Healers and Madmen Healers and madmen wander these crumbling streets, haunt the chocolataire, type their festive souls into the digital world of healers and madmen who smile and colour and whisper and climb to the cross above the village, fall on cacti, curse at dogs who follow healers and madmen, breathe the deep air fresh out of the arctic freeze, higher in the glaciers, breathe the afternoon sun with astute mindfulness of the freshly baked air that feeds every living soul minute by minute healers and madmen speak, from the breath of life of a world with more colours than those painted on earth, whisper melodies beyond the range of earthly ears, distribute elements not charted on the periodic table of elements, bath flowers without names like madmen and healers, laugh and are laughed upon, being the glory of their paradox that every sentence begins and ends with a smile, connected throughout by a wily half smile on the face of the madmen and healers who touch the planet with such a gentle step that shadows shudder with unfathomable envy and the madmen trace upon the landscape surreal lordscapes, windscapes, seascapes, lifescapes and they escape from pointed fingers by being healers and madmen bouncing forth on the feathers of a dusty duck making his way regardless of expectations, so the surreal begs reason for patience to understand the world outside our ken. That which exists is not synonymous with that which we believe, prove or trust, so madmen and healers wear an extra jacket from time to time to bear the extraterrestrial cold that surmounts them; wear caps and long hair and grungy beards to better weather the blizzard steeping upon their souls from worlds beyond the human eye, all to say we can press the horizon, and, she gives; press the aurora, he bends; press the heart, it heals of its own accord. The magic of things that we have yet to comprehend need not be hastily denied.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda.

Visit my Reiki Thailand Website for complete information on Reiki Natural Energy

The Inner Bridge, Introduction to Writing Poetry


There is often a wide gap between who we truly are and who we express ourselves to be. This comes as a result of weakness on both the spiritual and creative shores of self. Many times we forget to explore, or simply don´t know how to discover, our spiritual selves. This is further hampered by our inability, or even refusal, to express our inner, secret selves in a creative form.
The Inner Bridge provides a series of techniques that waken the spirit, activate the senses, and limber up the language skills needed to create poetry; the ultimate expression of our emotional and spiritual essence.

Techniques include innovative exploration of metaphor and symbolism, adventures in social and natural engagement, and exposure to quintessential poems of humanity through careful and incisive guidance.

The Inner Bridge is written, and seeks now, only you, the reader, to become, then, the writer, of your own bridge across destiny.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

The Gift Blossoms


By forgoing thoughts of the future and dwelling in the eternal present, outside of time, we are gifted. The gifts, of the moment, are too often clouded by familiarity, ignorance or neglect.

The gift of this present is this breath lifting my lungs to survive one more moment. The gift of vision blesses me with the first red christening of a desert dry cacti, the gift of cauliflower gently sauteed, rice, music, friends near and far gift my every moment, while thoughts run mumbo-jumbo to a future of hope, a past full of wishes.

The blinders fall straight in front of me, somehow naive to the glory of this full moment, momentous, every glance, every breath, momentous upon me.

So sadly, much of this is lost in the harried pace of hopes, plans and goals, all full of purported good, but each in its weight, a distraction from being.

Only the present actually exists, all else is but conceptual or memory. Thrive now in this moment, this eternal now, where all of history is united at a single focus, ever evolving, ever now, ever intense. Don´t miss a breath, for no breath forgotten ever returns, as each blossom on the high desert range reds once, yellows once, falls, once, as we, exist, once, for this moment.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

Laughter on Mount Punallayna


Of the six billion people on our planet, each with a solid opinion as tenuous as a thousand mountains, I thought that I was right. Right!

My laughter echoes for hours through the valley of sacred winds, who gaily laugh along with me. What are the chances of there being a right view, let alone the chances that I alone in the universe hold that correct view, among billions?

Laughter rinses the fear of being such a fool in front of so many majestic peaks and velvet valleys, long softened themselves by the humble whisper of rain upon their jagged teeth, as they themselves chomp, chomp, chomp upon chewy bits of truth.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

The Deepest Corridors of a Man´s Illusions


It´s easy to think that the wind whips all day with no particular agenda. Upon closer inspection, it seems the wind wants to teach us something when it whips in our faces and tears away our hats.

Walking through the Sacred Valley, seeking answers to ever haunting questions, it is best to ask the wind, for the wind is one of the few in command of the truth. The winds of Ollantaytambo reach down the deepest corridors of a man´s illusions to uproot the sacred chains of existence. He puts us in dusty touch with Patchamama earth.

Hike, climb and watch the sun salute the line of trees high on the granite ridge. Observe the grace of a humbling moon hovering ever in wait above stern, Inkan faces, and seek there solace and comfort. The kings may save warmth for better souls than ours, yet they know patience is the greatest virtue of the mountain. The towering granite walls never know any mercy. Look up at yet another unscalable mountain. Sit and ponder the many mountains you may never climb, yet never in dismay, only in wonder. Finally, it is far from necessary to climb all the mountains of the world.

Stroll back to the village before darkness can further deceive you. In the Plaza des Armas, there twists a solo ragged tree, more weather beaten than the mountain matriarch. In her twisted limbs is a message, waiting to be deciphered.

What has the wind taught the matriarchal tree, the oldest standing reminder of the ancient past? She stands in stoic defiance against the demands of modern urban style. The winds that terrorize the false hopes of men, lift also the hearts of those devoted to truth. The wind may smack of anger and pain, but always through compassion to teach those lessons most painful to grasp.

Hold your hat, and never let another day blow through your fingers without acknowledging the truth it bestows.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

When Flight chose Birds to Grace the Skies


When flight chose birds to grace the skies
And represent her majesty in ambient view
The clouds and mountains gossipped at first
That hawks and doves would never succeed

Until they saw through the misty wind, the wisdom of flight
Proven true upon the first set of wings
Gracing the currents in Andean valleys, where
Effortless charm merely tilts its wings with a smile

Now the lush green velvet hills sit back to admire
Her excellency´s gospel truth of wind and flight
Each bird a further tribute to the unseen light
Lifting wings ever higher than human vision

The elegance bestowed upon the planet earth
Transcends eyes, ears and mind
To the soil, I beg forgiveness for my trespass
To the skies, I kneel in eternal, suspended awe

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda.

Mountains Gaze upon Men with Laughter


Of the thousands of paths traced through the sky each night, and as many scratched on the surface of the earth, what path do we follow?

Who was the first man to wander from the known and accepted path? Was there ever such a first man, or does that wanderer live within every heart? For some, the wanderer is drowned amongst the demands of the city, while for others, they vamoose at the first sight of dawn.

Vagabonds have long travelled West to California, through the arid Mojave desert. They carry just their skins, and their bones, with them wherever they go, be it to the top of Mt. Whitney, or fall to unmarked crumbling stones.

Sleep Vagabonds in a dusty, faded gulch, dry with the wrath of millennium. These nameless men sleep tucked into caverns and caves, more fitting rattlers than men. Yet, a man, so destined, fits in well where death sleeps beneath the sun´s steely raze.

