Lotus Flower

Understanding and discovering the essence of self.

There is no empty glass--

Only a lotus flower and a burgeoning soul.

I cannot find my self,

So I chew the flower’s muddy roots,

Marring my lips with murky reds,

Like the spilled guts of cheap wine.

Now for the main course:

I delicately reach to pluck a milky petal,

Like a patient, tender lover.

Its luminance ignites at my touch,

Bleaching my vision with incandescent fireworks.

My focus presses inward.

I tumble into the wave lengths,

Cocooning in rain-beaded spider silk,

And for the first time,

My consciousness awakens.

This

is Nirvana.

But then, my hand trembles--

I confuse spiritual with temporal.

And my mind turns turbid, imprisoned by

Tempting thoughts.

The veneer crumbles and curdles.

Sunyata is abound

And I can only expel

Deadwood.