CLXVIII
Will you ever tire of being entertained?
* * * *
Those seeking vain reflection
Will not long reflect upon you.
* * * *
There is no satisfaction in hell,
Nor contentment with heaven.
* * * *
Count and guard you money,
Arrange and clean you possessions,
Act out your existence for the vanity life offers,
And cultivate the agony of mortality to its graveside end.
Who are the rare that distinguish the seed’s root,
And perceive that which is immortal?
* * * *
When time is clearly seen
As a neurological distraction,
How can you help but be free?
* * * *
What is it to rest in the lotus of stillness,
In the quietude free of passion,
Without the concerns
Of a hectic, time-filled mind?
* * * *
The divine breath is like an ocean wave
Crashed and stretching like a cat upon the sand,
And then withdrawing casually until its lungs are again full.
* * * *
Set about the inquiry through negation.
What you seek is what you are not,
Not what you believe you are.
* * * *
To resist your fate only magnifies the suffering.
* * * *
The deluded mind is like an impenetrable fog;
The seer like a light streaking across infinity.
* * * *
Those we consider heroes have failed us
Because we lack the discernment to pick real ones.
Great leaders are servants to the world,
Not vampires to self-interest.
* * * *
How long will the dream of man continue?
Only in time will the full epic be known.
* * * *
Do you really want
To be at peace with your Self?
Or are you just mouthing the given words?
* * * *
You will see the obviousness of it
When you are ready to embrace your true reality
Rather than the self-perpetuated dream-state of manifest time.
* * * *
You were born to contemplate the dreamy mystery
In whatever way the weaving has fashioned your experiencing.
You are the puppet of goodness experiencing the fleeting eternity of time.
* * * *
Can you be exposed to another’s experience without judging it?
Discerning its reality without injecting your personal view?
Can you walk a lifetime of miles in another’s shoes?
* * * *
Living is far more complex
Than the simplicity of its truth.
* * * *
The limited mind is sole creator of all imagined glory.
The living dead inscribe their tombstones
With the pretense of delusion.
* * * *
The most direct way to awareness is attentive breathing.
* * * *
Consider these field notes of an attentive observer,
Subject to the programmed editing capacity
Of a word processor thesaurus.
* * * *
How quickly an innovation becomes tradition
Laden with dogma, symbols and rituals.
* * * *
Does any other life form on this garden world
Pat itself on the back as quickly,
Or as often as we?
* * * *
“There must be more to life,”
The voice within stated, clear as infinity
So long ago a mere memory now.
* * * *
We are not as different as the mind believes.
* * * *
Why something that so easily turns into hate
Is called love is beyond understanding.
* * * *
The pleasure you get today
Will likely add to your suffering
In some tomorrow hence.
* * * *
You have achieved and failed in so many ways.
C’est la vie, baby.
* * * *
The tombstone for the hamburger
That was once called Michael Jay Holshouser
Should read, “Thank god it’s over!”
* * * *
A-wandering and a-puttering.
* * * *
All resistance is futile.
* * * *
You’re starting to look like you will
For the remainder of your life.
You’ve had your time in the sun.
Let it go.
* * * *
What a neurotic world you harbor.
* * * *
Behave yourself.
* * * *
As tiring as all the rest.
* * * *
Majority offers little recourse.
* * * *
Another day.
More bullshit to deflect.
* * * *
Engage the mystery.
* * * *
Every assumption is rooted in imagination.
* * * *
Memories are the dust of time.
* * * *
The concept of god
Can be a great obstacle
In your awakening.
* * * *
Love…What a strange sound.
* * * *
Belief is for those who need make-believe more than reality.
* * * *
We are all imprinted from birth by the limited mindset of one culture or another.
How can any awaken to a broader view without some twist of fate,
Which escorts them outside their original framework,
To a platform from which they can explore
In whatever way destiny allows.
* * * *
We are all just temporary containers
In which consciousness plays.
* * * *
Words are merely sounds
To which imagination
Arbitrarily attaches meaning.
* * * *
To say the universe is your creation is amusing.
To say it is not is even more humorous.
* * * *
Another life work flushed away by ignorance.
Oh well.
* * * *
The infinity of your universe is beyond comparison.
* * * *
You mean normal really does exist?