Where write Vagabonds self-scribed epitaphs, hoping to come to terms with their destiny. Not every life is rewarded with floodlights and gold, for such glories only prove to be distractions. Vagabonds wander alone through the unscribed paths of life on earth, and they, as sure as stars, come to rest beneath piles of rocks wildly tossed by Geology´s infamous gaze.

Mountains and time look upon her men, gazing with a little respect, a little laughter, at all the things the people do to get ahead, make a name, name a face, face the future. Vagabonds choose their own paths, regardless of prevailing winds, with no fear of ending up beneath the mountain´s very feet for their final resting place.

Be bold, brave, and face the stars at night to know the path as it is revealed to you one step at a time.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

A Little Death for Everyone


Soon,

I too will stagger out in the midnight of an unfinished moon, naked as any dog barking at his unseen fate, delivered at a velocity faster than any of us can comprehend,

I too will lay in my little pool of blood
and pile of shreds of what had once held me together, and

I too will whimper, moan, try to bite you or bite anyone who comes close enough to perceive the truth of my bones, the sacred tears of my blood, the river of sadness that pours forth on the dustry country trail, unpaved but for the agonies, and the utter frailty and futility.

Then I, in my flopping throes, shaking off tears of death like the fettered bug struggling to be free from the bondage of the spider´s web, each caught up in the drama of their race, the June bug, having just arrived on the cusp of December, eternally misnamed on this side of the equator by a dominating northern voice, like I, painfully, oddly, mis-embodied, mis-enspecied, mis-tongued, misfit to any nation or race, caught in this body´s own spider web of desire and causation and gutteral frustrations, in a man´s body, in a human world, all upside down and bloody, there, for the knives that carve my enseizured heart, wrestling with the anacondic tendons of this existence to be free of the thoughts that surround me and the emotions that embalm me.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

The Olde Poodle is a Loving Saint


The crying dog permeated the freshly dark evening with pleas for mercy and release.

In search of silence for my sweet and sour dinner over rice, I set her free from her leather and chains so we could share in the peaceful song before the dawn of the moon.

I allowed her in the house against all arbitrary rules by which we control the world. Her eyes up at me pierced, saying, I am a creature like you, while the whining pain of her prison gradually faded from her canine memory.

She sat rigidly but calm in her royal obedience and servitude. Noble through my meal, her eyes penetrated every cell of my soul, yet still I had no food to suit her, but I did have touch to share.

I placed my healing hand first upon her crown, then to her nape. She relaxed, softened, and curled to the floor. With one hand on her heart, bringing forth the healing energy of the celestial source, I prayed she be healed of any wounds that ever aggravated upon her innocence.

She rolled onto her back, her eyes rolling loonily in relief as whatever slag had hung upon her slowly dissolved. I found myself drawn into her glossy eyes, wet with tears most any vet would deny, and saw how deeply emotion poured forth as she wiped the dogged tears with her paws.

Released from her chain and unburdened of her grief, she floated, her pain well cleansed, a dirty olde poodle on the outside, the purity of a loving saint on the in.

She teaches me the love of life.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

Painters of the Rainbows


It was coincidence of course that Katie painted Red, Talitha Orange, Daniel chose Yellow, I had green, Kristin selected blue, Yuliana Indigo, and Ninfa Violet, and each in their order painted unaware the others, sheer accident that all the painters and all their colours were aligned to the vision of the rainbow.

Whose red originally was sourced in the primal earth. Orange, child of fire perennially renewed from the naval of the reproductive soil. Yellow, the light that first spawned man, his wisdom and his ego, and green, the everlasting blessing of the jungle and the mirror into the heart.

Blue, the dawn of human language by which to speak of love and compassion and renewal of the species, whispered on the balanced fulcrum of wind upon the Andean skye. Indigo, just a child of light of the universal mind, the bridge to violet godhead, the crowning achievement of a universe eternally in the making, her brush so delicate like an angel´s fingertips massaging the wisdom of the omnipotent into the delicate crown of the children, who painted and painted and painted from the deepest lake of colours perched 4000 metres high in the mountains, while unfathomably deeper below the level of Atlantis. Their colours pointed to the one source from which they had all dawned on their miraculous journey to the Land of the Inkas, the Children of the Sun.

Copyright 2007, Tom Radzienda

Gracias, Hot Water What is the gift of a hot shower when it is merely my daily right? When the tap at my command sterilizes my skin and scalp in a hurry, to rush me to my office, do I even pause to appreciate? What do I touch of luxury then? Have I ever thought of hot water as a luxury? Here in the hills above Urubamba, my daily ritual of boiling pots and kettles of water in the kitchen while gathering the fruits of breakfast, preparing for a brief, warm splash in the tub. Not sterile, but always at least half warm, half clean, and glacially, like it or not, fresh. This morning, my luxury is heat from an electric sun that trickles slowly and hesitantly over my naked soul, my first proper shower in a week. I bathe, no, I bask in the flowing warmth and the cleansing touch of a fresh dawn in Cusco. Were I to bathe in such warmth every day, the luxury would rapidly fade. The gift would become my need and demand. The ascetic bath teaches me of the simple world that is narrow on convenience and shy of comfort, that books from the north cannot reveal and I thus am bathed in luxury on my weekly visits to the city. Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda

Secret Whispers of my Homeless Heart


Friends at home are the stable pillars of knowing who we are, for their eyes reflect and influence our daily tribunals with life.

From a distance, friends are anchors as we travel across homeless, timeless seas in search of a path, the path, our path, beyond the acres we had once labelled home.

Further, be it time or space, we cast away, while friends remain buoyant on the horizon, too soon, far from sight, and a lonely snap of rain is enough to veil our remembrance, and then friendship claims the taste of luxury. For rain becomes hail and cobblestones so slick as to beg for stable footing. We, precarious, amble our way alone, along, some path, blind to right or wrong, but moving, at least, slowly flowing towards the proximate future.

It is then that one smile from among the crowd of strangers, at whatever hour, from this passerby, who knows my name and has seen the secret whispers of my homeless heart, that I am welcomed to her language and her land. I am gifted by her laughter and smile, I be tickled and teased by my first new friend on this ancient new continent and its dizzying array of life, and friends, all friends who have bounced upon my buoyancy and also born my weight, gather in my arms as we greet in the chilly plaza for lunch, chatter, doesn´t matter, when friends like distant galaxies collide to mix their stars.

Friendship is once again renewed, a blessing of our Patchamama existence.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda

The Beauty that Wisdom Dreams for You


Each gift (regalo) regales on a silver platter for you to accept to receive into your heart. As in the core of the apple, the source of fruitful truth, once she arrives within your heart, she may open, and blossom, and her wisdom penetrates every vein and corpuscle until you absorb her every vision and insight gathered over the millennium of orchards, passed on from seed to fruit to soil to seed and finally to bleed within your own arteries to nourish your soul.

Each gift, each luxury that manifests in your life, so many more than accountants can collect, the gift of the walk, the sharing, the talk, the daring, our time, our caring, through which the apple or orange of the story releases their butterflies like messengers of the earth to remind you, there is your gift, every breath, every smile, every kiss, every falling leaf, every death, be there that you be invited once again to the core of the universe, as it manifests in your own divine heart, and the message permeates your being, then the luxury has performed its passionate duty to inform you, enlighten you, lighten your load and transfer your burden into a parcel of undiscovered joy.

