Landlocked in Fur

Here is a poem passed on to me by one of my new cyber-friends.  It is by the 17th century mystic Tukaram, from India. Translated by Daniel Ladisky in ‘Love Poems from God.’”

LANDLOCKED IN FUR

I was meditating with my cat the other day
and all of a sudden she shouted
“What happened?”

I knew exactly what she meant, but encouraged
her to say more — feeling that if she got it all out on the table
she would sleep better that night.

So I responded, “Tell me more, dear,”
and she soulfully meowed,

“Well, I was mingled with the sky, I was comets
whizzing here and there. I was suns in heat, hell — I
was galaxsie.
But now look — I am
landlocked in fur.”

Eric

Eric would have been 34 today. I miss my boy. He has been gone seven years. It is seven years too many.

Requiem

by Robert Louis Stevenson

Under the wide and starry sky
Dig the grave and let me lie:
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he long’d to be;
Home is the sailor, home from sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.

mj

Twilight

All my cares slip away
With the lightness that was day.
A calm and quietness creeps in
With the shadows as they deepen.
The sky is soft and muted shades
And as I watch, its pale light fades.

While I watch the darkness fall
I feel that I’m not here at all –
Caught in a moment that has no time
Like writing a poem and losing the rhyme –
For today is already in the past
And tomorrow is not yet in my grasp.

mj

Bead Day at North Ranch

The open door of the craft room
Lets in the birdsong and breeze.
We hear the birds singing and tweeting
As they flit from bushes to trees.

We sit stringing beads, and chatting;
Enjoying the fine company.
We talk and we laugh and we giggle;
Making friends and jewelry

The birds are a-twitter picking at seeds,
And we are a-twitter picking at beads.

Pangur Ban

This is written by a 9th C Irish Monk in St. Gallen in Switzerland.

PANGUR BAN

I and Pangur Ban my cat
‘Tis a like task we are at:
Hunting mice is his delight
Hunting words I sit all night . . .

Better far than praise of men
‘Tis to sit with book and pen
Pangur bears me no ill will,
He too plies his simple skill.

Oftentimes a mouse will stray
In the hero Pangur’s way;
Oftentimes my keen thought set
Takes a meaning in its net.

‘Gainst the wall he sets his eye,
Full & fierce & sharp & sly;
‘Gainst the wall of knowledge I
All my little wisdom try.

Practice every day has made
Pangur perfect in his trade;
I get wisdom day and night,
Turning darkness into light.