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A parrot made my day

11 Mar

A baby parrot made my day today

bright flash of green and red

calling my attention.

We chilled for a while

he posed for a photo

Then flew off on his way.

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Baby Peach- Faced Lovebird, passing through Al Quoz, Dubai.

An escapee I suppose

Now free to fly!

It made me smile.

I thought,

‘Imagine having the gift of flight

and not being free to fly?’

So

I decided today

I need not return to the cage-

the one I built for rainy days

The one that keeps out the sunshine;

And the rain. And the clouds. And the rainbows.

They tell you you’re playing it safe,

when really you’re living in fear.

They say ‘hey bird, show us you can fly!’

So, you step out of the cage and flutter to one side of the room

They’re hardly impressed, but satisfied more or less

They clap anyway. Happy to see a bird.

But…. you can never truly soar in a room like that.

And my if they could only see!

My, if I could only feel the true taste of freedom and the wind upon my face

Let it consume me and take me beyond the sand dunes and out into the wilderness

But there I went,

returned to the cage before it was out of my sight.

Well, if a baby parrot can do it, so can I.

So not anymore.

It is time.

To fly…

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Dreaming of Jiuzhaigou Valley

23 Nov

Return To Nature (I)

by Tao Yuanming

While young, I was not used to worldly cares,
And hills became my natural compeers,
But by mistakes I fell in mundane snares
And thus entangled was for thirty years.
A caged bird would long for wonted wood,
And fish in tanks for native pools would yearn.
Go back to till my southern fields I would.
To live a rustic life why not return?
My plot of ground is but ten acres square;
My thatched cottage has eight or nine rooms.
In front I have peach trees here and plums there;
O’er back eaves willow trees and elms cast glooms.
A village can be seen in distant dark,
Where plumes of smoke rise and waft in the breeze.
In alley deep a dog is heard to bark,
And cocks crow as if o’er mulberry trees.
Into my courtyard no one should intrude,
Nor rob my private rooms of peace and leisure.
After long years of abject servitude,
Again in nature I find homely pleasure.

归园田居(其一)

陶渊明

少无适俗韵, 性本爱丘山。
误落尘网中, 一去十三年。
羁鸟恋旧林, 池鱼思故渊。
开荒南野际, 守拙归园田。
方宅十余亩, 草屋八九间。
榆柳荫后檐, 桃李罗堂前。
暖暖远人村, 依依圩里烟。
狗吠深巷中, 鸡鸣桑树巅。
户庭无尘杂, 虚室有余闲。
久在樊笼里, 复得返自然。

 

 

 

Amal Kassir: A voice of hope and despair

19 Aug

Amal Kassir. A powerful voice in these times.

Not sure how I came about this talented spoken word artist, but somehow I did and I am glad of that.

The suffering that is happening in Syria now, that my mind can hardly fathom., I began to tear and really feel through these words…

“I tried to keep my mouth shut for my tongue didn’t have any more room for scars in the shape of my teeth.

March 2011 we have been reborn a social infant screaming: let us live !

We will speak until throats are raw until all of syria is in the news …

The dates will read like obituaries…”

Utter despair…

But finally, like the name ‘Amal’ means hope, a look to a brighter future;

“There will be a time when we can eat together

When we will build homes out of abandoned tanks

Peace is a rusted recoil

We will sip from the cups made of old grenades

And shades of green are only worn by nature

There will be a time when the fences choose to sit with us

Instead of standing between us

Ameen”.

 

Sometimes hope is all we have to keep us going.

‘You’ve gotta have hope.  Without hope life is meaningless.  Without hope life is meaning less and less.’  (anon)

 

Coded Language

16 Aug

Saul Williams.

http://www.saulwilliams.com

 

His poetry blows my mind! #Truth.

 

 

 

Coded Langauge

Whereas, breakbeats have been the missing link connecting the diasporic

community to its drum woven past

Whereas the quantised drum has allowed the whirling mathematicians to

calculate the ever changing distance between rock and stardom.

Whereas the velocity of the spinning vinyl, cross-faded, spun backwards, and

re-released at the same given moment of recorded history , yet at a

different moment in time’s continuum has allowed history to catch up with

the present.

