Yes, our blood is warm.
It seeks, it goes forward.
And it points to how in life
The vapours of youth, of joy,
Of piety and inspiration
Pour forth like honey
Only to melt away so quickly,
Leaving their mark behind
Many centuries later.
And so, as I stand here
In an almost impossibly verdant
Fertile landscape, far from home,
Blessed by the unfamiliar constant warmth
Of a blazing Asian sun.
And soaked in the heady humid foreign air,
Perfumed by scents unknown,
It is now that I can sense
Some sweet distillation of the past,
Stirring in the air.
And soon luminous light
Is seemingly everywhere:
Even in the glances of strangers
From many other lands,
Whose suddenly realise, with a smile,
That they too can now tap into this moment,
This cauldron of precious perception,
That it has taken us all
Travel across continents
To find here today – unique, illuminated, bejewelled,
In the midst of temple ruins, long since forgotten,
In the clambering, grasping riot of the jungle.
Pure, naked fragile hope.
A gift from Tibet.
Bare, old and worn.
At first sight the crudest
Humblest of objects,
Fashioned to formulas long forgotten.
But these are
Bowls that sing!
That guard within
Their softly tended shadows
Close-kept secrets
That can speak to your soul.
And the mystery is
How their tone, their voice
Grows stronger and clearer
As the years, indeed the centuries
Slip kindly by – layer upon layer.
This is truly a cumulative alchemy.
A melt in time,
Magically shaped, begun by ancient hands.
A mystical mix of craft and contemplation,
Of mecurial moments, carefully gathered in
Just waiting to be sprung.
To be released again, sacredly in the ether,
To resonate forever.
Needing love,
We squeeze what we can
From a fluid landscape of life and light,
Gifted to us but for a moment
In the grand scheme of things.
Hope glistens,
Daring us to do so much more.
And, at our best,
When least distracted
By the petty cares of the day,
We hunger for a constant,
To find a flow,
A warm, healing current
We can swim within.
One soul’s journey
In search of a tipping point.
The possibility of honour,
The chance of grace in our lives.
Age gathers, colludes.
Cadences fade fitfully,
Seemingly before their time.
But there are echoes still,
Shapes we inherit, we inhabit, we bequeath.
A life however bravely spent,
Will always be jagged, incomplete,
Never far away from being enveloped in darkness.
Some may say,
Especially those who’ve known joy in life,
That this is not right.
I tell you clearly they are wrong.
So, just as a dancer
Might spin for you an exact pirouette
And release themselves in the perfect burst,
A lingering silhouette of energy,
Be content to love, to dazzle in the light,
If only for moments…
And then be gone, with gladness in your heart,
Before the creeping shadows
Claim too much your sadness at leaving.
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