Karma Chameleon

THIS MORNING I witnessed a death. I was driving home, out of town and into the country. As a novelist I naturally notice things and ahead of me on the road, moving slowly--very slowly--swivel-eyed and hesitating step-by-step, was a young chameleon. I took care to avoid him and drove up to my gate. Whilst I waited for the gardener to open the gate I looked back at the chameleon, still on its hazardous journey across the road. I thought, My heart's with you guy, but I don't think you'll make it. Immediately, a kombi hurtled down that stretch of road, its driver oblivious to the tiny creature; amazingly it missed the chameleon. But the car following quickly behind didn't and the creature was spun into the air and landed, inert, on the road. And then a truck rushed along and squashed it flat. And I was thinking, that's a life lesson right there, isn't it? One moment you're here; the next moment you're gone. For that chameleon, the struggle is over; for us the daily struggles go on: but also the joys, the triumphs and ephemeral achievements of what all of us call life.

c Kenneth Rowley 2015

Do it again

Do it again

To be alive
is to feel joy
pain
sun
rain
to get up every morning
and do it again
simply because it's there;
to love the breeze
in your hair
the soft crunch of chocolate
on your lips
the gentle swagger of motion
as you roll your hips
the love
of being in love
and being alive
again
and again
and again.

Let's do it again
let's do it again
let's do it again
let's do it again
let's do it again
let's do it again
let's do it again



KenR, July 2009

Duality, Non-Duality & Zen Satori

Perhaps Zen is really all about turning duality into non-duality or maybe realising that the meaning of life is life. My moment of sudden enlightenment (satori) came when I noticed an ugly woman and kind of asking the universe why a woman could be so ugly. The answer came that ugliness is a necessary part of beauty--that the two come together; each needs the other; neither can exist independently. The ugly woman allows me to see beautiful ones; without ugliness beauty could not exist:


Fleas, lice,
The horse pissing
By my pillow.

Giving the breast,
While counting
The flea-bites.

There is nothing intrinsically more beautiful or poetical about
the moon than about a dunghill; if anything, the contrary, for
the latter is full of life and warmth and energy.

Just get rid of
The mind that thinks
"This is good, that is bad",
And without any special effort,
Wherever we live is good to live in.