Book of jobe

4/14/21

Hold on to life.

It was the moon, you know, that taught me to believe, or at least to attempt belief. Yes, my friend, it was the moon; so vast, so beautiful, close and yet far, always changing, always returning.

-jobe

Death and the world can darken your thoughts, darken your hope. That’s why you must hold on to life and to your dreams. With both hands. Brother. Sister.

-jobe

Through the direction and nature of our attention, we prove ourselves to be partners in creation, both of the world and of ourselves.

-Iain McGilchrist

Maybe the purpose of being here, wherever we are, is to increase the durability and occasion of love among and between peoples.

-June Jordan

There is a voice that doesn't use words — Listen!

-Rumi

4/13/21

Night, like a tent.

Night arrived, right on time.

Moon, but no wind at all.

Life, as still as death.

Let there be peace.

Night, like a tent.

Moonlight, like a lantern.

Let there be peace.

Dawn is but a promise,

Not a guarantee.

-jobe

Pine trees shaped like triangles, breathing like humans.

Redwood trees as strong as helpful giants, also breathing.

A breathing sky as lovely as a woman

Longing for love.

The watershed, Putah Creek here, breathing loudly

Like a young man who knows nothing of love.

Sunset is coming.

The breathing Earth spins like a dervish

While the solar system slides through the galaxy.

The universe breathes, like a tree, like the watershed.

Motion and growth. Breath.

-jobe

I’d like to point out to people the divine in a musical language that transcends words. I want to speak to their souls.

-John Coltrane

A lion lives here.

The lone street lamp reminds me of a man stranded on an island. The quiet street is the still, calm ocean. Night. The huge Pacific. The feel of my feet on the sidewalk.

-jobe

There is a lovely hill in my heart.

The sun rises on one side

And sets on the other. Perfectly.

At noon the sun is exactly above

The crest on my hill.

A lion lives here, and a bear,

And a dove. Wild flowers

And pine trees. Squirrels.

The sounds and smells of nature

Cover the hill. My hill.

And it is all in my heart.

-jobe

Even now I crave her sweaty lust, her grunting passion, the moist, salty feel of her, and her eyes as bright as life. Even now.

-jobe

We are condemned to freedom.

-Jean-Paul Sartre

Love said to me: There is nothing that is not me. Be silent.

-Rumi

Conscious breathing is my anchor.

-Thich Nhat Hanh

4/12/21

Our hearts are our own.

I am no one

In particular,

No more blue

Than the sky,

No more deep

Than the sea.

The same as you,

Just a small piece

Of the endlessness.

-jobe

We might take off our shoes and walk together through the dew-damp grass of the very early morning. We might sit down together with coffee and quiet talk, speaking of those things in our lives that are real. It might be that we have beliefs and values in common, and that our hearts are our own, that we are not controlled by some dogma or ideology. That who we are and what we are might be more important than where we were born or how we pray. Wouldn’t that be something? In these things I will place my hopes, and I promise to leave room for your hopes as well.

-jobe

We are indeed connected to all things, but we should feel free to move about, free to join others, free to examine preconceptions and misinterpretations, and free to find our buddhanature as we engage in the day’s most common actions and events.

-Gary Thorp

Ask yourself: have you been kind today? Make kindness your daily modus operandi and change your world.

-Annie Lennox

No priests for me now.

by Juliana Coles

Dig the earth for gold, for silver.

Dig the earth for oil. Until the fingers bleed.

Until the people bleed, eaten by cancer.

Eaten by greed.

And now the earth itself bleeds,

Now the days are troubled.

And what to show for all of this? Just a few

Dirty coins to count.

Nothing.

-jobe

I suppose that I am still that boy

Who knelt before the altar,

Who knelt when the priest wished.

In some way, I must be,

For this is that body,

Although over a half-century has passed.

But I am not the same.

No priests for me now,

And no kneeling.

I have cast aside the false god

And the superstitions.

I am slowly becoming an old man.

I have the poems, yes,

And I have the truth.

