Category: Auto-biographical
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Dis-Missed as a Fool
Dis-Missed as a Fool I knew they dismissed me as a fool. It was okay. Mostly, I really wasn’t too worried. Occasionally, I felt a bit hurt. An honest emotion. But then I would just kind of smile to myself. It was the way of my road. The ambient color and resonance of my immediate…
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My Previous Incarnation
enlightenment is a narrow and rocky path, so beware of flip-flops “I’m the King of the Castle!…I’m the King of the Castle!…heh-heh-heh! “ My Previous Incarnation The story of my previous incarnation, when I was a Buddhist monk, in a temple in 8th century Ancient China, is, indeed, a simple one. Like me. Not very…
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My Hut in the Sky
My Zen hut rests upon rocks at the summit clouds fly past and more clouds arrive a waterfall hangs in space beyond the door a mountain ridge rises like a wave in back I drew three Buddhas on a wall I put a plum branch in a jar for incense the fields below might be…
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Caution – Small Man Rhyming
Caution – Small Man Rhyming Great Vanity of vanities How much Art and feeling In our world today Is warped and twisted Perverted and falsified Willingly For the poisonous pleasures Of Reward or Fame? I admire the man Who left only his zither and a donkey And the donkey ill at that But…
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My Dance in the Clouds
My Dance in the Clouds My Dance in the Clouds Spontaneous and colorful Like all things of men Will pass, one day. When the Music stops And the Bandmaster bows, I too From the waist Shall bow deeply. And to you two silent partners of The Way To my dreams and your thoughts To sun…
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Standing Alone
Humanity WHO?… oh, you mean that lot on Sigma Alpha 274 Delta Echo? Standing Alone Standing alone On a rocky, windswept ledge Just below the summit Of a minor, rocky mountain. I gaze At so-called civilization, Humanity by name Far below Insignificant And wrapped, blindly In a cocoon of madness. Only here, Where it is…
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Learning to Fly Helicopters (3) “First Solo “
Learning to Fly Helicopters Part 3: “First Solo” (in a Helicopter) The irony for me of course was the fact that I had, myself, in previous life, sent many a fixed wing student pilot off on his or her first solo. And it was always I who, as the (h)airplane instructor, had watched (anxiously) as…
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Learning to Fly Helicopters (2) “Do I trust this thing? “
Learning to Fly Helicopters Part 2: “Do I trust this Thing?” The Robinson R-22… Long time ago. Early model days. Old fashioned twist grip, no governor, straight tail. I was suspicious, still, about the mechanical integrity of the beast. It looked so flimsy. Like a bunch of surplus tin cans beat roughly into shape. Now…
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Lifting the Iron Curtain (1) “Minefields at the Border “
Lifting the Iron Curtain Part 1: Minefields at the border The Cold War was still very hot in the late sixties. Tensions simmered, and nobody really know how the future was going to play out. As a teenager, I read books on Karl Marx, Nikita Kruschev, and Stalin. I read about the Katyn massacre, and…
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Learning to Fly Helicopters (1) “Seduction “
Learning to fly Helicopters Part 1: Seduction When a chap has already logged several thousand hours fixed wing, and then starts getting involved with helicopters, people will ask ‘why?’. When on top of that, he has previously been unkind about helicopters, people will be doubly intrigued. My quiet opinion, along with a great many fixed…