In That We Share

This is the first book in the series, based initially on personal experiences past and present, but there is a moving beyond this into an exploration and defining of the that that we share.

to and from

Come with me and be my love,
all I need is in your eyes,
I will give you all you seek,
all I am is what you see,
what you are and see in me.

On occasions when writing these books I found the process overwhelming, and ventured out, usually alone, to escape what was happening, but I was still Seeing, sometimes with a sweet clarity.

The following poem describes an encounter at a restaurant/night club in Byron Bay on a quiet Saturday night.

Conversations at Cocomangas

She just stood there at the window,
looking searchingly out into the crowd
milling outside,
her eyes turning and twitching,
waiting for the face she wanted
to be familiar.
She chattered edgily, nervously,
wondering where, what and why,
boyfriend, beau, lover or love,
past, no more, or still to be.

She was a heroine from a silent movie,
with a sweet, appealing innocence,
her movements a little jumpy,
using simple dialogue, easy to follow,
but self-absorbed, and predictable.

She was waiting for:
the ship that comes in,
love left that was no more,
dreams lived and dreamt for,
for the friend who never comes,
for the one who is always there,
at the end of the queue,
always there,
still waiting,
for you.

from In That We Share
by John Stuart

At Byron

Late night sidewalk,
drums, drumming, drumming, drumming,
an insistent, growing intensity.
A gathering crowd,
local identities and non-entities,
old hippies and feral folk,
an international flavour,
the backpacker brigade,
surrounding the sound,
surrendering to the source.
In the center,
gyrating gypsied women,
jangling bellies bouncing,
pulsating, releasing,
from the blood,
bodies being being,
minds going gone.
Tribal exuberance.
And on the fringes of the frenzy,
onlookers, scattered passers-by,
polite peoples, British boys,
circling casually, curiously,
listfully longing
for the beat still there,
here and now, always there,
always there, when we care,
always there, if we dare.
In pulsing and throbbing together,
a letting go, forever.

from In That We Share
by John Stuart

One

Wanting one, only one,
only one for once only,
now.
Being one, as one,
always one, forever one,
now.
Once upon a time one,
wanting one, one more time,
now.

More and more joys refrain,
poignancy pushing pulsing pain,
all from wanting all to gain.
In seeking the I of the he and she,
and searching to see the we of me,
everywhere else but the always be.

One, in becoming, being.
seeing to find the always divine,
in one flower, one tear,
in one drop of dew,
a graceful embracing
of the universe of you.

One,
in wonder,
worshipping,
a sacred sharing,
in every glimpse in every glance,
in every movement an eternal dance,
in every flickering in every flame,
in every part in every game,
in every action in every act,
in every breath in being that,
that has always been and will always be,
you I us we,
totally inclusively, absolutely exclusively,
one being one seeing,
me being be,
now,
one.

from In That We Share
by John Stuart

The Golden Thread

Questing, searching watching waiting,
seeing sensing giving taking,
rituals reflecting what I can,
releases revealing what I am.

Beyond the temporal and the physical,
all powers of the mind,
the source that seeks that to find,
an eternal reality the objective,
but experiencing truth is subjective.

What does this mean?
where are we going?
I've had enough toing and froing.
We live in this world, defined in the mind,
we are all as one, in kith and kind,
each seeing this, in our own way,
and In That We Share, dare I say.
We see in the past where we now are,
our source being the birth of a star,
but bitter truths we need to swallow,
or living life is empty, hollow.

continued ...

from Sharing In That
by John Stuart