Nothing can be loved if you don't love it.

Poem from an online friend, Ramsey Tietjen. (Read more of his poetry here.) 

At times I become alarmed

By the behavior 

Of some of the other cartoon characters

Lethal or stupid

Pundits or bandits

And have to remind myself

They all run on the same ATP as I do

Thinking they’re real just like I do

The cartoon life expectancy can be fairly long

But still it’s a cartoon

We’re all driving in circles 

In our cartoon cars

From home to work and back

Redecorating our cartoon houses

With play money we earn

At our cartoon jobs

Making cartoon plans

Trying to learn 

The lessons of evanescence 

Before we burn

I am the most genuinely subversive agent 

You’ve ever known

I dismiss the arithmetic of submission 

On a regular basis

Just waiting

For my hometown past

I try to find a place to relax

Sometimes you have to get away 

And take another lazy day

Of living

Thanksgiveness 

Have plenty of it 

There’s nothing can be loved if you don’t love it

Every moment, like a figure drawn in water, disappears as it appears. 

(Dzogchen saying)

Machig Labdron "The Mother of Chod"

 

Carl Jung wrote, "One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious." 

That sentiment is embodied in the Tibetan Buddhist practice called Chod, which amounts to "Face your demons, and cut through your reaction to them." Machig Labdron was an 11th-century yogini who systematized the practice. 

Hold Your Own

Kate Tempest is the bomb. The atomic bomb. She blows me away. 

There are Tantric Buddhist Chod elements to this poem, such as her encouragement to not resist the demons that we feel.  

"The Tao is not human-hearted." Lao Tzu

 Photo of a nearly microscopic tardigrade (AKA water bear or moss piglet).

"Not human-hearted" means you can't shrink the Tao to your own limited view. 

Gautama was a Buddha, not a Buddhist.

 

Lyrics in search of a melody

FIRST VERSE

I was naked, I was helpless

As a newborn in Kentucky

I’m still naked, I’m still helpless

This disguise just makes me lucky

We act like we know something

But be honest, how much? How deep?

We act like we own something.

But what can we really keep?

REFRAIN

Not everything’s here to please us.

There’s enough to make you cry.

Even if you believe in Jesus

Gotta ask yourself, “Who am I?”

SECOND VERSE

Lotta lies to uncover

“You oughta do it our way”

One after the other

Found out, it’s all hearsay

My old heart sees clearly

Exactly what it’s made for

The view has cost me dearly

Ain’t no thing unpaid for

REFRAIN

Not everything’s rhyme and reason

There are birds that cannot fly

The faithful call it treason

But go ask yourself, “Who am I?”