copyright © 1983 Down 'n Out Press All rights reserved

The Epistemic Screw

Can't we be much more
than planetary sleuths
probing life's own investigation,
itself, a vision quest through knowing
being-and-doing in random historical drift
this search for a reasonable quest
(with our private eyes and communal ties)
for a fitting object of our affections . . .

Indeed, doesn't this screw of knowledge
turn on a horizontal axis
a rolly coaster ride
from chicken to egg
through countless generations . . .
our exploration parties grope
through progressively abstract
levels of logical type
through ageless labyrinths
of contradiction and paradox
nested in hierarchies of context
perceived difference, domains of distinction . . .
and incessantly shifting sands
of linguistically determined
communal agreement
 
 

10/20/93

~ ~ ~

Expectáté (eternally expectant?)

We grope through gray skies
and nocturnal expectations
guided, in parameters proscribed
in sense and season

Through wondrous realms of cartography
analogies of pattern
Morphogenetic
beyond our understanding
or control
 
 

01/16/95

~ ~ ~

Cast Adrift

in these dark times
does the muse
elude your senses?
do you yearn for an open highway
or the quick fix of your video?

can you still nurture stillness of mind
or calmly let go? and, in flowing
can you halt the constant chatter
the canned laughter of the construction cranes
those insistent cultural voices
their constraints
calling in the night
like a dream from your childhood
reawakening
without the protection and security
of a guiding light
 
 

04/25/95

~ ~ ~

Jeremiah Lawrence

Sweet and sour daydreams, all our hopes and fears
in another sunrise, an infant uncertain . . .
ambiguous as the ripening mangos
skin and flesh
bones and teeth
soft as a baby's bottom
mu shu puzzled dawning
awakens frazzled, and wrenched
Joyful, as we celebrate
a new life
and simultaneously
face this shit
that it inevitably hurls in our face . . .
 
 

09/09/94

~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~

Defining Spirituality Holistic

Not the spirit/mind disjunction
Not the split mind
mind/matter,
matter/spirit dualisms . . .
Nor is it revealed exclusively in didactic syllogism
This actuality: Mind
focused
outside of word
experienced. yet
communicable
experiential
and sacred . . .
those fleeting moments
in dharmas' grasp
in god's endless
re-cognizing experienced . . .
Actualizing known
sustenance
that if not
the one
than the means by which
 
 

12/08/94

~ ~ ~

Transcendent?


to what extent are the parts
the whole? . . . the messages & algorythms
or instructions
themselves subject to a higher transcending
levels of abstraction
ad infinitum
the negentropy through which
we hedging our bets
live and breath our knowing-
being-doing

amen
 
 

12/09/94

~ ~ ~

St. George in the Library

if I had a room full of Sankt Georgen
slaying his dragons, with Lawrence
burning on an open grill, his precious books
clutched in his right hand, falling asleep
at the seminar's table in the bibliothek
seeking wisdom through knowledge

through logos/dharma enclosed within
life's algorithms not proceeding from
a single point far off in the heavens
but immanent at least, within
this existence, emergent and lo, transcending
the whole of our infinitesimal
exceedingly minute corner
of this, perceived region of the universe
 
 

04/05/95

~ ~ ~

Hermeneutics of Growth

through Grants pass
over the grapevine and back
through steel reinforced
concrete canyons
That unfolding all
bringing forth
through past meaning
knowledge and growth
through the redwood forests
to grandmother's house we go
encoded in a proto post modern
blues, pale scarlet declassified
reinterpreted contemporary
and my, what big eyes we have

beyond those empty spaces where
logical paradise
in subtle paradox
deftly integrated resides
imagine a generation
beyond the need to shun
beyond learning the weapons of war
picture the emerald mansions
as we lift, push and shove
our many selves
out of past calcifications
slowly rebuilding the barrier reef
the meadows of our youth
 
 

01/21/95

~ ~ ~

Everyday Mundane

in the rapture of nature's hermeneutic
in that balancing act circle
of chicken and egg corresponding
adaptations of consistency
in DNA spiraling
multi-
faceted messages
inter-
linked in crystal ball
regularities, supposition
and liquid certainty
in the swirl of the earth's
elated rotation
 
 

01/23/95

~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~

Who Decides

Upon what ethereal wings
with which stochastic trajectory
did we soar to this global island?
Through what extended dance of elocution
did we discover our flight redundant . . .
and finding our ability to soar
the solar winds of imagination
squandered, are we now marooned here
in some cul de sac after our own fashion
overspecialized in self
deception, and destined like some
mammalian dodo, to play out
the certainty of our own extinction

Is that why we envy
in our metaphors and totems
the eagle and the humming bird?
 
