ANSWERS

Jesus, obviously,
is the answer

Less clear is:
what is the question?

JESUS RIGHT

Salvation, paradoxically,
is the most selfish
of all human endeavors

NIGHTMARE

A nightmare
when nerve is strong
is a speedy steed
back to the promised land
which I left
when nerve was weak
to Eden Here, that is,
where fear often goes with the territory
and second birth of self
is as essential as first of body

MOTHER MARY

The genius of the Holy Virgin
is her capacity for representing
all the vast powers of femininity
without, since she is virgin,
resurrecting any of the additional threats
of our own denied/projected sexuality.

The threat of the Holy Prostitute,
which we males have long since dethroned,
was/is the combination of both these powers:
femininity and sexuality.

Could/can we exist in the ecstasy
of both the sacred and the sexy?
Of both the powers of femininity
and our own balls owned?

THREATS

FAMILIARITY

Familiar ways are:
henpecked or abusive
Less common are:
coping carefully and
loving

REGRET

Regret is a copout
on the nerve necessary
for growing old
gracefully

HELPING

But seldom is it
as helpful
or loving

PHOTOGRAPHY

The danger in taking pictures
is the risk of the illusion
that we actually can
rather than daring the faith
to simply see sharply

DIRTY UNDERWEAR

For the kingdom there
you can=t be wearing
dirty underwear; but
for the kingdom here
you can=t even have any
dirty underwear; either
clean or soiled will do,
because here, unlike there,
cleanliness is not next
to godliness;
only honesty is

RELIGIOUS ERRORS

Blind at the time,
and wanting to see,
I erred in my efforts
to make beliefs reasonable

I did not know, back then,
that the great gift of religion
is mediating the unknown
while we are faithless
on the long path toward
becoming conscious

EYES FOR YOU

Male gene eyes for a female
after she reaches 2 score
and maybe 3 or 4
grow quickly dim
giving heart eyes a chance to see
what remained cloaked by
genes blindly rampant

But in time they too fade
as a man with nerve begins
to catch up with his own shadow
opening the way, when faith allows,
for love eyes vision
long waiting for genes and heart
to run their course
and the magical transformation
of girl and woman into person
which is the only human garden
where agape resides
and God sometimes moons us

HEAVEN HERE

Trying to make the world a better place
as though God goofed
is easier, I=ve found, post sin,
than being forgiven
and meeting Him here
where only I have ever been absent

DIFFERENT THINKING

She thought she was
just trying to help
I thought she was
just relieving herself
of the pain
of her own omnipotence
or is this just a case
of my own omniscience?
In either case, in my books,
each is a mortal sin

KINGDOM HERE

In the kingdom here
saying what you want
is sometimes feasible,
mostly not,
but knowing what you want
always is

PROVERBS 31:3

The bible,
written long before X & Y chromosomes
were discovered, and while men
were yet in the infancy of our
still to be achieved escape
from the power of the womb
struggling then for the illusions
of monotheism over momism
though replete with wisdom
on many other subjects
is mostly full of crap
about guys and gals
except for Solomon=s hard earned advice
after 700 wives and 300 concubines:

Give not thy power unto woman

Still, who among us,
millennia later,
is wise enough to heed?

BALLS

Being sexual is essential
for a man in the kingdom here
but owning the powers inherent therein,
plus moderating them wisely,
rather than projecting them
is critical for any extended residency

Once, for example, they are handed to Eve
as in days of yore
and she takes them
you=re both out of here;
still married maybe,
but out of here

BATTLE OF THE SEXES

From Chapter 2 on
the Xtn approach to the power and wisdom of woman
has been avoid/suppress/control, or try to
That is, to make fooling around bad,
to put/keep women in a place, &
to theologize the unknown, thereby removing it

Results: Limited male power displayed and undermined,
e.g., macho men with fragile egos;
Abundant female power unwittingly exaggerated,
blindly fled and/or worshiped;
Potential human consciousness shot to hell

So, unsatisfied with these results myself
I=m trying to find my way back to Chapter 1

THESEUS

BLESSING

We theologize that only God has it to give
yet irrationally we look to woman to dispense it
further empowering She
who is born with more than enough
to keep us in our place forever

ANXIETY

Anxiety insulated by
a magazine or clear goals
a newspaper or careful plans
information or a stiff upper lip
judgments or understanding
woman=s smile or man=s strength
a fragile ego or bold stance
familiarity of stuff or beliefs
self-righteousness or even a well-worn rosary
is still a spiritual time bomb
waiting for a frown/delay/
or unfamiliar sight or sound
to explode us out of the kingdom

