River of Dreams

By Billy Joel

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
From the mountains of faith
To the river so deep

I must be lookin' for something
Something sacred I lost
But the river is wide
And it's too hard to cross

Even though I know the river is wide
I walk down every evening and stand on the shore
I try to cross to the opposite side
So I can finally find what it is I've been looking for

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
Through the valley of fear
To a river so deep

I've been searching for something
Taken out of my soul
Something I'd never lose
Something somebody stole

I don't know why I go walking at night
But now I'm tired and I don't want to walk anymore
I hope it doesn't take the rest of my life
Until I finally find what it is I've been looking for

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
Through the jungle of doubt
To the river so deep

I know I'm searching for something
Something so undefined
That it can only be seen
By the eyes of the blind
In the middle of the night

I’m not sure about a life after this
God knows I've never been a spiritual man
Baptized by the fire, I wade into the river
That is runnin' to the promised land

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
Through the desert of truth
To the river so deep

We all end in the ocean
We all start in the streams
We're all carried along
By the river of dreams
In the middle of the night

Sonnets to Orpheus,

Sonnet 1.1 

By Rainer Maria Rilke (tr. Stephen Mitchell)
    

A tree ascended there. Oh pure transcendence!
Oh Orpheus Sings! Oh tall tree in the ear!
And all things hushed. Yet even in that silence
a new beginning, beckoning, change appeared.

Creatures of stillness crowded from the bright
unbound forest, out of their lairs and nests;
and it was not from any dullness, not
from fear, that they were so quiet in themselves,

but from simply listening. Bellow, roar, shriek
seemed small inside their hearts. And where there had been
just a makeshift hut to receive the music,

a shelter nailed up out of their darkest longing,
with an entryway that shuddered in the wind—
you built a temple deep inside their hearing.
    

In the World Where I Live

By Hank Edson

In the world where I live
The flames arrange in petal folds
Silent small open passive
And Beauty gathers Beautiful holds
Together draws them closer tighter
Their fragrant pulp not fire smolder
But light that shines much brilliant brighter
In the sweet dark eyes of my beholder.

In the world where I live
The air resounds in buttery peals
The heart's doors swoon and simply give
Every fracture smoothes and heals
As lifted raised abandoned free
The pulse of being open files
Trumpeting through the heavenly glory
Enraptured song when Beauty smiles.

In the world where I live
The wave of auburn hair is law
Arching eyebrows soft and pensive
Command creation awaken awe
And the tender graceful definition
Of her cheekbones nose mouth and chin
Offer chaos complete compassion
Beautiful wise and feminine.

In the world where I live
A pure and perfect peace pervades
Man makes amends the gardens forgive
Great lakes grand canyons ever glades
Noble emotions spiritual grace
Life's pristine wilderness and soul
Reflecting Beauty's radiant face
In every being and as a whole.

In the world where I live
Each heart beat ripples throughout space
Each breath transforms is curative
Each moment breaks from its surface
Like a bather from a mountain lake
Into morning air alive and small
Keenly thrilled and wide awake
Hearing Beautiful profoundly call.

In the world where I live
My every cell is energy
Communicating and sensitive
Poised upon a single certainty
Announced within the heart of heart
That everything depends on her
That life itself must finally start
In Beautiful complete surrender

In the world where I live
Every heart devotedly serves
And every head is fugitive
Every poet tongue-tied observes
And every scientist loudly sings
Rhymes and prayers among the rooftops
How Beauty reigns how Beautiful brings
The beginnings of a love that never stops.

In the world where I live
A succession of prayers repeat
Resonant and consecutive
Thanksgiving and praise rise from the street
For Beautiful the whole world sighs
And there I walk and mix my plea
To become the light of Beauty's eyes
To be loved by her eternally.

