NAN - Not A Number

 
    NAN – Not A Number: a purported numeric representation found invalid by any CPU

Face down with my eyes closed for a moment on a brilliant summer day

Switching my thoughts from dry and empty words to illustrative imaging

Arms outspread and feeling for earth’s smooth rotation underneath me

Smelling the moist brown sod beneath the green grass that’s tickling my nose

Ears pricked to catch the silence of our planet’s revolution about its star

Feeling the moon tracing around us, constantly changing her expression

Alert to the momentary minuscule changes in the output of our sun on my back

Aware of its rotational plane with respect to our own Milky Way

Observing as I move slowly upward and somewhere away from myself

Brain waves smoothing into that ancient, nearly-forgotten, frequency and rhythm

Relaxing, smoothing and soothing every part of my conscious anatomy

Anchoring at a center from which all things move away at the speed of light

NAN is not a number but it is the sum of all of my small experiences

My own unique personal version from one of the uncountable different infinities

Feeling my heart slowing as it nonetheless inexorably tolls my 3 billion allotted beats

Hearing an old German church bell again on that quiet Sunday morning in October

But, jet-lagged and sleep-deprived or fit and well-rested, my dust will be the same

Merging with smaller galaxies we encounter, on a route that seems to be directed

Tracing a path through the cosmos without conscious purpose and to no planned end

Aware of the bee as she buzzes about a neighbor of mine standing here in full flower

