Category: Contemplation

May the darkness of fear and illusion dissipate;

May the light of grace and truth shine through.

References

Who is this man of mystery—

This stranger from worlds afar?

He escapes my frame of reference,

And fails to fit my templates.

Unmoored, he traverses where he wishes,

Steadfast to a singular objective.

His manner is coarse yet cultured.

His speech is rough; his ideas refined.

Rash in moments but wholly devoted,

He breaks the rules with utter tenderness.

He stirs the old feeling of protection in me,

And in meditation, I ponder:

Will we sail to distant shores together,

Or will he vanish like those before him?

My instinct tells me the latter,

As our vantages are quite different:

While I seek harbor in contemplation

He finds solace in distraction.

I shelter inside my castle,

While he chases airships in the sky.

“I was going to come scold you but then I saw your profile. mmmm mmmm.”

She was a militant vegan and avowed feminist who took offense at some remark I made.

It meant nothing to me—I just like being a smartass.

Apparently, I ruffled her deeply-held beliefs, and she felt the need to set me right,

Naughty boy that I am.

She probably had no idea how creepy she seemed, though—

Just as lecherous and predatory as the men she railed against in her comments.

I blocked her without saying a word,

But briefly considered the truth that

We really are each other’s mirrors.

You are not special.

You are not unique.

You are consequential, but you aren’t important—learn the fucking difference.

Your beliefs mean nothing.

Your story is boring.

Your pain is no worse than anyone else’s.

Your wounds are no deeper either.

No one cares how fucked-up your childhood was,

No one wants to hear your whining,

No one needs to know your opinion.

There isn’t anyone coming to rescue you—

Swim to shore on your own.

The world doesn’t revolve around you or any of us,

And humanity is the pinnacle of nothing:

We are all specks of dust in the universe.

All cocks look the same after a while,

All tits eventually sag,

So pull your head out of your very uninteresting asshole.

Grow up, get over yourself, and get into the flow of life.

Do what you were sent here to do,

Stop surrendering your power to demons,

And get a little gratitude for the invisible grace that sustains you.

Share love if the opportunity presents itself,

But stop searching for it like a pathetic nutjob.

We’re all avatars riding on the same train;

So shut up, complete your tasks, and attend to your soul.

If you have the time or capacity,

Extend a little support to your neighbors.

And if that’s too much for you to deal with,

Then please get the fuck out.

I had a dream last night that I was the sole passenger on a train—
A train that ran on no track.

I only realized it when we passed through a place I wasn’t expecting.

This isn’t on the route, I thought.

I then noticed the train was free-falling down a steep slope.

I was petrified.

To my amazement, the unseen engineer skillfully navigated a sharp right turn onto an old trolley track,
And we descended a curving road paved with Belgian block.

The ride down was rough, but as we reached the bottom, we slid comfortably onto level ground.

Then I watched with disbelief as the train coasted through a forbidding gate—
The guard standing sentinel smiled and waved us through as if we were expected.

I finally understood that this chaotic journey had been carefully orchestrated:
The route without a track was exactly how I was supposed to reach my destination.

It’s true that the mercurial twists and turns of my life have often scared and perplexed me.

I learned long ago to work with whatever tools are available to me in the moment, without attachment,
Trusting that, somehow, it will lead me to my next step.

When the tool inevitably breaks and the moment ends,
I’ve never hesitated to take the next turn, the next bend, the next exit—
To my mind, I’ve never had a choice.

To those outside my train, it must look confusing and erratic.

I’ve become used to the looks of bewilderment, the remarks of scorn and ridicule.

What people have yet to comprehend is that this is the future planned for all of us:
The tracks that were long ago laid are being actively dismantled and destroyed.

No longer will we have the luxury of following a prescribed route in comfort—
We must now learn to trust the wisdom of irrational guidance.

Buckle up.

It’s one of those weird moments when I walk into a room after something awful has happened, but I don’t know what.

I see a few strangers standing in the corners, glancing at each other nervously and speaking in hushed tones.

The familiar faces are nowhere to be found. But even in their absence, I can feel the tension in the pit of my stomach.

I’m not part of any clique, and I keep to myself. I’m always the last to know about anything, if I ever know about it at all.

I’ve spent my life as an oblivious outsider—my only companion is my angel.

Through trial and error, we’ve developed a seamless form of communication:

Something isn’t right, I’ll think to myself.

“Time to go,” he whispers in confirmation.

I used to be scared by the uncertainty: he never tells me where we’re going next, and there’s usually some lingering sadness or guilt. Often a lot. We always end up in a better place, though.

Sometimes—years later, perhaps—an unbelievable quirk in the matrix will reveal to me what actually happened. Not the surface event necessarily, but the underlying truth of it. I have insane luck in that regard.

Oh, now I get it, I tell my guy, as I tuck the wisdom in my soul.

And here I am again, standing by myself in a dark space where life has suddenly gone absent.

“Time to go,” he tells me.

I exit without a second thought.

It was a dreary summer morning: overcast, not as hot as it could be, muggy, lifeless, and boring as hell.

I lined up several buckets of silty water on the edge of the creek. My feet sank into the mud, with globs of dark sand coating my sandals. I tried to avoid the giant piles of goose shit, but there was so much of it that I quickly gave up.

The creek cut through the city like a sewer—smelled like one, too. The banks were covered with urban refuse: clothing, old furniture, car bumpers, that sort of thing. The water was clear, but it must have been incredibly toxic, because I never saw any fish in it.

Most days when I worked at the creek, a resident flock of Canadian geese would scatter across the surface of the water and fuss at me from a safe distance. They were gone that morning, though—the droppings and feathers on the ground let me know they had recently passed through.