Then, the luxurious apple butterfly may do her sacred buzzing dance like a bee to share the beauty that wisdom dreams for you.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda

How much Laughter until we See?


Nothing can be stolen, only given. Nothing can be owned, only shared. How many generations will continue to believe that this temporary life on earth is anything otherwise?

If we look up to the myriad stars hovering over our house in Urabamba, I point and say,

that one is mine, and that one is yours,

we shake hands, sign and agree, build a fence, a barrier, a wall, post sentries and signs to guard our private rights and beckon the laws of the countries we´ve imagined to be, to enforce our ownership, how long, for how long would you laugh at me?

If you allowed the minuscule red mite that crawls across our table to tickle up your finger into the palm of your hand and declared,

she is mine, mine and not yours,

then proceeded with penalties and congresses to uphold and defend your little lady bug title deed, how long, how loudly, might I laugh at you?

If you took the bicycle wheels form beneath my seat that you, not I, might pedal your way into a smooth future, would I not benefit more by saying,

ride, it, it is yours,

and you be my forever friend, then to grimace and gripe that the bastard with the cutters has severed the cable that staked my claim to ownership of the bike?

This is how I learned to be generous, may this be how we learn to laugh.

Take down fences and signs, reach over the Hadrian´s Wall we´ve build in our minds, and embrace our sharing and stewardship of this home, this earth, for she laughs and laughs and laughs when we believe this planet is ours when indeed, all of it is actually hers. As life and death ever truly proclaim, for what do Columbus and Magellan any longer claim? Not a flower, not a weed, not a single ray of the southern sun or the southern cross can they tuck in their pockets to regale their kings.

While I no longer own a bike, never owned a star, and never wanted to own a little red mite, I am pleased, peacefully content with this little existence I call my own, for the moment.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda

Divine Song of the Morning Birds


When birds sing to the silent morning, their tunes transcribed into chilly dawn melodies, carried by the grace of an Andean breeze, across these deeply breathing mountain ranges where my untouched ears gather the intricate secrets of a buoyant species, I ask myself, my friends, all of you, have we ever, in our most silent, noble minds, ever truly heard the morning song as it whistles, warbles, cackles and cajoles its way through the prison walls of our heavily guarded consciousness?

These birds, ever freer without a declaration, greater seers without a proclamation, divine songsters without a record label, weave their song lines across the branches of the morning sky, delicate webs of wisdom to catch the arrogant, ignorant ears of those who might otherwise raise their cunning saws to deny the universe its precious songs in order to build higher wooden fences, to protect a larger wooden house by which to ensure security, beauty and peace.

Without instruments or books, electricity or tools, the birds speak, and the unencumbered, unadulterated ear of the last surviving, homeless, timeless heart, revels in the ancient melody of rainbows before colours could be named, birds caged, forests felled and souls diseased by the industry of consumption and haste.

Sing, little bird, dream, your ancient heart, beloved one. Dream, little bird sing, your melodic rainbow, to release us from the coma cast upon the industrialized earth.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda

The Universe Ponders the University


When pondered, the university and universe thus, whereby we might become beings of light, or beasts of burden, where we might learn to spell our names, or another might cast a spell like a fishing net upon our potential, where then might be found the true essence of education?

Would one lead us out into the world whereby the sights of distant stars and the intimate touch of a pyramidal moth might claim our eternal attention? Would one lead us into fetters, encumbered by papers and documented betrayals, entwined within our entrails that could drive us like so many blinkered oxen to plough the decimated soil of the nation for which we´d beg to die?

Ponder university, universe, and each the claim they lay upon our ankles, our crowns. How may we navigate the wisdom each might espouse, how might we circumnavigate the legacy of each, when already at our most tender age, each has already proclaimed its clemency upon our souls and our soles. What remains of our divine right to be, our ability and willingness to see, beyond the shadows cast by stately illusions?

Will we rise, in grace, above the din?

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Secrets of the Acorn


What are the secrets of the acorn sleeping among the tattered debris of fallen trees? Agony and disgrace, or eternal memory of that which once stood elegant and proud in this denuded place?

The acorn, or the begging child? Have your seen the boy with remnants of some long forlorn scabby meal shovelled without tutelage into his hungry face? What does he know of the human soul, long since fallen like the oak for which his barren village was once named?

Have you seen her, the acorn? Have you met him, the beggar boy?

Are we in touch with these novel conceptions of the vessels of life, each in their kind, containing the wisdom or folly of every preceding generation?

Or have we fenced ourselves behind the high oaken fences and the concrete and steel gates of our bugless, dirtless communities where no poor child would ever tamper, let alone claim, any civil right, not to own or bathe in luxury, but simply to perceive the beauty that blossoms beyond the oaken gates, or simpler yet, to stand, to simply be, a dirty faced boy with one open hand asking forever for the debris of waste by which to sustain his round of alms whereby his little stature inherently bespeaks of another world, itself gigantic, himself but the tiniest flotsam floating, asking to reveal that grace and disgrace can be perceived in their knotted elegance upon this planet´s face.

The acorn, I invite tonight to rest upon my Patchakuti altar that she too might bring vision to my candle lit room, warmth to my glacially inspired home, guidance along my dusty trail of destiny beyond any name, she, acorn, loves, trusts me, to guard and replicate her deepest hope that humanity not fall into ruin for lack of grace.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

When the Rainbow issued forth her Commandments


When the rainbow issued forth her commandments, the people of Cusco accepted their only choice; to be patient with where we are, fulfilled by what we have, comfortable with the wool we´ve gathered, in tune with the music of the rain, sated by the organic growth of our nutrition, tolerant of thundering crowds, apace to the rhythm of an ancient village in a mountain storm, neighbour to strangers, yet a stranger to none, inspired to leap across borders, cultures and languages as easily as the current of our hearts leaps from one synapse to another, alerting our minds to the presence of the love of rain and sun, there, in our hearts, flourish the rainbows.

The city and its traffic by foot and by car were frozen still, not from frigid defiance, but in the careful embrace of her drizzling majesty, compelling a people, a nation, to a calling higher than our human species had thus been corralled.

For the rain of wisdom disregards the nations and race, the beliefs and tastes, of any earthly conventions.

Such were the commandments heard in a vegetarian love that carrots and beans, potatoes and tomatoes, wheat and maize, would all sprout thereafter with familial joy of knowing they are the children of the rain, not the offspring of blood usurped for narrow pleasure.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Our Sacred Loyalty


No timer, no clock commands the rain to drop or stop or where or how. No manager or VIP can boss the sun to rise or fall, sizzle or simmer, approach or retract.

No parent nor teacher, husband nor wife, can dictate the ebb and flow of the seasons, the give and take of the tides, the wisdom or wit of the winds.

To whom then do we owe duty and obedience? To pueblos or public opinion? To the vagaries of a nation´s wars, or the random oscillations of leaders blinded by their own maniacal swords?

