Ancient Song
Branches are a-tossing in the wind
Breathing with the air that’s streaming through their fronds
Lifting and a-swaying as the forest sings it’s ancient song
One lifts and then another
Gracefully bending branch
Catches the breeze and joins into the dance
When the snow has melted from the ground
Yellowbells and buttercups strew gold around
In the warming sun they yield their place to all the colors
of the wildflower race
One blooms and then another
Gracefully shaping form
Releasing their heady fragrance into the warm
Air weaves in rivers through our hearts
Streams in fierce and gentle winds
Flows through the fields where colors ebb and flow
Home returns letting go
Some of us have nested in the trees
Some of us daub mud or find a cavity
Some prefer seclusion in the brush, or a root-lined hollow
near the river’s rush
Yet in the morning chorus
All singers loose their songs
Singing their hallelujah into the dawn
Breathing within each other
Yielding to each her bloom
Finding a song of wonder
Is there room?
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
Treasure
Based on poems of Kabir
Bago na ja re na ja
Teri kaya men guljar
Seek not the garden afar
The garden of gardens is within
Sit where the petals are opening endlessly
Then see the beauty invisible intangible
Then see the beauty formless and unknowable
Opening within
Seek not the ruby outside
The treasure of treasures is within
Within your own body it lies
Move there in stillness, my friend
Sit where the colors are reflecting endlessly
Then see the beauty invisible intangible
Then see the beauty formless and unknowable
Opening within
Sahas kamval par baith ke
Tu dekhe rup apar
Find where the flower now blooms
Rest there in silence, and then soon
Soon see the petals there opening endlessly
Then see the beauty invisible intangible
Then see the beauty formless and unknowable
Opening within
Opening within
Teri kaya men guljar
The garden of gardens is within
The treasure of treasures is within
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
Single Point
searching only
a single point
to reckon by
what blooms is
the seed of
the flowering
of emptiness
a heart cannot hold it
it will break
I am breaking
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
Waves
All my wounds are merely scratches
They cut only the armor of my soul
They crash with a wave on yellow sand
And quietly expire with the foam
How little the troubles that torment me touch me
In sweeping water even small scars are healed
I am left only with the long trailing backsides of waves
Then mysteriously they too are gone
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
Breath
As the mist that rises on a hidden course of river
Blurs the silhouette of distant hill and standing tree
So the breath within the body rising up
Blurs the distance between you and me
As the clouds arising on a stretch of shining ocean
Lift the waters high above the earth in soaring flight
So the breath within the body rising up
Turns our hidden currents into light
Breathe through walls and barriers fall
Pathways open through our fear
For we are held in a breath that rises
From the silent ocean that we are
Breathe through walls and barriers fall
Pathways open through our tears
Move like mist on a breath that rises
From the silent ocean that we are
As the mist that rises on a hidden course of river
Blurs the silhouette of distant hill and standing tree
So the breath within the body rising up
Blurs the distance between you and me
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
This Very Earth
Words adapted from Morihei Ueshiba, founder of Aikido
Now is the time
Strengthen and restore the cords that bind
Fire, air, water & earth
Come stand together with me
Come stand now
Stand on this very earth
Stand firmly at the center of its heart
Where the mountain echo clearly resounds
We stand
Amrit Vela
‘Nectar time’ or ‘ambrosia time’... twilight...
a time for meditation or prayer at dusk or dawn
When the velvet touch of evening
Turns the tide of day
Colors soften, shadows lengthen
Slowly turn to gray, and fade away
In between the light and the dark
Twilight floods the fields of my heart
Opens a land where beyond the dreams
The nectar of ambrosia streams
Gentle is the power
Of this dusky hour
A smile, a tear, and love, my dear
In luminous eventide
In between the light and the dark
Twilight floods the fields of my heart
Opens a land where softness and grace
Illumine your unknown and beloved face
Gently joy and pain
Sing their old refrain
A smile, a tear, for I love you my dear
In luminous eventide
Gentle is the power
Of this dusky hour
A smile, a tear, for all we hold dear
In luminous eventide
A smile, a tear, for I love you my dear
Amrit vela time
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
Chaparral
Mudstone manzanita knobcone
Sunlight wind space
Powers of earth, rise into my body
Evanescent powers, descend
to the vanishing point
of the spiral
the vanishing point
of the spiral
no point
of being
except
the vanishing point
of the spiral
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
ALAYA
The abode, the inner abode, inner emptiness, the inner sky....
