PRESENTED TO THE BUDDHA CENTRE ON SATURDAY AUGUST 16 2025
Preamble
“These poems span a stretch of years and will be read in the order they were written. They don’t form a single narrative, but together they reflect the changing concerns and questions of that time. My hope is simply that the images and rhythms speak for themselves, and that you find points of recognition in them.”
OPENING
The Sunflower
Sunflower dazzles in rays of summer
Like mind in its enlightenment state,
At rest in its innate effulgence.
Erect, uncouth,
Its nature embodies the ineffable glory of
What is.
Who makes the sunflower?
It makes itself,
Itself its own unfolding essence,
Its flowering simple, yet utterly profound,
Time-bound yet timeless.
Explain to me the sunflower,
The mystery of what it is.
No words suffice to state its glory,
No bliss penetrates its innate intelligence.
Complex, yet simple;
Simple, yet complex.
Its essence is trans-dual,
Immaculate, perfect,
Just as you are, right now, reading this.
You are the sunflower.
The sunflower is you,
To whom I offer this kiss.
Who are you in the window, looking back
Who are you in the window, looking back
at me, intent upon this posturing intent?
What is this me that looks at me and is me and yet
I know that is not I yet is.
Is it not nothing that sees? Nothing that is, yet is not.
No wonder that this universe is stuck,
Devouring itself in infinite infamy,
A string, a Druid’s staff, a Mobius strip.
I gawk at the kaleidoscope of sense,
Callisto’s mirror, Narcissus’ paradise.
It’s happened too, no time to waste,
Beauty is a transitory thing.
The yarrow stalks say change is constant,
And action is the thing.
Nothing except that which gazes
Which is the gazing
With intent.
Intent is gazing, the cuckoo’s call of spring:
Strive not!
The Faces in the Rocks
The faces in the rocks
Gaze at me,
Intent.
They ask “Who are you?
Where have you come from?
We’ve been waiting here
Forever,
At last you come
To our home.”
Their rough faces
Twisted in the rocks,
Each one individual,
Each one a mystery,
Each one holy.
I wish I could know them
But they are mute,
Only their faces speak truth,
Archaic faces
Twisted by time
Lost in the creepers and the vines
By the river that murmurs
Beneath the city.
I wonder, who else has come
To sit in silent witness
Beneath the flashing leaves
And hum of the cicadas
In the ravine?
I invite others to see, but no one comes.
The city is too close, its business
Infinitely distracting.
But I return
Again and again
Because I realize that only I will come
To witness their testimony.
It is a mission I have.
And if I die
In this place I wish
That I too may join their company,
The stone faces that do not speak.
A lone bird sings its song.
FIRST MOVEMENT
The Heart’s Prayer to Guru Rinpoche
Dedicated to His Holiness the Venerable Tulku Yeshi Gyatso
Guru Rinpoche, hear my prayer
From out the depths of my despair!
Awaken those who slumber on,
Ignorant of the true song.
Break down the barriers that intrude.
There is no truth
In sticks and stones
Or bricks and mortar
Or in the bones
Of the past.
These words ignite within my heart
A light that shall not die
Despite the might of mediocrity.
The chaff shall fall like lice
And be consumed,
Exposing the secret seed.
Your creed,
Forgotten indeed,
Shall perdure to the end.
That I defend
And shall not rend
Till I, empty of egoity,
Attain thy grace:
Guru Pema Siddhi Hung.
Dzogchen
I sit cross-legged.
A world unfolds itself
Concealed beneath a fallen tree.
In the midst of the valley
A jade stupa,
Surrounded by three great boulders –
Guardians.
I sit cross-legged
Upon a distant peak,
Gazing down Into the valley,
The murmur of water my mantra.
A world reveals itself
Amidst the bric-a-brac.
Worlds within worlds.
The soft green glow
Of the stupa
Enthrals me.
Sitting
In each moment
Essence strikes,
Immaculate.
Suspended like the butterfly
In midair.
Unspoken.
The humming bird too
Flies poised
Imbibing the mysterious nectar.
Still Life
“The world only gives herself up to those who do not desire her.”