Only in the ticking of the cicada, the falling of leaves, the urgency of spring to write into the rhythm of our lives and set the pace by which we will indeed be in tune, in time, with the marking and calling of the ancient rainbows, never as warriors, only as friends, by which to share the evolution of our inheritance of peace, therein lies our sacred loyalty.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

I Trust I Tread Gently upon this Soil


Each breath is a priceless gift, whose value is far beyond accounting. Most precious, just observe how long you could live without a breath, and see its value escalate exponentially.

Hold your breath, then consider for the duration how much you would be willing to pay for your next breath. At what price would you say no, I won´t pay any more? This determines the value of the air, for the earth holds all of us hostage to our source of breath. Ponder this for a moment as your engine warms, your factory sputters, or, ponder again, as you walk or bicycle your way around town.

Hold your breath again, and determine, what all would you give away to the children of abandonment, in order to secure your next breath. Cash, clothes, car, home? Is there a limit?

Again hold your breath, for this will be your final breath, until you are willing to pay the asking price. Realize the value of a lung full of air compared to the price of a luxury car. Which would you choose?

Such is the wisdom of hunger.

I trust I tread gently upon this soil, my voice never at odds with peace, my words never at war with justice, my heart never blind to the gracious gifts perpetually before me.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Healing Solitude


It is a year on this cold side of the mountain since any man has trodden his urban feet upon this path of wild goats. A year at minimum, a million preferred, that the ashes and dust lay eroding, undisturbed, to gather the depths of sublime solitude whereby I might safely spread the manta of my soul before the granite, grizzled, glaciers at the distant reach of the valley, and the merciless thistles of cacti that embrace my silent nest.

The little toes of a tiny town reach into the valley and plant a garden and a home, while on the mountain of the cross I look far abreast where only goats may pass. It is in their tracks that I seek the hidden gravity of infinite peace that no city affords.

Only in solitude, measured by space, and the deep trenches of time, may I truly nourish my loneliness. For in the comfort of society, or in my lover´s arms, I am warmed, nurtured, but never healed. Only in the cradle of the mountain, its rocky impermeable trail, can I pierce the human vessel of my name. I safely encounter the expansive world of the universe that I am.

And here I laugh, for after all these incarnations, I do not know my essential name, but answer instead to the tag applied to me in this present round of life.

This loneliness, this existential void through which I wander, this Fernweh, this lonely seeking after the curative tonic of splendid, final, solitude, whereby the heart of the mountain releases its every torment and the water falls under a different name, the shadows cast their own beliefs, the thunder rolls its own private drum, the goats astride the vertical cliff, in line like a giant serpent winding its way through the hills, I perch the shadow of my unnamed soul, who struggles with human convention and noise, ever a stranger, extrajenero, essentially homeless but for this frail body that everyone believes is me.

I perch.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Silence between the Leaves

As the Latin morning sun finally comes around to salute my hibernation cove, his heart long since acknowledged, but his smile long over due.

The shadows that had inspired my morning meditation upon the silence between the leaves, lifted their cloaks in Eastern retreat, leaving me overly sweatered under the solar auspice now fully in plough across the azure Andean sky.

This be my sacred labour be ever present, ever open, always on the precious prowl for indications of grace as they introduce themselves to planetary sites.

A stream roars with laughter, a willow touches her toes, a dozen ears flicker on half a dozen dogs, wind chimes beg attention, there is so much to do, the sentient soul, absorbing the quintessence of a morning in Perú.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Dreams of a Friend on the Cusp of Spring


She dreams of a friend who dreams of a door that opens upon our dreams of stepping through into the world of noble clarity in every sense.

Finding the door requires the savvy imagination that comes from tranquil effort. Opening the door requires that it be manifest in our lives, a reality beyond wood and glass, into the eternal reality of the essence of life.

Trust is the key, turned by faith in a hopeful future and tempered by the scrutiny of an ever alert mind, strolling casually across the green gardens of dawn whereby arise our perpetual thoughts.

The stepping through the doorway takes a leap from the mind to the world, from vision to sight, from hope to action and there we meet, our arms outstretched to greet our friends.

She blossoms through the door, clear and polished all along, and her flower reaches out to hug the visiting day. In the embrace upon the door sill between what we were taught and what we can learn, we grow and mature into the southern spring time. Sun and shade are provided in proper, graceful proportion by which we all sit in awe of the primal green truth of the open heart of spring in our every youthful step.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Buying and Selling of Silence


Of all the commodities for trade on Wall Street; silver, gold, technology and oil; and all the futures traded at the south end of LaSalle Street in the Windy City; pigs, sheep and cattle, the most precious commodity on earth remains the gift of eternal silence. The most valuable future continues to be peace.

Be a trader by day at the FOOTSIE, or a weekend gambler on the DOW, how much do you invest in silence and in peace? Nary a tiny sliver of all portfolios put their trust in silence, for it is so difficult to appraise, market and sell at a gain.

Who among us has downloaded a prospectus outlining the benefits and risks of a future based on peace, where no arms are dealt, nor munitions stored on inventory shelves? What sort of broker would weigh his profit on a belief in a dream so still, so giving, so thoughtfully shared?

I sit still, silently, on the golden, mountain grasses of South America, a peaceful valley tucked between gnarly faces of Andean stone. Investing my time, my labour, my life, in silent peace.

How will my CPA assess my annual dividends?

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Buddhist Cat


The Buddhist cat crawls upon my lotus lap and rests her head upon my writing wrist. She scratches her white furry cheek upon the nib of my pen. She teaches me how not to be productive, not merely how not to multi-task, but how to skip the whole procedure of productivity.

Sit here, she teaches, breathe soothingly like me, twitch your nose and attend to your senses with feline fecundity, keenly, but don´t bother over the chasing dogs and the unwashed linen. Purr. She seems to say purr, the feline OM.

It feels good, this luxury of stepping outside of time, to allow the windows of the world to be wide open to the luxury of a mountain morning, letting the dust of night settle where it may, and sitting in marvel at each breath as it lifts my belly and then, in acceptance of the laws of the impermanence of life, settles down into a silent lull, not defeated nor disappointed, but sated by the duration of its longevity, when then another breath rises, glances out at the blue marbled sky, the verdant trees, and returns to the bottom of my being, a breath spent wisely, neither hurried nor horded, but just so.

But what if the whole world lived like this? Indeed, this is the sustainable breath.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Truth with the Loneliness


When the voice compels me to my humble knees, there is no alternative to that all encompassing, god fearing silence, just before the lonely bolt of lightening strikes me deepest where I am weakest, and thus can the truth test my mettle.

I aim to see if I am true, or if I am myself, or if I am true to myself, or if the whole of life can be better categorized as meaningless bunk, just so much construction of egos and fortresses, bank accounts and publications, names, addresses and bulwark memories to shut out the inferno of loneliness that ever burns within.

What, then, if all we´ve ever accomplished in this life is just so much concrete and steel to barricade ourselves in, away from the cold, winter wind of lonely dreams that endure the long solo nights, lonely stars singing ever lonelier songs to the only ear in the universe able to withstand the unequivocal, nocturnal, frigid truth that loneliness is the only sure state of existence, dependent neither on the will of another, nor the wisps of any wind. To blame this is in vain.

