Eight Poems

I am trying to choose five to submit to Dash for publication, and three to Dash for a contest.

Single Digit

Single digits one through nine,

woven through this life of mine,

Arabic numbers from the ages,

follow me through various stages.

A digitized world was not forseen,

the ones and zeros and numbers between,

unending Eternity,  with a twist,

points and moments that do not exist.

Time is stolen by a bandit

as we’re funneled to an exit.

Years behind become the culprit

when  years ahead are a single digit.

On the horizon looms a summit.

When less than ten is the limit,

we begin to see the exit                                                                                                                                   
and prepare for spirit transit                                                                                            

   

   Eyeless

Arriving Blind,

Hearing only my own thoughts,

Feeling nothing,

Sightless eyes,

Blindfolded,

Eyeless.

Departing to freedom,

Hearing the sweet sound of Surrender,

Feeling feelings,

Seeing,

And accepting reality,

I-less.

   Brevity

       by Bill Hines

 My project today,

the boss assigned,

  is maliciously,

 toward insanity 

    designed.

To recount the whole course

  of man's progress,               

  the best of computers

    cannot

       process.                           

 For mapping the course

     of man’s evolution,

the most powerful computer

          has no

         solution.

Infinite data-

we cannot conceive,

  yet to simplify,

    for clarity,

 is to deceive.

            Dispel

With God as my witness,

I cast aside the old body,

Dispel                 the illusion of humanity,

                         holomovement.

                     the

                  transcend

               And

            Dispel          imaginary Light and Darkness,

         Distance, spelling, sight and speed,

       Sound or thought, truth or free,                                                                                                    Just to be,      absolute,      reality.                                                   
 

                                                                 
    

         Page

Oh, beautiful page,

Oh, beautiful blank page before me,

What a gift from God you are!

Because in you lies all creativity and creation.

That you would allow this humble servant to ascend to that vision,

Is a rare gift indeed.

For the luring colors of the beckoning palatial throne,

In descending incandescence,

Make me not alone,

Unveil the value of the gift of sight,

And lift our souls and spirits,                                                                                                      Above the vast ignorance of night.                                                                                                               

        This One

        There is unity. 

          There is null.                                                                                                                                                                                       

 That’s All there is.

       Every point is either unity or null,

         which is the only differentiation                                                                                                                                               between two adjacent points in space,

          since the area of a point is zero.

                                                 Therefore,

                          the only thing that exists,

                                           does not exist,

                                   except as potential.

                       All points

       considered together

            make a universe.

    The number of points

                       is infinite.

    To understand the universe

                and everything in it,

  you only have to understand

                         this one thing:

Infinity.

     SLING

Flashing mane,

Slicing pain,

Grates across my liver.

Thrashing mane,

Teasing game,

Sucks inverse gasps

Out of my river.

          Kaleidoscope

I watch the colored rays of light

Appearing now brighter than bright,

Rainbows exude from illusory rays,

Created by eyes in so many ways.

Prism colors and Brownian white light,

Dance in my brain in rain at night,

Circles and rays vibrate like jello,

Entertaining my vision as God says hello.

Daydream Weaver (fun poem)

Daydream Weaver

The Great Deceiver

 Had to take a breather,

When a basket of reefer,

Caused a deeper leisure,

A teaser, a pleaser,

A grand mal seizure,

Sent the teacher seeking

A sleeker leader,

A sweeter cheater,

An eager lotus eater,

A dream weaver and a daydream believer.

Beaver Cleaver had a fever;

Wally was a wide receiver,

A speedster on Easter, Caesar,

A real bleacher squeaker,

A bird feeder and a pleasure seeker,

A bee keeper procedure;

An antique-er and a mine sweeper,

Disbeliever brow-beater,

Fleeter greeter, centimeter,

Fire-eater, margarita,

A daydream weaver and a dream believer.

List of genre

Included in this blog, so far, are the following genre:

Short short story
Long short story (or short novella)
Short one act play
Poem
Song lyrics
Essay
Article
Prayer
Quote
Video

Cello Singing

             Cello Singing

Sing lonely cello as if only to me,

Sing of freedom, cause I want to be free.

Sing of bliss and magic that do abound,

And tell me where those things can be found.

I hear a cello in the darkness. 

It is singing to me. 

In low and lonely voices, out of darkness, it says,

"I want to be free.  Can you hear me?

  Hear me.  Hear me."

  

The light reflects an answer that shines upon the sound,

"Yes I hear.  I am near.  Can you see me?

   See me.  See me."

Where sound and light intersect, an interface profound,

But a word does not exist that will describe “light-sound”,

Blended bliss sensations and magic all around, 

That call out to me,   "I hear.  I see. 

    Feel me.  Feel me."

Sound follows sight; it’s an unfair race,

One, really slow, the other sets the pace,

One will not travel through outer space,

One can't be prevented from leaving this place,

  I feel.  I hear.  I see.

