A Crack in the Wall

Ghosts are Memories

The cracks in the wall
Let in the light
The light which
Destroys my blindness
Makes me see

I have long been obsessed with the impossible. Or rather I should say, the impossible has been obsessed with me.

[Black & White photograph of little flowers on a dark shadow of blades of grass titled, “Ghosts are Memories”]

Now before you get all excited to quote Leonard Cohen to me, please do be advised that I wrote my poem in 1989, when I was twelve. It’s several pages long but has since been burned and currently, I only clearly remember the beginning and the end.

Break me
Take me
I am here
But you cannot
Destroy
A crack in the wall.

Now, oddly enough, I have little degrees of separation with Cohen. I first heard about him from my father because he once talked about Cohen being part of the Mount Baldy Zen Center, so my father had met him. My father was an astute observer for all the wrong reasons. And he was in the midst of it all. The 60s, India, Yoga, meditation, psychedelics. He ended up in Venice Beach where I was born because he had hitchhiked from Chicago, Illinois along Route 66.

I even recall sharing this poem with Maoshing Ni at a party my father held at our house in Santa Monica. The 60s were a faded memory by then. The 80s ruled with money and status and real estate investments. A rewrite of the narrative and new identities to occupy in the game of survival and accumulation.

I don’t actually begrudge my father’s obsession with wealth on a certain level, because in that respect, he was for real. A real, poor, mixed Puerto Rican from a small, white mid-western town. There is so much to unpack about his identity, I shall not even begin. But if there was a chance that consciousness would win out, it was sadly and totally lost long, long ago. And though he very often successfully portrayed a most intriguing and attractive visage, he is a true oppressor and committer of acts of great evil.

[Black & White photograph of multiple exposures of a dark, misty lake titled, “Name It, Speak It, Know It”]

Writing was an integral way that I held onto myself. Breadcrumbs I left purposefully so that I would be sure to return later. The pressure had become too great and I was forced to go into hiding lest I snap and show my hand. So, I cast a spell upon myself, very intentionally, very mindfully. I buried a part of my consciousness deep down, where it would not be seen, for safe keeping, so that keeping up appearances could be a little easier for a while. Then I fell asleep. The deepest sleep perhaps I had ever had. I awoke late and it was dark, and I knew something had changed.

I remembered gazing at the palm trees.

There was talk of my future and what the red dot which appeared at the center of my forehead could mean.

The culture was a mess. The hippies were a mess. The artists were a mess. The musicians were a mess. The gurus were a mess. And yet most were actively enamored with worshiping at the feet of the “sounds good”.

I get it. I appreciate the complexity of the situation. Colonialism, empire, slavery, genocide, racism, patriarchy, capitalism, fascism, communism, two world wars, Vietnam, Civil Rights, the bomb, my god! Oh yes, and RELIGION.

As my mother said, she did not plan to live to see tomorrow, but she is still here today in the next room as I write.

An answer was truly, desperately needed, but folks were hell bent on destroying any such answer should it have the audacity to actually arrive. Such was the depth of deception and suffering. And the answer would have to have the capacity to contain it all, ALL OF IT, and that is a tall, fucking order.

Especially when she is only a few feet tall.

Somehow, I knew this. I saw them in their delusion. Their false seeking. Their refusal to accept reality in order to maintain an illusion of self. Playing games, denying their own liberation. Power is so very, very tricky. And they wanted it. They wanted the power. The power that I represented. Which is exactly why I refused to give it to them.

“Don’t say that word around her!”

“What word? Bodhisattva? She is only three, she doesn’t know what is going on, she won’t remember.”

“Oh yes, she will. You have ruined everything.”

[Black & White photograph of the view of the high desert from Dhamma Dena in Joshua Tree with bushes, shadows and dramatic clouds in the sky titled, “Freed From Rage and Sorrow”]

Doubt and Certainty

In meditation one develops an understanding of the Five Hindrances -- how, when one of them is present, you investigate it, you understand it, you accept its presence and you learn how to deal with it.

5. Doubt (vicikicchā): lack of conviction or trust.

The practice is the practice. This should be understood. It’s not a directive for how to live, it’s directives for how to meditate and gain awareness and live with wisdom. Once the awareness is gained, that is enough to navigate life.

I do find it interesting to investigate how doubt is a hindrance beyond the meditation practice. Especially in a culture conditioned into belief as a primary lens of reality.

I found it immensely problematic that people wanted to project a belief onto me, yet clearly had little to no conviction or trust in me. But perhaps this bit of doubt protected me in more ways then one. It’s impossible to be certain. And certainty is it’s own trap. There was one who was certain and perhaps she saw clearly. But in my experience, even when we know the end, we don’t entirely know how we get there.

And so, I observed. I considered. I did not draw conclusions. I had doubt, I had certainty and I had neither.

Theoretically, it could have all been very simple, however, it was anything but.

Mixing Medicines and Labeling Drawers

People have a lot of ideas. Pieces of information and experience. This and that. From here and there. Without a lot of investigation on what anything actually is or where it comes from. This is understandable. It takes a fair amount of effort to find out.

Since I could not trust anyone and was concerned about my own lack of lived experience and capacity to withstand influence, I opted for the audacious choice of total personal, direct experience as my teacher. I put my faith in the process. For protection.

Atta hi attano natho ~ Each is their own protector.

[Black & White photograph of discarded mining debris in the Owens Valley hills over looking Bishop, Ca. featuring an old white car full of bullet holes and the Sierra wave cloud in the distance over mountains titled, “War Pony”]

There is a reason you practice and learn something as it is. That’s how you know what it is. When Hinduism is mixed with Buddhism, when Mahayana is mixed with Theravada, when Theosophy throws everything in the same pot in the name of salvation, when Tipi songs are sung in Inipi ceremonies, things get confused. People get lost.

The point is not understood. It becomes whatever someone is most obsessed with, usually their own pain. Which again, is understandable, but not necessarily helpful.

So as my godmother once instructed, we must label our own drawers. The drawers of our mind. We must investigate, sort and understand so that we know what things are, where they are and that we are engaging with them accurately.

To this long, slow trek
Through an unmapped land
I am hurriedly born
Blank book in hand

Making the Impossible Probable

I deal with potentiality. Possibility. Doubt or certainty are not useful beyond an immediate experience, in the present. If something is to be, then let it be.

Allow it. Create space for it. But not in the way that you believe it should be. In the way that actually does it.