if . . .

Like a dream during your sleep at night, At once understand as a certainty That all the sundry notions you have are your own mind Arisen from the sleep of ingrained tendencies. Like clouds in the sky dissolving into the source from which they have come, At once understand as a certainty That your ill-considered actions and emotions, your feelings of happiness and sorrow, Will submerge into the source from which they have emerged. Like a reflection appearing in a clear lake, At once understand as a certainty That all the sundry concrete things, although they appear so, have no substantiality about them But are the gigantic reflection of a nothingness that has and is everything. (from The Story of the Mount Potala Delights verse 139, 140 & 141. A Visionary Journey - Longchenpa Translated and annotated by Herbert V. Guenther Shambhala Publications, Inc. 1989) :: Note :: ... text for tone poem ... Part II of meetings & meande...

Then all i have to do is recognize her, lifting her voice in pansori with an upward swing on the drum or listen to murmurs of dictee behind a seamless white scrim. The endless culturation following the gentle curve of the Han, a way of grace to what is other beyond measure. Reaching for saskatoonberries little orchid, maintain the heavenly blossoms. Wholeness lost and wholeness regained. :: Note :: ... "the perception of beauty is a moral test" sentence is a quote from Henry David Thoreau ...

Early in the afternoon they were playing in the temple They were looking forward to further dancingness and singingness. They could find the presence of absence in the action of memory. They might find timescapes to share. Just beyond the industrial area they passed fire trucks and sirens, gas stations, a car wash and a truck stop sprouting rubber hoses everywhere. A girl carried an empty chair searching for the porch. Feathers fell wavering to the carpet green. The land was flat and ordered. The streets were empty. They sat against a wall of old Korean script beside the family of ten. At the table behind a man wore a shirt calling for a revolution. The rain fell off and on washing the earth never quite clean enough. They returned home turning on the soft lights. The closeness, the warmth, the silence of intimacy. The sound of a drum, pansori and minyo. Rich layers of traditional love chants. Discordant harsh play lines recited from memory stacked over the carpet green. The fullness an...

                                                           Today all was usual                a hot July afternoon there were streams of poplar seeds on side streets he had been thinking about what she had said                        What is not spoken is unspoken often Cutting for more precision          on the index finger the splinter                 could not be removed He showed her in the shade to see her ...

The morning the gum surgery was scheduled we waded through fields of mosquitoes & walked the flats in rubber jackets & hiking boots mud heavy with soaked & sloshed foot trodden soles. From the lookout we saw glorious sandbars & followed paths to whitecap along the Saskatchewan while the silence healed the previous months hurt. Eyes bathed in the bright yellow canola summoning brilliance while the hay rolled under the power lines acknowledging our own steady fault lines. I saw the goldfinch flitting ahead his body a trace against the sky, the heavy overcast clouds dispersed bringing an even heavier drowsiness. I have read the world to which this man really belongs is far away through the fissures of dream & I have climbed steps down to rivers and oceans feeling winded & humbled and been glad of the green. In every sense have I felt on good terms with a clod of soil, an unknown song, the smell of sage. I have been cordial to the grasslands windswept face and the ...

No not a shadow. Like having midday darkness at your back you can feel but you can't see. As if it were boring into your skull, the shape of a recently vanished figure. He is not living where he really lives. The door leads into a hallway and up the stairs with a sharp corner. It's not that they shared the place long but the cigarette smell stopped lingering. There was only one door and it was magnificently quiet. Looking behind requires no effort. Came another with a feeling of dissonance, almost as troublesome. Not of being absent but building belonging. They were drying the air shifting possessions from one place to another. They moved along nailing and staining without agreements. He desired to make an invisible room. He left cans and crumbs scattered throughout. There was his black cat jumping to the window sill watching every move. Broke through the screen to escape, returning when called. A scheduled group came drifting in with stomps and grunts. If this took place anyw...

