Thursday, December 11, 2008

The Pointillist. by Patresa Hartman

i've been reading eckhart tolle
Power of Now
and i have been trying to lose track of time.

i have been severing the ties between
self and mind, because
i am not my thoughts.
i am not my emotions.
i am not my sleepy eyes or
my bad taste in pop music.
i am not my preferences
or my tendencies to analyze.
i am not my elbows or my skin.
i am not my sour mood.

it's hard, this new commitment to suspension.
it is difficult to take what was once a linear plane of events
stacked together on a continuum, and instead
see that they are points.
there is now.
and now.
and now there is now.
here is another now.
and another.

now is a new now.

there is no longer then, except for a little residue
left on my tongue.
but more importantly there is no upcoming.
and that is where i have my problem (life situation).
too much horizon gazing, and i miss where i am standing.
hours, i am in my head (which is not me.) accepting accolades, receiving
international acknowledgment of my most certain (elusive) genius.

and so in this now,
-- and this one, too --
i am going to honor the perfection of
fine, super fine points.
there is wine,
my favorite TV show,
my dog,
and cupcakes.

it is a fine moment,
and it doesn't matter what came before or
what comes next.

4 comments:

Barbara Quinn said...

The Power of Now has been my lifeline and mantra this past year. I love what you did with this..it really is calming and centering to read your words, for you do show how to stay in the now.And"pointillist" is an inspired metaphor. Connecting all those dots.Yes!

Angie Ledbetter said...

I'm probably the only human left who likes the "then and everything that's gone on before" as well as the now. The stuff/knowledge/experiences I've got were too hard won. :) Lovely post. As for the now, here in BR, I'm enjoying SNOW!

Kathryn Magendie said...

:-) There. now. My smile.

Anonymous said...

I'm so happy and sorry for you, for taking this leap with Eckhart into the never never land of NOW. It's the best and the hardest thing.

I love how you describe your findings. Your fine moment sounds fine, indeed. (And for the record, I am recognizing your genius, right NOW!) I'm inspired to pick Eckhart up before bed again tonight.

Here are my most favorite, most delicious NOW words of the day, brought to you by Rumi:

THAT LIVES IN US

If you put your hands on this oar with me,
they will never harm another, and they will come to find
they hold everything you want.

If you put your hands on this oar with me, they would no longer
lift anything to your
mouth that might wound your precious land -
that sacred earth that is your body.

If you put your soul against this oar with me,
the power that made the universe will enter your sinew
from a source not outside your limbs, but from a holy realm
that lives in us.

Exuberant is existence, time a husk.
When the moment cracks open, ecstasy leaps out and devours space;
love goes mad with the blessings, like my words give.

Why lay yourself on the torturer's rack of the past and the future?
The mind that tries to shape tomorrow beyond its capacities
will find no rest.

Be kind to yourself, dear - to our innocent follies.
Forget any sounds or touch you knew that did not help you dance.
You will come to see that all evolves us.

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