I watch the fruit ripening in the sun.
I watch it turn to pulp,
rotten with sensuality.
If I were attracted to the fruit
I would suffer.
If I were not attracted,
I would be indifferent.
But I see the fruit as it is,
beautiful in the first glint of the morning light.
The faint fragrance of rot stings the sky.
The fruit flies dance like dakinis.
Secret
One day this insect
Will be a butterfly
Sitting on a rock
In the sun-drenched clearing,
Thailand’s forests
Far away.
I hear the mighty bellows of the bull elephant.
He comes close.
I fly away.
Was it you, or not?
I long for it to be so.
Ekstasis
I experience the slick of my brain,
Geometric structures,
Ecstasy,
Consciousness.
Immediately I realize my wounds.
Perfectly brilliant,
Either slips back.
Ecstatic perhaps, my brain
A serpent,
I see the body experienced.
The serpent knows.
Clarity touches.
Vivid.
Smooth.
I can’t, disappearing along
Evolution, slowly coated
By facts, backgrounds, anything.
I recognize and state the fact.
The room is raised in feet.
The sensation of my arm happens.
The goddess,
Psychotic, primitive, superior, anything,
Simultaneously OM, paradoxically
Appears in my vision.
Without a future, everything slips.
My mane-shaped existence
Contemplates chanting.
Awakening
An ocean of nectar is suffering.
Delight in the wondrous yellow fog,
The scarlet pagoda emblazoned by the sun.
The great bell standing there.
And the Buddha there,
Standing before the bell.
Being Buddha
Cast adrift upon the mind of time
Like lotuses pelted by raindrops
We remain in place, bound to the mud
Of eternity.
But raindrops cease and sky clears
And the burgeoning sun
Amidst the glorious clouds of day
And the mystic moon
In the dark blue robe of night.
Radiant tangents articulate being.
What is this being?
Am I?
Clearly I must be,
Unclarity itself being meaning too.
Until in time the mind ignites
In pangs of ceasing
And unceasing bliss
And knows,
And knows
Itself
In death.
The Loneliness of the Dalai Lama
My birth, taken,
Surprised by the light,
The caravan carries me away
Into the night.
I cannot see
Where it might end,
But I remember
Where it began.
The flowers of my flesh
Cover the countryside.
Buried deep,
Their roots abide.
This candle flame,
Alone in name,
It is my shame
To carry.
I dare not tarry.
I shall not stagger
Beneath two destinies.
For I am free.
SECOND MOVEMENT
The Poem
For Robert Thurman
In righteousness of truth come near.
Seeing the archetype of being,
I stand before the mystery now,
Unutterable but for this stutter.
Where do I come from, and where go?
What is this place in which I dwell?
These questions but for centuries remain
An empty space within my shell.
My eye pierces the truth, but I,
Homonym profound and telling,
Know not the knower, being bound
By non-being, being’s illicit lover.
I seek within, and not beyond,
Perceive what is, for I am being
And non-being both, eternal tryst,
Twisting in a wild cacophony.
Consciousness empty and amiss,
Seduced by ignorance and bliss,
Tortuously seeking its own happiness
In the antithesis of this,
Conceals within itself the truth,
That all is void, that wrong is right,
That folly is wise, desire pain.
Seeking yet seeking it again,
I fall into the night inane.
Life after life, death after death,
The I that is not the eye that sees
(Nor even anything at all)
Passes its daze in the light of the moon,
Reflective orb, sterile yet bright,
While all around the true life slumbers
Awaiting the awaking of delight.
I am, that which perdures.
Like an uncarved stone
The simple fact of my mortality
Drops away like sleep,
And the dream that is I
Awakes into the sky,
And rises, ecstatic, into space.
Shambhala 1
Another life in which
Chains no longer bind us to reality,
No chains at all
Endless drift through a universe
Free of past,
Enveloped in emergent splendour
In which transcendence springs.
Where vision holds,
To stare we raise
Both arms toward the heavens
And this certain sight
Brings at once
Eternal joy
And the impetuous impassiveness
Of humanity’s grace.
You stand,
Quiet.
