Consciousness is always opening.
A door opening, a window opening,
even the wind opening.
Sometimes you can feel
that opening on your face
like the warmth of morning light.
Sometimes it overlooks a vast plain,
and other times it’s inside you
like well-being breathing peace.
Awareness is all that happens,
even what we do not see.
Clouds form and dissolve,
the light shines through.
That’s why being is always opening,
to include us in what never ends.
Poetry
Wings of November
The first junco
on my windowsill:
snow’s not far behind.
The woodpeckers
are busy today.
It must mean something
even if we don’t know the language.
A blue jay jumps on the fence,
and preens against russet leaves.
A cloud of grackles
open a hole in the sky
through which to migrate.
A saw-whet owl
drops down from a tree,
lamps on the path.
Villa Romana del Casale
We float above Roman mosaics
on a narrow walkway
that drifts through time,
and see Hercules, the Cyclops,
the bikini girls in mid-leap and turn,
the corridor of the great hunt,
captured animals
straining against their chains,
and, on a sea of stone,
a cargo ship setting off to Rome.
All the figures come to light,
half myth, half dream,
all shadows
floating between worlds,
just as we are floating
and part of theirs,
and our own
continuous unveiling.
Truth
Our fruit bowl is broken.
A mirror, cracked.
Outside, part of the fence has collapsed.
The driveway is in disrepair.
Someone shattered a window.
Our plumbing sprang a leak.
Insomnia comes along—
like ambulances in the night.
The next day, you’re gridlocked
behind a funeral procession.
When you get home,
an envelope waits on the table.
Fusion without Confusion
He picked up a pen, but it never touched paper,
and in his mind’s-eye his beloved took form.
Then the moon began flying erratically,
all books were washed clean
and from the tip of his pen
a white dove flew into white space.
Second Summer Sight
Silhouetted against such an azure sky
the yellow leaves fall so brightly
it seems the most natural response
to summer’s end to die with gratitude.
They bury themselves in saturation
as though light was the grave of time
and darkness, the briefest of seasons.
The Milkmaid
It’s in those yellows and blues,
in the precision and balance
and the ether of the composition.
In the foot warmer on the floor
and the brass container on the wall.
The darkness of the jug
from which the milkmaid pours the milk
in a silvered thread
emerging from shadow,
that imperfect zero,
a void folding into itself.
A small act mirroring the cosmos,
like something refusing to vanish.
Monet in His Studio Boat
Not that the place changes,
but nature shifts within it,
light altering itself,
reflections rising from the riverbed,
like the Seine flowing in a dream.
And you must be still and fluid too,
like the water on which you float,
detached, adrift,
aware of the necessity
of creating as you go.
My Forever Moment
Just this mild mid-October mid-afternoon moment,
A few yellow-gold leaves swaying,
Touching the stillness, testing it,
And glowing in the most exquisite light.
An azure sky that could have been painted
By some Renaissance master,
Inviting change to enter eternity’s door,
Mingling the heavens with our soil.
If the choice was mine I’d choose this moment
As my forever moment…
I’d make this perfection my last.
In the meantime, I’ll extend my stay
A moment longer, a moment longer,
And saturate the canvas with gratitude.
On St. James and the Camino
St. James’ body on a boat of stone
Set sail over a sea of stars,
Held aloft by an angel and spirited to Spain,
To Padrón, the stone pillar still exists,
Part of the main mast of the stone boat
And a miraculous assertion in stone.
St. James, with staff and scallop shells,
Traversing fields of stars, as in heaven.
What is more miraculous
Than a legend become pilgrimage?
From person to person, spirit to spirit,
Whether they know or not feel it,
For over a thousand years
A trace of his faith has crossed their faces
And the road to Santiago opened
To what is most frail in us, most hopeful.
Salvatore Ala 