Cloud-Capp’d Towers
Words by William Shakespeare, Music by Ralph Vaughan Williams (arr. Raso)
The cloud-capp’d towers
The gorgeous palaces
The solemn temples
The great globe itself
shall dissolve
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
leave not a rack behind
We are such stuff as dreams are made on
And our little life
is rounded with a sleep
Alaya
Inspired by Osho
Alaya —
I sit in my inner abode
With goodbye, my eyes cry
When you go, tears just flow
Who am I to tell them no
I sit in the inner sky
Alaya
Roots of trees find hidden springs
Fields turn green, the sparrow sings
None escape what winter brings
Still branches reach toward light-filled sky
Alaya
Fire to fire
Earth to earth
Air rejoins the wind
Water flows — love grows
Sitting in the inner sky
Only one sky
All that’s born will someday die (shall dissolve...)
The globe, the stars, you and I (leave not a trace...)
Heart swells with joy and breaks with grief (our little life...)
Trembles for our time so brief (is rounded with a sleep...)
Who am I to wonder why my eyes cry (my eyes cry....)
Sitting in the empty sky
Alaya
Fire to fire
Earth to earth
Air rejoins the wind
Tears flow — love grows
Sitting in the light-filled sky
Only one sky
With goodbye my eyes cry
When you go, tears just flow
Who am I to tell them no
I sit in my inner abode
Alaya
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
ALAYA
The abode, the inner abode, inner emptiness, the inner sky....
Cloud-Capp’d Towers
Words by William Shakespeare Music by Ralph Vaughan Williams (arr. Raso)
The cloud-capp’d towers
The gorgeous palaces
The solemn temples
The great globe itself
shall dissolve
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
leave not a rack behind
We are such stuff as dreams are made on
And our little life
is rounded with a sleep
Alaya
Inspired by Osho
Alaya —
I sit in my inner abode
With goodbye, my eyes cry
When you go, tears just flow
Who am I to tell them no
I sit in the inner sky
Alaya
Roots of trees find hidden springs
Fields turn green, the sparrow sings
None escape what winter brings
Still branches reach toward light-filled sky
Alaya
Fire to fire
Earth to earth
Air rejoins the wind
Water flows — love grows
Sitting in the inner sky
Only one sky
All that’s born will someday die (shall dissolve...)
The globe, the stars, you and I (leave not a trace...)
Heart swells with joy and breaks with grief (our little life...)
Trembles for our time so brief (is rounded with a sleep...)
Who am I to wonder why my eyes cry (my eyes cry....)
Sitting in the empty sky
Alaya
Fire to fire
Earth to earth
Air rejoins the wind
Tears flow — love grows
Sitting in the light-filled sky
Only one sky
With goodbye my eyes cry
When you go, tears just flow
Who am I to tell them no
I sit in my inner abode
Alaya
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
With an eye made quiet
Words by William Wordsworth
With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony
With an eye made quiet by the power of joy
We shall see into the life of things
From the blessed power that rolls
About below above
Framing the measure of our souls
We tune to love
Love in universal birth from heart to heart is stealing
Earth to human, back to earth, now is the hour of feeling
One moment may give us more than fifty years of reason
Drinking at every pore the spirit of the season
Silent laws our hearts may make which they shall long obey
We for the year to come take our temper from today
From the blessed power that rolls
About below above
Framing the measure of our souls
We tune to love
With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony
With an eye made quiet by the power of joy
We shall see into the life of things
From the blessed power that rolls
About below above
Framing the measure of our souls
We tune to love
Copyright 2018 Raso Hultgren/Misty Ridge Media. All Rights Reserved.
Lullaby
golden splashing
silken wind
gathering the vastness
gently coaxing
into one small berry
my gift to you
golden splashing
silken wind
feel the universe unfold inside you
filling you with clear, infinite space
see how large and beautiful you’ve grown
soon you will be everywhere
luminous with starlight
golden splashing
silken wind