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Picture

Bohm Medallions
by Robert Zend (copyedited by Natalie Zend)

Copyright © Janine Zend, 1981, all rights reserved, reproduced under license.
These hitherto unpublished poems were inspired by theoretical physicist David Bohm, whom Zend knew personally through his work at CBC Ideas.

The Ultimate Proprietor

I say: my country; I say: my people, 
but they are just mine, they are not me.

I say: my garden; I say: my home;
I say: my friends; I say: my family, 
but they are just mine, they are not me.

I say: my eyes, my ears, my skin, 
my lungs, my kidney, my brain, my heart, 
my flesh, my bones, my blood, my nerves, 
but they are just mine, they are not me.

I say: my consciousness; I say: my dreams, 
my memories, my plans, my talents, my daydreams, 
my art, my philosophy, my humour, my mind, 
my body, my soul, my spirit, my self,
but they are just mine, they are not me.

Where is the wise man of whom I can ask:
beyond the properties, which are all mine
where is the ultimate proprietor:
the I
who hides
behind
"my I"?
(Once upon a time, there was a poor man 
who set out on a great journey, lasting for months, 
to meet the Wise Man of a distant region 
and ask him how to break out of his misery. 

 The Wise Man told him:
"Go home to your little hut,
take your little shovel,
and dig below your little bed."
The poor man went home to his little hut,
took his little shovel,
dug under his little bed
and he found a little box
full of gold and diamonds.
He had spent his whole life
near his treasure,
but he hadn't been aware of it.
Therefore, it would be wrong to say
that his long journey had been futile.)

One Wise Man who points to the treasure that's right there: the ultimate proprietor

Infinitely

Since the universe is infinitely large, 
I am infinitely small.

Since the atom is infinitely small,
I am infinitely large.

I am infinitely confused about my size, 
but one thing I know for sure:

I am the center of all things.

Just like the universe.
Just like the atom.

Ring

That I am 
is more 
than to know 
that I am

Trinity

Here I am sitting 
with the borderline of my skin 
separating the unknown surrounding 
me from the unknown contained in me,

here I am sitting,
I, the unknown.

Knowing

The Ether, the Air, the Water, the Fire,
the Earth, the Crystals, the Plants, the Animals
don't know
that they don't know.

Only I,
Homo Sapiens, 
know
that I don't know.


Circulations

The flame is extinguished 
but the fire keeps burning

The drop dissolves
but the ocean keeps undulating

The bubble bursts
but the wind keeps blowing

The leaf falls
but the tree keeps growing

Why do I fear death?

Zen(d) master Thich Nhat Hahn with his own version of circulations


Anti-Uni-Verse

1. 
In the hollows of our cavernous 
universe invisibly hides 
another cavernous universe 
in the hollows of which our universe 
hides invisibly

2. 
“Let's hope that we are 
invisible for those 
whom we cannot see”

3. 
I caught these words while they were passing through me

Problems

The first problem: How large is outer space? 
Infinite? Our mind invented,
but doesn’t understand this word.
Finite? Then what is beyond it?

The second problem: If matter is divisible, 
how far can it be divided?
Infinitely? How far is that?
Or is there an indivisible building block?
And if we blew up that block to the size of a cosmos, 
what would it contain? Would it be empty?
The cosmos cannot be empty! So what would it be full of?

The third problem: How long is time?
If it began once and will end once, 
what preceeded it and what will follow it?
If it has always been and will never end, 
then how is it possible?

The fourth problem is that if the mind’s role 
is to understand the world, then why doesn’t it
and why won’t it ever be able to? But if understanding the world 
is not its role, then, on the one hand, what is its role, 
and, on the other, why is it burdened with the 
inextinguishable thirst to understand it?
What use is science?

The fifth problem is that if we don't know what our role is 
in a world whose role we don't know either, 
then we also don’t know what we live for,
and even less, how we should live for what we live for.

The sixth problem is that if we believe in God, 
then we don't only avoid answering these questions, 
but also raise new ones, like for instance:
If God dwells outside the world, then where is that?
And if that's no longer part of the world, then what  is it?

But if God is in everything in this world,
then what’s the difference between God and this world?
If it is possible to last forever,
then why do we conceive of a temporary world
created by an everlasting being?
Had we conceived of an everlasting world, 
we wouldn't have needed to create a Creator!
If God was born and will die, who preceded Him 
and who will come after Him? If the world is merely 
His body, then He may not even know about us,
so why should we worship Him? Our cells do not worship us either 
just as we don't worship the Galaxy. If, prior to creation,
He planned everything out, then why do we strive?
If He expects  us to be good, then why does He allow Evil to proliferate?
If He lets us  chose freely, then He is superfluous.
This God-concept is, really, very discombobulating: if it is merely 
a creation of our mind, then it is like the labyrinth, 
built solely for the purpose of getting lost in.