 

05/05/95

~ ~ ~

Anchored in Grief

How to untie this senseless knot
it aches like blazing dry ice
double bound and lodged in my solar plexus
head in my hands, unable to cry
with cast down quiet eyes
bowed in cascading rage and disbelief

At the evening news
I moved down slowly to the street
pushed my back against the aging silver maple
squeezed between the sidewalk and the curb
limbs out stretched, defiantly arched
reaching for the constellations
in the pitch dark emptiness
of the night's unending horizon
How shall I mourn your passing?

Plant flowers in new turned soil?
Recall the chickadee, golden finch and titmouse
their beauty, their exuberant songs
keep the memory of your fiery eyes
your enthusiasm and your goodness
burning brightly!
 
 

05/19/95

~ ~ ~

Undoing Knots

Locked into one way of languaging
we step out into an abstract
black hole of our own devising.
Blatantly unaware of being entrapped
in our mono-logical objectivism
governed by physical metaphors
of energy & power
reified and revered with fascination & fear.
After all, feelings of dialogical entrapment
happens in being-with "Others"
an experience
Which can not arise outside of language
yet surfaces dialogically
in actual contestations.
Just imagine,
without insisting on sweeping generalizations
we may, through appropriate
re-visions of our relationships,
participate in emancipatory demythologized
morphogenesis, in therapeutically new
re-articulations of ways of being-with
Others . . .
which could undo our crippling
notions of unilaterally held
power and power-less-ness
 
 

05/31/95

~ ~ ~

Darts & Arrows of Abstraction

It all seems to begin with these mistaken notions
an allocation of meaning, simultaneously
informing, programming, defining
civilization identified with
the sophistication of only its men
at arms with stones of hearts
and copper clubs

But those bronze urns
of ancient Thailand
and Yang-tze China
must be indicative of
somehow more than
mere pinnacles
of a martial
mental capacity

Something about the self evident
the absence of chaos in the perceived universe
something concerning the continuum of patterns
across a spectrum, punctuated evolving . . .
evolving balance, within
multi-dimensional parameters or matrixes
drifting enclosed in raw potential
wide open variables of a mental
material
holist unity
 
 

2/02/95

~ ~ ~

Paticca-samupadda

Yet, something must always be changing 
The complexities and regularities of life
Of random disorder increasing, that 2nd law 
Minus energy, which must be overcome or exceeded 
Quite literally informed, held steady
Recursively balanced habits of perception
Bio-sphere logic 
Held fast while advancing 
Mental states in combination, ecosphere
Evolving genetic poetry (digital cum analogic)
Testaments to realms of inclusive knowledge 
Transmitted
Chromosomically strung out on silver threads
Commanding though frets and chords 
The algorithms of life 
Played out on a transparent lute
Orchestrated
Oceans of context and meta-context
Levels of metaphorical type and meta-pattern
Through language, society, culture and speech  .  .  .
Through veneers of time re-occurring 
The message re-sounds diversity 
Seeds of chaos 
Sown across ratcheted calendars 
Commensurable only in ecomind 
Implementing elements of randomness 
Gathers its karma
A process more complex than thermodynamics
And toils at maintaining that stasis 
Of compassion and 
Love's reciprocal symmetry
Concentric circles
Without any 
Center
 
 

02/3/95

~ ~ ~

       Janus and Hermes

            since ancient days recognized
and personified in Hermes-Mercurius
the pathfinder, messenger and thief
the gambling scoundrel
             leaping victorious youth, gleefully toiling
in tandem with Janus, the two faced guardian
introspective and brooding, the quiet one
the gatekeeper of life
             both, unraveling and transferring
intricate strands of gnosis      acknowledged
mysteries, ineffably sacred prajna-paramita
that wisdom which goes beyond
mere words and rhetoric.  .  .  .
             that which both records and transfuses
successfully,      the generations
incrementally      co-evolving
tactics and strategies
for something      like "survival"
             these social agreements
cooperatively maintaining
life's multidimensional symmetry  .  .  .

. . . (Hermes) . . .

