Everywhere you look,
everywhere your gaze lands,
there
the angels,
carpenters,
playwrights
and arborists,
bus drivers,
tanners,
rain-makers
and silversmiths
populate the invisible,
dashing into position
at the end of your glance,
blossoming from time
and space
wherever your vision rests,
hidden but present
inside your every view
like the blood
in your own hand,
just out of sight,
just behind
the world as it seems to be,
just giving a bit of color
to the proceedings
you’re so used to endorsing,
planing boards,
planting saplings,
banging pots and marching in circles,
inventing musics,
fashioning dialogue,
forging bracelets and street lamps,
forming clouds
and giving tours,
scenting shrubs,
erecting thresholds,
tents, and fairgrounds–
and so on and so forth.
One subtle shift of your mind,
you see–
one instant of resonance
between you,
your mind
your heart
and that Idea–
and the ocean begins
yielding flowers
instead of fish,
vines drop down
from the sky
for climbing,
or for swinging,
and talking elk
appear along the plateau’s edge,
grazing on sweet yellow fruit.
Every being
is astounded,
you included,
for who is there
who can say,
I saw this coming…?
Who is there
who can say,
It is just as I planned…?
This is how it really is.
The rest of it–
what you’re accustomed
to dealing with in a manner
which some have called
perseverance–
that is all
very deceptive
painted-on buffoonery,
the graffiti of the so-called “ones”
who keep trying to sign
their name on everything,
as if to say,
Yes, I did that…
It is just as I planned…
My astounding colleagues,
there is no power
in make believe.
Embracing Forever 
‘The wisdom of insecurity’ is what Alan Watts called it – resting in the knowledge that if we could just get out of our own damned way, all will be well after all; and the supposed power of make believe is then laid to rest in the graveyard of the untrue.
“To put it still more plainly: the desire for security and the feeling of insecurity are the same thing. To hold your breath is to lose your breath. A society based on the quest for security is nothing but a breath-retention contest in which everyone is as taut as a drum and as purple as a beet.”
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Hariod, how do you do it?! I love your timely quotes and references which always add depth and reason for contemplation to my own scribbled musings. As I reflect on how much occurs in my daily life that is far beyond my conscious control, and yet astoundingly particular to my proclivities and deepest yearnings as a being, I often return to the notion that what occurs is experienced as ever more perfect in its arising once we’re along for the ride. Part of what I mean by that sentiment is that when I consider how many persons there are on this planet, and then consider how perfectly suited to my own needs and desires are those precious few I have come to know, it boggles the mind. There is an orchestration of spontaneity that is wondrous to glimpse in those few instances when I muster (or rather cease altogether in my efforts to muster) the fleeting audacity to get out of my own damned way.
Case in point: Hariod Brawn.
Michael
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H _/\_
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Oh so grateful that it is all much more than I can imagine. Some turns of phrasing here have me giggling in my pajamas instead of banging on pots and pans and marching in circles. I trust – is my mantra of late, in the chaos, in the mundane and emergency, in the conundrum, in the world according not to my Planning. I think it is good planning on someone’s part that you have a vein of all that is running near you that you can tap into so playfully and poetically – today I am grateful for that part of the plan. Blessings, friend, Michael!
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Thank you, Marga. It most certainly does have a way of trumping the imagination from time to time. What is real is at once sweeter and more profound than any images thrown up on the board by my illustrator muse. Every time I imagined something real, the image it came with was but a cape pulled away at the last instant to reveal something without form or blemish. And so many times what has appeared in front of me was beautiful precisely because I forgot to imagine it first, so it snuck into me exactly as it was. Trust is a beautiful remedy. You can skip the cape part that way, and the vain specifics, and just get right to it.
Blessings to you as well-
Michael
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Oh yes, *I* planned that! LOL
Don and I have long understood that we are not doing, we are being done. Our new saying is “We serve at the pleasure of the Mystery”.
Blessings, Alison ❤
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Oh, so you’re the One! I like you’re new saying very much. I’m guessing the pleasure is mutual…! I don’t have a new saying right now. But if I did it would need to incorporate the word trust these days. Enjoy your New Year’s in Australia!
Much Love
Michael
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Hi Michael,
“vines drop down
from the sky
for climbing,
or for swinging,…”
Came alive for me.
xxKa
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Thank you, Ka! I am delighted to make your acquaintance, and look forward to reading more of your thoughts and shares. I grew up in a home where astrology was viewed a bit dimly, shall we say, but was in retrospect not perhaps fully understood. As time has passed I have become increasingly respectful of, and interested in, the manner in which this multi-verse swirls with influence and keeps its pot stirred, as it were. 🙂
Michael
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Hi Michael,
I spent the first 15 years of my astrological journey in a closet about it – to my family. It was just safer that way. I believe it can be misused. Especially as a person who doesn’t like stereotypes or labeling of any sort, nor false dichotomies such as art/science. Astrological understanding requires skill, but much more than that: time & experience. Upon my journey, I found the psychological usefulness of astrology as a tool to self-discovery. Eventually, by about 20 years-ish, it had become obvious to me that this was not just a passing interest *and* though there is something “to it,” it’s still all up to the interpretation. 🙂 Interpretation is always in the hands of the owner – the one who lives their own life charts their course -within the framework of the mystery. I am in reverence to all of us, on our journeys, and whatever that means to us. Beautiful writing, Michael.
I love this, “As time has passed I have become increasingly respectful of, and interested in, the manner in which this multi-verse swirls with influence and keeps its pot stirred, as it were. :)”
I’ll be back, I hope! xxKa
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Thanks for sharing all of this, Ka. I resonate with your sentiment that “the one who lives their own life charts their own course– within the framework of the mystery.” Part of my maturing understanding is that as we accept responsibility for our lives, we cease to be victims of circumstance, and yet we are unified with that mystery you mentioned. We cannot help but be influenced by the rhythms and graces of the Whole, and by our unity with one another. This is paradoxical, but beautifully so, and the depth of what this means is revealed to us through living…
I’m glad you came back. I hoped you might!
Michael
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Thanks for this Michael, and the talking elk (who) appear along the plateau’s edge, grazing on sweet yellow fruit. This is how it really is, notwithstanding the so-called “ones” who keep trying to sign their name on everything. Thanks too for another year of inspiring images, I continue to be enthralled…
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Thank you, Tiramit. The enthrallment is mutual, as I continue to savor your postcards and quotes and the glimpses through your vision that are shared, which penetrate the world’s strange skin. I love the way you reveal the world’s (and our own) klunky interfaces, and it’s (and our own) empty depths, and how they (all) tumble over, into, and through one another in your writing.
Blessings and Love to you in this pending New Year!
Michael
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“and the ocean begins
yielding flowers
instead of fish”
What a great image
What a great poem…
Feels like being swept away by a beautifully reckless whirlwind…
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Thank you, Julien. Much appreciated… We’re all being swept away all the time by a beautiful whirlwind, but being such powerful winds ourselves, it can all feel “normal” sometimes… So much lies beneath the surface!
Michael
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