A wiser course
is hanging loose and wading in
to see if ecstasy is lethal
or only the path to God
who is already here--
except, of course,
for the faith required to look

MYTHOLOGY

Mythology, like fairy tales,
is a wonderful mirror for glimpsing
reflections of dark forces
engened long before consciousness dawned
moving us now, blindly

But with the dawn
man rushed too soon toward the sun of sense
reducing myths to religion
making gods out of goddesses
shrinking rich polytheism to a minor mono
hopefully containing the dark XX powers of femininity
by hiding the abyss
but unwittingly cutting ourselves off
from the power of mystery

Meanwhile woman lingered too long
in the oracle=s cave
shielding herself from the light of consciousness
clinging to serpent wisdom
while sense begged for sight
killing kings rather than grappling with Why
wielding powers blindly when clans-turned-cities
called for politics more than cunning
thoughtlessly rejecting the powers of reason

All this, regrettably exacerbating
the 600 million year old Battle of the Sexes
just when, for the first time in recorded history
(and unrecorded),
making love was finally ready to evolve
into loving

FRUIT OF THE TREE...

Presence and Judgment are mortal enemies
Judgment cannot enter a place
without slaying Presence first
and the resurrection of Presence cannot occur
until Judgment is banished
because being here and staying alive,
not to mention meeting God,
require all the powers of full attention
which are lost whenever we presume
to know good and evil
which is perhaps why God warned:
You=re out of here when you do

ADORATION

Adoration and blindness
go hand in hand
So when you fall in love
with woman or Jesus
expect, in time, to stumble

Only worth-ship allows standing
in God=s presence

DRUGS AND ROLLER COASTERS

The rush to external stimuli
all to quickly dulls us
to the internal excitement
inherent in just being here
anywhere

CONFIDENCE

Confidence rooted in what-they-think
is too shallow for the suns of Presence

CONSCIOUSNESS

Consciousness counts

It=s content is relatively irrelevant
but since Mother Nature graciously served it up
we dare not decline the gift

After all, in Eden,
manners matter too

NAMES

In the long course of consciousness
if the earth shakes
we need a name for the shaker
and Poseidon sounds good enough to me
Though some prefer God

COMMUNICATION

The ultimate inevitability
of the impossibility
of communicating oneself
is a truth I still struggle to accept

At best, though,
we may say who we are
when faith allows

SEEING

To see
is to become one
with the sights,
an event of Spirit
to be sharply distinguished
from mere looking
or taking a nice picture
which gives me the illusion of presence
sans risks
and God

MATURITY

Maturity is less signed
by social responsibility
than by being able
to pee in public without shame
but with discretion

FITTING IN

Fitting in
counts greatly in the city
where What They Think reigns

CAMELOT

Dreams of Camelot, ala Minoan Civilization,
The Golden Age of Greece,
or pie in the sky bye and bye
All mirror man=s lost knowledge
of Demeter=s Secret
awaiting resurrection here on the earth
She protects,
the new age of every man
which cannot come so long as he resides
with the Gods on Olympus
removed far from earth
yet threatened by gays
not to mention girls
and the gaping cunt

MORTALITY

Bodied ones, being mortal,
are unconcerned with immortality
Only the disembodied, as we males so often are,
dream of immortality, a second shot
after a first miss

BODILY SHAME

Bodily shame is a powerful social force
but rooted only in society,
it dies quickly
when we dare discover embodiment
sans suits

IMAGING

Imaging is essential for transforming
perceptions into conceptions
on the arduous but rewarding path
toward becoming who we are

Lacking faith, however,
we easily freeze them into icons
substituting idolatry for thinking
playing god instead of daring humanity
I, for instance, have often worshiped
voluptuous hips rather than risking
being sexual
or held on to sacred beliefs
to escape believing

SACRIFICE

Healthy sacrifices only appear
to be gifts to the gods

In reality they are chosen reminders of humanity
lest we break the First Commandment
and miss the kingdom here

GENDER TO GOD

On the rarely taken but readily open path
from gender to god
from man/woman to person
from lust to love
genetic visions are to be honored
but not idolized
lest immanent passion keep us away
from transcendent presence

DESIRE

ETERNAL LINES

Always seeing sharply
without ever judging
what is seen

GAIA

Ever since I finally learned
that God was woman
before She became a man
I=ve been wondering
how we all went so wrong
and how to quit paying so much
for our mistakes

HELPING

Helping, I finally see
after a life time of trying to do so,
is often but an easy out
from seeing the struggles of others
and standing with them
or facing my own
and moving through them
on the long way to loving
unwittingly depriving them
when ever I succeeded
of learning the only way we ever really do
in the School, that is,
of Hard Knocks

STILL WAITING

Soon after Gaia arose from Chaos
and sensed the ripening of her seed
she sought herself a man to cover her
but finding none, she settled for a boy,
immaculately conceived, of course,
and kept on looking

So that else is new?