And in this stronghold, we rest secure. For anyone that comes along in an attempt to sabotage or steal our hard earned loneliness, do we call him an enemy, a thief, or a friend?

It gets cold and dark in the Sacred Valley before the answers speak complete.

And you, in your fortress, will you toss away your lonely veil and sketch a smile upon your face so when the thief arrives to deprive you of your sanctuary, you can greet him with much deserved joy.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

She Alligates, Silently (Rurrenabaque, Bolivia) Her diamond eyes breach the darkness Floating menacingly just above the liquid flesh of the river We search and skim the waters seeking the truth in her glare She alligates, silently, waiting for her prey She stares back without menace, but piercing nevertheless My billion year olde soul as we idly float down the midnight stream Her haunting gaze penetrates my reptilian brain, taking me back To the origins of living matter on earth Within which the truth exists, Long lost in the jungle, lost amongst cultures Buried beneath millions of evolutionary struggles She is my diamond mirror at midnight, and now

I have risen from dust Knowing ever more of the history of the universe

Honed in her razor sharp teeth, her truth, by which she exists Her silent stare into the vapid darkness Of my soul, floating,

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Song of the Andes


The song of the Andes grips the village
Marching and swaying, whistling and drumming
Its traditional path through foothills to plaza
Down the market road through the soul of the pueblo

She calls me with a hammer drumming the seminal beat
She calls me whistling through the echoes of bamboo
Invoking music from ancient depths, present here and now,
The song never written, the music without end

The procession winds through frigid mountain streets
Every twisting body craves to be vacant,

As music commands the limbs
Leading each dancing drumming human vessel dream
Through the eternal rounds of the espiritual song

As it unravels its mystery through repetition
Shrill reeds from the jungle kissed by the human breeze of life
Empower the mountains to rise in glory, in tune
Leaving our spirits in suspended awe

She dances love as melody sways me to her side

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Can Violence be Truly a Meal?


This morning´s sun rose divine
In all its sacred truth
For those with open eyes to divine

He called me to the gate of the bridge
Where sleepy but sure I answered his call
His language deeper than was safe to swim

Sun calls upon earth to break the nocturnal fast
From where sleep, nightmares and dreams nourished
To partake of the eggs and fruit of Patchamama

She provides her golden wheat, ploughed by sacrifice
Baked warm and fresh in the oven of the man
Shared out to the culture on a corner full of dust

The eggs, full of life, though never planted by seed
Carry life within, and into my stomach my own
Not a chicken beheaded to sustain this life

Her bananas and grapes regally ripe and alive
To touch my tongue with sensuous pride
Their living genes, my diet bears life

Through eons of evolution does the cow stand still
Whose milk breathes to her calf
Or brewed into cheese to breast feed me

Only that the cow stands full of life
Can her milk ever nourish the heart
For if she knew the knife, her flesh would be but pain

Can knives and violence, suffering and pain
Be truly a meal, so full of death?

Or is the living fruit the purest earthly touch
By which to inflame my awakened plate?

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Wings of Mountain Wind
(Coroico, Bolivia)


This bird upon the wings of mountain wind
Watch her climb the rising breath
Guided by the tips of her feathers

She turns with breeze into upward drafts
And carries my heart above snowy peaks
Dancing the currents with impenetrable grace

Into her eyes where ancient wisdom resides
I follow the path from misty to clear
Guided by the espirit of the wind, spirit friend

Who coasts upon the invisible blanket of peace
Spinning, stepping eternal peace in a silver spiral
Enchanting my silent eyes, agape in the rain

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Ancient Rhythmic Source
(Puno, Peru)


The angel´s wings are luminous
As she sings through her torso´s swing
Her eyes in hypnotic peace, swaying
Through the unforgiving streets of Puno

Andina musika spreads its wings
Lifting our joy to spiritual highs
Intensity magnified by angelic charm,
Whose ancient culture manifests in a fiesta of rain

She takes my arm with rhythmic occasion
And leads me through the musical streets
Drunken not with the booze of the poor
But wizened by love of melodic lore

Peace me, breeze me, your arms all aglow
I enter the trance of the angel´s dance
She lighter than air, stomach full of joy
Gracing the city, love in butterfly with peace

Dance me, carry me to the ancient rhythmic source
Deep within the lake at the top of the world

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Andes, Pebble by Pebble
(La Paz, Bolivia en route to Corioco)


To really get the feel of this poem, it would be best for you to place your washing machine up on the roof, right on the edge. Climb in the washer, put it on fast tumble, and look out the window and the view below. After about 20 hours in the machine, you´ll have the feel of the poem.

Hydraulic brakes screaming and gasping for a breath

of thin Andean air
Transmission aching and wheezing for a shift above its creeping pain
This is where the Amazon has crept high into the altitude
Where the Andes, pebble by pebble, bows awkwardly

towards the jungle

Water cascades on the road with aquatic riverine abandon
Rinsing the tracks of a road known more for disaster than being safe
¨Dios te ama¨is graffitied on the granite walls at every bend,
Where God had well better be your friend

Each switch back is a switchblade in my defenseless passengerial back
¨Cristo viene ya... preparate,¨ Jesus has arrived,
And is fully booked with transporting these vehicles to safer ground

This is where the test tubes of our Karma meet their organic balance
Testimony to eruption and erosion of our tumbling fate
Where mountains, clouds and jungle are intimate lovers until death,

Which we hope to avoid

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

History´s less than Elegant Grace
(Huchuy Cusco, Peru)


Poetry really has been tossed into a mess of ruins
Like the crumbling walls of a long forgotten empire
Its boulders and mortar once proud as the sun
Lay strewn across the hillsides in dark disarray

The only salvation arrives in archaeological teams
Drunken with the inspiration of discovering truth in a hidden crevice
As they struggle to reconstruct the words and walls
Shredded by history´s less than elegant grace.

The Andes wither so gradually as to never grey,
Whereas olde poets wrinkle and fade beneath the sun and wind
Their words excavated from dusty Inkan ruins
Like poetry shattered into unresuscitated shards

The modern mind cannot touch their ancient souls
Regardless of the speed of their processors

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Hardest Stone


Exploring the universe of history, I see the footprints of opinions. Solid granite, too often carved into the hardest stones with the sharpest chisels and cleavers for all to bear witness, but what stone is flexible enough to change its notion of tigers or lilies when the season changes and right is no longer so sound?

I stand behind my opinions as if they were a fortress by which to protect my own vulnerable soul. Who then might safely approach me with courage to speak, lest the guards of my fortress come out at arms?

Better to walk away from the fortress and wander the countryside between towns, cross raging rivers on loopy swinging bridges, to clamber up hills of cacti, mines of salt, ancient wonders, than to sit enthroned, but enfeebled, on my well-picked pack of things I used to believe and defend.