   Wait for me.  Wait for me.

Last day of 2012 with Stephen Covey

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience.  We are spiritual beings having a human experience."
                          Teilhard de Chardin

(from Daily Reflections for Highly Effective People)

Great, or How I Rate Movies

Great

       This morning, I looked at the word great, as written later in this essay, and contemplated the spelling.  English is such a strange language.  I had never thought of it before, but if not for exceptional rules, the word might be pronounced gree-at.  Grate is obviously pronounced with a long a, but the pronunciation of great requires knowledge of a rule, an exception.

       The reason that I was thinking about the word great in the first place, is that it is the highest rating  in a system I have used for years to rate movies I see.   I have not chronicled the movie ratings.  Actually, I am only interested in identifying the Great ones.  The reason I was thinking about movie ratings is that my wife and I, and our best friends—and movie going partners—saw a movie last night, which we (typically) disagreed on what we thought of it, our tastes varying significantly.

       The film, Anna Karinina, was labeled Great, by me, on the spot, which is unusual because it is usually the next day before I can bring myself to award this highest acclamation.  The others, of course, disagreed.

       So, below, excerpted from an article I wrote for my church on “What Is a Great Ministry”, is a description of my personal movie rating system:

      A system for rating movies that I have used for years is:

                1.     Great

                2.     Excellent

                3.     Good

                4.     Fair

                5.     Awful

                6.     Not worth seeing for $1.00 or for Free.

       A Great movie is so good that a rating of Excellent does not describe how positive and excited you feel about it. 

       An Excellent movie is one you come out of saying, “That was Great,” but the quality or admirable characteristics don’t seem (feel) like it deserves the highest accolade, which is Great.  You know what Great feels like, and this is not it; close, but not it.

       What constitutes a Great movie is different for most individuals.  For me, it would contain some deep psychological principle, usually not disclosed until the end.  A classic example is when Scout sees Boo Radley behind the door in Jim’s room, and identifies him as the man who stabbed Bob Ewell, thus saving her and Jim’s lives (To Kill A Mockingbird, 1962).  Although Scout has never seen him and reports of his appearance are grossly distorted, she simply says, “Hey, Boo.”  As soon as the rest of us catch up with what’s going on, we begin crying “tears of joy”.  “Tears of joy,” is another characteristic that might identify, or differentiate, Great from Excellent.

       So what is a Great movie?  When we see it, when we experience it, if we are interested and agonize over the answer, we know whether it is Excellent or Great because, . . . well,

. . . because we know.

Bible Scholasticism

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

         This morning, for a change, my creative juices are flowing in a positive direction, although some might interpret these thoughts as negative.  The subject, once again, is the Bible and the contention that those who view it as inerrant, infallible or literal, do so at the expense of distorting the message, the true meaning of the most precious “Word of God”.

         The contention, mine of course, is shared by a multitude of real scholars—real scholar being defined as one who approaches the study of the literary and historic aspects of this all time best selling book, without the prejudices or bias of believers seeking proof that their interpretation is true.  Those believers who claim to be unbiased in their scholastic study of the Bible, who claim that their scholars do not have a predisposing prejudice, are unaware of the definition of the word “bias” when applied to areas of research and statistics.

         The debate over truth, authenticity and history of the Bible with inerrant, infallible believers is futile.  Every question, every challenge can be met, legitimately, to them, by reverting to their principle that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God, and therefore cannot be interpreted any other way despite irrationality, mythical resemblance, contradictions, scientifically obtained information demonstrating knowledge of true authorship, and changes made during decades and centuries of oral tradition, and proof of changes made by a multiplicity of interpretations or whims of scribes.  Scribes were people who could read and write who penned the original and copied the “Word of God in biblical and pre-modern times.

         When an inerrant believer cherry picks a Bible passage to challenge a true, modern student, a common practice is to ask of the student (for whom the passage does not contain immutable information for either side), “What are you going to do, tear that page out of the Bible?”  The student’s response is that the believer has transformed this beautiful Word into an image of worship, an engraved image, in direct violation of the second commandment, and in so doing has exalted the sacred text into impotent meaninglessness. (Talk about inflaming them, that statement will take them over the top).

         What’s left for the believer is their belief in magic, acceptance of obvious mythological analogies as literally true, and rejection of any theory or proof of the results of true scholasticism which question any fundamentalist view of any book, any verse, any author which are available to be rightfully studied by a legitimate, contemporary scholar of the Bible.

         The charismatic literalist does not understand that it is his approach, his dogmatic insistence of being right about things not believable to logical people, is what’s driving people away from the church today. Fundamentalism builds a blockade that keeps modern man from finding and knowing the real, living Jesus.

         Are these thoughts negative?  Depends on which side you are on—truth, or being right.