Of Palms and Palimpsests

 

To dream is not an evasion,
nor a waste of time or energy,
even if dreams fly
beyond the arc
of human consciousness.

To dream is to be in continual free-fall
to the unexpected, unanticipated next;
dreaming requires no notion or plan
—all is suspense, all is in suspension,
a readiness in unreadiness
or the scratching of a quill
over the sheet of foolscap—
archaic,
but only in the sense
that one might lack the ink
or the penmanship
in the non-present now.

There, we might glance
at our lively page
to find nothing written there, at all;
but the paper has been folded and eared,
screwed up and tossed,
retrieved and smoothed,
folded neatly, then unfolded,
creased in differing directions,
only to be undone back to flat,
worn, now and limp,
lacking enough integrity, perhaps,
for aerodynamic flight.

And all for a lack of direction,
a longing for flight
fighting reticence to height,
so that the dipped reed might record
a thought or trace a silhouette
—or otherwise leave a mark,
even if a splotchy blot

—Ultimately, the run-on sentence
is the avoidance of endings,
especially for those who
can’t figure out how to make a start,
or maybe it is all continuous starting,
without end,
Amen.

While wrapped in these ponderings,
in this landscape of dreaming,
there approached a form
drawing slowly up from a distance,
and soon there appeared a man,
riding an onager.

His gaze was steady and warm,
laugh-lines were in evidence,
and he greeted me like a friend.

Seeing the creased and blank sheet,
he said,

We embody the world we see,

an unfathomable array of beauty
punctuated by experiential pain.

Life is good, so we are taught,
and we can find ourselves

in this goodness as existential truth

even when the willow bends to breaking.

Don’t leave the canvas blank, my friend,
make your mark.

Don’t be afraid to create yourself,
be in the being;
as you have folded
and unfolded,
so all your markings
continue to amend and change.

Simultaneously, we each
know and do not know
where we are and why;
doing is all,
we invent as we go.

The words we utter,
and later record,
live on, even down to the dust
that is carried on the wind;
don’t die with your song trapped inside
—sing out, in full voice.

I’m making my mark, see?
he said,
touching his forehead, his lips, his heart,
don’t hesitate to make yours,
even if you don’t understand the significance
—the run-on sentence is the doing,
not the avoidance;
you can write and overwrite,
paint over and write some more—
it’s all continuous starting,
continuous writing,
without end,
Amen. 

He reached out and took my hand,
and held it for a moment, smiling,
before letting go,
but, as an after-thought,
reached out and touched my forehead.

Then, handing me a palm frond,
while good naturedly
slapping the onager’s flank,
forward and off on their page they went.

Looking down,
I saw that my page was full,
and that words were even running,
puddling in the creases,
accumulating in pools,
to run off the page
across the wadi,
or fly off the page,
up into the sky.

Both knowing and not knowing,
continuously starting,
we run, we fly, and we sing
without end,

Amen

© 2023 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen & songsofasouljourney.blogspot.com

Solstice

The shortest night

eases into the longest day;

the light can barely contain itself,

and the land heaves a sigh

of something quite pent up—

the interior landscape

exhales heat and humidity.

The birds take to song early,

take to flight soon after,

until the beating of wings

awakens the whole world

with inescapable rhythms.

Every stone, every branch,

even the driest blade of grass,

all awaken, as if from a long sleep,

and a longer dreaming.

Waves of warmth rise

in circular patterns off the ground,

as do the pollinators, 

flitting from blossom to blossom,

as if self-aware of greater liberties

to propel themselves upward,

despite the heavy weight 

of their cargos.

Everything rises on tiptoe, 

as if weightless,

expectant,

waiting

for the next coming,

Next,

only round the corner, now,

is all poised to bloom

and bear fruit, 

for, verily,

Life is the only choice

on this event horizon.

© 2022 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen and songsofasouljourney.blogspot.com

 

Advent Austerity

 

That which we seek may not show forth today
—perhaps this is a hidden blessing.

 

Moon and stars light the night skies,
making way for bright sun / cold morning.

 

Masked faces pass one another silently,
like quiet and distant ghosts.

 

Solitary cyclists ply their courses,
weaving between pedestrians with care.

 

Fisherfolk, in shorebird form,
bide their time, lying in wait for canny nourishment.

 

People prepare humble meals at home,
created with simple ingredients to hand.

 

Come nightfall, all creatures
retire to their respective nesting places.

 

Thoughtful quiet descends.

 

There is a measure of,
if not peace,
acquiescent composure.

 

The tension between oppression and freedom
is bridged by self-control,
wherein this condition apart 
is allowed to uphold fragile integral nature,
very like the deliverance depicted in any miracle play.

 

If we were not so self-conscious
within our self-regulated austerity,
we might yet hear the song
of the hummingbird's dream,
might feel the earth’s hum in our bones,
might awaken to the nascent answer
of the riddle of our existence,
then tattoo it, as a reminder,
on our opened-ever-outward palms, 
ready to accept and to give blessing,

as the journey rolls on.

© 2020 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen and songsofasouljourney.blogspot.com

photo by Rick Lewis for Bay Nature magazine, April - June 2016

Afternoon at the Lake

There is a moment,
in the depth of the afternoon,
when the summer sun is hottest,
that the soft light of peace gathers
to settle the dust of day.

The tread along the footpath
does not disturb the hum of hushed bees,
nor the meandering of dragonflies
from shore over the center of the lake,
coasting on any errant breeze.