We do hereby declare reality unkempt by the changing standards of dialogue.

Statements, such as, “keep it real”, especially when punctuating or

anticipating modes of ultra-violence inflicted psychologically or physically

or depicting an unchanging rule of events will hence forth be seen as

retro-active and not representative of the individually determined is.

Furthermore, as determined by the collective consciousness of this state of

being and the lessened distance between thought patterns and their secular

manifestations, the role of men as listening receptacles is to be increased

by a number no less than 70 percent of the current enlisted as vocal

aggressors.

Motherfuckers better realize, now is the time to self-actualize

We have found evidence that hip hops standard 85 rpm when increased by a

number as least half the rate of it’s standard or decreased at ¾ of it’s

speed may be a determining factor in heightening consciousness.

Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the

unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth.

Equate rhyme with reason, Sun with season

Our cyclical relationship to phenomenon has encouraged scholars to erase the

centers of periods, thus symbolizing the non-linear character of cause and

effect

Reject mediocrity!

Your current frequencies of understanding outweigh that which as been given

for you to understand.

The current standard is the equivalent of an adolescent restricted to the

diet of an infant.

The rapidly changing body would acquire dysfunctional and deformative

symptoms and could not properly mature on a diet of apple sauce and crushed

pears

Light years are interchangeable with years of living in darkness.

The role of darkness is not to be seen as, or equated with, Ignorance, but

with the unknown, and the mysteries of the unseen.

Thus, in the name of:

ROBESON, GOD’S SON, HURSTON, AHKENATON, HATHSHEPUT, BLACKFOOT, HELEN,

LENNON, KHALO, KALI, THE THREE MARIAS, TARA, LILITHE, LOURDE, WHITMAN,

BALDWIN, GINSBERG, KAUFMAN, LUMUMBA, GHANDI, GIBRAN, SHABAZZ,

SIDDHARTHA,

MEDUSA, GUEVARA, GUARDSIEFF, RAND, WRIGHT, BANNEKER, TUBMAN, HAMER,

HOLIDAY,

DAVIS, COLTRANE, MORRISON, JOPLIN, DUBOIS, CLARKE, SHAKESPEARE,

RACHMNINOV,

ELLINGTON, CARTER, GAYE, HATHOWAY, HENDRIX, KUTL, DICKERSON, RIPPERTON,

MARY, ISIS, THERESA, PLATH, RUMI, FELLINI, MICHAUX, NOSTRADAMUS, NEFERTITI,

LA ROCK, SHIVA, GANESHA, YEMAJA, OSHUN, OBATALA, OGUN, KENNEDY, KING,

FOUR

LITTLE GIRLS, HIROSHIMA, NAGASAKI, KELLER, BIKO, PERONE, MARLEY, COSBY,

SHAKUR, THOSE STILL AFLAMED, AND THE COUNTLESS UNNAMED

We claim the present as the pre-sent, as the hereafter.

We are unraveling our navels so that we may ingest the sun.

We are not afraid of the darkness, we trust that the moon shall guide us.

We are determining the future at this very moment.

We now know that the heart is the philosophers’ stone

Our music is our alchemy

We stand as the manifested equivalent of 3 buckets of water and a hand full

of minerals, thus realizing that those very buckets turned upside down

supply the percussion factor of forever.

If you must count to keep the beat then count.

Find you mantra and awaken your subconscious.

Curve you circles counterclockwise

Use your cipher to decipher, Coded Language, man made laws.

Climb waterfalls and trees, commune with nature, snakes and bees.

Let your children name themselves and claim themselves as the new day for

today we are determined to be the channelers of these changing frequencies

into songs, paintings, writings, dance, drama, photography, carpentry,

crafts, love, and love.

We enlist every instrument: Acoustic, electronic.

Every so-called race, gender, and sexual preference.

Every per-son as beings of sound to acknowledge their responsibility to

uplift the consciousness of the entire fucking World.

Any utterance will be un-aimed, will be disclaimed – two rappers slain

Any utterance will be un-aimed, will be disclaimed – two rappers slain

 

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