Night Walking, All Alone

I had a feeling I would not be heading home

I quickly left behind what I had known

There was a rustling with the restless breeze

The full moon shone through leafless trees

I pulled my collar about a bony neck

I felt the chill of night alone, one tiny speck

Still the inner voices spoke but remained elusive

As their echoes joined with the music

Solemnly I made a vow of recession

Slowly walking in that procession

Some mumbled secrets I could almost hear

Others walked alone in nearly silent fear

Through the night my pace adjusted

Bathed in light and star encrusted

Far from that life we’re daily following

On a path made only for those walking

As I paced alone through with that darkness near

wolves crying about me made things clear

there was no one there that I could to talk to

still I lacked the words to try and say so

I kept my thoughts to myself alone

Saw faint lights, but always far from home

There were outlines in the distance

Memories arose to trick the senses

Hidden entrances made me want to call her

Yet, still I held no course, so no need to alter

None traveled the path in the other direction

Where my route led was beyond detection

The night wind gusted from wails to whispers

where the pines gathered round to listen

The moon grew whiter as it got higher

Thoughts of my life burned away like fire

When I paused to test the breeze

Something small scurried away in the scree

I grew drowsy but dared not tarry

Lest I lose the tune that I must carry

Farther on past an icy stream

I am engulfed once more in childhood dreams

Walking on throughout the hours

Here and there I pass darkened towers

On this trip time cannot be saved

On this road there are no traffic slaves

Little worry in my steps

It seemed, for once, that time just crept

The night wore on beneath my feet

Thoughts of home grew faint and weak

Those once close now rejoined me forever

I found it right that we arrive together

Then at last came that first bird song

hope for those who had walked so long

I started down into another valley

There, where the sun was late to dally

As I turn then for a quick look back

Where I came from was still quite black

Suddenly as I at last awoke in some confusion

Just caught sight of my own apparition

There he was crumpled, pale and gray

Tired after his long night’s journey, he lay

For a brief moment it was not just madness

Though I could not but note, a touch of sadness

When Thoughts have lost their words

I am only breathing

          Breathing deeply, very slowly

All the noise seems safely, very safely, far away

          Letting go of everything, everywhere, all at once

It is simple breathing, as the hurried world rushes past

          Softly breathing here, quietly, just behind my eyes

I am only breathing

          Slowly, slowly filling with a mild sense of calmness

Each inhalation brings a bit of cosmic background peace

          Each exhalation, part of that deep relieving sigh

There is nothing more required

          Thoughts have lost their words

I am only breathing

          Delicate and subtle but somehow very vast

A warm glow suffusing from somewhere deep within

          When I am filled inside, I see that it surrounds

A center spreading outward, smoothing angry tides

          A calm that reaches well down into my autonomic side

Warmth and tranquility spreads from my soles to my scalp

          A phrase repeated as I respire nurtures every cell

For I am only breathing

          Innocent and fragile, feeding inner strength

The restful hum of the quiet mind comes to the fore

          My gratitude is mixed with a faint sense of relief

Moving smoothly now in time, no longer young or old

          Sometimes even floating skyward in our blue atmosphere

I am only breathing

          But my brain is producing, a set of characteristic waves

I warm each and every ache and pain and relax all of my old wounds

          with that calming flow of radiant energy from the center

Increasingly I am absent in the middle of my breaths

          Then slowly come the images at the edge of sleep

I am only breathing

          The adrenaline ceases running and my vital signs slow down

I clear aside my worries and anxieties, the fears and the doubts

          I am safe somewhere inside the instant between each calming breath

I let go of time as I did while floating in my mother’s womb

          Bird calls and breezes can now become part of me

I am only breathing

          Briefly, I am not driven by empty hunger and undirected restlessness

Random thoughts of pressing issues slowly decrease in frequency

          During some intervals I am broadcasting my most harmonic waves

I am quietly filled with a subtle ether, quite dilute and very mild

          Seconds change to minutes in the rhythms of the houseplants

I am only breathing

          Yet it frees the quiet joy at the privilege of simply being

Wisdom In Small Waters

In the mossy rocks along the bottom of a stream that we watch gently glide

There is another world than the one from which we stand upon this bank

Down in the depths where light fades to only green and blue

The stones hold cold secrets left them by the melting snows

Underneath the surface, currents come and go with the seasons

Just as the sound of running water is different through the ice

The streams where we waded as children were old long before our time

They had polished many pebbles and undercut their green and spongy banks

In the deep pools where eddies ripple, the stream still pauses to reflect

In the weedy backwaters, the overflow irrigates wherever it collects

Behind the beaver dams tiny reservoirs are managed yet today

The wetlands hold the moisture until they freeze thru once again

This small creek spins different versions of its many tales, all at once

The wind strokes the grasses that thrive in the moist soil by the water

People come and go but the water keeps rolling on from somewhere

Behind a resting boulder the large trout fans in its soothing eddy

Though moving in many directions all the water still ends up together

Tiny wavelets lap the shore in a diorama of the entire cosmos

In the shade of a tree on the bank it is cool on the hottest summer day

Though restless and ever-changing that brook is clearly timeless

Passing over rocks it is smoothing, the water takes a deep and cleansing breath

It gurgles happily like a long and purring cat twisting on its back

Sometimes in spring, between its slurping, you can hear it knocking stones

Such small waters might bring a short and unaccustomed peace to a wandering folk

The More It Blurs

The hand that grasps cannot realize the fingers that point

But the mind that is empty remains full of surprises

For those no longer busy

There is always just enough to do

The mind that wanders does not travel far

While the hand that simply reaches out, crosses any border

A people with roots within the earth

Find meaning in simple rain and sun

The man who fears that he might fail

May just be content with what others deal

To glimpse the riverbed through flowing water

Might require good light and a high bank

For those whom time has passed by at last

This could be a blessing they cannot share

A dry summer might not seem important

To sophisticated city dwellers

The more we center all our focus

The more a blur all else becomes

To strive and fail is difficult

To strive again is harder still

For the angry man nothing satisfies

As too little always comes too late

A dog may lie sleeping quietly for hours

Exploding into motion at some unheard noise

The meaning that we attach to things

Removes something from what we understand of them

To sleep is not simply to ignore

To dream is not just to run away

It’s far too long for even eternal love to last

Cantor’s diagonalization argument for uncountability > infinity: The real numbers is an extraordinarily special set. If one were to graph the real numbers on a line, any segment on that line contains the same cardinality of points as does the whole line itself.