The seventh problem is that if we brush aside all these questions,
declaring that they are not important and that we should just go ahead
and live life  as it comes without believing either in a God
or a purpose,  or in free will, or predestination, or in good  and evil,
then we degrade ourselves to the level of animals, of plants,
or even of minerals - dumb , lifeless matter
unaware of its own existence. Is this why
we struggled to become human? What was our whole
bloody history good for?

The eighth problem is that if living is good and therefore 
dying is bad, then living is bad because dying is inevitable.
But if living is bad, then dying is good.
And if dying is good, then living is good too.
So then, what's the good and what's the bad between which 
we have to chose, and is there any way out?

The ninth problem is that if there is a way out and 
life is just a dream from which our death will awaken us,
then what would the problems he in a life after death? 
If there are problems even there, then it's not worthwhile
even to die! But if there are no problems there, 
only the music of the spheres, which we would have to 
listen to forever, then that would be utterly boring, 
therefore a new problem arises, namely:
How is it possible to bear a life without problems forever?
But if that life also has an end, 
then why should we even start it?
As far as that goes, why did we have to start this present life, 
a life equally unbearable because of its problems?
On the other hand, if instead of the world, 
there would be nothing, then we would not be either, 
in which case we would have no way of knowing that 
that nothing is better than this something.
But something cannot arise out of nothing,
and something cannot turn into nothing, 
Therefore there is no such thing as nothing:
again, it’s just a word invented by our mind 
to describe absence,
although in the real world there are only presences.

The tenth problem is: Where can I get money 
to pay the telephone bill tomorrow?

An Essay on the Nature of Man

Picture
Man is composed of 5 macaronis
intertwined as a braid.

The first is for liquid,
the second for solid,
the third for gaseous,
the fourth for intellectual,
and the fifth, for sexual stuff.

The top hole of the macaronis
serve for getting hold of the Input.
(Drink, Food, Air, Culture, Excitement.)

The bottom hole of the macaronis
serve for getting rid of the Output.
(Number One, Number Two, Number Three, Creation, Children.)

The fuller and faster the traffic
through the bundle of macaronis is,
the happier Man is.

                    - January 12 1982

Building

On the seventh floor of my mind I know
that thinking is useless
         speaking is worthless
         loving is hopeless
         writing is fruitless
         and fearing death is senseless
but most of the time
I live on the main floor

Mind under Matter

The Mind cannot understand the world, therefore 
the Mind is a mystery.

The World is not a mystery because 
it doesn't understand the World, 
but it doesn't mind.

The mystery is why the mind minds 
that it doesn't understand the world.

The Mind is a question without an answer.
The World is an answer without a question.

The Mind invented the idea of both 
the question and the answer.

The World is both and neither 
question and answer.

The Mind is the "why?"

The World is the "just because."

God and I

There is a free verse written 
 in Unispace, Unitime:
God is a Universifier 
whose poem does not rhyme.

My verse takes a minute to read 
and it's small as a pie 
because - alas! - I am no God 
and therefore I shall die.

Tell me, what is better to be: 
immortal and immense 
with no sense? Or to be mortal 
and make rhythm, rhyme, sense?

                  - December 6 1981

I am the legendary onion 
who after peeling off its layers
searched for its self
and found it in the scent dissipating
In other moments, the world
seems to be an incoherent mosaic
The mind on the edge
is just another tile
which thinks that it is in the centre
and everything else is as square as itself
The structure of infinity is 
that millions are contained in one
that one is contained among millions
and their overlapping selves
devour one another to resurrect
A spiral of black stars revolve
 in a white space embroidered with silence
yellow pearls explode, but 
the memory of the future is eavesdropping
On a bicycle composed of moss
rides a girl composed of sunshine
She smokes an ether-cigarette
and thinks about a long-forgotten
purple orgasm
One of the friends is sinuous, shimmering;
the other is full of swarming chaos,
they walk side by side
under the ocean
among the ruins of a former world age
In a forest of people
two trees make love
Black letters say:
"Let there be light!"
                            
- February 26 1984

Three Discoveries

1. No one can choose 
    his parents

2. No one can choose 
     his children

3. No one can choose 
     himself

- January 10, 1971

Copyright © Janine Zend, 2014, all rights reserved.
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