In the Presence of Grace

Image: (c) Jamie K. Reaser

Rain drops

set by night’s storm

jewel iris leaves

past the hour of morning sun.

A child

is born

into purpose.

Butterflies of delicate wing

and nectars sweet

traverse continents

there and back again.

Strangers re-member

something profound

in their togetherness.

A tadpole

becomes

a frog

and

calls souls to dream.

We awaken from slumber

with time enough.

As the flower opens

white petals widely

to the bee

for its first pollination,

Someone,

somewhere,

breathes in deeply

the last breath of

their sacred other ~

And

at the window

the mourning dove coos

a celebration of life

and love.

(c) 2003-2017/Jamie K. Reaser

Published in Sacred Reciprocity: Courting the Beloved 
in Everyday Life/Hiraeth Press

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Stop Holding Your Breath

Image: origin unknown

Stop holding your breath.

The one laying there next to you,

back at your side,

hogging all the covers,

that one doesn’t have to offer

what you are looking for,

doesn’t even understand that

you are looking,

Seeking.

That one prefers to remain asleep,

eyes closed.

Stop holding your breath.

That unmet longing that has you ceiling-staring

has nothing to do with being completed by another.

Nothing.

That unmet longing is the yet-to-be-had,

never-to-be-ended conversation

between your Soul and the Spirit that unites us all.

And, “Why yet unmet?” you ask.

Because you cannot truly engage in any dialogue

while holding your breath!

Part your lips, open your mouth, and release your

inflated cheeks and fears.

Breathe.

Inhale Life. Exhale Love.

Inhale Life. Exhale Love.

It’s time to do what you’ve known

it’s time to do.

With utmost intent,

it’s time to enter into The Sacred Marriage.

With utmost compassion,

it’s time to love yourSelf enough…

Breathe.

©2010-2011/Jamie K. Reaser

Published in "Note to Self: Poems for Changing the World from the Inside Out" by Hiraeth Press (www.hiraethpress.com). Nominated for the 2012 Pushcart Prize.

Callings

 

Photo: (c) Jamie K. Reaser

Do you hear yourself being called

to places that are far away,

beckoned by landscapes

intimately known and unimaginable?

Does it feel as if only strangers

can speak your name?

You must leave home.

You must leave HOME!

Escape the walls of your

upbringing any way you

can.

Caterpillars do it.

Travel far and wide,

get lost,

be robbed,

over and over again,

realize that the world is big,

you are small.

Forget who you believed

yourself to be,

who you thought

others thought you were.

Become someone who can’t

answer simple questions like,

“What do you do?”

Fail.

Totally and completely fail

to reach your intended destination,

though carrying a map and compass.

You are where you need to be

the moment after you

give up on all the landmarks.

Sit down and cry out

all of your laments.

Cry out the laments

all your ancestors

feared to cry.

You are indeed walking

in circles,

downward,

inward,

along a path marked

“Grief and Despair”

that leads directly

to soul.

You have arrived.

Arrived at the place

you began

that it killed you to leave.

There is no entrance,

nor exit.

Never was.

When people ask you to tell the

story of your travels,

your journey,

of the road you have taken,

do so by living your life,

Ecstatically.

Now you are human.

(c) 2003-2019/Jamie K. Reaser
Published in "Note to Self: Poems for Changing the World from the Inside Out" 

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When Dreams Dry Up

Image: http://uphilldowndale.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/

There are dreams,

like fruits,

which pucker and shrivel

on the stem.

The erotic drip of juice from your chin

is not guaranteed,

no matter how intimate

your relationship

with tree,

and blossom,

and pollinator.

I looked upon such a dream-fruit

today.

There was grief,

and that old familiar smell

of truncated memories.

I had a mind, for a moment, to pluck

the shrunken, hard dried mass

and take it into ceremony,

but my hand stopped,

suspended,

in mid notion.

Aghast.

What arrogance to think that any

intervention on my part would grant

a more holy passage

than Destiny’s plunk into the cradle

of leaf and microbes!

And that’s what I learned today

about dreams –

Sometimes, part way is fruition.

Sometimes,

it’s best to simply step back

and let the energies

return to their Source for re-cycling.

So, to the being on the stem,

I bowed in prayer position

instead.

© 2010-2012/Jamie K. Reaser

Published in "Note to Self: Poems for Changing the World from the Inside Out" (www.hiraethpress.com)

Receptivity

Photo: (c) Jamie K. Reaser
















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We were born onto a life sustaining planet.

Why?

Because we signed a contract of reciprocity:

Oxygen in exchange for carbon dioxide.

The problem isn’t that She’s been holding back,

or that you have.

The problem is one of receptivity.

We have bared our souls from an intimate relationship

with Abundance –

Fear shuts down, walls off, defends Homo sapiens

against life-force-sustaining energies,

the oxygen of emotions:

compassion, kindness,

nurturance, love.

…the capacity to experience beauty.

…the capacity to celebrate and be celebrated.

Here’s a hint…

Any closed system will eventually deplete itself,

and a sense of lacking will set in.

Lack of self esteem.

Lack of self worth.

Lack of self love.

Lack of anything meaningful beyond the self.

Nothing made of wood, stone, metal, glass, or plastic

will ever fill the void.

Never ever.

The increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere,

it’s not a sign that you’ve been overly generous

in this so-called partnership.

It screams:

“Excess is the ironic outcome of wantonness.”

Excess is the ironic outcome of wantonness.

Here’s what I want you to do:

Open up!

Open your eyes.

Open your mind.

Open your heart.

Expand the rib cage that some

say is the bone of contention

that defines our very existence -

procreative man and woman

begetting an entire species.

Now…Receive.

Open and receive.

Let in the life-force-sustaining energies and

make a place for them to root and grow

in the essence of your core being.

Open and receive.

Encourage others to do the same.

We must stop forcing ourselves upon Her

as a means of securing access to that

which She has already offered openly.

We must learn how to accept.

We need to say, “Thank you.”

~ Jamie K. Reaser, Author

Published in "Note to Self: Poems for Changing the World from the Inside Out" 

The Cairns of Carrowkeel

Image: (c) Jamie K. Reaser
Ireland, 2003

I, walking past the
vaginal stone,
crouch and kneel

to enter Her.

There is a pooled

wetness that seeps

in the

darkness.

Passage.

Slowly, with a

gentle touch to

ancient walls.

Only when I reach

the wide openness of

womb do I

become erect.

Receptive and empty -

this is a place of

mooning,

where the implanted divine

can gestate and

mature.

Each devotee an egg,

each inspiration -

sperm.

A pulsing life force

vibrates in the

chambers.

We are three:

She, me, and the

potential that dwells

within.

Cycling -

death and re-birth.

An old way of being

is buried when

new life

or a new age

emerges.

(c) 2003-2018/Jamie K. Reaser
A Talking Waters poem

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