Get Unstuck
Leaves from the Tree of Life;
brown and withered,
dried with growing old,
dislodged by the touch of Time;
or green,
with veins still swelling
with rising sap,
torn free by an untimely wind.
What are they,
these dancing treasures?
The more the tree creates,
pushing and budding
out of reaching, branching fingers,
the more they spiral down
and spin and congregate
like giant midges
in every gust and eddy.
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Home Sapiens CHRISTMAS
“Plastic flowers, plastic treeses,
fan-assisted, cooling breezes;
all the snow is cotton wool
with chunks of ice to keep it cool.
Olé! ”
Walking about his planet
(with his dog)
carrying out his inspections,
looking at his reflections,
blaming the mirrors,
talking an endless monologue,
strides Homo Sapiens.
(non sapiens, non rationalis
sed capax rationis fortasse) .
A small man
(think of a dinosaur) ,
with big ideas
(think of genocide) ,
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Multiple
In Buddha's sunlit laboratory
(or Dhamma chamber) ,
experiments by laboratory assistants
(or monks)
demonstrate
that if you shine the light
of investigation
on form, feeling, perception,
thoughts and consciousness
and apply continuous mindfulness
at the very centre
of the rising and falling
of these phenomena,
all things are seen
to be without a permanent self
and a state of Peace
is found behind the suffering,
which fevers this loose aggregation of parts
we claim as our own self,
and replaces it.
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Visitors And Visitations
Up Hillcrest steps to where
the crumbling, grey, defining wall
becomes a bare
and narrow ledge
holding back the jungle of beyond.
Honeysuckle, fern and bramble
slowly amble
and quietly digest
the Hillcrest
fence.
(a peaceful study in impermanence) .
On the boundary hedge,
a green and flowering ivy has blossomed there
in the late summer sun,
and the still air
has turned the ocean
from a surfers’ paradise
into a millpond.
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Speaking Guide Book
“In Chiang Mai
there are many shapeful chedis
in which nowhere can be seen.”
Is stillness something
or is it merely
what’s left over
when things
disappear?
How can things
which are ever-moving,
ever-changing,
not be?
Stillness is complete and perfect
when boundaries disappear.
Cattle
do not feel
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Viewpoints
At Tha Thua they sweat,
eat ice, jump in river.
At Whitsands we're wet,
wear coats and just shiver.
At noon, garlic toast is a must.
Half-an-hour later it tastes just like dust.
Our viewpoints change to meet new data
as smart clothes adjust to the Fashion Dictator.
(And yet the dog with mange
seems oblivious to change;
is equally ill at ease
in hot sun, shade or breeze!)
At twenty I run,
At sixty rehearse the past,
at eighty, well, breathe in my last!
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poem by Brian Taylor
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What Shall I Do?
There's a lot to be said for a balanced world
stable and well-fenced-in,
that plays early that prays late
and industriously fills the within.
This world's a strange place to find one another
with alien flesh labelled father and mother.
Flesh is just dust
in a clearing of air.
And air?
A flicker of light-waves out there.
Yet the masses still form
and the movements take place.
Two faces stare blankly back from the glass,
that of a mind and that of a mask.
So let us watch shapes,
shapes and their lovers,
praise them and give them their due
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Treasures on Earth, Treasures in Heaven
The scent of the rose
fades in the dry air
and the roses themselves
shrivel and fall.
The Rose Garden too
succumbs to the developer
and his high-rise flats
which brush against the sky.
Red bricks give way
to changing architectural fashion
or a motorway
or a bomb.
And as the polar ice melts
the sea slips slowly in
with its colonies of fish and crustaceans
that slide and crawl in and out the ruins.
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Waiting
Magdalen’s grounds
are full of life,
full of space.
Space, which is mown
and cleared,
tended and enclosed,
its waterways unchoked,
brown and sparkling clear.
It is home to ducks
and coots,
to dragonflies and deer.
Grass and paths and gates
and streams
and yesterday’s undergraduates
are waiting.
Not for the return of the past
nor the coming of an awaited future.
The past once gone
is a steadily fading photograph.
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poem by Brian Taylor
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Normal
Pain is in proportion to livingness.
The more alive you are,
the more it hurts
to live.
This is normal.
The young hurt most
but mend quickest.
New flesh heals
where old flesh withers.
Young mind feels
pain piercing and deep;
often so deep that of itself it heals;
a child that cries itself to sleep,
cries and forgets in eternal singing.
This too is normal.
Until clinging
enters the heart,
laying up the treasure
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poem by Brian Taylor
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