Have a drink
And when I went
looking for myself
I found only remnants of the past
and you were there
looking out for me
I couldn't see your million hands
all reaching out to me
so I faced the storms
of guilt and fear
feeling alone
//
now I know better. I'm not hypnotized by the calling that I am alone, doomed to be alone, imprisoned in chains of alone, pushed down into a ground of alone, drowned repeatedly in alone, slapped across the face as I wake by alone, drugged to sleep at night with pills of alone.
no. now I know better.
I love every flicker of happening. I love you, reading this now, so much. not because you read, but because you are. I mean it. Feeling the breath soft, slow. Feeling the breath quicken, my diaphragm trembling. Feeling my lungs filling deep like quenching a thirst. Feeling the breath. Echoes of past, present, future Buddhas shimmering everywhere. Each human's love, each fragrance of tenderness, every scent of empathy in human eyes, melting into the simple walk to work. Into the absent-minded exchange with the convenient store clerk, as he finishes a night shift. Into a back ache. There in sleepless nights and potluck dinners it dwells, the love of being alive.
May all creatures give themselves, permit themselves, shower themselves with
a moment at this water-hole.