Two simple things, we stare toward the heavens,
As beyond
The ignorance of humanity,
The vision which lies
Beyond them.
Others ask
In whose eyes?
The beautiful eyes in which
Came the myth of resurrection
Still lingers in me,
Beyond belief, nor sight
Exists for what we feel.
Our moments in which one lies a free human, and their neighbour
May well wear bonds.
But the bonds are set by none other than their own labours.
Steering,
You stand too.
Two simple things we stare toward the heavens
In the face of humanity
And watch God the loving parent.
Shambala 2
In the deep root
Of life, all things unfold
And grow in equal harmony and perfect harmony.
That impulse, the inconceivable impulse
When facing the darkness of equality’s totalitarian reign,
Driven in the jumbles of histories we do not shrink from.
Orgyen
Lotuses strike softly,
White as ice,
And with green candles at dusk
Hope all men
To find their way through,
To dream lightly
Of strange wings
Amongst the milkweed,
Here come to bathe,
Out of the lotus lore,
Quite unburdened,
Given back to nature,
Seem to leave some wish;
Throngs the rainy river’s pitch.
On this far stretch, in the east.
If a flower-man wants to strike,
Here he may choose
To live as he pleases
Among the living faces
With flowers painted,
In eastern woodland gleams,
Yellow, red and purple.
His glance seems to stare,
Assured
That whoever comes
To bathe in the spots where beauty comes,
Knows first things to do.
Dzogchen 2
When the wild leaves shelter the babe in spring,
Raising their vacuous arpeggios,
This chorus is the hevajra of her song,
And resonates with the wild chimes,
Green starlight of Sherpa Palace.
She opens her double eyes and looking into space turns to contemplate
The peaks and turbulences afar,
Stares at yakshinis boiling with Ch’ang Sing.
Woven in the multitudinous womb,
Complete and compact,
Even as the stone shot by the bow of Alexander,
Even as the hard gems of sunrise
Of Pacific isles rise,
Are faced, holds contemplation of all the years she has lived.
She and her babe clench hands in tranquility
As she aims her mind deep into the stars.
Found Poem
Yet again, monks,
the Wayfarer with the deva-sight,
purified and surpassing that of men,
beholds beings ceasing
and rising up again;
beings both mean and excellent,
fair and foul,
gone to a happy bourn,
gone to an ill-bourn
according to their deeds
(so as to say):
Alas, sire, these beings,
given to the practice of evil deeds,
of evil words,
of evil thoughts,
scoffing at the Aryans,
of perverted view and reaping
the fruits of their perverted view –
these beings, when body broke up,
beyond death rose up again
in the Waste,
the Ill-bourn,
the Downfall, in Purgatory!
Or:
Ah, sirs,
these beings,
given to the practice of good deeds,
of good words,
of good thoughts,
not scoffing at the Aryans,
but of sound view
and reaping the fruits
of their sound view –
these beings,
when body broke up,
beyond death rose up again
in the Happy Bourn
in the heaven world.
Thus with the deva-sight
he beholds beings.
Inasmuch as he sees thus,
this is a Wayfarer’s power.
Song of Pancasikha
O girl long of thigh,
Possess me with your limpid eye,
Let me lose myself in your
embrace, O maid.
I shall emblaze
This yearning spark
To perfect flaming.
All beings arise,
Delighting in the curls of her hair,
And give gifts to the saints.
THIRD MOVEMENT
No More Your Grave Gurus
He is mystical, forbidden,
Bound to himself and abandoned,
Now immortal and abiding,
Once shunned, now saved
Into eternal bliss. This blessed tree
Is fragile and rotten.
Enochian conceits
Always hide our secrets
From our guarding nooses,
Earth deepened to inebriated honey,
And garden’s cool earth cracks
For lust without mention,
Expressive tongues without explanation:
Transmission without charge,
Responsibility without degree.
And ignorant and cynical,
Despite evidence and shame’s laws,
We betray love. No wonder then
Little interest was shown
In such trivialism, so worthless
Of poetic truth. Judged
By darkness it hides,
It cannot possibly be love.
