bed sheltered by curtains.
These are merely instances.
kindness
one coherent star shines
and
upon waking
a pillow goes far beyond dreams
wisely asking:
Am(eye separate)from everyone eye
see?
Am eye them in different forms?
eye had thought that(eye was separate)
but that separation came from
a flawed teaching(that
thought of itself as
greatly separate)
while not perceiving that it was
of a larger whole
Separation can cheat a kind man and
will mock the handicapped
Separation can have achieved good grades
and can have
learned the
crude lessons well
Unless one merely remains with the crudity
lessons are for transcending and joyfully discarding
thus flying love
beyond the isolated cadaverous walls of
self
that enclose
(in dark)
while grounded
All others are you.
Much of what we do involves motive. Our reactions, throughout the day, largely emanate from motives. Oftentimes these motives are learned (i.e., absorbed) habitual responses, and the end-products (that they unfold into) usually are rather mundane and ordinary. The ramifications of this tend to be conformity, sameness, and a lack of real perception and real creativity.
Such sameness and conformity may not at all be beneficial for life as a whole. Superficial motives often keep one in stagnation, while imitating others. Such habitual motives are a form of inaction and are a wastage of energy. Beliefs stem from motives, and beliefs (with their separative groups) tend to cause division in the world.
The innocent/wise mind, throughout the day, can often look without mere motive. Such looking, such perception, is uncontaminated, whole, and pristine. Seeing beyond the ordinary, it flowers in insights and depth not merely dependent upon direction. Mere motive always has a direction. Such direction corrupts. Only what is beyond direction and motive can, perhaps, commune with the timeless, the immeasurable whole.
They scramble and they gamble
and they weep and they run
They wiggle and giggle
and they tan toast in sun
They piddle and paddle…
pull dandelions from fresh grass
and waddle and dawdle
and fish for striped bass
They fumble and they tumble
and they struggle in time
They chisel and they grizzle
and they wrote this short rhyme
When we two
met
it was the most
enchanting, beautiful thing
and it still is
We were destined to be
togetheryou
see
Torenia Summer Wave Violet … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
The shadow of my wing
unfolds as a very curious thing
reading this to the very end
The Shadow of the Dragon’s Wing… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
The separation of the inner from the outer involves standard perception which largely involves misperception and barbaric acceptances. Such misperception involves conflict, separation, isolation, and distinct borders. A prudent entity who intelligently transcends mere inner-outer frameworks of perception is not a dull mind that walks into walls or that steps into busy traffic. Rather, such a person exists beyond old and cadaverous viewpoints and worn-out, primitive perspectives. Only such a person can be of real order; only such a person can be fully genuine, deeply compassionate, and of vast integrity and virtue. (By the way, idealistically saying that one is “one with nature,” which is all the fashion these days, is not it! A limited, fragmented mind can easily identify itself with anything, but it still remains a fragmented mind.)
Thought and stored memory feed the separation of the inner from the outer. Too many of us worship a false inner and are indifferent about the vast outer. A separate perceiver cannot be the complete understanding of the whole as long as the fragmentary self-projected images and thoughts of an isolated, independent observer are maintained via learned effort. Any state of opposition, such as what a concocted, separate “0bserver” brings about, further nourishes indifference and isolation. Thoughts and “image making” form the perceiver, and without thoughts and mental images, without repeated effort and psychological struggle, the perceiver would not be. The psychological ending of the so-called separate perceiver is not something to be frighted of; the true ending of limited images, symbolic patterns, and accepted barriers is not frightening; rather, it is liberation and involves profound insight. Holistic insight does not occur often for conflict and misperception.
Katydid Nymph and Ladybug… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
The turning of the key looked south
and the room peered deeper into itself
When the circumscribed room left itself
it was outdoors where it was no longer a room
Gentle breezes again looked south
and the radiant depths of the garden penetrated the mind
Oh,dear Emily,that blue fly that interposed upon your death,
was she very alive in your confined,secluded space?
Ms.Dickinson,was that stillness what can never die,
even when the windows,with all their keepsakes,
fail?
