Many Temples Senryu

Image by Little MiMi from Pixabay

so many temples

away from the daily stress

enlightenment here?

~cie~

notes

I don't want to spend too much time rambling on, but I want to give credit where credit is due. This poem was partly inspired by the prompt, of course, but also inspired by a line from the song She's Come Undone by The Guess Who, which pretty much sums up the way I've felt about things for most of my life.

I know that some people get comfort from religion and I'm not saying they can't. However, I never have. Religion never did anything except make me feel worse about how flawed I am. 

Further, people tend to conflate religion and spirituality. A lot of the time, I believe that there is a higher power and that the soul continues following the death of the body. I believe in the possibility of reincarnation. I don't need to believe in any specific deity or dogma to hold the aforementioned beliefs. 

The Norwegian black metal musician Gaahl said that God is not in some building, God is in nature and God is in each of us. I wish we would extend kindness to one another's souls rather than being hateful to one another for our external differences.

Sometimes I reckon I'm just fucked and there is nothing but a life of pain followed by nothing. That possibility just makes me feel worse, so I try not to entertain it for too long.

Too many mountains, and not enough stairs to climb
Too many churches and not enough truth
Too many people and not enough eyes to see
Too many lives to lead and not enough time

 It's too late
She's gone too far
She's lost the sun

She's come undone

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Lourdes

Copyright Dennis Jarvis

would I be washed clean

of the stain of my mistakes

if I bathed in Lourdes?

~Cie~

Heeding Haiku with Chèvrefeuille: Summer Solstice

Image Source

At the beginning of the day on the summer solstice, I leave my body sleeping and walk in dreams to a place I will never see in life. I watch the sunrise through rocks mysteriously stacked long ago and wonder if it was possible that I was there in some form.

Do I have a connection to a time and place I could not possibly have known in my current reality, or do I merely wish that I was more important than I am? Did I once have wisdom and abilities forgotten by the passage of centuries and lifetimes, or am I merely a pathetic creature who wishes there was a possibility that I might not be as utterly hopeless and wretched as I appear?

There was a time when I believed in one God and a single savior. Then came the time that I believed in many deities and no specific savior. At this point, I neither believe nor disbelieve in any specific thing, except that I think the god postulated by most organized religious institutions is a construct created to give adherents carte blanche to behave cruelly.

is there someone there

a powerful entity

or are we alone?

~Cie~

Note:

It is not my intent to belittle anyone's faith. The thoughts I express are mine and mine alone. I neither believe nor disbelieve in any particular deity or set of deities, including the Christian god. My final paragraph is a criticism of the sorts of people who use their religion to behave as intolerant bigots and to cause harm to those who do not adhere to their dogma and edicts.

Alone in a Private Hell

Image Source

Alone in a Private Hell

An amicable soul, in some ways childlike

Unadorned and understated, sometimes silly, never frivolous

In some ways always lonely and misunderstood

Now trapped within a mind like a house long abandoned

Where the light of love cannot touch the soul-crushing loneliness

~Cie~

Notes:

We are currently not participating in blog hops although we still like to use the writing prompts. 

I personally am not really up to doing much in the way of return visits, and it's kind of rude to ask people to visit me if I'm not going to visit them back.

I'm also not much up to having me or my work be scrutinized right now. 

I'm sick and tired of being the crazy person getting the conciliatory pat on the head. 

"There there, Crazy Cie. Isn't it nice that you express these feels of yours through your art? Aw, how broken you are. So glad I'm superior to you." 

I'm tired of having it be implied that the way I feel is somehow wrong or childish or sick and twisted. 

I'm tired of having it implied that there should be a time limit on my grief.

I'm tired of it being implied that my every thought is due to my fucking brain chemistry.

I'm tired of being told that I shouldn't express my heart because the soul is an outdated concept.

I once had a (sanctimonious) person ask why I publish what I write if I don't want to receive "constructive criticism" on it.

Well, I didn't publish it for you, Asshole.

I publish it on the off chance that there's someone out there who's like me; someone who's adrift in a sea of misunderstanding, who may really need to hear what I have to say, to know that they aren't the only lonely, misunderstood weirdo in the Universe.

That is who I do it for.

Then I do something else.

I read it aloud to the man in the picture above. 

I'm not in the room with him, so I'm not reading it where his physical ears can hear it. 

I read it to his soul.

Because he's lonely and afraid and doesn't know what's happened to him.

So I hope his soul can sense that someone cares about him, and maybe he'll be a little less afraid and sad.

I do this, and I believe it may help, because I choose to believe it does.

The end.

He would actually get this better than most people. 

Which is one of the big reasons why I've loved him for the past 38 years, and will for all time.