And re-reading essays I wrote about the meeting place of opposites in the universe--the meeting of conscious and unconscious, Self and Other, nature and man.... that writing
gave me the opportunity to read so many wonderful things written by artists, Jungian psychologists, and even quantum physicists. All of it for me boiled down to the realization that 
we are so far from being alone. The voices of all these Others can be heard - in dreams, in listening to nature, in meditation. They are heard, paradoxically, in silence. In the middle of the night, awakened by a dream in which I asked, "how can we better hear them?" I had written:
"The silence doesn't require goodness/morality. But it does require--truth? Truth to it, being true to it, to the silence--what it asks is our renewed truth. Whatever it asks we must give."
3 comments:
The thoughts constantly screaming in my head, demanding attention, demanding to be said.
Cycle through and new ones come to take their place. Tyrants of distraction between my ears
In this inner space, never-mind, the impossible cure.
Focus on the breath the key to the pure. Prying open the latch on that door,
Beyond which is everything and Nothing grand, surrounding as you watch.
Reach out to grab it and it goes away, join in the dance and you are part of the play.
Of everything and nothing--all the same--the space between determines the game. Play both simple and complex all the same.
No-thing and every-thing and vice-versa, everything + nothing = the universa!
I think this is a great poem, Poet! The first thing it made me think of is the work of Eckhart Tolle -- do you know of him? A friend made me a gift of some tapes of his spiritual philosophy, and it's all about getting out of those "screaming thoughts" in the head and learning to observe them, with detachment, from the space of pure Being that he believes (I believe also) is our true essence, where we are all connected. So I've been thinking a great deal the last few months about the exact subject of which you've written.
"Tyrants of distraction" -- what a perfect description. "Demanding attention," yes, and "demanding to be said"--oh, yes, I've struggled with that one a lot lately! Tolle says it's the ego that makes that demand, that it has such a need to stay alive, and these clashes with other people's egos is what makes it feel alive.
I love this line -- "in this inner space, never-mind, the impossible cure." That is really profound. There's a lot that's profound and feels so original in this poem. "Reach out to grab" the everything that surrounds, and it goes away... yet "the space between determines the game," yes!
And the last stanza is perfect, and so thought-provoking. "everything + nothing = the universa!" It makes me think of chaos theory, and the idea that there is just a slight preference for everything holding together vs. everything spinning apart, and without that slight preference nothing we know would exist. (At least that's now I understand it, but I haven't studied it.) Everything plus nothing equals the universe. I like that.
Thank you for sharing this!
Dakota says--
The first thing it made me think of is the work of Eckhart Tolle -- do you know of him? A friend made me a gift of some tapes of his spiritual philosophy, and it's all about getting out of those "screaming thoughts" in the head and learning to observe them, with detachment,...
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I agree although I have never heard of Tolle. For me it is to become curious about the "tyrants" in our minds without needing to "understand" what, why, where, when, who, or how.
I have heard parts of a great CD set by Bhuddist Nun and teacher Pema Chodran called "How to Meditate" in which she not only discusses technique, but also the understandings and teachings on which it is based. For a brief sample of her teachings you can go to:
http://www.kpfa.org/archives/index.php?arch=24927
The CD set costs about $15 dollars from Amazon.
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