Eternal Blooms (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
Eternal Blooms (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
A lot of people use the word love. Popular songs, needless to say, are riddled with the word. It is a word that is so easily dished out; however, its profound depth of meaning may have been long neglected or absent in human culture. If love, for an individual, is tied to self-interest, or motive, it is likely not actually deep love; then, in such very numerous cases, it is involved with (or “is”) desire. If self-motive is involved, then it usually is mere desire, relish, and craving. Deep love is not what is mere desire or what involves self-motive. If one says one loves one’s nation or immediate family, for instance, but does not deeply care for all humanity and all forms of life as a whole… then that so-called love may just be a form of self-gratification or motive for security (out of fear).
Profound love goes far beyond mere sensation, far beyond mere gratification from stimuli. A merely greedy, avaricious mind cannot be of it. It may be that few people (on this little globe) truly have love. It may be a rare jewel that one cannot cultivate or exploit. Like humility, one cannot program it to occur or make it happen; additionally, one “of it” would not “know” that one is imbued with what it is. Though it cannot merely be cultivated or manufactured, it may occur in a very perceptive mind that is deeply aware of internal and external relationship. Most, unfortunately, perceive with (and “as”) separation; this negates love via innumerable limited psychological walls and barriers. Does one really love another, or is it an image (or set of images) that one’s set of internal images are associated with and fixated upon? Is — in the mind — one set of images that cling to another set of images what profound love is? What is limited, self-centered, and small cannot — by natural law — deeply be in harmony with the whole. The limited (mind) will cause conflict (internally and externally), friction, wars, turmoil, pollution, and suffering. In awareness that is not the product of the separative images and patterns that others cling to in limitation, the free mind is of an untethered vastness that largely transcends what causes suffering, friction, and prejudice. Such a mind has no borders and, therefore, love is possible.
Mating Butterfly (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
Mating Butterfly (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
The other day
the shoreline went for a walk
It saw dogs walking their people
and it saw goslings swimming with joy
Laughing kites were what it saw
and blankets on grass eating strawberries
And(i’ll tell yew the leastlittlest of secrets)
we aren’t really separate from what we experience
After a while,the trees and shoreline sat
on a wooden bench to rest
Eyelids shut themselves and there(for a while or forever)
was(beautifully too)no
thing
********************************************************************************************************
[Note: If we ruin the environment and casually let callous, pigheaded politicians ruin our environment… (while doing nothing about it), we will be forever etched in time as the cadaverous indifferent… and we will be the malignant enemies of all life. Period.]
Strolling with the kids (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
Strolling with the kids (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
In watching, there is (ordinarily) the watcher and the watched. The watcher, as he or she was taught, feels separate from what is being observed. This also occurs when psychological/emotional phenomena manifest… as when one thinks that one “has” jealousy, but thinks that one is not the actual jealousy.
In profound awareness, the so-called central “I” or “me” does not — as the learned image that it is — exist. Then, an altogether different relationship may manifest… wherein there is no separation between the watcher and the watched. Then, an ingrained, inherited kind of friction and conflict ends. Then, there may be real integrity without any piecemeal disorder. For such integrity to take place, there must be instantaneous transcendence beyond the ordinary and mundane. When one looks at a bee, for instance (in beautiful nature), one is not, of course, actually the wings and the antennae; however, the patterns and the image (and, perhaps, the essence) of the bee are not at all separate from what one is. One need not always robotically label the bee (or whatever creature it is) as per what species or type of organism it is, but may look without mechanical memory and separation. Love transcends separation and mechanical categorization.
Transcending separation (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
Transcending separation (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
.
On an extremely small, green planet, there was a large animal called “horse” that had four legs…
and not one of the legs felt it was separate from the other legs.
Each leg — of “horse” — walked and galloped in great beauty and harmony with the other legs;
had one or more of the legs felt it(they) was(were) separate from the other legs,
“horse” would kick and buck in disharmony.
Upon this diminutive planet, called “earth,” there were also billions of inhabitants, called “humans,”
and these “humans,” with bipedal legs, mostly thought that they were separate from those
upon other legs. They often fought in vicious wars and kicked others who walked and ran on two legs.
They also hunted and harmed many of those walking on four legs and were also often mindlessly indifferent
about the environment containing all the legs. However, a small few sagaciously and harmoniously realized
that their legs were not at all separate… and that none of the legs were really separate whatsoever.
.
(Note: Left click on the art-oriented one to see the detail. Click on arrow to return.)
Eight legs. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
Eight legs. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
Tom's Nature-up-close Photography and Mindfulness Blog 