It’s far too long for me to plan for any future

It’s far too long for my constrained imagination

It’s far too long to engage simple emptiness

It’s far too long for even eternal love to last

There’s just too much time after this blue-green-white earth is gone

There’s just too much time when my memories are thinned beyond recognition

There’s just too much time to be totally senseless, thinking nothing

There’s just too much time to be far less than alone

It’s way too much to even outline

It’s way too much to hold inside

It’s way too much to get a grip on

It’s way too much and still, there’s so much more

I have extra time that I did not even have to save

I have extra time unfolding like a burden I cannot hope to lift

I have extra time growing longer and more overwhelming

I have extra time moving ever faster beyond my shrinking comprehension

I have nothing to do and no way to get it done

I have nothing to do and all the time in the universe to do it

I have nothing to do then and do not even know it

I have nothing to do and cannot get over it

I don’t have to work anymore or ever again

I don’t have to work because there are no workdays

I don’t have to work and I have no boss

I don’t have to work because I flow like water

Freedom at last without any more choices to be made

Freedom at last chained in molecular compounds

Freedom at last in the vast black and near-vacuum

Freedom at last at so close to absolute zero

I’d be happy to live in eternal sorrow

I’d be able to get by with constant pain

I’d be alright with poverty and suffering

I’d be better off than unconscious in that empty and unknowable void

Tulips in a crystal glass, Litter in the mud

The tulips in the crystal glass are so very fragile

The litter in the mud and grit has nothing left to lose

There is only so much good in the whole stinking lot of us

But that blind spring of entropy flows on forever

The best of us is glimpsed but rarely, and only in a few

Thus we mostly live immersed forever, in palest mediocrity

The beauty of humanity shines through, for the briefest of instants

The emptiness of our normal lives casts an enveloping pall upon us all

The moments of our uplifting are truly few and far between

Torture, greed and death are always just below the surface

The good we do with modest forethought is like a tiny candle in the wind

The brutality of our indifference wracks the world and its people

The innocence of children is but the briefest shower in the drought

The never ending corruption fouls everything just like that dirty tsunami

Music briefly fills our souls with the knowledge of a morning peace

Smashing, shouting and hoarse cackling fill the noonday heat

The calm strength of the ancient mother rights our course just a fraction

But mostly we plunge on blindly, proudly honoring an unconsidered ignorance

The just must often struggle mightily for the smallest victory

Indifference tramples without malice grandmas, sprouts and babies

Those things that truly sustain us are so very quiet and unobtrusive

The smashing sounds of progress fill our ears and drown our thoughts

Sunrise and sunset may awake us for the briefest instants

nights are no longer truly dark and the days are too long, too hot and too loud

New found love illuminates our worlds and fills us with great joy

And then the ash of indifference begins to slowly, thickly, coat it all

The apple tree then blossoms and stands outstretched in a silent exultation

But for months stands gray and wet and naked in the freezing rain

Somewhere, by dint of sheer persistence, a people toddles forward

The mass of us roil on, enveloped in dirt and greed and hate

Somewhere a masterpiece gives rise to a momentary superposition

Elsewhere the fecal tide rolls in a little thicker and higher every day

In a quiet glade, a gentle mother softly licks her newborn fawn

Meanwhile, in surrounding areas, smoky fires burn and diesels roar

One child in a million casts off the chains of poverty, pollution and neglect

Generations without hope share a dirty cycle of need, crime and disease

A man works very carefully for many years and fulfills his one small dream

The masses vapidly follow only the flickering of electronic images

For the briefest moments gentle north light fills our souls

Throughout the crushing work day we are forced to stare into the sun

Our memories are scattered pearls we hope one day to string together

Reality is a strangling vacuum closing in from all directions

A strange and compelling bird cry haunts our thoughts for a brief moment

Commercials blare forever and the laugh tracks never cease

An oarlock squeaks and the water drips upon the twilight dappling a quiet lake

The rain washes used oil from our cars into every little stream and river

The peaceful smell of moist wet spring earth awakens our better instincts

Our children prefer to stay inside gorging on fast food and electronic media

Facts learned about our universe provide a moment of perspective

Truth ground into us daily covers us with a soot that we cannot wash away

Considered opinions adapt like plants to changes in the sunlight

The average impulse purchase provides about twenty seconds satisfaction

Our better instincts serve as measuring sticks for the progress in our pilgrimage