Copyright © Hank Edson 2007

All I Want

By Joni Mitchell

I am on a lonely road and I am traveling
traveling, traveling, traveling
Looking for something, what can it be
Oh I hate you some, I hate you some
I love you some
Oh I love you when I forget about me
I want to be strong, I want to laugh along
I want to belong to the living
Alive, alive, I want to get up and jive
I want to wreck my stockings in some juke box dive
Do you want -- do you want -- do you want
to dance with me baby
Do you want to take a chance
on maybe finding some sweet romance with me baby
Well, come on

All I really really want our love to do
is to bring out the best in me and in you too
All I really really want our love to do
is to bring out the best in me and in you
I want to talk to you, I want to shampoo you
I want to renew you again and again
Applause, applause -- Life is our cause
When I think of your kisses
my mind see-saws
Do you see -- do you see -- do you see
how you hurt me baby
So I hurt you too
then we both get so blue

I am on a lonely road and I am traveling
looking for the key to set me free
Oh the jealousy, the greed is the unraveling
It's the unraveling
and it undoes all the joy that could be
I want to have fun, I want to shine like the sun
I want to be the one that you want to see
I want to knit you a sweater
Want to write you a love letter
I want to make you feel better
I want to make you feel free
Hmm, Hmm, Hmm, Hmm,
Want to make you feel free
I want to make you feel free

Eidólons

By Walt Whitman

          I met a seer,
Passing the hues and objects of the world,
The fields of art and learning, pleasure, sense,
          To glean of eidólons.

          Put in thy chants said he,
No more the puzzling hour nor day, nor segments, parts, put in,
Put first before the rest as light for all and entrance-song of all,
          That of eidólons.

          Ever the dim beginning,
Ever the growth, the rounding of the circle,
Ever the summit and the merge at last, (to surely start again,)
          Eidólons! Eidólons!

          Ever the mutable,
Ever materials, changing, crumbling, re-cohering,
Ever the ateliers, the factories divine,
          Issuing eidólons.

          Lo, I or you,
Or woman, man, or state, known or unknown,
We seeming solid wealth, strength, beauty build,
          But really build eidólons.

          The ostent evanescent,
The substance of an artist’s mood or savan’s studies long
Or warrior’s, martyr’s, hero’s toils,
          To fashion his eidólon.

          Of every human life,
(The units gather’d, posted, not a thought, emotion, deed, left out,)
The whole or large or small summ’d, added up,
          In its eidólon.

          The old, old urge,
Based on ancient pinnacles, lo, newer, higher pinnacles,
From science and the modern still impell’d,
          The old, old urge, eidólons.

          The present now and here,
America’s busy, teeming, intricate whirl,
Of aggregate and segregate for only thence releasing,
          To-day’s eidólons.

          These with the past,
Of vanish’d lands, of all the reigns of kings across the sea,
Old conquerors, old campaigns, old sailors’ voyages,
          Joining eidólons.

          Densities, growth, façades,
Strata of mountains, soils, rocks, giant trees,
Far-born, far-dying, living long, to leave,
          Eidólons everlasting.

          Exaltè, rapt, ecstatic,
The visible but their womb of birth,
Of orbic tendencies to shape and shape and shape,
          The mighty earth-eidólons.

          All space, all time,
(The stars, the terrible perturbations of the suns,
Swelling, collapsing, ending, serving their longer, shorter use,)
          Fill’d with eidólons only.

          The noiseless myriads,
The infinite oceans where the rivers empty,
The separate countless free identities, like eyesight,
          The true realities, eidólons.

          Not this the world,
Nor these the universes, they the universes,
Purport and end, ever the permanent life of life,
          Eidólons, eidólons,

          Beyond thy lectures learn’d professor,
Beyond thy telescope or spectroscope observer keen, beyond all mathematics,
Beyond the doctor’s surgery, anatomy, beyond the chemist with his chemistry,
          The entities of entities, eidólons.

          Unfix’d yet fix’d,
Ever shall be, ever have been and are,
Sweeping the present to the infinite future,
          Eidólons, eidólons, eidólons.

          The prophet and the bard,
Shall yet maintain themselves, in higher stages yet,
Shall mediate to the Modern, to Democracy, interpret yet to them,
          God and eidólons.

          And thee my soul,
Joys, ceaseless exercises, exaltations,
The yearning amply fed at last, prepared to meet,
          Thy mates, eidólons.

          The body permanent,
The body lurking there within thy body,
The only purport of the form thou art, the real I myself,
          An image, an eidólon.

          Thy very songs not in they songs,
No special strains to sing, none for itself,
But from the whole resulting, rising at last and floating,
          A round full-orb’d eidólon.