PICTURES

Photography/Theology
making pictures of Her handiwork or Herself
though potentially useful in later seeing/being
all to often end in piles of picture and text books, unopened,
not to mention idolatry

IDOLATRY

Icons are icons,
be they on mantle or in mind
in house or at church
secular or religious
plastic images of Jesus
or mental images of his Father
or tits and ass of imaged Hers--
they=re  all the same

Though each may give shape
to primal perceptions of power
mythologies of temple or loin
each is to be demythologized
before we can meet God here
not to mention a woman

LOVING

Loving loveliness
is only natural
but loving anyway
is divine

Any nut can worship an icon
but only a self
can care for a person

COMMUNION

Loving Gaia is more than
talking to a smart woman
or falling in love with a nymph
though both may be fun at the time

But Gaia loved, like God,
is Gaia eaten

AIR PORT BAGGAGE

Trusting in the midst of strange systems
is distinctively different
from trusting any system;

they only appear to be the same

BIRTH OF SELF

Seeds sown eons ago in the primal womb of Mother Earth
fertilized over time by countless risings of Father Sun
are wondrously germinated in the fullness of a moment=s perception
which is formed into magical images of appropriate shapes
then, entering the Decoding Room of Mind,
these mythed perceptions are demythologized
into discretely defined concepts
which are happily merged into reasoned thoughts
then finally, when faith allows,
these sensible notions are called forth into worldly space
the vulva lips of mind are parted
and self is born into the universe
the first of countless rebirths into the Sun
until Mother Earth again reclaims her own

ATHENA

T'was said
that Athena was born
from Zeus=s head
certainly an advance upward
over Adam=s rib
but still far away,
sans male illusions,
from Gaia=s womb
whence all life
must surely come

HOLY COMMUNION

Gaia scorns images of herself
indeed all images
even names, because caring,
she does not wish to tempt
us to idolatry
preferring that we eat
rather than idolize
who she is
and we may yet become

FREEDOM

The only path to freedom now
that I have found so far
lies through the difficult door
of the past reentered
with eyes which the present
has opened since then

PRIESTS

A real priest,
I now see,
is an illusion

Priests, by definition,
are purveyors
of magic

COURAGE

The greatest nerve
I=ve come to see
lies in embracing
the human birthright
to simply acknowledge
our knowledge
and profoundly become ourselves
without confirmation
or judgment
or regret

Becoming conscious
for a self-blinded adult
begins with vision,
looking back at what has happened
and out at what is going on

But consciousness is not complete
until looking back and out
becomes seeing
as was so in childhood
before Oedipus copped out
via blindness

COST OF A DAMN

To give a damn
for what anyone thinks
is to barter a precious part
of thinkingness
the most essential ingredient
of giving a damn about anything
Loving God, that is

POSSIBILITIES

Love is impossible
without balls and brains
because the nerve to care
not rooted in the earthiness of Self
and the heavenliness of God
is only a hot house plant
awaiting the sun to wither

But with courage and sense
even love becomes possible

PLANNING AHEAD

To Plan Ahead
without knowing
what you=re going to do
is an art reserved for those who dare
to remain present

MATTERING

Early on when
everything matters
mattering is easy

Later on after
it don=t matter no more
it really matters
to live like it does
back when it did

To see God, that is,
long after his death

LOOKALIKES
ACROSS A WIDE GULF:

Sane seduction for sex
and
Crazy adoration for salvation

The former at least
leads to pleasure
at most to replication
The latter at first
leads to illusion
at last to hell

FAMILY LOVE

What passes for love
in families, I belatedly note,
is more clearly seen, I hate to admit,
as utility parading as agape

Blindly we use one another
and righteously justify our abuses
as love

EVOLUTION
Like God
in case they=re different
is very forgiving

Mistakes,
even bad ones,
hardly matter at all

IRRITANTS,
like enemies/like devils
are blindly created
sized in proportion
to our unfaced aggression
safely projected out there
until times of faith
and salvation

ETERNAL QUESTIONS:
How long should one keep going home
to old places, habits, & memories?

