Saturday, November 17, 2012

Priests of the Pogonip





These photos were taken on a rather unused hiking trail at one of my favorite churches/temples/mosques/meeting halls here in Santa Cruz, the Pogonip; a magical open space that borders the University of California campus. I have told people, If you ever find me upset, or restless, too overcome with the world, too involved with my self ... Well, you'll know where to find me. 

... And when I return, I will be cured.

Along this mostly forgotten loop of trail, there are several very old Oak trees.


They stand out as the most beautiful of all the trees, revealing their inner architecture, sweeping downward now, not up--releasing parts of themselves bit by bit to re-nourish the earth, to somehow feed new spring growth. The energy that once was all theirs now eager to leap into soil and begin anew.

  
These old Oaks host all sorts of other species, turkey tail mushrooms, and bright green mosses, Poison Oak and creepers and vines I do not know the names of ... Animals, bugs and birds have drilled into bark, bored into it, traveling through limbs and trunks; and I wonder if these trees feel a great tingling and intermingling and disintegration all at once, while still, blissfully warmed by the California sun.

  
Let's call these the Priests and Clerics of Pogonip ... In all their apparent sacrifice, alive with mystery.


Look at the contrast here, between the smooth, elegant skeleton of this tree and the new evergreens arising, bustling with a fresh greenness all round it. Rampant growth!

When my Grandma Nell was very old, I used to touch her skin ... It was so delicate and soft, and her eyes so very pale and blue--everything about her vulnerable and open.



I wish I had a better camera (I was using my phone here), and more time to fool around with it. These photos would be so much better ... But look at me! Posting these here! Something I've always wanted to do.

Groups of hikers and runners and moms and herds of what I call "the Spandex Ladies," speed through the Pogonip, chatting and laughing, huffing and puffing. I am sure they are all enjoying what they can about this place, and enjoying each other, but as for myself, I cannot imagine it!

The Pogonip calls on me, as perhaps a hushed and crowded church on a Sunday morning, to enter quietly, to slow my pace ... and finally to find a place to sit. To just sit, and to Be.


...

 I did not go into the Pogonip on this day, during this early spring season, looking for a lesson on aging and dying, but the Pogonip spoke to me, as it always does, in one way or another ...

I receive my sermon.

In order, in part, to share it with you,

With Love,

Your Mystical Mama

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Flying into Dying

This
is the last light
under the door
as Mother/Father
closes

All imagined monsters
suddenly arise
and subside
again
in Sleep

I tell my children,
You will not feel that itch,
that pain, nor remember that
remark
in Sleep

Such sweet relief!

This
is the last light
at this West Cliff,
teeming Bay
A razor's edge of
screaming hot
Pink
flattening into a shimmering sliver
on the dark horizon













Blue mountains
once green
fade to purple
then gray
and dissolve into black
and blackness
Merging into One
Night

This silently flying
bird wings its way
into that gap
between light
and dark

Inner lit homes
Cozy and bright
in their seaside stateliness
Erratic bicyclists
chatting, rolling on this edge
Silent pines
standing sentry
and the gentlest of waves
giving
the rocky shore
a lovely, lapping massage

All arises within
This Consciousness
As has all that
has ever
Appeared
and will ever
Appear.
All You and
Not You,
too.

A projection from within
the black heart of night
Illuminated by I AM
Creating timespacematter
and subsiding again
into this Loving
Heart
of darkness

Subsiding back
into You!

This has been a long, full day
Peace-and-desire,
joy-anger-sorrow-Love!
that is over

And now the final chapter
Closed

And it is time
to go Home
and
Rest.