Motosai Meditation

Wow...I'm all ABOUT the poetry right now!

Living in Asia has inspired me to meditate daily--a practice that has changed my entire life. Sometimes, however, I oversleep or have difficulty fitting it in, so I do it on my way to and from work. And, well, seeing as how my main form of transportation nowadays is a motorcycle taxi, I frequently meditate while balancing on the back of one.

This poem is the product of one of these mobile meditation sessions. 'Cause, well, there's just no excuse to skip meditating!

How to meditate on the back of a motorcycle

Close your eyes
Smell bursts
Shrimp, garlic, jasmine
Feel the driver balanced in front of you
Like a pot sprouting lazy leaves and
Pinpricks of color like anointed eyelids, resting

Trust.

Thrust your head upward under cranes and scaffolding and a night without stars
As the motorcycle jerks in its self-preservation
And its gasping movement reverberates
In the deep, dark seed of your belly
Expanding and contracting in pure presence
Cells thick with earth and time transforming the urban air

Breathe.

And the grief swells up and joins the oily neon
Sliding under the transient darkness of closed eyes
Eyelashes grip each other like hands in prayer and
The grief makes the night electric and real,
Feelings and thoughts scattered on iridescent waves,
Hardening in the dense chasm of this moment
This moment
And the grief rises and falls until
It is carried away on the stooped backs of headlights, of smoke
Carried away until all that remains of it
Are your outstretched arms,
Reaching for it

Release.

Eyes open
Heart slows
Coins tumble into an open palm.
Kap khun ka.

Gratitude.