Hermes, we here celebrate        your winged ankles
your clever flight        your wildly orchestral dramas
like some complex game of chance    these fluid panoramas
scored with Gordian's symphonic rigor, guarded by Janus
then improvised in nature's colossal casino, like sweet jazz
co-mingling stochastic scenes,        life's discipline disrupted
embodied in fluid vistas        transmuted
             the guardian's interlocking grammatical rules
transcribed by your playful performances
our gambling, dancing god,        your metaphoric imagination
reeks havoc      within      poetically calm co-adaptation
mutating mind waves      creative resonance
rippled redundance        epistemic dissonance
rumbling through sundry myriad levels of abstraction
ecological themes,        reeling
             morphogenetic symmetries
brilliant harmonies, stretched to virtuoso performance
their death defying leaps of terrifying unison
all, all,  .  .  all,  .  .  .  an inclusive synchronicity
on the seemingly liquid stages of the biosphere
your laughter is apparent
in the infinite regressions of relevant contexts
set in countless boundaries and frames
             all structurally enclosed,        while embracing
the passions of its lyrical poetics,       composed within
ecomind:        each form of life      a bundle of ideas
messages,        organic stanzas,      expressed and reified,
an echo of their communal past      reverberating throughout
the ecology of ideas,        levels of difference,        perceived
thresholds of glory revolving
within us,        around us,        and through
             previously illustrious patterns of life
                         unfolding . . .

                            .  .  .  (Janus)  .  .  .

            stern, compassionate Janus
        conductor and brakeman
        under your watchful mind, this unfolding all transpires
       life's temporal imprint       maintained     in genetic
     historical drift, a sort of floating crap game, evolves
    latent messages     encoded rules     or bench marks
   guarded by the two faced titan .  .  .
  life's severe croupier       time-tested and truthful
 governing the gaming tables in Ecomind's plush casino .  .  .  .
             your epistemic games of chance
in which each form of life partakes
judged against complex regulations
protecting Eco's delicate matrix
contributing to the mesh    of    unlocked memories
transcribed, preserved and transmitted        miraculous
algo-rhythmic codes     breaking the entropic bank
successive structural triumphs  .  .  .  .  .
             your past successes,        memorized & retained
 countless wonders, coiling digital bits      of differentiation
  distinctions        culminating        against all odds,
   analogic forms         restating life's genetic tricks
    our conceptual deck of cards        reshuffled
      dealt out on information loops  .  .  .
       bonding and merging, sevens and eights
        unfolding     new ideas     concretized in tunes
          pre-set     to autopoietic systemic bias.  .  .  .  .  .

~ ~ ~

Untitled: Homeostasis

untitled,
balanced but wobbling
on the scales of elation
and disinterest teetering
in matrix of cognitive accessible
reference marks, not quite random
in harmonics & dissonance
progressively localizing reeling
clusters of perceptive activity
gathered in transcription
digested, shunted around
and through increasingly abstract
levels of spherical logic & difference
all, globally localized
inter-nets of health
and collective
pathology
 
 

01/25/95

~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~

Recapitulated

ours is the living
and twice blessed
are they, who hold
the book and candle
without grasping
steadily,
without anguish and fear,
seeking knowledge
and compassionate
symbiosis
over control
 
 

03/29/95

~ ~ ~

Shy Titmouse

Shy titmouse
Silver gray at the wind
Delicately clutches the feeder
Displaying her burnt orange patch of anterior fluff
She turns and straight
Looks me in the eye,
Two steely jet pinheads
As deep as the cosmos . . .
Suet and seed in her beak
She releases her grip and full of grace
Glides back to her red maple security

Bird calls ricochet through the crescendo
Of cicadas, crickets, and barking squirrels
Old friends compose this summer's tone
Familiar sounds embellish Vivaldi's cellos,
Or, Horowitz's piano in the background
 
 

06/15/95

~ ~ ~

Mid-Summer Night Maneuvers

There, at the threshold of order and chaos
He stood transfixed, not thinking . . .
Just beyond the cover of old growth
Maple and Elm
Beyond the internal dialogue, he stood
Encompassed in the silver gray mantel
Of this morning's damp stillness . . .
Bathed in subtle hues of Whistler's delight
A procession of fireflies
Floating on the high breeze
Just above the tree tops
Sparkling chartreuse diamond blue . . .
Translucent lightning bugs, arching electric white
Twinkling organic aircraft, their running lights
Displaying a truly random component
With integral strobe light precision
Flashing hypnotic messages
The ageless exuberance of winged courtship
Married to the mysterious symmetry of their dance
Defining random sequence
 
 

06/23/95

~ ~ ~

Minimal Holisms

I know this world
too often, in fits and hazy fogs
through my own failures
and overcompensation.

