Dharma Bum Welcome (On Holy Hill, Part 2)

5 March 2015

Lenten Walk on Holy Hill

The Flaneur's thoughts turn to representations of religious faith

 with humor and solemnity.

 The Graduate Theological Union

On Walpurgis night defrocked proctors parade past 

Aimless ghosts under the rattling leaves

Boutique theology,
 There's a Starr King waiting in the sky,
He'd like to take us with him,
But he thinks he'd blow our minds

 Cracks and fissures, both actual and figurative

began to show in many religious institutions

 Nondescript, non-denominational,

This modest steeple forms the emblem of Holy Hill,

The city of Berkeley drives past it

 Many today expect to earn heaven on the back end

Come on up to the house

Some feel that urge

 The door, ersatz ancient 

The sun casts expressionistic shadows

 The view West from Holy Hill

A good place for silence, 

solitude, and contemplation

 A bagel from a bakery on Gilman street,

My simple Lenten fare with water

 This all occurred to me at 

The Pacific School of Religion

 I continued on toward a small Anglican chapel

Where the Flaneur in the past attended vespers

 Everything is sort of mock-mediaeval

An icon of Mary wears Rosary beads,

Anglicans may I remind the reader

"He's Got the Whole World In His hands" on a picture disc

 Yet at least the chapel is kept open

For pilgrims who climb here be-sandaled

 I shall dwell all my days at the table of the Lord

 The time to resume one's burden

 as secular saint

 ,

 

 A evanescent painting of The Crucifixion

In the Theological library,

Where I first read the Gospel of Thomas

 The  Crown of Thorns and the scourge,

The Cross, the nails and the spear

Christ's Passion resides in our hearts

4 March 2015

Garden Centering

The Flaneur discovers another lobe
to the sprawling gardens at Lakeside Park.

 It was a Sunday afternoon at nearly two

 With my special effects goggles on,

 A hummingbird drinks a drop of water

Suspended in mid-air

 The world is ever wonderous

 Wonder what lies behind

Yon curtain of trumpet-vine?

 A sub-tropical region of the imagination

 Flowers of a different kind

 I smell sex and kandy, yeah

 Wrap your troubles up in dreams

 A guy was making watercolors of this flower

They were like designs for dull wallpaper

He squawked when my shadow crossed his easel

 The hour has come 

Bid the Garden Center adieu

The Flaneur will return again

To this newly discovered bench

And the good times that surround

22 February 2015

Berkeley Today

Clouds really speak to me,

Yesterday they had a lot to say

 A little look around on a new month arriving hereabouts like a lamby lion.

 Known to get in your hair

 Ghost photo in the ice rink of the Overlook Hotel,

 The Gunman comes to town,

Thinning out the herd

The Elmwood Post Office under an unsettled sky

28 February-1 March 2015