TEMPORAL ANSWERS:
Until all their powers are diffused
into gratitude
and they at last are freed to return
to a quiet history of personal utility
and we to the lively wonder
of this present place
here and homeless

MATHEMATICS
OF HAPPINESS AND HELL

Heaven,
I have found,
is directly proportional
to capacities activated
either in efforts of war or peace

Under-activation breeds unhappiness
Boredom is Hell

TALKING

If you want to really live
it=s rarely feasible
to eat all the food on your plate
let alone comb your hair
and wear makeup

MOVERS

The most powerful motivations
I=ve yet seen
are self and sex
named as two
but seldom distinguishable
when I look closely

MEANING

Inherently,
only words have meaning
and only then
when we assign it

Life, like a word,
is meaningless
until we dare
by our own faith
to do likewise

FILTHY LUCRE

Money is,
like e-mail,
the cleanest of all
yet to evolve
media of exchange
between humans
yet to learn
to love

WISDOM

In their eonic knowledge
genes know much about staying alive
and when to die

When will we who bear them
learn as much?

WHAT WOULD I DO?

I am so practiced at survival
in the land of Should
that I can easily ignore the wonders of Would
which I also know
are just around every corner
as is the faith required
to go there

BEING WELL

If we can be
we must be
if we are
to well be

UNKNOWN

Human reality is:
A pin-point of data
born of frozen perceptions
projected outwardly toward space
and in time
in the vast plethora
of ever-changing variables
which are never pinned down
in reality

KNOWLEDGE

The apex of knowledge
is using seeing
to stand-well-with
and explore the unseen
rather than to obscure it
the unknown from awareness
to push the wider world
into nonsciousness only

ARRIVAL

Early on
getting somewhere matters
Later on
not having to get anywhere
matters more

Art is knowing
when to switch
Faith is what it takes
to do so

DOING BUSINESS

There is no right way to do business
outside of context
The way to do business
is the way business is being done

As is not so
with living well

DEFINITIONS

Two plus two are only four
by common consent
as with all our other definitions

All things, like words,
have meanings only when we assign them
Otherwise life is meaningless
clean, that is, of humanity

Lesser animals
lacking consciousness
Don=t have this problem
but we later apes
Can=t show up without
eating the paradox
Of being both apart-from
and apart-of
All at the same time

If we escape into apart-from
via judgments
Of better or worse
we=re out of here
If we lose ourselves in apart-of
we=re equally gone
Only big enough to bridge the gap
without leaving either side
Do we earn the right
to show up in this Eden
Which is everywhere
as the lesser animals
Never forgot

VISION

The reluctant gift of time
unrelinquished without faith
is the possibility of seeing themes
previously cloaked behind events
which bring with them
freedom from necessity

THERAPY

On the surface
therapy is about getting help
with problems

Below appearances
it is about companionship
along the fearsome path
from darkness to sight
from entrapment in images
to the freedom
of consciousness

The problems, of course,
remain, only now with
options

RELIGIOUS ERRORS

Blind at the time,
and wanting to see,
I erred in my efforts
to make beliefs reasonable

I did not know, back then,
that the great gift of religion
is mediating the unknown
while we are faithless
on the long path toward
becoming conscious

OLD

SPEED

Eating, like fucking,
can be fast
but tasting and digesting,
not to mention making love,
take time

GENETIC SALVATION

I have erred grandly
not in my wish
that some woman
would make a man of me or
help me be a man or perhaps
let me be a man
but in the illusion
that any woman
could do either
(if only she would)

FEARS

PROJECTION

I am increasingly aware
of my life long habit of projecting myself
on to humankind
on to Athem,@ others Aout there,@
women and men
sometimes trying to help, even save,
them to themselves
unaware that all my vision
is only my seeing
which may or may not be
either visible or useful to them
but wherein lies the path
whenever I dare to be what I see
to my own salvation

GROWING DOWN

Early on for a boy
learning to know
counts much
Later on for a man
learning to not know
counts more
Finally for an old man
embracing mystery
matters most

BEAUTY

is a wonder
which only reaches its fullness
when for itself alone
any for others or for later
or for anything else
mars its perfect face

TALK THERAPY

of the talking kind
is often necessary
while one moves
from talking for others
to talking to another
on the long way
to speaking oneself
which is a prelude
to being silent
bearing the power of knowing
wisely

BEING FOR OTHERS

has been for me
a hot house for my soul
yet to stand the sun
of being
for myself with God

KINGDOM HERE

In the kingdom here
saying what you want
is sometimes feasible,
mostly not,
but knowing what you want
always is