Once before, even seeking
Earth’s dull pool of madness
Led us into perdition, gladly
Sacrificing humanity, thought and genius
For the fleeting satiety
Of conquering lust. O earth of love, pray
That a leaf of salvation
Wear its innocent scent,
And linger again at this touch,
And observe from within
The hero it radiates. When ashes
Of fear, disappointment, doubt, shame,
Fear, guilt, hypocrisy, disdain
Of love come to anchor with pain
Of intellect, sorrow, doubt, fear and anxiety,
Bring bother again, pray,
With wisdom free from blind sturm:
Love is still treacherous.
Satyagraha
These few words of mine haunt his lost soul,
But he’ll get no respite
From that demonic creep.
In perplexity they beseech,
They fight back the battle:
Do not lose the fight,
O ye high and glorious angels
Of whom they pray
By the burning leaves.
Pray that by their prayers
Their end shall not come.
Save the slave that fears your face,
Get behind the boat.
All so fleeting,
You too are born again.
Perhaps he finds relief,
As he digs in the ancient books and scrolls,
With scowl and lips pursed,
Or maybe he assumes this artificial posture he preaches to convert others.
In fact, truth lies within,
If aught would seek,
And refuse to follow those that follow falsehoods.
Those people are obviously ignorant and uncivilized to not be inspired.
Since it began in me for right reasons,
With my divine roots afire and my spirituality,
I then proclaim
To each within my reach
That truth is the crux.
Fate is bent and turning,
From eternal grace born anew,
Whether truth or falsehood.
What shall end and what shall continue,
Be forever?
Here we sing, to you through our voices,
That it’s more difficult — thought it so clear —
Than that first wave upon wave
Is the original merit
For remaining thus upright.
Quietly I ponder, as darkness falls,
The tears I shed
To further realize and see
No lies.
And yet here he stands,
Drawing my scorn for guilt,
Hate and gloom, while persisting,
Yet he knows he pays no true price
Than for who he is,
Now and forever condemned
To forever think in blackest fear,
And chase demons of lesser height,
And lie, believing it’s all true.
No man would be worthy,
So the immaterial dwellers, seducing.
He has lost the path
Towards whatever lies ahead,
Until that resolve to seek again
Conquers all lesser notions,
Regret, anger, despair, guilt, pain, desire, laziness,
Attraction, hatred, resistance, resentment,
Depression, anxiety, thoughtlessness.
Intention, sound, rhyme and song —
Shake it all free,
Without dark;
Think clearly.
The lessons taught and discovered,
What the next step is,
Without caution or forgetfulness,
‘Cause he follows and thinks of him that joins.
And he hardly knows it, for he says there’s no real path,
But go where you want.
The bitter drops are what in fact our path must consist of,
Bitter drops of truth.
Of all his lives, no cause should shake him.
He must shake away guilt,
Get rid of his hate, anguish and uncertainty,
Shun fear, love and trust,
Meet great difficulties on equal terms.
Lam
The climax and apex
Of wisdom is identifying oneself
Both in thought and appearance
As equal and equally manifested,
The Buddha-nature as nature,
Dealing purely with what is,
Emptiness as substance.
Being only in non-existing awareness,
Everyone who identifies with self
As essence
Is seeking more of it.
Passionately seeking more,
Everyone who identifies with self
Is abandoning everything.
The mistake here is asking
To express oneself,
Experienced only in thought
Firmly planted within non-discussion.
Dwelling solely in abiding nature,
Will possesses no belief
Differing from others,
But even if pure perception to something perceived
Is held ungrudgingly,
Firmly-rooted, defiles.
Chasing form from form to follow sensation
Describes desire.
Whatever reasons are acknowledged,
However radically different
Between terms or identities,
Endless commonality is the same,
In coming back,
Emptiness attached.
The goal is the way,
Is the highest path.
Is the path not?
Once there is detachment,
Everyone will think differently,
Though reaching the same awareness
Undoubtedly ends suffering.
The way
Is to realize all beings
As themselves,
As ultimately empty.
In Praise of Sweet Fire
I bow to the emanation of truth through his fingerless hand;
I bow to his compassionate glance of milky tenderness.
