Halfway to brimful

Life is half empty 

Half way there

Half left to dreams unfulfilled 

Half too scared to dream

Life is half empty 

Hopes trading places 

With fears shuffling 

for space in ever narrowing minds

Life is half empty 

Waiting in vain for secure

Bank statements tallying up

Positive integers for a change 

But then one day there is laughter

Sloshing around in my half emptiness

The smiles of friends

And warm hugs encircling body fat

Sagging bodies chasing bouncing kids

There is space in my half emptiness

For love and healing hurt and the 

Brightness of young eyes all around

I am glad of my half emptiness 

This space to fill with 

All of you I hold dear

On this day 

mundane as any other 

Made special by these generous

Generic humans 

Filling my half empty life 

3.7.17

Firefly

With bated breath

I wait 

hoping not to hear 

strange footsteps

In the night

As time trickles through

Desperate hands

cupped in vain

My mind wanders aimlessly

down alleyways

Where Darkness fears to tread

"Why have you forsaken me?"

I ask the Sandman

When a gentle finger alights -

On my shoulder

Lending deliverance

And I sleep in the soft glow

Of a little firefly

An impossible task

Saw this online

https://youtu.be/4dA7WnsWk04
So beautiful that I had to try
An unworthy translation
In the early morning light
Unsolicited and perhaps illegal
Just to see if language really is
A barrier to beauty and love

So here with apologies to the author
Mr Rafeeq Ahamed
Who I have never met
Is my vain attempt to capture
The magnificence of his words

Dedicated as ever to
That constant companion


When Death arrives

When Death arrives I wish you
To be here by my side

To run my gnarled fingers - stiff
from scooping embers -
Through the comfort of your hair

To let my final breath share the
Gentle air that you exhale

To soak my world weary eyes
In the soft radiance of your face

To fill my worn out ears with
The sweet seal of your whispers

To spread the green salve of your
memory as thoughts melt
Off my fevered brow

To move my lips in silent prayer
As they hold dear old footprints
Of your kiss

To rest my burning feet as they
Dream footfalls of your love

That would suffice
My love

For this lucky one
To resurrect

A blade of grass
Cutting through all that
Dark earth that holds me dear

Humility

As I sipped sweet tea under the high ceiling of his old Art Deco style house I hinted at my work in measured tones of understated self indulgence.

"University of Cambridge" he mused, "very good" he said, before moving on to a parable originally attributed to Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa:

A salt doll journeyed for thousands of miles and stopped at the edge of the sea. It was fascinated by this moving liquid mass, so full of life and mystery and promise, so unlike anything it had seen before.

"What are you?" asked the salt doll. 

"Come in and see" replied the sea with a smile. 

So the salt doll waded in, thinking to itself: "I will dive to the depths of this new, wonderful thing so that I can fathom its dark insides and tell all my friends when I go back home" 

Before long, as it dissolved to nothing and yet became everything in the sea, with its last conscious thought the doll exclaimed in wonder:

"Now I know what I am!"

Slowly I realised that this gentle host of mine was teaching me the first lesson in research ...

Humility 

Grace for the generic human

Cold February 

Iz kamakawiwo'ole singing somewhere over the rainbow on YouTube

She in a pink jumper and leopard spotted woolly socks slow dances with Tiny Trouble wearing of all things a sky blue cape and purple jammies, face lit up in a grin missing two front teeth 

As the big man croons with unexpected gentleness ...

I watch them swaying gently in the middle of our living room like slender kelp saplings in warm ocean currents when -

suddenly -

- the other one shoots across my line of vision carrying a gianormous beige teddy bear on his head as if nothing could be more mundane

Perfect Sunday Afternoon 

Fleshbag affinity

Entity Tracker one (ET1): time point update imminent

Entity Tracker two (ET2): proceed as per protocol

ET1: 

Sampling at random from upper hemisphere, sectors 4-7, lower tertile of ambient temperature range.

Subjects fleshbag 1 and fleshbag 2.

Positioned long axis parallel to terrain supported by inorganic indigenous artefact.

Fleshbag 1 is moving terminal calcium capsule on pedicle. Energy dissipation rate above baseline threshold. Fleshbag 2 continues within range of resting median.

Internal oscillator of fleshbag 1 following previously observed ramp and burst protocol in gradual increments. The correlation of internal oscillator activity with intentional movement of terminal calcium capsule persists as documented in other samples.

Fleshbag 1 appears to transfer appendages to encircle fleshbag 2. This movement appears to be purposeful suggesting autonomous processing.

Mild fluctuations in basal energy dissipation of fleshbag 2 noted. However this remains within baseline range.

ET2: Thank you ET1. Please proceed to interpretative algorithms 

ET1: Despite repeated trial and test runs the algorithm still returns an occasional high probability of autonomous processing with sentient potential.

ET2: I have to over rule that conclusion for lack of sufficient data. This has to be sampling error. Previous larger data sets have reliably demonstrated and replicated the observation that these fleshbags are not capable of higher order sentience as noted in other sectors of these outer minor spatial structures.

They appear to have receptors for immediate environmental interpretation within their calcium capsules but the archaic reports from small initial samples suggesting the feature of fleshbag affinity have now been categorically proven to be sampling error. 

Most previous ETs who have approached this with a surface wide sampling protocol have concluded that the predominant feature of these autonomous fleshbags is peer aversion. Recurrent observations support the robust conclusion that peer aversion leads to irreversible termination of internal energy dissipation of large sample sets with cessation of internal oscillator activity and in some cases cavitation of terminal calcium capsules.

ET1: I recognise the weight of the data against my observation. However I still maintain that fleshbag affinity remains a possibility as observed in finite sample sizes.

I know you think this is sampling error but there has to be a minor trend at the very least.

ET2: That statement maybe accepted as fact but only with a high probability of error. However these observations from small data sets cannot override the surface wide sampling studies performed without a priori assumptions.

These clearly show no such trend for fleshbag affinity. Overall these minor organic entities are self limiting in species advancement primarily due to the lack of peer affinity that is reliably demonstrated in all higher order sentient beings.

.………

As I lay in bed this Sunday morning with her sleeping face gently resting on my shoulder, I could not shake off that odd feeling that someone was watching us.