KUNIKOS (reflections on numerous recent comments)

Brother Bernard
of the Order
of the Benedict,
in the crypt
he is
lighting candles
and praying for the souls
of all men,
one gland in an organ,
one small mystic in
one Mystical Reality.

Meanwhile back
at humble ranch
called the Holy Hostel
of the Goddess Beauty
in old-new cacophonic City
in the ancient-future near-East,
from one meek tower
minnaret hard-cast citadel peering down
quite ugly on
Brother Bernard
comes the edict:
'You, sir,
'are irrelevant.'

Sister Frances
in the City
wonders at the
hymn she's hearing
from the Hostel:
'I'm bringing home a baby
'bumblebee,
'won't my Mommy . . .?
'I'm bringing home a baby . . .'

Father Athanasius
opens thick oak doors to these
ancient kuniks, but these
recent smaller breeds have disavowed
the arbitrary orders
of Chihuahan border,
nipping at his heels
in all humility,
beauty, and complexity;
he meanwhile has
a Mass
to get to.

'I'm squishing up my baby
'bumblebee,
'won't my mommy be so proud of me?
'I'm squishing up my baby
'bumble-bee . . .'


-r

INVERSIONS

We stand around bleating
about the Good Shepherd seeking
his lost little lambs, being
sweet as He is to his sheep.

Cool grit the shears
in such bleeding;
crook in the Staff greets
the Reading.

We ask whither the Wind
bloweth over, only to find
the SEEK YE inscribed
in Lamb's bone-setting bite.


-r

Healer-Idealist, Hmm

After nearly 26 years of living, I continue to find it shocking that the world isn't filled with 'healer-idealists', and can't name the source of this everlasting assumption. God's design? Natural inclination? Egoism? Loneliness? All of the above? There could be a dangerously and naively selfish edge to the assumption; I don't mind being naive or being perceived as naive (old hat), but the true danger is in failing to recognise the world for what it is and in doing so rendering yourself useless to the world at hand. There are many different kinds of persons in Creation, each kind with its strengths and weaknesses that we need; yet I'm everlastingly surprised at the lack of empathy and selflessness in the world. I naturally assume that we all struggle with self and pride in the same way, on the 'outwardly-focused' end of the spectrum; frankly, we do not.

The 'solution' here seems to be parsing and prayer; the items here lapse over into each other, natural and innocent inclinations mixed with egoism and the like. But then again that's the mystery of life for you.


-r

FROM BEHIND PAPER-THIN WINDOW

[or, THE DIFFERENCES]


So it would seem
freedom means my ceasing to be,
breathing means my freezing,
smiles likewise to weeping--
very well, oh yes,
it's not so strange yes
but also not so easy
never will be easy--

sadly though
this mystery of motion
(oh, for me a merely teeny-tiny ocean
(of complete destruction)
makes you think you're happy. So
let's, sure let's, grin hand-almost-hand,
not hand-in-hand
but neither never too far out of hand;
internal bleeding-out meets your relief in
fact that it
will take ten thousand lifetimes
for this burnt sand
to break down,

oh sure yes.


-r

SUNBURN IN NOVEMBER

[or, The Parable of Dr. Jon Osterman]


Apotheosis has its own hidden odds,
a pothole hardly occurring to
hapless the human soul who
happens to stumble into
the courts of the gods.

Seeing the quarks
sears dumb such transformation,
oblation becoming dark,
obtuse relations:

To Mars with the one
whom apotheosis has preyed upon -
his exodus is
a dark exodus;
his inheritance is the winds
of the ubermensch, the supermen,
the disembodied, the inhuman men.


-r