I have people to love

And a place to be.

That is enough for me now.

-jobe

by Tom Killion

Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.

-Pablo Picasso

To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.

-Pema Chödrön

To learn something is to know yourself; to study Buddhism is to study yourself.

-Dōgen Zenji

4/11/21

The love that we start with.

The powers of a poet

Are immense.

Why, I can fit the entire earth

In the body of my poem.

Every rock, every grain

Of sand, every drop of water.

I capture them all,

And I deliver them to you,

Dear reader.

-jobe

We rest

In the love

We are blessed

With

We rest

In the love

That we nest

With

Open your heart

To the love

That we start

With

-jobe

Beyond random acts of kindness comes perpetual kindness.

-B. D. Schiers

To cut through the mind’s clinging, it is important to understand that all appearances are void, like the appearance of water in a mirage. Beautiful forms are of no benefit to the mind, nor can ugly forms harm it in any way.

-Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Be true to your teeth and they won't be false to you.

-Soupy Sales

LINKS-

HOOT, a monthly literary magazine on a postcard

The Morning Porch/Patio

VIA NEGATIVA, purveyors of fine poetry since 2003

thanks/jobe

4/10/21

Step by step, breath by breath.

One night past full, the moon rises

Over the tree to my east. A lot of pine,

Some oaks, four sycamores standing

In a row like soldiers on guard duty.

In walking meditation, I move slowly

Through the trees and out into the open.

Step by step, breath by breath -

Moonlight on my face, and finally

Looking up, in my eyes.

The Corn Moon, September.

-jobe

May I be spared the illusion

That even one second belongs to me.

I own nothing.

There is only that which I do,

And that which I don't do.

The rest is an illusion.

-jobe

Unlike a painting, our minds are not fixed. It is like the image is wiped clean and a new one is created every moment. While the next image will often be very similar to the previous one, it is never exactly the same.

-Khentrul Rinpoche

When the Buddha walked, he walked without effort. He just enjoyed walking. He didn’t have to strain, because when you walk in mindfulness, you are in touch with all the wonders of life within you and around you.

-Thich Nhat Hanh

Rays from the sun light up our faces.

We, the people, live in this field that goes on and on. There is no fence, no border, no end. Flatness and crops. Rays from the sun light up our faces.

-jobe

Whether it was the sound of rifle bolts

Slapping into place,

Or the click of a pistol being cocked,

I hope there was defiance

In the eyes of Frederico Garcia Lorca

That last second before death.

May there always be defiance

When one of us, the people,

Faces the fascist.

-jobe

Gray sky, wind. The first rains of a new winter. What is that to the prisoner, locked up tight in a cold cell?

-jobe

Be happy; without reason.

-Tsoknyi Rinpoche

A student, filled with emotion and crying, implored, "Why is there so much suffering?" Suzuki Roshi replied, "No reason.”

Hope and fear cannot alter the seasons.

-Chögyam Trungpa

4/09/21

Every root, every insect

The land mirrors the memory of the footsteps

And the lives that came before.

Heartbeat and breath, life and death.

Every root, every insect, all are a part

Of the whole. Even us.

-jobe

No sun, just a gray ceiling.

The Yuba River, rushing past. It is in a great hurry. Even at full-on noon the river has no time to cast my reflection. Swift water on white rocks. Overhead, a turkey vulture circles slow, watching.

-jobe

They tried to be immigrants

And instead were locked into camps.

No sun, just a gray ceiling.

-jobe

It doesn’t take many words to tell you how I love the silence.

-jobe

Fulfillment has nothing to do with circumstances.

-Gangaji

Mindfulness practice is not an evasion or an escape. It means entering vigorously into life — with the strength generated by the energy of mindfulness. Without this freedom and concentration, there is no happiness.

-Thich Nhat Hanh

As long as you seek for something, you will get the shadow of reality and not reality itself.

-Shunryu Suzuki

Remember that everyone you meet is afraid of something, loves something and has lost something.

-H. Jackson Brown, Jr.