It is 2011, just before the thunderstorm. Here I am, repairing, and I am bleeding. I am located at the corner of alphabet village at the bottom of the hill. I need your help. You will find me surrounded by apartments, where the trees tower especially silent during the day, where shouts and cursing rubs the back alley. We roam to make one another suspicious; to fend from eyes that bring disease. We are running on borrowed time, recycled filth in the last cycle. Mouths open/shut. We would be criminals to one another stealing or scavenging. We would be sticky, dirty and in vengeful stench. We would be lost or, at least, struggling. Be hurt. Invisible except to the most callous observer. We will be sewer water. Potash tailings of bleach. Collapsed lungs. No, we must first collect. Be reused. Be taken apart. Be lightning. :: Note :: ... hovering before rising & falling ...

It is 2011, just before the thunderstorm. Here I am, repairing, and I am bleeding. I am located at the corner of alphabet village at the bottom of the hill. I need your help. You will find me surrounded by apartments, where the trees tower especially silent during the day, where shouts and cursing rubs the back alley. We roam to make one another suspicious; to fend from eyes that bring disease. We are running on borrowed time, recycled filth in the last cycle. Mouths open/shut. We would be criminals to one another stealing or scavenging. We would be sticky, dirty and in vengeful stench. We would be lost or, at least, struggling. Be hurt. Invisible except to the most callous observer. We will be sewer water. Potash tailings of bleach. Collapsed lungs. No, we must first collect. Be reused. Be taken apart. Be lightning. :: Note :: ... hovering before rising & falling ...

... one of my ritual summerl activities used to be gardening but ever since Mom sold the house it's been a simple condo balcony flower display ... have tried herbs but they don't seem to take ... the tomato plant she still receives from old neighbour Peterson thrives ... we'll see how things grow this season ... ... sure miss the raspberry bushes & the horseradish which was totally out of control ... oh yes & we always had to be careful with the zucchini or it would rule every spare space ... Mom loved the potatoes & beets ... she would go out daily for her lettuce, onion, chives & tomato salads ... mixed results with beans & peas ... we did well with carrots havesting them in the fall ... we got a couple of pumpkins for halloween ... tulips in the front were the first sign of spring & they were the first bulbs Stefan planted ... ... the honeysuckle climbed the fence ... ... we had these huge petunias, iris plants taken from Nana's place in ...

Kafka has a dear place in my history ... ... Metamophosis , read at age 13, was the first work of fiction that made sense of the nonsense I felt around me ... after reading decided to spend a whole day as a worm at the high school ... arms entwined, squiggling from class to class ... great fun ... ... an adaptation by Steven Berkoff of The Trial was the first mainstage university production I directed (Nov. - Dec. 1989) ... an exhilarating experience ... the students were thrown into a process of me sorting through my European studies ... the retiring stage designer for that show was cleaning up his office when he found the original Trial maquette offered it to me which i gladly accepted despite wishing to unload rather than collect stuff ... photo to the left is from Emry's Dreams : Greystone Theatre in Photographs and Words taken by David Maneville ... ... Kafka resides in the deep recesses of my memory haunting as he haunted the 20th century ... await his latest incarnation ....

... well as school concluded & report cards handed out in front of the school ... ... did I mention the whole basement flooded & my office, all costumes, props, sets, scripts, computers, filing cabinents with 25 years of teaching material were lost as well as the boiler room and all electricity ... apparently it flooded to a height of six feet busting through doors ... we're not allowed back into the school until mid-August ... ... well as school concluded so did a precious working relationship draw to a close ... for the last five years principal Chad has guided us through many a storm ... transformation from a mainstream high school of over 1,400 students to a inner city abode for just over 300 has been dramatic & challenging ... ... i met her when i was in grade 11 & she a grade 9 student ... our paths though varied have crossed often during the span of 42 years ... she retires today ... one of the best ... one of the extraordinary ... her last act was to give ea...