Pulling water from the creek was sort of fun when I first started the job, but it quickly became routine drudgery. It wasn’t the filling part that was bad, but hauling those heavy buckets up the granite steps from the creek to the top of the bank.

I got slower and wearier with each visit, taking my sweet time and frequently stopping for breaks. No one from my work helped me or even checked in to see what I was doing, so what did it matter?

The creek was low that morning: there was a drop of a good foot or more from the bottom step to the sandbar, which was usually submerged. That made the trek up the steps particularly grueling, and I took more breaks than usual.

At some point, a hazy figure appeared in my periphery. I glanced up the slope to see a man in a dark shirt and blue jeans, likely in his 30s, stepping off a bicycle. From a distance, he looked like a typical urban dweller out for a morning bike ride. Probably from a nearby apartment building, I quickly decided.

As I walked up the steps with a bucket in each hand, the man took off his backpack and laid it beside his bicycle, rummaging through the bag slowly and deliberately.

Up close, my perception of him changed. His clothes were clean and form-fitting, his hair was neat and short, but his face was worn, sunburned, with several days’ growth of dirty blonde stubble. He had the grim expression of a drifter who lived hard and toiled much.

He muttered something to himself as I looked ahead and said nothing. Further away, I shifted my eyes in his direction for a moment and had the distinct impression that he was doing the same to me. I can usually sum up a person to my satisfaction within a second or two, but everything about this man confused me.

I was surprised that I had no fear of him, but my defenses were still raised from hardened experience, checking for any sudden movements or strange behavior. I readied myself for the typical sob story and request for money.

I walked back down the steps a few minutes later, and the guy was standing at the water’s edge, barefoot, with his shoes in hand, carefully shaking dirt out of them.

I said nothing as I stood beside him, grabbed the two remaining buckets, and walked away. His backpack was sitting on the steps, unzipped; it was faded but clean — cleaner than the bag I carried — and appeared neatly packed with folded clothes.

At the top of the steps, I looked down and saw the guy pouring water over his face, soaking his hair. Jesus, I wonder if he’s going to bathe there, I thought with a twinge of sadness. I stayed away for a few minutes to give him some privacy.

When I returned, he was at the top of the steps again, standing by the bicycle and wringing out a shirt that he had presumably soaked in the creek. I lined up all my buckets again on the sandbar and began refilling them.

“Hey, man”, he called from the top of the steps.

Here it comes, I thought.

“Can you fill this bottle for me from the creek?” he said with a slight drawl, holding out a container in my direction.

“Sure”, I said automatically, running up the steps to grab it from his hand. I was both perplexed by his request and my willingness to help.

The bottle was made of thick glass and appeared quite clean. I dutifully unscrewed the lid and dunked the container in the water, listening to the glub-glub-glub as I avoided touching the rim.

Is this guy going to drink this shit? I thought. Why am I even doing this?

I pulled the bottle out and inspected the contents—the water looked perfectly clean and clear.

I darted back up the steps and handed the bottle to him.

“Thanks,” he said. “That water is nasty as hell, but I need it to cool off during the day.”

“Yeah”, I responded with a nervous chuckle, trying to sound genial.

“So what are you doing with all those buckets?” he asked.

“I’m watering the trees”, I said.

“Oh, gotcha. You’re working here.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

He placed the water bottle in the backpack, zipped it up, and hopped back on the bicycle. I didn’t notice when he rode away.

As I was refilling the buckets, I spotted a tiny fish—no bigger than one of my fingers—darting through the water.

The fish swam right up to the surface, and for several minutes we both stared at each other, peering into each other’s world through the glassy barrier of the water.

I guess there’s life here after all.

1. A cry for help is just a cry for attention. No one actually wants to be helped.
2. Everyone thinks their life is either uniquely special or uniquely awful; neither is true, and either way, it’s narcissism.
3. Ninety percent of the world’s problems would be solved if every man were complimented on his penis by another man.

I search the streets in the darkness for my friend
The one who met me in a dream

We gave our names in a handshake of agreement
A promising future ensured

When I broke from the group, I saw my friend in the shadows
Silent and cloaked
A soul apart

We began to share freely
The warmth of light glowed between us

The cloak fell away
My friend’s countenance changed
We saw each other clearly
Our hopes and fears laid bare

Now, in the thick of night, I wander the streets
Observing signs and patterns
Looking for my friend

But signs and patterns, I have learned, are often illusions
Dreams, I must admit, are so very much too

What nook of this vast city harbors my friend?
Our paths did not cross at the evening play,
Nor the midnight show with a dozen dozing spectators

A card on the ground shows seven diamonds
A sign of success?
A reminder for patience?
The meaning for my soul is unclear

Yet meaning does not exist, my mind tells me
As a drunk girl crouches and pisses on the path ahead
Are we not all animals wallowing in chaos?

Two young men dash up the street as if in a play
Acting out a fight for my amusement
“Help!” one cries in my direction, the other throwing mock punches
They laugh and whisper as I shuffle past, ignoring the spectacle

Now, a man in a thong bikini dances wildly in the street
I walk past silently, too bemused for judgment
My presence startles him

“You scared me,” the man tells me
“How is that?” I ask
“I didn’t know I had an audience.”

My coffee high wanes
I wander to the river
The sun rises early, but light is obscured by haze
Clarity eludes

I sit beneath a tree and watch old men cast poles into the water
The night, I reflect, has been a short, strange dream
But my friend has yet to find me

I close my eyes and wonder
Must I wander the streets alone again?

So many years I stumbled in nights of silence
Through empty towns and hostile country
Terrain far more menacing than here

Here in darkness, a play unfolds around me
A character at every corner
A story on each block

Here, I realize, the night is my friend.