Three More of Poems in a Pandemic

April 15, 2020

The Dream

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there are days I fall down

and with ladders I climb up

sometimes I go sideways

but then there’s the dream

———and the dream is a circle

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if the fall is the negative

and the climb is the positive

sideways is status quo

and the dream – that circle

———it’s something else

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“excludes” is its downfall

“includes” is its main word

striving is its sideways

and the circle – yes the circle

—————is wholeness

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there are tears – some grief

there is laughter and a smile

there is walking and stillness

and there is music round and round

—————song in a circle

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April 16, 2020

Question

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do you ever know the last anything for sure – when

it may be the very next thing that’s going to happen again

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April 17, 2020

The Mantra Prayer

Dear Mom—

Well, I thought I’d try a letter even though you died in 1984, and now in 2020 I am 86. Even so, I know you’d like to see this prayer I’ve been praying for quite a while now. It comes from the Himalayan Institute and it’s just four sentences. Here’s the first one:

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“I meditate on, and surrender myself to, the Divine Being who embodies the power of will, the power of knowledge, and the power of action.”

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You would absolutely understand the word in this sentence where I always got stuck when I was memorizing this. Yes, you guessed it——surrender. I have a hard time doing that you know. Actually I think you had a bit of an issue there too.

Here’s the next sentence:

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“I pray to the Divine Being who manifests in the form of fragrance in the flower of life and is the eternal nourisher of the plant of life.”

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It is right here, Mom, we begin to get to the things I love about the prayer. Imagine this—a divine being who manifests in the form of fragrance in the flower of life—isn’t that wonderful? And I think it’s true. When I inhale the smell of a lilac, I can just picture that fragrance being the manifestation of God. And the other wonderful thing about this sentence is that I am affirming that God is always—eternally—nourishing the plant of life, the earth.

I should tell you that when I pray this prayer (actually I set it to music) so, when I sing this prayer I change some of their titles for God. For instance in the first sentence instead of singing “Divine Being” I sing “God, the Creator.” And in this second sentence again instead of singing “Divine Being” I just substitute “God”. It seems more natural to me somehow and yet doesn’t change the intent of the prayer.

Now the third sentence:

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“Like a skillful gardener, may the Lord of life disentangle me from the binding forces of my physical, psychological and spiritual foes.”

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This is my favorite of the entire prayer—to think of God as a “skillful gardener,” which God certainly is AND that I have “physical, psychological and spiritual foes,” and that God can disentangle me from their “binding forces.” I breathe deeply here when I pray and stick in a quick little thank you for that.

And the last sentence is:

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“May the Lord of Immortality residing within, free me from death, decay, and sickness and unite me with immortality.”

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And that’s the promise and I say with a chuckle Mom that you are the living proof of that. Thanks for listening to me. I miss the talks we had together when we were both here on earth. I loved our ability, either one of us, to bring up subjects and then explore them together over many weeks.

I love you—ANN

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(Prayer: This is the Maha Mrtyunjaya Mantra from the Himalayan Institute in Honesdale, PA.)