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1. Indra’s net

One story of this world

Begins with “Let there be light”.

I do not think that punctuation

Had been invented

When these words were first recorded.

But judging from what follows,

An exclamation mark

Should cap that sentence.

But what about Indra’s net?

What are the words

That first emitted and still carry

The light that knits it into one great whole?

What punctuation should we use?

A question mark seems most fitting.

You and I, like everybody else,

Are both:

Jewels linked into a net

And reflections bouncing within a hall of mirrors.

But let us not get trapped.

We have the power to play it

Like a game, a dance,

A laugh-inducing tickle.

2. Voyagers

Wake up! Wake up!

There is a porthole, a port, a portal,

A momentary gap

Right here,

Where the past

Meets with the future.

A dawn breeze is rising.

You can glimpse the swaying masts,

The white sails being hoisted.

You can hear the seagulls laughing,

The lines groaning, singing,

Taut with force

Ready to propel the ship.

Let us arise and cross the threshold,

Let us run

To where the land and the water

Meet.

It is for us to name the vessel,

To unfurl the flag,

To set course

Across an uncharted sea.

3. Exploration

To blossom into being

A new world needs travelers.

Now we are here,

Calling out to each other:

“Look!”, “Did you hear that?”,

“This feels just like…”

“Watch out!”, “Where does this…”,

“Well done!” “What if?”

Now we are here,

Exploring with all our senses:

Humor, awe, dread, irony, appreciation, wonder.

When we gaze up

Celestial bodies

Flare into existence,

Dance with each other.

Flocks wing across the sky,

Swarms billow over bogs,

The air comes alive

With singing, buzzing, courting, hunting, pollinating.

Each step we take tells us

What is underneath our feet:

Grass, ice, rock,

A swaying bridge above the mist

That rises from the chasm

To cling to our ankles.

I do not know how far

We are destined to travel.

But I trust this world

To keep unfolding space and time

For our journey of exploration,

For as long as we are here.

4. Siren song

Sirens have two kinds of songs

To lure those who come near them,

To bind the minds of travelers

With snares of longing.

Songs of adventure and of glory,

Of giving names

To new lands, to new creatures.

These songs promise freedom

From the tedium

Of familiar words,

From the confines

Of the cradle, the field, the hearth,

From the gray stones of the graveyard,

From the moss that steals over the names

Of a long line of ancestors.

Songs of warmth,

Of embracing arms and sheltering walls.

These songs promise to turn

The terrors, the regrets

Of past voyages,

The uncharted vastness of the future

Into words, into lusty tales

That can be traded

For a hearty tankard of ale

A seat close to the fireplace,

The eager gaze of a rapt listener.

5. Nightmares and their riders

A nightmare is a kind of horse:

A powerful creature, wild and willful.

Approach her with respect, with skill,

For she may bite, kick or rear;

She may leave the one who dares to touch her

Broken, paralyzed, dead.

Yet she is capable of learning to accept a rider.

Balancing on the back of a nightmare,

Riding a dark dream,

We can leap much farther than is humanly possible.

A nightmare can carry us across an abyss.

6. Trains and their dreamers

The distant clatter

Of the predawn train

Quilts the quiet air,

Pulls the thread of the whistle

Long, long, l-o-ong

Through the mist.

Between sleeping and waking

I dream.

I piece together

Stations, timetables, tickets

To choose my own destination,

To fashion a different self.

7. Synaesthesia

Escape is possible.

Search the floor of your perception,

Feel for the hidden trapdoor,

The moment of synaesthesia.

Pry it open,

Heave it up on its rusty hinges.

Plunge into the blue.

Roll up, solid, dull,

Like a ball of lead.

Sink through the water,

Pass through the gradations

Of the shimmering light

Deepening into darkness,

As the shadows thicken.

Let go of all

That has been visible.

Feel the weight of the ocean

Press you to the bottom.

Smell your own fear.

Taste the bile of loss.

Rise, rise like an air bubble.

Push through the cool resistance

Until you are released,

Until you burst into nothingness.

Let the freedom of empty space

Flood your senses with joy.

8. The Age of Discovery

Having circumnavigated our world,

I realize that it is not a sphere,

But a spiral.

I am back where I started from.

The path ahead is as unknown

As it was before the journey.

But you, my friend,

Who steadfastly stayed here

At the origin,

How did you find out?

Or was it clear?

Was it clear all along?