When the sun begins to weaken, when I fall full weight upon the cactus, I can only smile, and when the wind steals my hat, I let it go, as all must be let go.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

To Nurture the Children of the Sun


As the fire sweeps across the hemisphere, blessing mango and orange with his vivid joi la vie, we all are enriched.

While night she crawls from beneath the secrets of dusk to blanket the sky with yet deeper mysteries as displayed in her enigma of stars whispering their astral hopes upon the beings of the universe.

Silence, but for crickets and the echoes of human feet upon the cobblestones of darkness, resembles the whisper of this searching heart, stepping quietly from thought to thought, guided by the light of each interwoven breath, lighting the path but one step at a time, just as eternity presents itself, one moment at a time.

Follow the reciprocity of silence between the heavens and the heart, the present breath inhaled from the still evening ellipse of time and space presented now, one moment at a time. I exhale silent tranquility as it has simmered in my heart and lungs, filtered through a procession of feelings and thoughts, sustaining my human body for another sensuous, prescient interval, and the dance of now between the universe and I ever meeting as in this moment, now and now, silence our precious melody, my ego fades under the enormous gravity of love.

This is my voyage, to transport the love and peace of the world to each those that I reach, and spread her buffet across the planet and plains, me in my torn and ragged shoes and jeans, so that love, its health and compassion, may heal and nurture the children of the sun, children of night.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Soul of Music Revealed upon the Wind


Music, her soul revealed upon the wind, bathed in the elegant morning breeze, tempted by the warmth of a promising cup of coffee and the proximate rise of her lover, the sun, whereby both would lift the spirits of the universe to ultimate highs. She poured fragrant water over the nape of her neck to rinse away the demons of a fallen melody, whose splash upon the equally bare earth nourished yet another plant to blossom soon into her very next song.

The women and men laboured at the drums and the strings trying ever frantically to conceive of her prodigious compositions, for the wind was privy to the inner workings of music´s soul, just as the sun was intimate with the sensuous body of her every symphonic chord.

She tickled pianists through the epochs to match her wit, and they in human strategy performed great feats of tantalizing leaps across keyboards, jumping generations to where the future had yet to take hold, leaps of undefined faith, and they placed their grace notes between her majesty´s breath and she, the musical mother of all, sighed always with admiration that a planet might dedicate itself so deeply to the supremacy of her soul.

Listen to her from the deepest ears of your being as she gently inspires the love and awe of every musician in her realm.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Streetscape, La Paz


Daughter with mango across her hands and cheeks. Son, freshly plucked daisies in either hand, pink and white. Girls after school sprawl upon the brass inscriptions inlaid upon the roundabout. A man without fingers, without hands, holds between his forearms a plastic flute destined for survival. Streetscape, La Paz.

Searching for peace in every street vendor of pineapple, humintas, whipped cream, mellow biscuits, car horns, bright, vivid green vests of security, boys, some deviant, some not yet, the sun elapsing behind the Bolivian Andes, La Paz, Los Frios, the cold, imminent night, more hawkers, hot, sexy cinnamon, Api, if we can locate the woman in the shawl on the hill, humanity before and after dark.

Saw a blind man on the corner, I thank god for my vision, thank god for my hands and finger and the musical gift that flows in them, thank god for lovers strolling down the cobblestone lanes, children chasing pigeons, thank god for the gift of flight, gift of youth, glory, the pony tails of daughters nimbly woven by the maternal fingers of elegance, gifted by the universe.

While here on earth, I weave my existence across a gaggle of continents and countries and abide by the culture, language and law of each, bless this diversity, this training for the epic journey through the infinite universe, I weave and bob and shimmy my earth worn soul seeking the present universe in my arms, its embrace as of my love, spoken of in the circle of dreams, the ice cream and flower market, coca leaves all performing their celestial moves on the streets of La Paz.

Every touch is evidence and witness to the glory beyond the human edifice. The seer pierces the ambiance like the bull horn of an urgent bus approaching humanity at fire speed, foretelling of the light that aims to bless, providing vision and wisdom when we penetrate the material veil that cloaks us all like an Incan shawl upon the erstwhile shoulders of the Quechuan woman captured in the urban lock, the breeze, in which we believe, the force of gravity, speed of light, light years and black holes and Big Bangs and quantum physics and nuclear spaghetti, believe, we are made to believe, we release, and ask beyond these frontiers what is behind it all, behind the primeval call to duty, the supreme truth beyond flattery, call it the name you like, enter the deepest cell of your being in noble, honest silence and be present with the source as it surrounds you, in any earthly manifestation you perceive, see it impregnated in the core of every whisper and touch, our blessing, these beings, thinking this is all, whereas this is the beginning, but the trial runs before the incarnational marathon en route to the heavenly peace beyond the reach of our leprosy ridden city.

Connect the words on the page like stars on the sky and create a cosmo vision grander, more replete than any cinematic representation of truth, reach, reach, connect to the glory with all the force and fortitude of our eminently gentle souls, so painfully buried beneath our social grit.

The drunk man shits his drawers, but remains kind. I cannot explain, for if you have words to straightly describe how much I love this passion play, I will kiss your hand, let you this pen, and beg your explanation.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Inside, Outside, Everywhere


Rough with the tumble of the urban grid, what mind can tune itself to frequencies above the din?

The body, the emotions, the brain and mind, the spirit and the universe all oscillate at their appropriate wave lengths. The finer and more subtle the receiver, the higher the insight that can be received.

The mind, overcome by noxious fumes of video crassness can hardly be expected to tune in to its own visual apparatus in order to deduce the wisdom and truth of existence, so ample within.

The high mind, the crowning spirit, is so heavily clogged by perpetual import of radio waves, sound bites and similar dregs, can hardly be asked to listen to a higher voice, inside, outside, to deeply penetrate the void and vacuum of the universe to its ultimate source, inside, outside, everywhere.

Close your eyes and from your inner brow visualize the world.

Close your electronic gadgetry and tune your hidden inner ear of the crown of your being to the higher spectrum of the celestial song.

This is the power of meditation, to calm, to be free from urban input, liberating the inner spaces of our soul to tune with quantum exactitude to the seminal message of creation.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Breeze Whispers to the Inkwell


From where pour forth the words that reach from the parchment to the heart, or from the heart to the page?

What breeze of metaphysics contains the elegance to cry a poet, weep a novelist, weave a comment into her inky fingers to splash meaning and quintessence between questions and commas?

Who speaks the voice, the breathless voice upon this inner ear, tapping its little language drum upon the keyboard of invisible consciousness?

By what means do we download the divine intelligence that guides us through our mundane barriers? Who opens all the doors and windows of our hearts that the wisdom beyond humanity still speaks to us even after all our futility and war, our depressions and poverties, our hungers and disgrace?

Still. Yes, so still. And still the voice reckons on of higher gifts and goals for the fallen race. The breeze whispers on in the marginalized brushes and inkwells of the human artisans trying so hard to read into the fabric of the celestial dream with their touch and still remain sane enough to speak the colours of the masses as the latter slave away for subsistence.

When there are no more forests, poetry will still cry. When the seas are beyond redemption, music will still dream of a saviour.

When the sky is soiled beyond redemption, or ceases to exist as we know it, still the vision of craftsmen and saints will assemble a series of hopes.

