carnal knowledge
A man can’t die where there is no earth
because there will be no place
to bury him. His body is the sky
and understands the language of birds.
His body says the earth is made of everything
that has fallen from Heaven
while no one was looking. He promises
to defy gravity and then return home.
A man can’t reach for the sky and not feel
he is falling. It goes on forever and the birds
talk about the awesomeness of flight
while the oxen labor in the fields,
while the cows eat grass and dream
of slaughter. A man can’t talk about flight
because one day, there will be no sky,
just the body covered in earth.
And now the sky is empty of birds.
And now the earth is covered in flowers
🌹
Where the Sky Meets the Earth by W. Todd Kaneko
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THE LONGEST NIGHT
Now listen to your broken heart.
Fall into the wound and bathe
in the balm of midnight.
Don’t follow a star.
Let your root find sap
in the blackest loam.
What are countless golden petals
or the fragrance of myrrh
compared to the yearning
of the shadow for its cause?
Birthless seeds are singing
beneath all that rises and falls.
When you are truly silent
you will hear them bursting
through the long good night,
until you are healed
by loss.
COMMENT
In the North we enter the darkest days, the longest nights. For many these holidays are not bright with Christall radiance of newborn Solstice sun, but truly dark with inward midnight.
Yet the mystics of all great religions have a message for us about such depths. If we have the courage to fully embrace our darkest places, they deepen into boundlessness, soften and glow. Grace gongs from their hollows. And Darkness herself becomes the path.
Hindu devotees called Krishna “the dark Lord.” His beloved Radha only found him after her long night of yearning. The mystical path in Islam is patterned after Mohammad’s “night journey” (Isra) which leads to his mystical ascent (Miraj).
The Christian Gnostic Valentinus wrote: “Who is the real Virgin Mother? The mystical eternal silence.” Medieval Christian mystics spoke of the deepest union as “divine darkness.” Dionysius the Areopagite wrote that the mysteries of God “are veiled in the dazzling obscurity of the secret Silence, outshining all brilliance with the intensity of their Darkness.” Jan Ruysbroeck said, “The unfathomable waylessness of God is so dark and wayless that it encompasses within itself all divine ways.”
Hebrew Psalm 139 declares, “Even the darkness is not dark to Thee… the light and the darkness are one.” Thus I dedicate this poem to those who are in darkness, whether it be night or day…
Fred LaMotte
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Apple, plum, carpet steak, seed clam, colored wine, calm seen, cold cream, best shake, potato, potato and no no gold work with pet, a green seen is called bake and change sweet is bready, a little piece a little piece please.
A little piece please. Cane again to the presupposed and ready eucalyptus tree, count out sherry and ripe plates and little corners of a kind of ham. This is use.
🍰
Tender Buttons [Apple] by Gertrude Stein
between the lines of the labyrinth is a secondary path
there are so many ways to get from here to there
so many ways to find your way home
enter the arena from whatever spot you find yourself
remove your armor
speak your truth
kneel and kiss this holy ground
the lions will behave…
or not…
at least you will live and die on your own terms
and that, my dear friend, may be enough to change the world
🌍
Amy Lloyd
FCC on a snowy night – Photo by Kathleen Bidney-Singewald
life: acoustic & amplified 