Upanishads – poems 2 die for

SCRIPTURE

thick smoke pouring
skyward indicating
target-rich environments

things
balanced on
a scalpel-sharp
knife edge
nuclear option
not least of all

and here I am in
the basement stack
a year before
we met
used to chat
in this exact place

half
a century ago

here I am
deep down in the
bowels of the University library
(the same
library destined
to burn)

reading
the Upanishads, wondering
about the nature
of consciousness,
transcendence and
this thing
they call the
soul

outside the thick rain clouds
hitting us with an
insane deluge
as they cross
the mountain

and
me diving deeper into
these sanskrit scriptures
(in translation)

losing all
sense of
space and time

the ghost presence of that
briefest moment
of being
together,

swirling about me
unseen, promise of
something
beyond special
never destined
to be

those thick clouds rising
above an expanse
of ferocious
flames

this is not going
to end well

chance that
what ends it
ends everything

so much
for all of us to lose,
we
played this so badly
so stupidly,

the laws of physics
that tell us
we are all
if small
matter

infinite energy
a small Sun a
flash of light of
miraculous intensity

and
crazy as it sounds, obessive
truly

the balance
slipping, tipping

thinking of you

something of the truth
of you there
in those scriptures

SAVED

all those books burning
in that same library.
where before
things got messed
we used to chat
and I caught sight
of you once
strutting your stuff
in a giant white stetson

all those books
we both used
to read
much oneupmanship
between us
for some sad reason

and we exchanging words
at a distance about this tragedy

but there
I am before I ever met you
outside such a storm
creeping across the mountain
the rain slashing down
across
the entire peninsula

me immersed in the Upanishads
reading the great text
on the return
of the soul to the one
like drop into ocean

we
all one

and you my
forever one
though nothing close
to union

ever between us

somehow
that fire in my heart
always burning
consuming
never going out

SALVE

SALVE

salve aqua
you are the original solvent

it was raining that day when
I figured death
might indeed not have dominion

empathy
entropy
thermodynamics
and the drama
of the self

down in the crypt-like stacks
of the University library
rain pouring down
(a natural watershed here
on the backslope of this mountain)
here to
read
(daily intellectual
spiritual pilgrimage)
lose my head
in the clouds

or deep into
the Upanishads,
ancient Hindu scriptures

which talk
the soul’s talk
talk of
journey and
perpetual migration

trying to
wrap my mind around
trying
to wrap around
my young
mind

the rain falling, gushing down
salve aqua
every single droplet
its
own entire cosmos