When at last the poor are trampled down into their own dust, those who led the progression can smugly remove justice from the textbooks as easily as they remove their shiny shoes before they retire for the night to sleep softly, confidently, blindly, in their hearths, to not awaken another day.

Copypright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Original Fire of Language

The original fire of language allowed animals to speak to minerals to speak to humans to plants and thus communicate the deepest drives and needs as was each their station.

The rivers could bubble as partner to the sizzling fire, where by morning all resumed its natural balance, for night knew day as well as it knew herself, and moon and sun agreed on relative terms of strength and posture and the lullaby of language whistled from dawn til dusk just as silence hushed the cool evening with a gesture towards the listening.

With all the languages thus conceived, who would come forth and say, I listen to 2 languages, I listen to 3 languages, no, it is only, I speak, I speak, but too rarely, I listen.

The value of silently listening is as a gentle, speechless hug that communicates parents´unconditional love, just as it relates every faithful child's unconditional surrender to the original source of vital energy that first blew through her lungs.

Let speaking be of higher things. Let listening be for all.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

A Silent, Timeless, Homeless Moment


The silence of morning solitude, slowly stretching, sitting, rising, glowing, warming, purring, settling into the meta-tranquility that transcends thought. The mind slipping into suspended time where no measure weighs upon its total stillness.

Many thoughts are vying for attention, each a temporary claim to importance, then fading in obedience to the grip of pure void, absent of the markings of opportunity and productivity, content in the vacuum between breaths, not dragged down by expectations nor drifting away amongst hopes.

Just here. Still. Attentive. A silent, timeless, homeless moment of now without words.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Lifting Humanity to the Stars Night in Ccotohuincho falls an unheard of darkness. I look up to the galaxies where a million stars beg attention, relief from their famine, refuge from abuse and a myriad more injustices long meted out upon the innocent. I think carefully between steps along the potholes and piles of stone and dung, of how many children on our planet beg attention, relief, and refuge from the dire straits into which they have been born, and structurally bound for generations. Could I count the starving abandoned stars in the Peruvian sky any more easily than I can count the homeless, wanting children of the earth? The difference is that I cannot help, hold or support the stars, while the children I can greet, hug and heal within my reach. This is where we meet Mosoq Runa, humanitad nuevo, New Humanity, where we share, help and cure through our reason, with our passion and compassion, the lost children of the universe, and guide them onto their optimum path. They are the new humanity, provided we support them with our own inspired and enlightened gifts as we ourselves join the new humanity. Darkness is an unlimited resource, penetrated only by the evolving light within our imprisoned hearts. The streets of Ccotohuincho cannot be recommended after dark, for at our peril, we may fall into the empty reservoirs, the spillage of waste, the pall of poverty, the stench of the social abyss, unless new humanity is encouraged, lifted, raised through our collective will. Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Whispers the Silent Entourage


I used to lay claim to every opinion and word as my own cunning wit, piercing the illusions of our world. Then I saw that I myself was the illusion, obsessed with a fictional self, supported by heaps of evidence and reinforced by every being that walked the same social path.

The illusion of I, this permanent, solo, physical being traipsing his way through the corridors of banks and the alleys of degradation, all in a Sisyphean attempt to fulfill the basket of his desires, a basket so poorly woven, not nearly fine, yet, insatiable.

I see that I today am a composite of the universe, gathered, collectively, conveniently into an I, this being, while in truth, I am an assembly of spirits, leading, guiding, and observing the principal character, the one on the stage, the ego, the I of fortune and fame´s silliest charades, while the assembly awaits their cue.

When the silent entourage does whisper and the ego-I does learn to listen, the guidance is divine.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Secret Whispers of my Homeless Heart


Friends at home are the stable pillars of knowing who we are, for their eyes reflect and influence our daily tribunals with life.

From a distance, friends are anchors as we travel across homeless, timeless seas in search of a path, the path, our path, beyond the acres we had once labelled home.

Further, be it time or space, we cast away, while friends remain buoyant on the horizon, too soon, far from sight, and a lonely snap of rain is enough to veil our remembrance, and then friendship claims the taste of luxury. For rain becomes hail and cobblestones so slick as to beg for stable footing. We, precarious, amble our way alone, along, some path, blind to right or wrong, but moving, at least, slowly flowing towards the proximate future.

It is then that one smile from among the crowd of strangers, at whatever hour, from this passerby, who knows my name and has seen the secret whispers of my homeless heart, that I am welcomed to her language and her land. I am gifted by her laughter and smile, I be tickled and teased by my first new friend on this ancient new continent and its dizzying array of life, and friends, all friends who have bounced upon my buoyancy and also born my weight, gather in my arms as we greet in the chilly plaza for lunch, chatter, doesn´t matter, when friends like distant galaxies collide to mix their stars.

Friendship is once again renewed, a blessing of our Patchamama existence.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

In Defiance of Definition


What we know, or thought we knew, learned through memory during our experience of time, perpetuates our paradigm of the world as we perceive and conceive it to be.

Necessarily, all knowledge ages, like the deforested foreheads of friends, and temples of our greying youth, knowledge and concepts date, not from lack of use, but from perpetual familiarity.

It is thus that the vagabond departs from the known land and seeks the other, outer reaches, be it warmth or cold, rags or gold, the search beyond the stretch of all the words in the language of home that ever portrayed our lives.

The vagabond sifts through languages and vistas, tragedies and unstrung harps, in order to construe an unfamiliar being into existence. When the strings of a new day can be tightened and tuned to speak in unwritten, uncaptured tongues the length of history, to reveal the newest designs available in the field of thoughts we had once claimed to know, we ask freshly then: What is love, grace? What are friendship, face? How can birds sing, fly? Why fruits blossom, die? History be war, who teaches being peace? Poetry taught as memory, while in truth it is courage.

This is our calling for homeless, timeless awareness of the luxury of sense, whereby we make sense of a world that stampedes in defiance away from all definitions that humans have ever staked into the soil.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Value of Silence


What if silence took over our cities and ruled with a velvet grip? What if he stepped into each factory busy with noise in itself, busy in the production of booming boxes, and laid off every sound greater than a whisper? What if silence unplugged every motor and dried out every fuel tank, so only the soft steps of the very mild would gain any forward motion?

Imagine if we valued silence in our minds as much as we valued our distractions, audio and video, motors and wheels, movies and concerts, fireworks and play stations. Would we fall into a stupor, or would our hearts unleashed finally rise to their potential?

When Silence is our master, we learn to listen with the finest ears, walk with the gentlest gait, and our innermost dreams become warm fires to guide us through the narrow streets of cities in decay.

Our attention carefully tethered to the present breath, never wandering further than the length of our deepest sighs, always at our own peaceful sides, not blinded by distraction, but infinitely aware of the panoramic width of consciousness, super modern, not in any old historic sense, but fully rooted in this present silent moment, intensely modern, only now unfolding as we breathe, release, a mellow silence too often ignored, yet awakened in the subtlest minds.

