The Precipice of Emptiness

Half-way up the Precipice, I stopped to summarize the situation. This hike had been my nemesis since I had started hiking in Acadia.

In summer it was closed because of nesting falcons and in autumn it was blocked by my own fear of hiking something almost vertical and sheer.

In winter ice prevented even thinking anything about it and in spring I had to ramp things up on Connor’s Nubble or that simple trail

up Gorham Mountain with an ocean view to kill such obvious egoic thoughts or two.

But here it was September, and my hands were on the iron rungs sunk deep into the granite ready to ascend my apprehensions

toward the peak of no return. That's when I heard the runners breathing down my neck.

I stepped aside and watched two high school students jogging up the trail between the end of classes and their evening homework.

They passed me in a flash of adolescent joy. And absolutely I was humbled but it didn't really matter.

I was such a one now with that mountain nothing personal could destroy, even those same harbingers later laser-streaking by

while I was somewhere only near three-quarters to the summit. A quarter later there was nothing left to say.

The beginning of the end of days spent hiking in Acadia was under way.

Nondual Tractate on Poetry

No words describe the truth and yet I am the truth. Even pointing to the truth is much too brazen of an act

and maybe dangerous to another who mistakes it for a thought and then believes it going on to form a new religion resulting in empirical destruction, inquisitions, holy wars, and waiting for the end of times which may require their personal intervention on authority of voices in their head or paragraphs they read inside their venerated book.

But poetry may be more subtle. Lines are written in a way where nothing solid is ever said—

because it's in-between the lines that's really talking. Here between the lines the spirit of the poet speaks

and here between the lines the spirit of an audience is listening. And spirit equals spirit.

There’s no difference. There’s no two. There's just an open clarity of knowing, being, loving space. No hat is hanging there.

Instant Apocalypse

The world is like a training ground in which the matter of illusion learns to see right through itself, or not.

It may not seem our lives are filled with quiet desperation but that Facebook face is neither truthful nor original.

Something truly broken can't be fixed by all the empire's holy bishops or its countless soldiers.

Neither will the revolution never be the status quo. A picture only tells ten-thousand words because it stops

the transformation in a freeze frame. Never try to do the same at home. When ice is melting, melted water helps

to melt the ice some more and not attempt to change the ice's shape to something moderately nice.

Daydreams in the mirror are much closer when they disappear. This rhymes with neither now nor here.

The Book of Reflexive Happening

Is self-awareness something deeper then the scientific method? What role does love play in my experiment?

When the false sees through the false, what is truth? Knowing? Being? Loving?

Awareness aware of awareness is the instantaneous manifestation. This is satcitananda!

Matter is the closing; mind is the turning; knowing-being-loving is the grand opening.

The closing makes a big bang. The turning hurts. I am the grand opening.

The Apocryphon of Memory

Memories are yesterday translated by tomorrow, neither of which exists of course. Or as god is my witness I'll never remember again. Yes, the real use of remembering is self-remembering.

Memories appear to be sacred because they're not real. If your identity relies on memory and your memory is unreliable, who am I? If memory is false, only existence remains.

One falsehood makes all false. There is a fine line between the concept of existence and existence itself. This is why silence precedes embodiment. All beliefs must pass.

One precedes three without two. I have to believe in something before I’m self-aware. Always look at the big picture and not some idol. Always remember 'I am' is not a memory.

I only know existence. If you want to speak to the absolute, stay on the line. True Tantra emphasizes the world to make it more obvious to see through. Seeing through yourself is being oneself.

Being oneself is the absolute direction. You will be tested for your own evaluation; there's no final grade. Between existence and the concept of existence is all the tea in China.

At first it's difficult to remember there's nothing to remember. Then the latest and greatest impediment to knowing who I am is indoor plumbing. And when I discovered writing was another business, I filed chapter 11.

Treatise on Quality of Understanding

"For realization, understanding is essential. Action is only incidental" ~Nisargadatta Maharaj

“A man of steady understanding will not refrain from action. Action is the test of truth.” ~Nisargadatta Maharaj

Is this concept of merit, then, the appraisal of one’s action in the test of truth, and not an individual’s doing but the understanding?

