Caterpillar and butterfly

A magical metamorphosis, from a methodical crawl

To carefree flight, happens out of sight

The only evidence, a broken cocoon

Once home to a caterpillar, now a butterfly

Beauty of that intelligence is unsurpassed

It can call our mind home, if we let it

The carefree flight of childhood is turned

Into rusty shackles of adulthood, an unconscious happening

Casting wistful looks at tender, paperlike wings of butterflies

Brings back memories, of childhood, chasing speckled flecks of color

When thoughts flitting around are given such beautiful wings

A miraculous transformation happens within the shell of the mind

Death and deathless

We are at one end of a rainbow, cradling the body

Death is just a mirage from the other end

Bridging the divide, between death and deathlessness

Is the mind, when seen from a far distance

May reveal where death ends and deathlessness begins

A red line few seek to cross, the rest are blissful, in ignorance

Forgetting the rain will surely stop, but the sun will continue to shine

It is deathless as far as we are concerned, nourishing bodies

Caught in the slowing tightening vise grip of death

Even as the mind appears deathless, donning the garb of desire

That mimicry of the soul’s nature will find no takers

At the other end of the rainbow, where eternity begins

Creation and destruction

Two bookends, creation and destruction

In between, space to grow, for the body and mind

There’s a reminder, in every thought

Silently created and destroyed, not by us

We are just a witness, to a spectacle

Stretching from the micro- to the macrocosm

With our mind, it is hard to create, easy to destroy

Peace, wealth, love, health and success

Our hands are not large enough to hold universe’s creations

But certainly strong enough to destroy our world, if we let it

What’s created is destined for destruction

Only the body, but not great inventions of the mind

Far and near

Eyes in the sky, aided by glass and mirror, fail to see

The far reaches of the universe, as elegant mathematical

Equations can, these have birthed in human mind

Which is the near field, where we park our consciousness

But it is at the outer limits of the inner universe

The body cannot travel far, held by gravity’s puppeteer strings

The mind orbits in the far lanes of the vast inner expanse

Two vehicles we stake our lives on, have left us precariously perched

As we cling to what’s near and dear, even if is far from reality

A difficult balance, the mind is well conditioned, easily adapting

In its throes, the journey’s entertaining, but the destination is far away

By casting aside eyes and equations, what’s out of reach quickly comes near

Greed and contentment

In a secret alliance with time, greed pleases

Until that partnership is brought to a dead stop

A timeless essence, contentment, it can be found

On the variegated tree of the mind

Seeds and fruits of contentment are scattered

By winds of a different pursuit

Greed usurps the body, to its end

The contented seek neither heaven nor earth

They wish to be free, knowing fully the weight of that burden

A mind swept by greed makes room for none

Touched by contentment, it is suddenly open to all

Both attract guests, one from the finite and the other from the infinite

Future and past

In every moment, there’s purity, it’s hardly felt

When there is no silence, of the mind

Each moment has only one chance to shine

In the spotlight, but it is stolen by marauding thoughts

From the ghetto of memory, or from the ones

That paint the sky blue, with artificial ink

Promising to erase any accumulated pain

This moment could be as vast as the universe

Instead it is a tiny sliver between two imaginary boulders

The past and the future, which dominate the landscape

There is hope, of prising open the moment

Letting it be, in its pristine and untainted state

Skin and seed

A seed’s sacrifice, letting the skin of a fruit shine

Spending its life hidden, under the pulp

Not every seed will turn into a tree

But the potential’s there, that’s all that matters

Always working in the dark, never allowed to see light

From a tiny shrub to the giant redwood

They cannot stand without a seed giving itself up

We’ve all come from a seed

It’s long forgotten, making way for skin’s different hues

Adding to the richness of humanity’s fabric

The essence of the seed is never lost, hidden under the skin

It may be found where it’s at home, in the silent dark