Our overwhelming greed pits us against each other and the earth

A couple work their lives away sharing a dream of golden years

But far too soon one is stricken down and the other shrivels up

Children find an enchanted forest just outside their new home

Soon, however, come the bulldozers to smash and flatten and develop

The gurgle of the smallest stream gives comfort to those who lie sleeping

In the baleful light of Monday there is no time for contemplation

The smile upon an infant’s face lights and warms the entire room

Greed and indifference trample all the helpless little plants

Fathers teach the boys to fish and to preserve the lake for their sons

Armies teach each generation even better ways to kill and destroy

One small light gives comfort in a dark and empty countryside

The vast and pointless city glow simply hides the message in a starry night

A single action adventure story stimulates our imaginations

An endless stream of loud repetitions overwhelms and dulls our senses

Petty bureaucrats, caught at minor crimes, quickly lose our faith and trust

The large-scale lie repeated endlessly is slowly adopted as a working truth

A climax forest achieves maturity after many a dignified succession

Decisions made without much thought often prove difficult to undo

Small wild animals go on purposefully with the only business that they know

Species remain oblivious to the pointless extinction they undergo

Cherry tree stands with its raised branches in a crescendo of blossoms

Soulless heavy machinery gores blindly into the surrounding earth

Baker tends the sourdough starter with a reverent admiration

Corporate farms spread designer crops to pump up this quarter’s stock price

Once we cruised a scenic highway towards an enchanted destination

Now every day we idle for hours in the same anonymous lines of traffic

The ballet of a hummingbird traces a cosmic pattern in the air

Blind greed forms the very core of our best theory of economics

Just a tiny bit of soap could wash the little children’s faces

A gritty dust settles over all of us, from every direction, all the time

In early spring the birds return and begin to sing at dawn

The traffic roars by forever and the litter piles up down in the swale

The day emerges full of promise, still wet with its dewy afterbirth

Then noise and confusion from every direction carve out our insides, once again

Odd moments return to almost nag us in dreams not quite remembered

All our thoughts are slightly yellowed by this dreary, daily immolation

We win some of the smallest battles in the hopeless war that can never end

We fight the good fight daily despite the darkness that is encroaching from all sides

Echoes sweep right on through me

The calls of the crows feel as if they are moving through me from side to side

Coming back, I notice that my last thoughts had arisen from a different place

Fading in and out with a quiet mantra and warm sun upon my feet

Echoes sweep right on through me, feeling like peaceful, rolling waves

As my consciousness erodes, another state of being fills my brain again

Sometimes a twitch or spasm joins these two worlds for just a moment

At some invisible boundary I pass from not really thinking to not quite dreaming

With luck I move between them enjoying a state of grace, for minutes at a time

For then, with tension and worry pushed beyond arms length, there is no fear

Even the most awful circumstances are factored, reduced and abstracted

Almost sleeping, and not really awake, ebbing and flowing between their two shores

Moving back and forth between breath control and autonomic respirations

Pushing off and letting go, to drift out in some slow and gentle current

Bumping back to shore to hazily and briefly note the things I felt and saw

Like the cat that purrs at intervals before falling deep into kicking dreams

Gnawing anxiety and even pain are somehow isolated and left behind

There comes a disconnect that surprises and cannot be controlled

Looking back, one never sees exactly where the paths diverged

Accustomed to a total darkness we could only fear the sun

We can find no success greater than our most miserable failure

Death cannot even visit where no life is to be found

Even when none are beautiful we still choose the fairest from them all

Where all are obese, the least heavy is deemed to be quite thin

Our greatest victory always implies their equally agonizing loss

We can be no more uplifted than we have already been debased

If I can love with all my heart so can I hate with all my soul

If there existed no humility neither would we witness excess pride

The deeper my laughter the more rending could be my tears

Without knowing any sorrow, how much joy could we really feel?

Without such sickness they do not appreciate their better health so much

If most are blind, those who see even blurry shapes are deemed true visionaries

If war is our natural state then our peace must still be full of strife

The biggest lies always somehow ring with some tinge of truth

I would not recognize the greedy were I not raised by the generous

Water only satisfies us to the degree of our thirst

They love best the rain those who have been through the entire drought

They will not call out the evil if they do not know the good

To appreciate such a spring as this you must have been here for the winter

The instant of creation ensures an absolute and certain death

Small as we are, we view some among us as true giants

Little satisfaction comes without enduring some long-held desire

If all we ever heard was music, what would we think of this piercing noise?

Accustomed to a total darkness we could only fear the sun

No one knows an old thing if they have never seen the new

One knows not what it means to take if they haven’t been taken from

He does not know he hurts someone if he feels no pain himself

I did not know I had always felt bad until I grew a little better

A different future cannot be crafted should we choose to ignore the past