El Dios de Lluvia

My cup overflows

I lap the water 

from the table top

Precious

too precious

to waste

What did 

Father

used to say

Remember your 

grandmother

bringing water

up from the well

bucket

by bucket

Unrelenting sun

Eight children

to feed

Her husband 

toiling 

in the fields

Cha'ac

the old God

gifting rain

Final Scarcity

My old memories will be of little use to you in your search for water.
Even now, after all these years, it's still hard for me to fathom how far
we have fallen in my life. Water was so plentiful as to be absurd. You
could open a faucet in your home and it would pour right out, as if that
is how things had always been in human history. We would buy plastic
bottles filled with water, we'd fill portable containers with it, we would
bathe in it any time we felt the urge to be clean. It was always there
until it wasn't. Everything fell into chaos once supplies became scarce.
There was so much suffering and death. To die of thirst is the most
excruciating sort of death. Men, women, children, all condemned to die
due to lack of a basic need. The rich and powerful gloated for some
time until their stores began to run dry. In the end, their wealth and
power were nothing without water. It was then that what little remained
of civilization collapsed. Now, water is life. Water is more valuable
than diamonds, gold, or oil, ever were. This world is bathed in thirst.
Some say our world is dying. I say that it is not. We are dying. The
world will be fine once it has rid itself of us. Perhaps that has been the
plan all along. Soon there will be none like me left who remember
the old world and the hubris of our decadence. Only those born in this
time of endless thirst will remain, and the old world will be reduced
to stories and fairy tales that will scarcely be believed. What ever did
we do to deserve such a fleeting paradise? Even my memory has begun
to fail me. I wonder at times how much of the past was ever real.
All of it, I think. Then doubt is cast. We could never have been so
foolish. Yet, foolishness is always in overabundance. I grow tired.
I want to close these old eyes and dream of water flowing over my
body without any thought of it ever eliding into scarcity.

Mantra

You are the water
You are the dust
You are the heavens

I am the water
I am the dust
I am the heavens

I am the water
You are the water
I am the dust
You are the dust
I am the heavens
You are the heavens

You are the water
You are the dust
You are the heavens

returning to shore

Bury me in the water
off the coast of my favorite beach
Spread my ashes
Let me float
Carried on the the swells
I'll swim back to shore
I'll find the new life
I was always hoping for

flow

Given enough time
flowing water
will carve a path
through any rock

only present

river waters rushing past
origin and destination lie out of view
only now 

baptized by salt water

to wake early is to witness the world emerge from
the darkness and into itself. to see the sun reveal it's
face by the gradual shift of the sky. birds speak in
babel talk and I wonder how or if they can decode
the languages between them. sunday morning and
the church bells will toll soon. to wake and to worship
as our fathers and mothers before us. my church
surrounds me at all times. i kneel before the ocean
and am baptized in salt water. this life healing and
renewing me. I who can be weary wish only to live
in the state of joy and happiness. to do so is to foster
that within and bring it to the world.

Calling

Water must move
Can you hear the shifting of the tides
A voice speaking from within
Words you are straining to understand
Calling you all the same 

Conversation

Son of an ancient soil
Why do you long so deeply
for a land in which you
were not reared?

I long to know what was
my birthright. To know the
stars and earth from which
my blood first sprang.

Soil is soil and the same
heavens are shared by
us all. Is there more my son
that you seek to know?

To know the self, to know
my self. That is the larger
understanding I seek to have.
Together a story is written.

Gaze upon the dawn or
the setting sun to know the
truth your ancestors and
those of all have known.

In that way I know we share
deep truths that are eternal.
Truths that will persist long
after my body is dust.

How peacefully do you rest
beneathe the sky of your
fathers and mothers? Does it
soothe you to be there?

I rest as though I am truly
at peace. The silence of night
and peace of morning, listening
to the birds sing from tree tops.

But are you soothed?

Yes, my heart and mind are.

I will tell you a truth you
have known, even if you
have never thought these
words to yourself:

You carry the sky and blood
of your land with you always.
From it arose your life. This
truth will be yours forever.

Walk the Waves

First light and there is
no one around
Alone in silence
I walk down the hill
Sloping towards the beach
Waves call louder with each step
Sand gives and shifts below my feet
Water foams and licks the shore
At last the touch of cold water
soaks my feet and electrifies
my body into full alertness
I press forward into the
water as I sink deeper
into the salty depths
as my clothes cling
to me and my hair
grows wet I bob
up for a breath
inhale deeply
submerge
see the
land
bel
ow

To Listen

I dream in colors
appearing
and blending
as though they
were a sea of
shifting tides
giving birth to
one another.

The sea within me
moves and grows
as I learn to
listen to it's
songs. I do not
always understand
the language it
speaks but I know
I must listen.

When the voice
speaks it speaks
in measured tone
so it can be
understood.
Calling to me
in a faintness
almost over
powered
by wind
I close my eyes
and find
the words
it seeks
to give me.

The Great Restlessness

Restlessness moves through me
  Impels me to stand
                   to walk
Restlessness reminds me
          of irreversible time
                    A river moving
                    forward unable
                    to be still
Able to take us
                    to sights
                    unseen

Journey Home

I and the water
  flowing through the street
  are the same
Passing through
  looking to meet
and be part 
  of the great Ocean
once more

Wind and Springs

Beds in rooms
Rooms in houses
or apartments
The silence of solitude
Thoughts welling
A spring bursting through
Bubbling and making itself known
How peaceful will these winds be
How powerful will be the storm
The winds have arrived
Now we ready
for the onslaught

Shivering Skeleton Fingers

weight of years
carry me down
from great heights
into the ground
blind my eyes
recreate me
into new life
new eyes
let me move
up from the
ground and
onto grass
and skies
let me accept
eventuality
let me be at
peace with
life itself
let me touch
soil upon which
I stand and let
my feet bathe
in ocean waters
remind me
always of this
fragile gift

Water Moving in Circles

Is history a river
feeding and flowing
into itself
time after time
age after age
repeating events
with new characters?

Against the Tide

Days of uncertainty

Nights of disbelief

Caught in the tides

   of struggle

Thrashing

    fighting

       for air

What choices

               are left

                    to make

In this well
are only ashes. 

Random Post

The Sky will speak through me
in gulps of breath

                            while Water
soaks my flesh and feeds my life.

__________

My kindness has been cruel to me.

__________

The Push of Waves

Enough flesh had decayed from the head
that by the time I came across it at the beach
I could see the skull of the dead seal.

Patches of skin were gone but it largely
remained whole. I walked up to it,
curious to see such a creature up close.

I felt no sadness as I stood before it,
merely a sense of certainty at what befalls
all living things in time.

The waves rushed in and pushed the body
further up on the sand. It rolled over
and came to rest further from the water.

Wind bit my face as I pulled the hood
of my sweater over my head.
The tide inched closer by the moment.

It would not rest until it drowned my feet
or pushed me further from its touch.
In the end the ocean got what it wanted.