* * * *
Some lessons are long
And hard won.
* * * *
A genie caught in a bottle
Is akin to your being in a body.
* * * *
Irony is allowing fools and psychotics to lead us.
* * * *
Applause has such a hollow sound.
* * * *
The more you attempt
To prove something to others,
The less likely it becomes.
* * * *
Most problems seem to grow
Much greater than need be
In undiscerning minds.
* * * *
Inside so infinite.
Few see it.
* * * *
It is the journey of immortals.
* * * *
Wax wings need not melt when touching the sun.
* * * *
Dull as it may seem at times,
Every step is an adventure.
* * * *
Ignorance incessantly argues with itself.
* * * *
How can pretence be more real than it is?
* * * *
Even shit has got soul.
* * * *
Death is effortless.
It’s the dying that’s hard.
* * * *
Zen monkey.
* * * *
A silent, attentive mind
Is humming with the scene
Through which it is passing.
* * * *
Pathetic is as pathetic does.
* * * *
Transcend malarkey.
* * * *
When is there time to practice
When reality is bearing down on you
Every moment of your life?
The game as afoot
The moment
You were conceived.
* * * *
We are all born of the same mystery.
There no greater or lesser aspect to it.
* * * *
Mortal gods.
* * * *
There’s nothing to justify.
* * * *
There you go make-believing yourself again.
* * * *
Ideals do not govern well.
* * * *
Is there anything more foul than a gutless coward
Who claims himself a true friend to your face
While bit by bit pushing a jagged stiletto
From behind towards your heart?
* * * *
Absolutely nothing can touch you.
* * * *
Labels are for those who believe.
* * * *
Look back at the path you just traveled,
And all you will see is the dream
Perceived in imagination.
* * * *
All attempts to limit the infinity within
From its origin bring about only
Irreconcilable suffering.
The unlimited
Cannot be bound by thought.
* * * *
The dream you call a life,
Could it have been any different?
Every decision, every turn, every pause,
Every laugh, every tear, every single experience
Has brought it to this imaginary flowering.
Had it been just one breath different,
It would be very much the same.
* * * *
Seek ye wisdom?
'Tis a lonely trek.
* * * *
How enticing the passions
Of jealously hatred, sorrow,
And other storms of the mind.
* * * *
Illusion, ignorance, delusion and confusion
Are the bitter seeds of destruction
Built into the foundation
Of all humanity has created.
* * * *
Am not sure what the point of that life is.
* * * *
You will never be told you must go home.
It is a volitional, choiceless return,
* * * *
Just tap your Ruby Slippers.
Kansas has been wafting
Before the beginning.
* * * *
Once you ignite
The crystal seed within,
Reality precipitates into oblivion.
* * * *
Humanity’s seed will endure far longer in time
If it chooses to discern its perfect origin.
But if not, it’s really not a big deal.
We are not as vital to the play
As we so vainly believe.
* * * *
Individuated personal vanity
Is the manifest flaw of your perfection.
Indivisible personality is an entirely different state,
To which few are drawn, and fewer discern.
* * * *
Now is forever.
* * * *
Ain’t no creature great or small or equally tall,
Whose shit is really any different than yours.
* * * *
We need leaders whose vision
Is thousands of years from now.
* * * *
Life, that breath between birth and death,
Is the make-believe of adults.
Children just play.
* * * *
If you vote your pocketbook,
You’re voting for extinction.
* * * *
The diagnosis is the remedy.
* * * *
Unwittingly, they raced toward gridlock.
* * * *
Dark, sinister, cynical laughter
Erupted from the speakers above.
* * * *
If you didn’t pay attention,
It’s much less likely
That it occurred.
* * * *
The usual adjectives.
* * * *
Even the hardest diamond
Will one day melt into oblivion.
* * * *
There’s definitely an absence of evidence
Regarding the existence of a separate entity
Many throughout the world choose to call “God.”
* * * *
Is it possible to ever appease this world?
* * * *
I’m sure it must be important
To at least one other person.
* * * *
You’re as real as it gets.
* * * *
If that isn’t scary,
I don’t know what is.
* * * *
Buddha without a belly,
Or at least only a little one.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Stillness Before Time (Compendium)
© Michael J. Holshouser 2009
World Rights Reserved