We know this world
too often focused
in parallax, bifurcated visions
myopically cramped into a living cell
marooned on this third orbit from the sun.

Just imagine our vast solar system
adrift in the milky way
the planets, asteroids and satellites
visited intermittently by comets
all spawned of cosmic dust.
In full view of the cosmos
from dust we are created
from ethereal thin air
from fiery earth, and mud and water
from which we can just barely venture
escaping to the moon or mars.
Nor are we able to plot & steer
the course of mother earth
adrift in the milky way

Of all this, I know not the ultimate levels
of regularity and abstraction,
only that we must seek to evoke
to bring into consciousness
a heart/mind
of wisdom and humility, enough
to contrive a humbly more viable,
elastic and sustainable response
Garnered, not chiseled in stone
from within our limited knowing
a flexible ethos of co-evolution
into each new awakening
dawn . . .
 
 

05/24/96

~ ~ ~

Morphogenic Resonance

The concept itself comes back as an echo
on a noisy loop
distorted echoes
coiling back on recursive nets
where hierarchies and holons join
nested in the spiral
double coiled messages of life . . .

Stories in a book
recording the limitations of growth
preparing the way . . .
cultivating and nurturing memories
remembered
in the petals of the rose
in the bounty of the lotus
 
 

06/05/96

~ ~ ~

Musing Out Loud

Not the quantitative size
the shape or volume
of the cosmos,
Nor its progenitor
its origins, or creator
that we were here to plum

Rather, how each of us
once being born
is immortal

Though I believe I was once conceived and born
I don't remember
and just as surely as I was born
to die, I suppose
I won't remember . . .

Our participation in this continuum
through every thought and action
every mood and fraction of our knowing-
being-doing manifests as an artifact
immanent informative residue
a message forever embedded
in the whole of the global cell

Knowing immortality
an overwhelming
responsibility,
if ya just think about it
Since every fiber of your personal
existence, influences and establishes
the singular matrix, the integrated contexts
from which each successive generation
will learn the next steps
of this global roundhouse dance

~ ~ ~

Learning the Dance

Through the double doors of enquiry
cracked open just wide enough
two fours merged into infinity
in a single heartbeat
eight gates to life
everlasting

a coral reef awakening
on the shoals of time
adding closed circles of awareness
organically grown transparent onions
at every cycle we unlock
a sublime intelligence
and bloom toward an integrated learning

it is not about energy, this information
transference, reception, interpretation
ecstasy is translucent
your fingers on the nape of my neck
all perception is transient
and ultimately dialogic
 
 

12/07/97

~ ~ ~

Coffee at Day's End

Seated on the front steps
a cup of black coffee
greets the day's end
Above and to the west
that white crescent
an astronomical hard fact
rising on a field of topaz
A setting so clear
its transition
from aquamarine
to darkness
passes unobserved
In the night sky
the hale bob comet lumbers along
its earth-year trajectory
plotted in fourteen thousand
recursive units
Re-appearing at regular intervals
humbly re-seeding this quadrant
of our galaxy
 
 

04/04/96

~ ~ ~

Dearest Ma

A velvet lupine
Among golden poppies
Lavender, your favorite color
Surrounded, encompassed
Thriving
In California Gold . . .
The Coastal Wonders
along Route One, winding
North to Fort Ross
or South to Nepenthe
The giants of Big Basin
A delicate monarch hugging
the clouds of coastal mist
At Pebble Beach and on
along the cliff's edge
To San Luis Obispo, rolling hills
and beyond to Santa Barbara
where it all began

With the seeds of wild flowers
the majesty of Sequoia
and the flight of Butterflies
We've crisscrossed the state
and half the country . . .

May these images return
Some of the joy & beauty
You've shared along the Highway
on this 75th Birthday
 
 

07/17/96

~ ~ ~

Untangling Organic Koans

Crickets and cicadas sound
August with open windows
Squirrels barking summer's end

Adrift, as we are, in this sea of chaos
At the boundaries of each specific frame
We can taste and consume the messages
Recycle their colors as sound
And fashion the harmonics of love

At the boundaries of each fractal
Nothing appears to be moving
Yet I share with you these discrete items of infinite variety
Increased complexity, elegance & ordered simplicity

Within this specific frame
At the boundaries of our six senses
Love and compassion forge life
And I share with you this sense of awe
In the shared recognition of order, emergent pattern
Ratio and degree

Crickets and cicadas sing
August with open windows
Squirrels barking summer's end

~ ~ ~

copyright © 1983 Down 'n Out Press All rights reserved