Those compassionate tears, as soon brought forth by earth and sun, were made manifest at the mouth.
Environed by all those glorious sights they made whole his heart —
Focusing in on his radiant likeness
With the stained and worn robe,
With the wild hair and sweating face,
Like a picture adorned with precious jewels.
Solar Epoch
Beyond the illusions of success.
Secrets hidden in nirvana
Must not be reckoned with.
Unto different darknesses
Where perceptions pop and haunt
There are endless worlds to explore,
All beyond what we know.
And whatever may occur
Beyond this unending turbulence
Beyond transcendence
Beyond sense wisdom
Beyond likeness and silence
Beyond anxiety and self-image
With no other mind
Than the unknowing self
Into emptiness
Into the dark sun
Dasein
A granite stone cube buried in a sandy beach towers against the plain expanse of blue sky. Or is it merely infinitesimal in a world of stars? Perspective blushes the imagination. the universe crushes all experiences to sand, even a granite stone cube or an “I.” We capitalize the term, we speak of “an I.” I ruminate upon a granite stone cube, infinitesimal in a world of stars, being crushed to sand, and I understand, perceiving meaning in an arbitrary act that beggars the imagination against the plain expanse of blue sky. What artifice is this ant tracing, of what origin and for what posterity? Being answers naught. the mystic knows naught. The mystic seeks in some vain yet vital cave of the heart the answer to the riddle that he himself poses, constructing spider’s webs of language, himself the spider and the prey. He sucks himself dry in his chimerical pursuits, only to discover the ashes of naught, his webs traceries of charcoal. But he who neither knows nor speaks dwells in the perfect emptiness of mind that is bliss. This bliss is present even now. It is the presence of sentience, the vacuity of being, the being of mind, the mind of bliss; sentience, devoid of self or thought, being purely present to its own-being in perfect simplicity of being itself.
Emptiness
running wildly
to escape
the sickness
into a dark, lonely room
swearing
to escape
aiming a scarred laser
without mercy
admitting
he sees us
naked beneath
as blinding floods
drown our flesh
spackling the hellscapes
left after
the plague
the gods of destruction
worshipped
punished
followed nowhere
the refugees
telling our tales
their stories
wish to return
yet afraid to reveal
what we tell
wish to leave
the choking poisons
behind
but unsure
until closer hears
footfalls upon paradise
running there to find it
taking up new challenges
trying to uncover new truths
only trying to save
a family
a home
into a gilded prison
plucking the lid off
thieving every crumb of hope
admitting we should do that
just trying
to find new cures
for those constant droplets
flickering through my hands
miraculously revealed
yet it becomes nothing
feeling the echo
something will unfold
old bruises still bite deeply
raw feelings, fearful warnings
wracked my eyes
still twisting like a knife
telling the prisoner
we have swallowed new breaths
blood leaving traces
sending us hurtling into flights
surprised, breathless by the discovery
that beauty lies
at the base of destruction
desert islands of bold heaven
at our fingertips
slim optimism, selfish charity
grinning, rubbing off their flesh
while fantasies claw the surface
admitting
getting deeper while worse wounds remain
that our momentary fantasy
is almost selfish when viewed through this skin
and we are trying
to breathe life, yet we, withering within,
filling too easily with other thoughts
only to rush back
for a hint of self
only to embrace
adding hours more, hours that turn into years
old nightmares bound on my chest
though long buried
find life waging a war
this error reveals too soon
desiccated hair now turning white
trouble openly catching onto its feet
blooming painfully
prolonging life’s end
atmospheric, hot, velvety flowers
grilling our fragile senses
For what glory am I, if that glory ever sees again?
The Householder
Again to be for there, on tiptoes!
To breathe out, to play:
My selfness, doing things
To please itself, reaching,
Lofty, heart-uplifting things.
Behold! I shine! Like the lover!
Giving gifts
Of heart unbound,
Like “incarnation.”
I Am
I could have been so many things
Than what I am
And yet
I fret
Bereft
Taut as a wire or a string.
Death teaches me, brings
The knowledge of what I am
Stretched
Etched
Sketched
In my mind, like a song that sings
Itself. I listen to it ring
In the cathedral of my I.