In observing one’s actions in mindfulness—one sees negative emotions—then the test of truth reveals an uncertain understanding—without merit.

One doesn’t accumulate merit through virtuous action—such merit is acquired only in furthering understanding—with earnestness—love in action.

The further one understands—what one is not—the more what one is—acts.

The quality of understanding is primary—the merit of action is simply the test of that quality.

One explanation for furthering understanding is just to know what I'm not and be what i am.

The satguru is one’s teacher and the world is one’s testing ground. I prefer my river hut and distant village to whatever. 

The Apocalypse of Beginning

How does one start when there's no beginning? For example, I've heard white rabbits are well-read.

My birth is quite the story and the rumors of my death are completely unsubstantiated. This leaves here, now and change for all my thoughts.

I haven't yet begun but still I'm in the middle of this story somehow, somewhere, sometime.

It's true the world is in the mind; awareness is reflected in this being and that has nearly brought us to the end.

All mysteries require the one who pulls the trigger. The name in this one is Intent although for purposes of truthfulness, it continues nameless.

If there were a god, just how could it begin to know itself? Just where would this subjective absolute begin?

The Book of Ancient Math

Deconstruction becomes compassion or gets stuck in deconstruction; this is cynicism. Love becomes compassion or gets stuck in love; this is romance. Compassion becomes truth or consequences.

Romance is fiction. Cynicism is non-fiction. Truth is not either. Consequences are neither here nor now. Belief is the beginning of all nervous breakdowns. Self-awareness is the cure.

The hero studies beyond this world but practices in this one. The student studies beyond this world and doesn't practice. The master is beyond this world and is the practice. Do not mistake the master for your practice.

Deconstruction is the greatest martial art. Guardianship is the greatest love. Knowing oneself is all. All things seen by the eye is karma. All things seen-through by the eye is I.

Less than one nanosecond of being is worth ten thousand seconds of thinking. Ten thousand seconds of thinking equals believing. No mind equals x.

When does practice, be it loving or deconstructive, turn real? Yes, compassion. Yes, seeing through. A better word for seeing-through is understanding. Thus, compassion equals understanding.

If compassion is less than understanding, comedy. If understanding is less than compassion, tragedy. If comedy equals tragedy you're history. When does practice equal karma?

Between change and disbelief is what's happening. Your confusion turns to intent when you understand your hesitation. Reflection is your vector. Deflection is your fear. No math is an island.

The Apocalypse at the Movies

Startled out of bed while in the deep abyss of natural awareness, I dream. Daylight is the pigment of imagination.

Beliefs are filtering the light of this existence manufacturing the spectrum of emotions. God, they’re really colorful and mesmerizing!

Inertia is the world's one law and love its only outlaw. None of this is what it seems to be but all of it is what it is.

Awareness only sees itself in seeing through reflections in itself. Because there really isn't any object, no one talks about that subject.

Knowledge is experiential only. Words can only point to what one is. That's why we cry at the movies.

The Book of Santa Yana Yada Yada

Behold the universe I am. From starting with the stars to interning with insects, what a piece of change it is. Awareness is the only constant.

Watching rain descend as mercury behind a picture window, I reflect upon myself. There's a certain Sunday samadhi in the air today.

Two cups of green iced tea was followed by a mug of coffee. That supplied the bang I needed.

Zhuangzi loves to tell a joke but Jesus loves himself some love. Addicted to caffeine and sugar, I prefer to write for prophecy. Or two.

What would nothing do?

Division is original beginning of the one unborn. When young, my peas were separated from my mashed potatoes.

While in high school, I subscribed to Time to contemplate the weekly covers of the latest war or neoteric politician.

College boy, I marched on Washington opposing Nixon's opposition to another people's opposition to… and so on goes the game of drones.

This world has always been about the lowest commonplace denomination. Stop the presses! Love is one way, deconstruction is the other.

She takes the high road and he takes the low road and I'll be home in no time.