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 it is not about the "where"
but about the "going".

:::

there never was

nor ever will be

a greater currency

than itself manifest

as the forms of family---

of friendship.

:::

"tell us the story of The Three Fools":

the first of the fools

was a mountain guide from Nepal.

growing up in the high elevations

had expanded his lungs

and darkened the skin on his face.

he knew the summits of these mountains

like the hills of his knuckles.

so innately aware of their alluring beauty,

he was also aware of their precarious stillness;

each one of them a guillotine of ice and snow-pack

ready to drop to the head of a perfect vibration.

although their stillness was purposefully

disrupted by mountain rescue teams,

the fool was all too wise in knowing

not all mountains were so naϊve.

on a cloudless, sunny morning,

brisk air enlivened the colorful prayer flags

watching over the climbers like angels.

the fool and climbers were talking

through the steam of their coffee

when a thunderous cracking sound

was heard from up the mountain.

air rescue notified the base camp

the avalanche was heading straight towards their camp.

the fool had seen several of these ghostly white monsters

thrusting themselves down the mountain-face

but never this close...

never so intimately...

the climbers and other guides stirred into a frenzy

of evacuation to get out of the avalanche's path,

but the fool stayed.

the fool was not frozen with fear;

he was entirely captivated by something else.

this rumbling---this force---so mighty

and yet, so foreign to him.

he heard trees snapping and a seismic roar

until all came into view---coming for him---

calling for him---inviting him in...

the fool crouched on the ground,

turned his back to the beast,

and waited until he could understand this force---

become the avalanche itself.

the second of the fools

was a drug addict from Sir Lanka.

at the turn of each minute,

all she could think about

was getting her next hit.

her life thus far paled in comparison

to that which she knew of a fresh hit.

no other colors were more beautiful

that the amber-brown elixir and the dark burgundy

blood which ferried the chemicals

throughout every part of her brokenness.

she liked to take her hits on the beach.

something about the water calmed her.

upon arriving to her usual spot, syringe in hand,

she noticed the waterline was further out

than she had ever seen.

she was not the only beach goer to notice,

as several curious souls walked on sodden sand

that would usually be past their ankles.

the fool could feel a stillness around her.

insects vanished. dogs were barking.

mesmerized by the surrounding mystery,

the fool decided to walk out to investigate

the water's extremely shy tide.

a large rock made for a clearer view.

the copious desire to take a hit

had subsided to an annoying rant.

nothing appeared out of the ordinary

until desperate screams were heard from the shoreline.

"Tsunami!"

the curious onlookers ripped through the wet sand inland,

but the fool stayed

and turned her gaze back to the wavering horizon.

she kept her feet planted beneath the shimmering boulder

and realized her heart rate had dropped.

she looked at the syringe in her hand

like a murderer having second thoughts.

for the first time in her life,

she could hear herself think.

the wavering horizon morphed and growled a low growl---

rolling and rising the closer it came.

never had she felt so serene.

as the mounting, king wave arrived

at the doorstep of the coastline,

the fool dropped her syringe.

she turned her back to the beast

to understand this force---this fluid tyrant---

to become the tsunami itself.

the third of the fools

was a firefighter from Texas.

he was a proud and strong family man

whose father died in a fire

when he was a young boy.

he vowed to himself never to let anyone else suffer

the suffocating fury as his father did.

the men and women in Engine 52

were his brothers and sisters.

hotter was the passion in his heart

to save the lives of innocent people.

one summer morning, the department received a call

about a burning horse barn.

when the fool and other firefighters arrived,

it was clear Time was mocking their every move.

the long, sweltering summer and aged barn

were welcome prey for the fire.

while a latter was being raised to have the roof aerated

of black smoke,

the fool and the rest of his team rushed to the door, unlatched it,

and let a plumb of black smoke escape before going in.

the horses were yelping and neighing,

kicking their front legs against the stall doors.

the inferno played a cruel game of hopscotch

between the horses' stalls.

in pairs of two, the firefighters wrangled the frightened horses

out of the barn---

some of them having already been badly burned.

the fool was not so worried about the fire

as he was about the age of the barn.

through the shield of his respirator mask,

the fool looked up at the roof---

the only one aware of its imminent demise.

he helped corral the horses and the other firefighters

out of the barn but did not emerge from the smoke.

he heard the cries of a horse,

which he soon discovered had a foal.

he knew the mother horse would know what to do,

so he took an ax and gouged at the stall latch until it gave up.

the mother horse and her foal instinctively galloped

through the flames to the exit,

but the fool stayed.

he was enticed by the sultry dance of the flames

and lured by the absolute destructiveness around him.

the flames licked his suit now.

a glorious gradient of oranges, yellows, and reds

reflected off of this mask.

he felt white hot...

he suddenly felt alive.

never before did he know this heat---this force---

as he did now.

the fool looked to the roof and closed his eyes

to the beast to understand this power---

this blaze of all blazes.

the old roof caved like a house of cards,

and he became the fire itself.

~

accepting the force of love,

welcomes the call of death,

to eliminate the minutiae of ourselves,

revealing our most divine nature.

:::

a flower cannot grow

with that of a rotten seed;

till the soil of my worth

nay let love grow as a weed.