Knowing Wholeness

Knowing Wholeness Through Poetry and Imagery The integrating of body, mind and spirit, embracing the dark and the Light of one’s human and divine conditions, is one of the purposes of KNOWING WHOLENESS; Through Poetry and Imagery, a book of nearly 100 soulful poems and several images. Here is one of the poems which captures this intention: Robust Those lusty ways So primal While we have these bodies Let us get from them The mileage that we may Connecting to divine aliveness Merging with the great beyond Communing with the One Through union with another Lover Spirits flowing Arms enfolding Hearts of gold No withholding Share this Earth Give birth to making Fertile now At any age And any stage of life A time for pleasure-making No mistake in waking To a time to savor Bodies which have brought Us through and on beyond Our suffering to now enjoy the bonds Of blissful union, Sweet communion. While the poetry seeks to help the reader embrace one’s head, heart and hara (belly), the heart is celebrated as the center of our being, the place where resources from Heaven and Earth meet. The hatching of the heart – So ripe, this phrase is haunting me. How good, indeed, it would be for the world If each of us would HATCH our HEARTS this year, Allowing hardened shells surrounding these To slowly crack and fall away, Releasing Light and Love with wings So all within the orbit of our field Could feel the flow And somehow know That love of every kind Comes from the heart, not mind. There is a circle here: The mind informs the heart, The heart illumes the mind Which then, again, informs the heart – And so it goes; with Grace the process flows. Celebrate anew, each day, your best of parts: Your tender and courageous heart And start to HATCH that HEART today; Tomorrow, someday, set it free Then feel your Essence, fully BE. Wholeness includes our times of pain. A section entitled “On Loving and Leaving Narcissists” explores this challenging human experience. In other poems remorse, even the darkness of “our evil twin”, our shadow, are put forth. Carl Jung taught us that the road to wholeness is made of fateful detours and wrong turnings. These detours within our history can be integrated and much of the energy can be transformed into personal power. We’re whole, a duo, you and me, Tamed within my heart, not far Away from me, you are Within these chambers, holding close, The dark and Light, for we are both Included in the “All That Is” Complete, connected, Resurrected wholeness. Life doesn’t work the other way So darkness, you are here to stay with me In wholeness, Truth so bright; Your darkness does not dim the Light. The Age which is upon us here Says this: When polar opposites appear Let’s welcome the dichotomies Let us embrace as partners, these. Now is the time; let it be so. Following the section on “The Shadow, That Gremlin” is a section of poems about “Remorse and Surrender” with the suggestion that we do so sooner rather than later: Sooner. Wise are those who do it sooner. Surrender to the One. We do this when the day is done, When deathbed gives no other choice. So why must “I” not have a voice About my life while I am young? Why should I turn it over, Give control away By saying, “Take me, Spirit, Make me what you see That I could be.” By giving not ourselves to God When we are young We get to see, eventually The errors we make, So many woes Which aren’t undone Without the Grace which comes Replacing our remorse At having not surrendered Sooner. A section on “Our Spiritual Connection” reminds us of the healing we receive from nature: Sweet baby green ones Pop like popcorn Only silently As Spirit moves These neonatal Nubile, clean Pristine Clear green Bright leaves on branches Springtime brings Until the Summer sunshine Blanches them with life’s full throttle living Giving wear and tear to what was innocent Our hot young living’s grand and strong aliveness Starts to turn the cycle ‘round Then Fall begins to brown and tarnish What was tender months ago By dropping those Which once were popping So we go below for Winter Leaves as compost Food for future growth New gleanings Greenings Waiting for renewal Rebirth Springtime brings The jewels Of baby leaves Like baby Jesus Bringing hope The scope of which cannot be told But felt within as like a blanket soft The Holy breathes new life Relieving us of grieving As the Spirit holds us In its arms Of newborn leaves Some sections are entitled “Oneness” , “Duality and Diversity”, “Be the Trinity”, and “Four Quadrants of the Heart”. Four compartments has the heart, Housing all its qualities; Two Yin, two Yang chambers apart Meet Soul at their interstices Stout hearted, Tender hearted Heart both Yang and Yin Four chambered gem you are Soul is found within Our Soul contains our humanness Embraces each securely. While holding us together as a being, Holding us in love, It also flows forth Far it goes Then farther on beyond Until it merges with the ALL Where we are surely One. Diversity, a certainty Equal we can’t be In terms of energy Nor talent, beauty; But equally we share A Soulful goal, Our choice to serve collectively, Perhaps a duty, Which is: to know our wholeness. This is ALL we’re here for. We are here for ALL, Our wholeness, knowing of it Tells us our totality, Shows us equally the holy, All That Is. That is all; Within ourselves As it is so Without – That is, within the great Beyond. Simply, this is it – To know, Then go Enjoy It ALL.