While the blue green algae rests
in a shaded nook along the far shore,
the black crowned heron stands,
motionless, watchful,
awaiting the slightest stir
in the shallows that might signal lunch
—food to fuel night flight.

© 2017 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Meditations in Fast Times: 31. Night watch is always happening

Note to Readers: “Meditations in Fast Times” is a devotional writing experiment for the Season of Lent. Each day during the season, I am writing a poem as a meditation on, taking as my inspiration and intertextual basis, T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets”, as well as incorporating the daily office, current events, and other readings—some the same as those Eliot used while composing his seminal work and others.

                31.

Night watch is always happening
in the garden of the soul, where
one always worries that the torch will burn out,
in the strain of that very darkest hour,
before the horizon’s eyelids begin to flutter.

Wondering, wondering,
while restlessly wandering in the dark night,
one constantly wonders about choices,
trying to learn from the uses of choice,
to remember the successes and the failures.

The random thought occurs
that past choices might be woven together
into an enchantment that could conjure or cure,
but the song of the soul gently urges against such folly;
though all time may well be the same,
each moment presents itself differently
to the individual.

Those laws of time that truly exist
lie outside our perception;
these were not carved in stone,
but lovingly touched into living flesh,
softly blown into each wisdom eye,
that the quandary of possibility
might be met flexibly
in each moment of our journey.

No challenge can be answered
with stone tablet thinking;
all answers must be driven
by the informed and intuitive heart.

Waking from the night watch,
of wonder, dreaming and prayer,
is to greet the day of our challenge
with the faith of best intention,
rising with the resolve to act,
in the assurance that our effort
will be met, as befits the need.

© 2014 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Head in the Clouds

Soft clouds walk the skies,
while I walk the beach
—we, in our own worlds,
walk together.

Sprinkles of rain,
tears of sorrow and joy,
sprays from salty waves,
these all commingle,
like thoughts.

The sun also joins
this conversation,
warming hands,
warming sands,
circulating all moist thoughts,
dropped to the thirsty earth,
back into the passing clouds.

Do I find my thoughts
among the clouds,
or in the spindrift?

Do ideas drift in and out
with the traveling mist,
in the passing storm cloud,
by way of fog and dew?

A complex conversation—
quiet, but more full of life
than my imaginings
can fathom.

© 2012 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

On a Bridge, Overlooking an Endless River

Evening digresses, as it will, into sleep and rest and dreaming. And in those moments before sleep overtakes me, I wonder, both at the life I have known, and the one I have yet to meet.

For the most part, I know that what has been, what is, and what will be is a continuous celebration, one whose venues and themes shift to match whatever moment passes through a window called now. The situations are all the same, but the current that runs through them is very like a river flowing under a bridge—the bridge may stay the same from one moment to the next, but the water flowing under it is always new.

I suppose that what astonishes me the most, as I look over my shoulder, standing on my bridge as a bundle of sensations and experiences collected through that portal called now—at least the now that stretches from this moment back beyond 50 years to those moments when my body formed and waited for my soul to enter—is how much my life has been dedicated to the various arts that have washed over me and sifted through my hands, my heart, my soul, and through my expressions of being and doing.

For so it is that I have been, for as long as I can remember, held tightly in the web of the Muses. I know that this is so because whenever I have tried to venture away, it was only to be firmly led back to that consciousness or source that persists in the realm of audiovisual sensation, thought and action that I know to flow within a river of muses. The only choice is to engage with this river of expression, and yet the river offers endless choice.

Perhaps this realization only means that the living of life is a river through which all actions and sensations, all waking thoughts and dreams flow all expressions are indeed art, whether they result in form or are “successful” experiments or not.

As I fade into the refreshment of sleep this day, I know that I will dream about something that will touch my life, or yours, as the river flows on, carrying everything onward in celebration.

Flow on in beauty, sweet river.

Flow through the songs of my soul and the work of my hands. And when it is my time, carry me into the onward.

constant dews

a retreat

from time,
from sun and moon,
from birdsong and flowers,
but not to a forgetting

a retreat
into mind,
to rest-in-self,
to refresh under
constant dews of thought

a retreat

into contemplation,
to fly kites with possibility;
sleep plants the seeds for tomorrow,
so sleepers awaken to a world in bloom!

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Wishing Well

Shafts of light reach into the placid depths of the pool.

So, too, my gaze and my breath reach,
inward, downward through the mossy depths,
finding source and swing,
peace and wing.

The sharp relief of day's cast is softened,
and stillness imbues thought's idle current,
discoloring emotion to the point of peace
and back in reflection.

May the stroke of my gaze
and may the breath of my soul
be tokens that,
floating ever deeper into the still quiet depths,
find both their question and their answer,
find their expression from inward ever outward,
and their expansion onward, upward—beyond.

Well wishing to and from a wishing well,
for this moment and for all the episodes that follow.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Oceans and Nights

Over the oceans of blue,

the reflected azure of night
draws an expectant sigh;

stars seem like a map
to places unknown,
ideas untested,
dreamscapes
abroad.

Star
radiance
draws the eye
no differently now
than in the millions
of years of observance
and ritual tracing of sky
within the mind of humankind.

Moonlit skies lead travelers
across the barren deserts
of time and mind and
deep space dreams,
great journeys
into the why
and how.

Believe:
answers
await those
abstract followers,
who strive to arrive at
those weightless keys
that unlock the internal
mysteries of undivided self,
of nothingness and eternity.

© 2010 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen