Month: October 2013

Immortality: A Dream/Poem

Posted on by rita kowats

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“BlackWhiteSpiral” by Kurt
(Used with permission: sumo.fm)

Dream

I sit on the plaza steps overlooking the beach, taking it all in.  wind-whipped waves create high drama, luring visitors to the edge for a closer look.  Teenagers hang out in high spirits as they stake out a place on the steps in anticipation of the evening’s rock concert.  Dogs cavort and children chase kites.  Three young men wander behind the plaza, to the vault created by the steps. Three alert crows follow them and vigil outside.  Soon, a man enters the vault, carrying a large piece of driftwood like a battering ram.  His sinister demeanor does not bode well for the boys.  I follow. Upon entering, the scene immediately accosts my senses.  The man has brutally battered the three teens.  Their bodies instantly disintegrate, leaving only three drops of blood on the floor.  The man knocks me flat as he flees from the vault.  The three crows fly in and surround the blood drops.  Each crow takes one drop in its beak and flies out.  I run out into the plaza, desperate to see where they take the blood.  They land on the opposite side of the plaza, and drop the blood on the floor before an old Buddhist nun who sits in meditation.  She stretches her arms in a wide arch around the blood and blows on it.  The spray from her breath shapes the first arch of the spiral, then the next, and the next, until new life has a new path.  Unable to sustain the mesmerizing effect of the process for long, I wake up, reaching for breath.

Poem

Immortality

These interrupted lives will not see the
Thirtieth chamber this time around.
They have morphed into mere mortal vestiges,
Immortality a dim dream,
Until…
Shelled lives reshell,
And Yin becomes Yang.

The winged clairvoyants carry the remnants
To rest and wait in the
Genes of their souls, until buoyed on the
Breath of Expectation,
They rise
Again.

© rita h kowats

Creative Process

This is a dream I had a few years ago.  I remembered it when I saw the art work of the nautilus shell.  At the time of the dream, that image was strong and insistent.  It took a couple of days to let it meander around my unconscious.  As I entered the hypnagogic state I consciously re-entered the dream.  It took me to the same place with only a few fresh nuances.  The theme of immortality came in a meditation on the art work.  That bright light at the core of the shell conceived the poem.

Spider Webs and Survival

Posted on by rita kowats

Soul Survival

Day eleven of oppressive, dense fog across the Seattle area.  I broke loose to look for something uplifting.  Pun intended.  A young tree wrapped in a myriad of spider webs caught my eye, and immediately my light-starved spirit waxed eloquently about the wonder of the webs, profoundly reminiscent of interconnectivity, community, and networks.  Arriving home, curiosity prevailed, and I asked Saint Google to send a National Geographic video which I hoped would unveil all possible spiritual analogies to spider webs. Reality ensued.  I had forgotten what ingenious traps of deception they were.  Spider webs ensure the spider’s survival! They catch victims and eat them.

Still, the poet in me couldn’t resist an analogy.  To survive spiritually, humans don’t need deception.  We can choose to feed on altruism in its many manifestations.

Soul Survival

Some souls
Cast silk threads,
Sticky with the nectar of
Compassion and Forgiveness,
Dangling drops of affirmation
Queued up to plunk down on
Ravenous visitors.

The magnetic threads dance
A three-step vibration,
Pulling the visitors into
The expectant vortex,
Where they feast at the
Resplendent table.

Interlaced souls survive
To cast threads
Another day, another place.

© rita h kowats 2013

spider alone

Laying It to Rest

Posted on by rita kowats

dementor2One particular scene in the film,“Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” always sends shivers through me.  Harry and his friends are on the Hogwarts Express when a dementor  attempts to suck out Harry’s soul.  That is what they do.  They prey upon all positive energy and leave their victims in a state of emptiness.

I think of this symbol today because I just spent sacred time with a friend, putting to rest a time in our youth when we were preyed upon simply because we were there.  And we were vulnerable.  I am keenly aware of the need to develop spiritual practices that protect us.  I know that many of my readers have experienced similar betrayal, for it is a human experience.  I pray that you also experience healing and forgiveness.

Blessings.

LAYING IT TO REST

Two aging soul-sisters
Hold vigil in a Victorian café-
A sanctuary for deep
Soul-work.

No brain fog mimics the
Claustrophobic fog outside.
We remember every word of
Our story.

In tandem we tell the story
For what we hope will be the last time:
How dementors in a consecrated community
Sucked out our souls and how-
Because we were young and wounded-
We let them.

Stronger now, our souls are safe.
In the telling, we recognize
Healing and forgiveness-
Self-forgiveness stumbles
Through the fog.

 It is past time
To pack up our pain and
Rise from our chairs.
Claustrophobic fog has no power
To crowd our spacious spirits.
Our eucharist has ended, and we
Step out.

© rita h. kowats

The Land of Nod and The Feast

Posted on by rita kowats

Recently, a fellow dreamer, Kayla, (www.dreamerly.com) posted this dream:

“Last night my dreams took me to the strangest places – to a little neighborhood of modern buildings nestled among the familiar imagery of my hometown.  On our way to our destination, my companion in the dream and I passed a light blue modern structure, a restaurant called “The Almond.” (I think that name is delightful and if I were to start a restaurant, I would surely name it just that!) Our destination in the dream was the house of a woman who served dinner from her home. It was a Sunday, and we were uncertain if she would be serving dinner that night. She was. When we were seated, we were the only ones there, but soon more people came and more and more, so that the room was completely full. A strange feast of the oddest foods was served. It was a marvelous dream, one that evokes memories of Babette’s Feast and that has had me moving through my day with an inward eye and a strange state of mind.”

With Kayla’s nod, I made an attempt to enter her dream and create a poem:

Tomboyseer 2

The Feast

Thirty-Seventh Ave. S.W.
Basks in the glow of yesteryear,
Yester joy, and the abandonment of youth.
Its aura creates an illusion of “All is well,”
When it isn’t….But THIS part is well:
Re-enacting every movie we saw,
I at the top of one vacant lot, a virtual Carol Burnet, singing at the top of my lungs,
“I’m calling you, ooo, ooo, ooo,”
Melania Wozniak echoing from the opposite vacant lot,
“I’m answering you, ooo, ooo, ooo.”
A “gemutlich” time, a hospitable hiatus
From a sometimes inhospitable home.
Out on Thirty-Seventh Ave. S.W.
I didn’t have to fit in where I didn’t fit.
Here, the wild, tomboy-seer
Fit.

The neighborhood of my youth
Tenders a gift:
“Return to my table and re-member the memories.”
I return.
New table.
Renovated restaurant.
And in the breaking of the bread
I see.

Deo Gratias

© rita h kowats