Silence leads towards peace. Present leads towards fulfillment. Slowly, the silent evolution encapsulates and enchants the multi-tasker, slave to his accounts and machines, unable to take even one extra long breath for fear of failing his production quota.

Reign in the motorized unmuffled mind and guide it toward your own silent peace.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Healing of Poetry


All the grace arrived at my shaky wooden table overlooking the ancient cosmos of Cusco. Thoughts flooded my skull and my pen as wily as Noah, writing a snappy ark of observations by which to commend the mountains on their linguistic savvy and verve.

The tablets of prose came quicker than Moses could file, spilling off the stones into the dusty soil above the shoulders of the Puma of Cusco.

The healing arrived in the language sense, but they were all in a transcendent voice which sought to soothe an exhausted empty page. The curative voice of the original mountain king paints, heals or sings in accordance with the skills of the transcriber. A painter receives insight via the language of colour and shape; a healer is guided by silent intuition; while the singer takes note of melody and chord; each in their own way transcribing mountain wisdom into their respective uncanny crafts.

And still, how are poetry and healing synonymous? In order to heal, one must truly surrender illness, as in order to feel viscerally, one must truly forgo reason, leaping, in both cases, into the essence of existence where all is balanced and in tune.

As we reverberate in the chambers of the healing poem, our energies from quantum to celestial are silently organized by the grand maestro of the orchestra, tuning and timing our beings in relation to our essence and our calling.

The poetic senses, unleashed from the protocol of rigid reason, respond to the symbols of the highest peaks, comprehend the thunder of both sky and river, ever unifying the essence of the universe within the stanzas of the poem.

In healing and in poetry, the recipient first must open from crown to heart to root and be ready to receive with confidence and joy, the healing, inspiring wisdom of mountains, literate long before the glaciers and the floods, so that we in our dusty chilly corners might abide by the Apu, the mountain source of intelligence whose wings are of the condor, whose bite is of the puma, whose infinity represents the serpent coiled upon itself, ever ready to guide the receiver of the gift.

The poem heals. The healer creates.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Tiny Elements of Youth


Every drip of water flowing through the channels that border my daily existence is a luxury, for what essence of her pouring faith have I ever truly earned? A sip from the glacial spring inspired awareness of aqua consciousness, cherished not today during our industrial supremacy, but in the lull between the construction of dams and the toxification of her cancerous ripples.

Hiking through the Eastern valley en route to the Chicon glacier, I met a parade of children who blessed me with their greetings. We mingled at such a pace, set by the child Maria and her infinitesimal steps towards her family home, held me indefinitely, bondingly, her whole hand required to grip my index finger, while her even smaller sister held my pinkie as she took even smaller steps up the dusty rural trail. We stopped numerous times to greet the children who lived in the shadows of the Chicon, which I, blessed by their innocence, forgot that I had set out that morning to seek the source, the high frozen chunk of truth slowly melting its oldest, innermost secrets, into this morning´s cup of tea.

Instead, I met the tiny elements of youth, not yet sanitized by the illusions of the bank, nor yet brainwashed by the fantasies of the media. Reality consisted of the taking of tiny steps, holding the fingers of a stranger, strange, but in the end, a knowing friend.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

la firma de alma es el poema


The soul be such
Essence
Of delicate invisible fruit,
That to paste a label
Or hang a name
Upon its lapels
Would be to violate
Its eternal elegance and grace

So hard to explain

In a world where names
Are chiseled into buildings
Hung upon trees
Collared upon the necks of dogs
Barbed with fences across continental plains
So as to foster the perpetual illusion
That we understand by knowing the name.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The Armless Weaver´s Transcendent Loom


The homeless poet wandered through the universe in search of the signatures of every friend that had ever joined the regal parade through time. He witnessed the birth and flowering of time, its dispersal, its infinity and ultimately, he peered through the illusions of time which he had inherited from all his years of human school.

It was from this timeless, homeless perspective that the pieces of the jungle were woven into the intimate tapestry upon which eternal history could express its deepest wishes. Somewhere within the push and shove of the armless weaver´s transcendent loom, colours were cast and patterns planned, that all who approached would find their image exquisitely mirrored in the endless fabric.

These mirrors, each to each, drew always the homeless poet ever closer to inspect the intricate details, the destiny and dust of every thread thus ticked and tucked, thrust and trusted upon the loom from the vast array of spinning wheels that spun in perpetual motion like water wheels on god´s chosen river.

This is how the story unfolds.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

The White Rose of Friendship


You might call her the white rose of friendship, but could she better be called eternity?

For nowhere else but on this thorny branch could such a gentle scent linger, just so close to the edge of fear, and as unfolds the universe following its own cerebral logic, so she mirrors, in the dimension of time, petal upon petal, every friend on the branch.

Each branch itself is reminiscent of other friends grown, wed, enthralled by all the portals through which she will pass on her matrimonial journey with the son of the celestial gardener.

She is surrounded by flowers in a rural bouquet collected just as another rain prepares for its hour of duty, each whose colour is known as white, pink or yellow by trade, yet each is a separate galaxy in the scheme of putting forth its own hard earned honour, compassion and finesse.

The ears of the flowers wiggle like a hundred loony puppies at the promise of a smile. These wild petals, whose landlord is too often forgotten, release with liberty their joy beneath the beaming provincial sun, as every friend gathers to confirm the enormous gift of love spread across the garden of earth.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Introduction to the Luxury of Grace


Every creature leaves its distinct signature on the universe, be it the jaguar´s muddy footprint or the monarch´s golden brush stroke across the sky, we each, one by one, sign our existence upon the dotted line which has been assigned us as our given, if not exactly chosen, path.

As signatures gather and a regal petition becomes noticeable, so our world evolves from rock into trembling mountains and back again to stones. By the time we arrive at the present moment, we must page through legions of names and places, colours and dreams, before we can tentatively sign away our lives, to state in no uncertain terms that we exist; we live; and in between we make certain claims to truth and a variety of half truths that will be largely left unresolved by the time our signatures fade into sand, or memory, or dust.

So this story necessarily begins in the middle, or more accurately, at the most recent end of history, for we reading and writing today are the very last to arrive on the scene, yet we retain the hope that others will glean a little shine from the polish we have striven so hard to embellish on the sometimes overly hardened surface of the earth.

This story transcribes the signatures of grace organized by principles beyond the earthly grasp, but in one of our futures, the dots will connect and the stars will once again spell out our sacred destinies for each of us.

Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.

Truth Rises to Blank Stares (Urubamba, Peru) The Stars all agreed with celestial applause That the moon in full armour was stunning beyond belief, None dared shimmer or shine as was their want For fear of distracting from her lunar grace Only the winds above the Urubamba Rivered gently through the valley to say That her regal beauty left others speechless In light of her glowing September face For her part, she spoke to each one thus- This beauty, be not my beauty Nor this grace, even my grace. This is all illusion, you must turn quickly away To the East, and await the coming of Dawn When the truth of it all will rise to meet you. But by Dawn, the stars could only blankly stare At the paling face of the moon Blinded by the early sun, They returned gravely to the darkness where they begged to stay Copyright 2006, Tom Radzienda.