The moment of non-existence ? The Brain.

That moment of nature when, 

as I suddenly look out of a window 

and see the tree 

that has been standing there 

for all the years I've known it, 

and there it is again, 

but this time I forget myself, 

as one does when taken into the embrace of a lover, 

abandoned thoughts, 

all senses taken up with the now of being, 

absorbed into some other-ness; 

in this case almost a part of the tree, 

as my eyes wander over its individual structures 

and arabesques of needled swaying twigs, 

the firm strength of the trunk 

with its decorative scales 

becomes so powerful, 

the one hanging pine cone 

on the very end of a branch 

left by the squirrel, 

it being too far out to reach, 

one dew drop 

on its end. 

Then I am an element, 

not human, 

not plant 

and yet not of any substance, 

lost in the particle-theatre 

of this most fascinating and wonderful world, 

an essence of being 

or ...? 

Those are precious moments in life, 

that cannot be dialled up, 

bought 

or otherwise conjured up 

in the inner senses of the mind, 

they appear unexpectedly 

and fill one with a wondrous feeling of existence 

by paradoxically 

also giving one the feeling that one doesn't exist, 

at least not as the entity one recognises as 

the me.

Such ephemeral moments, 

so baffling to the understanding, 

as if the brain were in limbo, 

absorbed into the vision or

the body of the other, 

light as air, 

floating, 

blown high up 

into the magic of the minds eye, 

deep 

there 

always present, 

the sensitivity of the instrument 

we so admire, 

the brain 

and we have one 

and we can use it, 

but not half of its possibilities has been tapped, 

so what are you hiding 

brain? 

You give us glimpses 

of your multitudinous possibilities, 

and yet we cover it with outward entertainment 

and drugs 

that dull those very senses 

that could give us lives that spin 

and dazzle; 

there in each person 

are so many mind-boggling latent joys

just waiting to have their doors 

flung open, 

and we ignore them 

with the banal lives we muddle along in, 

each day grumbling about this and that, 

when there it is 

this magic wand, 

this fairy godmother of a brain 

that has so much in it 

it would take a million years to find out 

the whole of it.

The curtain of the mind, 

the brain, 

sways in the breezes and tempests 

of this life we live, 

only parting 

in tiny cracks 

to let the sight of what its worth show through, 

like the glints of light on the surface of the sea, 

so numerous 

and yet intangible 

in the great mass of dark waters 

that make up our muddy experiences 

of mundane repetition 

and drudge.

Is that what we create religions for?

Is that why we take drugs,

Is that why we crave entertainment.

Because we have not 

the simple intelligence 

to use this instrument wisely.

Is that what love can lead us to understand?

Love of our own faculties 

our brain, 

love of nature, 

love of another, 

love of all peoples 

love of this magical unbelievable planet

this baffling universe 

and the ever recreating ability 

of all living things.

This is a simple thought and yet one that seems relevant and needs reviewing occasionally, the simple is often the most hidden? Ann of Norway