Chris Spheeris Some Words

Words

the golden thread

at the ends of the earth
at the edge of my faith
in the darkness almost absolute
where god has chosen silence

your presence in my heart,
your invisible light,
is the golden thread
which always guides me home
--End

safe

i am no longer safe to hold myself from you

i am no longer safe in the illusion of safety

the most dangerous place is the place where I think I am safe
because my hiding is so visible to you and is invisible to me

in my safety, i cannot see the source of my courage
and I cannot see that the danger is the belief that I am not safe
--End

i know nothing of you

i know nothing of you
and less than nothing of myself

i learn you and i forget you in the same instant

i can no longer bind you with my knowing

because i have forgotten myself
and with this i have forgotten that you and i are not one and the same

i forgot to remember and in my forgetfulness
i feel something new that i have now forgotten

because now i am completely full of remembering to forget --End


my prayer

my prayer is:
to empty myself of myself
so that I may see, touch, taste, smell, hear, feel and sense
the fullness of your glory
to love myself as to feel worthy of you
to humble myself into constant gratitude for making me your instrument
to silence myself as to hear your symphony
to embrace my fear and limitation as doorways to your love
to forgive myself and dissolve into your timeless grace
to forgive myself for putting you outside of me

my prayer is to no longer have a prayer
to no longer speak, but to be spoken
to no longer hear or be heard
to no longer feel or be felt
to no longer a touch or be touched
to no longer smell or be fragrant
to no longer a taste or be tasted

in that place of no place,
the sensor and the sensed are one and the same
and the prayer is silent --End


skin

the softness of your skin dissolves me

in the tenderness of your touch, i disappear

and the frontier of our separation opens and melts
as identical light falling on two countries

my skin opens to you and you enter what was once me

just as we have shared the air, our breath,
we now share this space between our atoms

this hybrid being is the source all all life

this shared essence is the beginning and the end of all things

the end of our skin is the beginning of our love --End


never alone

you deliver me to god

you are the gateway to forever and all things

you make everyone else possible

you make me possible


you deliver god to me
every moment with you is a prayer
and every prayer answered is a moment with you

once filled with you, with god
i can never again be alone

because after being with you
i realize that i was never alone in the first place --End


to my love

in my mind, i never thought that i would ever come to this place
where the love i feel inspired by your presence
would free me, would heal me, would complete me.
in my heart, however, i always knew that i would one day be here.

you have helped me understand that it is not you,
but the aspect of myself that is you, that i wish to honor.
in this way,i love myself in your image.

the purity of spirit that you embody has made me transparent.
i can no longer formulate an image of myself.
there is nowhere to hide
as there is no one to stand behind.

your transparent presence, in turn, gives me nothing to hold
and nowhere to hide behind you.
you have given me the gift of my own emptiness
and in so doing, have shown me possibility.
this place of possibility is where i now begin in each moment.

i have surrendered,
not to you, but to me.
i have surrendered to the voice in my heart
and a calling from my spirit.
--End

truth

my idea of truth once kept me from knowing

i had put truth in a place, a special place, on a shelf, a very special shelf
my shelf snapped from the weight of significance and truth moved into my body

and my body became a river, then an ocean of liquid awareness

now, the ocean evaporates in the sunlight, and truth floats free to heaven,
occasionally rains in drops of humor and nourishment. --End

Small moment

I cannot attach myself to you
My hands are too small to hold you
My thoughts far too limited to conceive of you

I can not contain myself
So I spill over the edges
I drip and flow over my boundaries
I am absorbed by everything around me
And everything becomes wet and fresh with me

I drip over tables, fill rooms, gush out of houses , flow down streets , flood cities ,
Over countrysides , wash over fields , inundate countries , spread across continents
Merge with oceans , exude from the planet , splash out into solar systems and galaxies,
Envelop the stars and the voids
I liquidate all befores and afters
And expand to include all of time