Crafted
Raftered
Vaulted
It rises to the sky.
FOURTH MOVEMENT
Padmasambhava
within lie truths
the enigmatic unveiling
we merge with both realms
from your cup we drink poetry
surreal embodiment
Padmasambhava, e-ma-ho!
obscure and vivid
leading us through two realms
guru, guide, you are the tapestry
reason confines
your presence transcends
whirlpool hues
vortical existence spins
where nectar flows
ethereal winds command
with hand on staff
symbols of symphony
each movement a ritual
fierce compassion
your guides dance mystical
untold secrets unveiling
lightning cracks the sky
impermanent reminders
tread your path adorned with skulls
your spiritual power
ignites the cosmic stage
wisdom’s torch bearer
one enlightened
light radiant birthing
darkness subjugating
transformational spectacle
a dance flames wrathful
we meet realms
of fiery depths
lotus of the thunderbolt
Padmasambhava, e-ma-ho!
Chod Cham
For Miles
“Heads and head-splitting, this indeed is the insight of the Conquerors.” Suttanipata, V.1. 989 (Norman)
The chisel cuts
away my flesh
splits my bones
gouges out my eyes
empties my skull
I offer my flesh to the sky
smoke rising like incense
my brains smoldering, sweet
my spinal cord like a serpent
writhing in the fire
on my bones intricate carvings
that resemble Chinese characters
from Laozi’s Tao
…
What is this dance that possesses me?
What is this life that slays?
Whose the lance that caresses me?
Whose the knife that plays?
—
I offer my flesh to the sky
smoke rising like incense
my brains smoldering, sweet
Gāthā on the Boundless Real
1
Reality is the sky—vast, boundless, without edge or floor.
2
Nothing lies before it, after it, or outside it.
To doubt it is only to affirm it anew.
3
Perfect is the Real,
for imperfection implies a beyond—and That is It.
4
Beyond one and two,
Reality is the transdual whole.
5
Dividing, analyzing, naming—
these cannot grasp the all.
6
Every system is swallowed
by a system yet greater still.
7
Reality, then, is not a system—
but what makes all systems possible.
8
It moves without why or when,
mysterious, ungrasped, non-rational.
9
The touch of knowing, the flavour of felt truth—
these are also the Real.
10
No word binds it;
no phrase can hold it.
11
But it is known—
by intuition of Self: the irreducible “I.”
12
Mind alone is primal;
nothing stands beneath sentience.
13
Thus is Reality sentience itself,
reflexive, all-containing.
14
It appears as the dance
of difference and non-difference.
15
Their play is lived reality—
the breathing now.
16
This lived moment is phenomenon,
ever blossoming.
17
Phenomenon arises and arises again,
spun by cause and effect, birthing the new.
18
This endless arising is no illusion—
it is the face of the Real.
19
Time has no first breath, no final sleep.
How can there be a before-before?
20
The quest for origin stumbles;
creation myths collapse.
21
Yet from within its infinite play
arises desire, attachment, delusion.
22
Thus are born the realms—
from gods to ghosts, humans to hells.
23
Above them dwell the four formless spheres:
Space, Consciousness, No-thingness, Neither Perceiving nor Not.
24
This is the formless realm—
free from grasping, dwelling-place of Buddhas.
25
The Buddhas are the deathless ones,
the awakened, unbound.
26
All of this—seen, unseen, grasped, forgotten—
is held together in the Real.
27
The wise call this “nonsense” and smile;
so fools become wise, and sages laugh.
CLOSING
The Mirror Has No Edge
I sought the Self
and found the seam unravel.
What watched was no one.
What rose was nothing, clear.
The world danced —
dependent, ghostly, radiant —
a necklace of flames on a windless shore.
No pearl was strung.
No hand strung it.
The voice that said I am
dissolved into am,
and then into
laughter.
What remains
is not a god,
not a void —
but the mirror
before names.
It does not shine.
It does not move.
It gives birth
without becoming.
I am
the vow to know
what cannot be known.
The arrow that does not fly.
The flame that has no source.
FINIS.
Dharmata 