NATIONAL CEMETERY

When the fragile strength of reason
meets the awesome power of memes
as when sense about real estate
confronts honoring dead soldiers
known or not
the latter wins hands down
every time, except when reason
has the backing of genes
in which case clothes & marriage
& even etiquette are likely to be shed
if not blood as well

CAN DO

If we can do
we want to

Nature evolved capacities
functional in well-being
and desire is our connection
between capacity and consciousness;
Well-being = capacities embraced and activated,
allowed in consciousness and
mediated in practice

DRUG PROBLEM

A better solution would be for society
to create/provide more legal thrills
rather than simply making chemical thrills
illegal

CONSCIOUSNESS

Consciousness is not a virtue
but a capacity
which, like all others,
cries out for activation

To cling to nonsciousness
when sense is possible
is like holding your breath
for protection from the
excitement of ecstasy

COWARDICE

Cowardice is cowardice
It is often the course of wisdom,
sometimes the best way to cope,
seldom if ever a male virtue

JUST BECAUSE

Love that matters
is not because
of something
but in spite
of anything

ILLUSIONS

Illusions of possession
mistaken as reality
are a vital part
of magical relationships
the waving wand inviting presence
hiding the truth
that real love is anyway

NOSTALGIA

Nostalgia, e.g., for the good old days,
et al, is rooted in primal womb memories
now evolved into illusions

In the real world
I can=t go home again

GRACE HAPPENS

Shit too,
with fan fair and loud voice,
but quietly, regularly,
and more often
grace stands present awaiting
my recognition
whenever faith allows

IMAGES

God and Cunt
are our two most powerful images
the first, I suspect, evolved by males
in desperate necessity
of coping with the second
which of course came first

Then comes Money
followed by Mother and Justice
with Romantic Love
not far behind

PARADOX

The limited salvation
to be found in religion
comes from the illusion of security
inherent in cloaking the ever-present unknown
with comforting answers
protecting us from the larger salvation
of living well with having none

ETERNAL TIME

Surely there are clocks in heaven
but they go relatively unnoticed,
if not unwound,
except when one has a bus to catch
or perhaps a baby to make

All proper goals in life
are like taking a good shit:
they have no schedule;
they take as long or as short
as they take

Therefore it's always a mistake
to get in a hurry
or to hold back too long

DANGERS

To avoid the eternal dangers
inherent in certain knowledge,
such as, believing you know
what you=re supposed to do
not to mention be
one should periodically do things
without knowing why
taking the risk of meeting angels
unawares

DOING GOOD

Do what you should
when you choose to
but never stray far
from your wants to
lest you end up self-righteous
and far from yourself

SHOULD

Should is a useful guide
but a terrible taskmaster
and a destructive habit

GONE FISHING

Fishing is fun
because its more like the Real World
than the illusions of the Enchanted Forest
which we create early in life
and unwittingly enter for solace
seldom to leave
until the weather is right
and we hear the fish are bitin=

MINDING

Writing and speaking, ideally,
give form and shape to minding
bridging the gap between
imaging and thinking,
the creative edge of minding,
where everyone in the Real World
is continually present
patient with the excitement
inherent in the only eternal question:
Wonder what I will do next?

Unfortunately such ideals are rare
more often writing and speaking
only lead to words and notions
which constipate the mind
and kill the con-versation
with arguments or agreements
closing the door to the ever-present
Kingdom of the Goddess
which we can only enter through
minding

EARLY ON

Early on
when She really is God--
Her breasts, our only access to food
Her body and arms, our warmth and comfort
Her kisses, our magic healer
her love our eternal life
we are wise to curry Her favor
by whatever means

But later on
when times have changed
and powers shifted
wisdom lies elsewhere

DECIDING

Signs and omens
gods and lovers
all protect us
from the awesome responsibility
of making up our own minds

Not to mention
the faith which deciding anything
always requires

SPIRITUAL SCHIZOPHRENIA

Giving your self a present
is better than giving one to someone else
or getting someone else
to give you one
but not as good as yourself getting

NO NONSENSE

In a universe largely beyond all our sense
both figuratively and literally
to live a no nonsense life
is to price oneself
out of the human market

SIGHTS

Of all our difficult sightings
well past Santa Claus, God, Mother,
and our fragile Egos
Self, I think,
remains the hardest to see

KNOWING

Knowledge is power, but
knowing is empowering

The first is temporary,
a possession easily lost or superceded

The second is eternal,
a stance which is continually
in the process of fulfilling itself

Therefore a wise one is diligent
in phasing all knowledge
into knowing