Sonnet 53

What is your substance, whereof are you made,
That millions of strange shadows on you tend?
Since every one hath, every one, one shade,
And you, but one, can every shadow lend.
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit
Is poorly imitated after you;
On Helen’s cheek all art of beauty set,
And you in Grecian tires are painted new.
Speak of the spring and foison of the year,
The one doth shadow of your beauty show,
The other as your bounty doth appear;
And you in every blessed shape we know.
In all external grace you have some part,
But you like none, none you, for constant heart.

William Shakespeare

GobbleGobble my Dear Readers!

CultFit Alien


Zen Living

Birdsongs that sound like the steady determined tapping
of a shoemaker’s hammer,
or of a sculptor making tiny ball-peen dents in a silver plate,
wake me this morning. Is it possible the world itself can be happy? The calico cat
stretches her long body out across the top of my computer monitor,
yawning, its little primitive head a cave of possibility.
And I’m ready again
to try and see accidents, the over and over patterns
of double-slit experiments a billionfold
repeated before me. If I had great patience,
I could try to count the poplar, birch and oak
leaves in their shifting welter outside my bedroom window
or the almost infinitesimal trails of thought that flash and flash
everywhere, as if decaying particles inside a bubble chamber,
windshield raindrops, lake ripples. However,
instead I go to fry some bacon, crack two eggs
into the cast-iron skillet that’s even older than this house,
and on the calendar (each month another oriental fan
where the climbing solitary is dwarfed . . . or on dark blue oceans
minuscular fishing boats bob beneath gigantic waves)
X out the days, including those I’ve forgotten.

Dick Allen

*Side Note*

Tomorrow afternoon form 3-7 PM I would love to have you as a guest at Infinity Wellness Omaha. The Ladies who launch Omaha will be having a PamperYourself Event, just in time for the holidays! As a dude, events like this are great. No fussing about at the mall looking for parking, wandering around Lululemon getting “distractedAll your holiday shopping treats in one spot, in and out – simple. I look forward to seeing you there!

CultFit Fall


Behind the Scene(s)

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance-

In writing this blog-o-thing, I am doing what many other passionate and authentic people do: Taking the flow of my daily struggles and sharing it openly with you. The conversation we often have, like life; Is chaotic, awkward, tedious and associative.

I don’t know how to convey my feelings at times, words stumble from my fingertips and fall deftly onto the screen. Like life itself, this flow, this blog  YOU  Are intrinsically nourishing.

I can’t look YOU in the eye this morning, to find the courage to say “I am fully there This awkward awareness serves as my antidote to urgency and anger.

With your caring, continued support. I know without any shred of doubt, that my contribution here will be forever useful to the extent I can shift from being motivated by the desire to see results in my life: Likes, Follows, How long I can hold a pose, Being the best dad, A better lover, A better friend

Dependence on results cannot but compromise my True Strength.

Daily Meditation:

Sometimes what’s most painful for me is the conviction I have of just how simple it would be To love and share enough to satisfy everyone’s basic needs; to create a flow of kindness.

CultFit Forest


A Vote For the Gentle Light

a vote for the gentle light
burned senseless by other people’s constant
depression,
I pull the curtains apart,
aching for the gentle light.
it’s there, it’s there
somewhere,
I’m sure.

oh, the faces of depression, expressions
pulled down into the gluey dark.
the bitter small sour mouths,
the self-pity, the self-justification is
too much, all too much.
the faces in shadow,
deep creases of gloom.

there’s no courage there, just the desire to
possess something––admiration, fame, lovers,
money, any damn thing
so long as it comes easy.
so long as they don’t have to do
what’s necessary.
and when they don’t succeed they
become embittered,
ugly,
they imagine that they have
been slighted, cheated,
demeaned.

then they concentrate upon their
unhappiness, their last
refuge.
and they’re good at that,
they are very good at that.
they have so much unhappiness
they insist upon your sharing it
too.

they bathe and splash in their
unhappiness,
they splash it upon you.

it’s all they have.
it’s all they want.
it’s all they can be.

you must refuse to join them.
you must remain yourself.
you must open the curtains
or the blinds
or the windows
to the gentle light.
to joy.
it’s there in life
and even in death
it can be
there.

Charles Bukowski

CultFit Light

 


A Long and Gracious Fall

A long and gracious fall this year.
The leaves are down. Gardens: emptied,
manured, tilled, smooth, and waiting.
Mower and tiller serviced and put away.

Smoker put away, as is the summer table.
Prayer flags, windsocks and their poles: down.
Twenty-foot homemade badminton poles,
peace flag at the top of one, store-bought net—
all down and put away for another year. No more
outdoor summer chores.

Fall planting — peonies and tiger lilies — done.
Summer flower stalks removed, beds mulched,
a blanket for the cold. Fall pruning done.

Woodshed roof hammered down and sealed again.
Cellar closed. Drive staked and flagged so the
snowplow knows where to go.

What else is there to do? Finally, for once, we are ready
for the snow. Ready now to come inside. Time now for
words and music, poems and shakuhachi. Time now
to light some incense, sit and stare at candlelight.

– David Budbill

CultFit Winter