When all is full of me ,
When I have embraced all of space , all of time , all invisible and all timeless ,
I once again stand in your presence and
and bless this small moment together --End

i am empty with you

i am empty with you, empty without you
i cannot find you, yet there is nowhere where you are not

i am full without you, full with you
yet you are nowhere to be found

you have dissolved the boundaries of inside and out
you have emptied all that is full
and fill all that is empty

i go nowhere without you
yet cannot take you anywhere
you are already there
and I am already everywhere
and nowhere

with you, without you
has become my awareness of you
has become my forgetting of you
--End

boundary waters

if my absence frightens you

if the unfamiliar look in my eyes comes as a threat

if my silence evokes the voices of ghosts
that haunt the darker rooms of your aloneness

if my lack of attention draws attention to your needs

if my lack of regard brings resentments into view

FAITH

i am beyond the horizon
where i have cast my nets into the boundary waters

i will bring home my catch
and lay it on half of our table

i will share with you the treasures of my solitary voyage

but the bounty will not be complete
until you have poured your treasures
onto the other half of our table --End

the face of god

across the chasm of identity
in the most unexpected of moments
you completely fill my awareness
breathing vitality into my motionless form

i am a deer
paralyzed in brilliant light
awe-struck with intensity and recognition

i am a moth whose call is to be consumed by light

i am without memory
looking at a new face in the mirror
seeing something strange and beautiful
feeling something deep and familiar

i hear a single voice
an anthem of unity
a symphony of all things performing silence

i open my mouth and destiny speaks
i put my pen to paper and destiny writes

i am told to translate in tones and words
this vision of having seen the face of god --End

my final confession

forgive me, father
for i have forgotten
that i am utterly incapable of sin or error
that i am perfect
just the way that i am
and all that is, simply is
and there is no other option to that which is

forgive me for forgetting
that everyone outside of myself is perfect
just the way they are
and that there really is no one outside of myself
that we are all united in the spiritual world
and all interdependent in the physical world
and that there is no difference
between the spiritual and the physical worlds
as spirit dwells in all things

forgive me for not forgiving myself
and everyone else in the past
forgive me for not being grateful
for the gift of every moment

this will be my final confession
because now that i see
that we are one and the same
there is no longer anyone to confess to --End

point of view

every point of view is its own religion
its own set of parables and metaphors
its own, unique perspective of god, perspective from god
infinity and eternity, looking in, looking out

small hands reach to grasp the intangible
while great invisible arms orchestrate the dream of forms
painting from a palette of light

every point of view writes its own scripture
borrowing verse and vocabulary
tiny mouths mutter
while the sacred articulates in silence

each point of view is a miracle
clothed in a paradox of unity and separation
each, a cell in the body of god
a thread in the fabric of existence
an atom in the universal element
each, holding a place
without which all of existence would somehow be altered

how minute and significant we are
how magnificent our vision
from a single point, into all that is, was, and will be --End

my available soul

when currents call
i gladly go
i fall from placid shore
to wild and deep and tameless sea
to explore
to know
the mystery and rapture
of my available soul

when trade winds blow
i follow
like a kite I go
to trade this place for another place
to mimic the moon
and change my face
to phase across some unknown sky
some silent night
to fly the whims of fate
in the sheer delight
of my available soul
when i see the world
revolve and spin around me
i step outside my static center
i let time bring what time may bring
i choose to enter, to evolve
if it means that I grow old
and turn my temples white from cold
still I'll sing and play with chance
i'll flirt and dance
in the arms
of my available soul

in the presence of this essence
in the presence of this perfect partner
i with ghost
i the host
am embodied
am consumed
giving home to my most precious spirit

to fear the call or never hear it
to miss the magic and be doomed
to amble only half awake
somewhere feeling something missing
as if love passed by far too late
would be cruel and somehow tragic
i will not let that be my fate --End

god to god

in the womb of my mother
at the moment of my conception
in the womb of my being
at the moment of my conception
your eloquent fingers plant within me
the seed of your image
as i grow, so within me grows your vastness
and with it, a longing
gnawing on the edges of this empty expanse
day by day, i fill with the emptiness if your image
and today i am full
bursting with nothingness
i am overcome with a silence so vast
that even the most powerful of desires
cannot find audience within me
today, i witness my greatest victory
as i surrender to nothing
and return
god to god --End