Attach

For a very long time I have pushed the idea of "detachment". A mindset that is apart, that is solitary, a single shimmering spark - free from the consequence of everything, because its heart is not intertwined in the dramatic, glittering details of life.
Its a good theory... Much is avoided, so many sufferings - perhaps too much. The detachment from pain, the detachment from possession, the detachment from ownership, from loyalty, from friendship, detachment from love. Perhaps too much? I think so.

Detaching oneself from the sufferings and the pleasures of existence is like a rock in a river, determined to avoid the water which surrounds it. It struggles and pushes and attempts to be dry.. and yet it was never meant to be. It belongs to the river; is the river - is made to be wet, made to be roughed and tumbled and smoothed. It is the gray, rough wildness of earth; neighbor to salvation and to Ecstasy and to freedom.

I am wondering more and more intently about "attachment". The more I contemplate it, the more I am compelled to explore the intricacies of my involvement in life; instead of maintaining a resolute avoidance. I'm interested in pursuing a healthy, complete, and unreserved attachment to this moment. For the first time, I am pro-attachment - and it feels amazing.

What does that mean to me?
I want to suggest an attachment to life that is healthy, real and deliberate. An attachment based on truth - two truths actually:
1.) I deserve nothing.
2.) All that is life - is fleeting.

An attachment based on those two principals... changes everything; it changes what I love, what I pursue, what I enjoy, what I speak, it allows me to completely touch the corners of humanity of sensuality, of happiness and no longer be afraid.
No longer afraid. That is a good place to roar. I think the major difficulty with "de-tachment" is the constant fear of allowing life to somehow reach my soul. When I am trying to detach myself.. I cannot love, I cannot care, I cannot breathe too much or swim too deeply.. because I might be affected. That is almost unbearable. It is a cold, ruthless choice, that saves us from suffering, and at the same time starves us from joy.
In the arms of "healthy attachment" I can smile.. I can hold and touch all those things that were always so detached, so far away. There is no longer fear, because the objects and experiences of life do not hold value in themselves anymore... I give them true value.

A healthy look at attachment: (the one I'd like to pursue)
I am attached to the world, I love it - the people, the places, the days. I enjoy it, I share and smile and wander among all the splendid wildness.. but I do not cling; not to my own life nor anyone else' - because we are all living on sacred, undeserved time. I own possessions like I own water. I am attached only to the beauty that is mine for an instant - be it the sails of a boat, be it a bicycle in a park, be it my health, be it money. This way.. I am not lost. I am not destitute and cold and untouchable. I am touched very much, but I am not owned; never owned. Never a slave.

I long to attach.
Part of my heart beats for it. To be in this world to feel it between my fingers, in my hair, on my skin... to be like the rock in the river, letting the water saturate me - letting it find my rough edges and my stone back and my dusty eyes and my hot dry mouth. This life was made to touch.. a healthy touch.. a touch that knows it deserves nothing, a touch that knows the fleeting and impermanence of these days. I want that attachment.





(Andrew Tipton)

You and I

I remember meeting a surfer in Santa Cruz - my first time there to camp and surf. We were both out in the waves, breathes heavy from the icy cold water. My hands numb, my lips colorless yet pressed up into a half-way smile. It was mid morning, and the sun was shimmering through layers of silver clouds. There was a mist everywhere.. all around the beaches, up in the Redwoods - everywhere. It was the sort of morning when you aren't sure if you're in a dream, or actually there; the sort of day when nothing fills your mind except your own throbbing heartbeat.
I remember sitting on my board, feeling the ocean under my body, feeling it around my body, over my body.. like it was my body - like I hadn't "arrived" in a perfect place, but instead I had "become" a perfect place.
The other surfer glanced over at me.. flashed a grin, and started paddling in my direction. He came about six feet away and sat up on his board. "How's it going?", he asked. I just nodded. He smiled a genuine smile and then looked back out towards the waves. We never said anything else. We spent hours out there.. in the fullness of the waves. Surfing together, enjoying our existence together, finding peace together, laughter, our own happiness.
At dusk, as the sun was just hitting the top of the ocean, when all the oranges and deep purples and explosions of color consume your eyes, I paddled back to the shore. I stood on the beach for a moment shivering, smiling, and silent; wrapped my leash around my board, and gave a peace sign to the other surfer.. still out in the waves, he returned the gesture.

It is for only an instant that our lives touch as you and I. Whoever you might be. Perhaps you are the surfer in the Santa Cruz waves that day; you are the clerk at the gas station in Winslow Arizona when i bought that HERSHEY bar; you are the beautiful art student from Bennington that seduced my eyes; you are the vagabond in the back seat of my van that shared his whiskey; you are the hippie girl in the campsite next to mine at Bryce Canyon; you are the drummer on Kalakaua street in Oahu; you are a story in my story - and I am just a story in yours. How will that story go? Sometimes I forget about all the pieces that make up existence; that make up our stories. Those moments and those friends that are only an instant - those humans who were a flicker in my heart without a second thought. But that is a story too. What I say, what I do, what I speak about; my thoughts, my touch, my motion - it all becomes part of you; part of us. Like magic, the smallest gesture or smile sinks into our souls and shapes our days, it changes who we are, and how we view one another. Forever I will be etched into your mind, into your story, and remembered for that very brief interaction; for those simple movements.
How beautiful, to pursue even the smallest stories with awe? The seemingly insignificant details of the day, with bewilderment? If it is true.. if our lives are indeed all that we do, then even the friendship that only lasts 30seconds is a remarkable one. All of it is simply remarkable.






(Andrew Tipton)

Poems for the Deaf

We threw all our fears away; To be with the wild things there.
You wear in two.
You and I, hungry and free, tasted the day.
We get lost only when we're broken.
Remember, we threw all our fears away.
Of this life and the next.
Maybe I don't know Christ,
Peter forget me upstairs,
I want the world.
There is none worth chasing,
Maybe I don't know Christ.
I want the world; fight to own you more.
Look at me quietly - sounds of the world.
Try to catch her eye,
Smooth, tasted, minds,
Down, inside the grass,
Perfect circles. Shapes of Thought.
Down here in the grass.
I've seen mouths moving, the clueless own the wind.
Play with my favorite pony, play the way I used to love.
Daring rebel pistols.
Remember it well; tremble between the daydreams.
Camden was the color of thunder, seal me in.
Save the sail boats too.
Save the wood that makes the bow.
Sunken inside a sail, I want the people to say - Paint the walls red.
Deep Crimson.
I broke you every day; Someone
broke my belief. Broke my dance.
We don't sail anymore.
Paint the walls blue
Paint tomorrow twice.
Your voice reminds me of Champagne.
So good to drink dark flannel mystique - alcohol of your voice runs down deep.
Take out my lungs, replace them with lust.
One two three. Two one three.
And again.
I melt into the season and move slowly.
Steal my omen; steal my pages, inside of my book.
Choose to be desperate.
Choose to be forsaken.
Choose the destitute curve of love.
Not what I know. Not what I wander to find.
Deeply in my unbroken spirit - I am a captive of the glossy glass fragile love.
Crack the vase; explore the broken pieces.
Blue chips and sharp edges. Blue poker chips, buy a naked beautiful girl.
Sunflower stains on silk sheets.
A wonder, a thought about the souls of dolphins.
Swim through these teal waves.
Swim through the complexity of words and find me.
Me. And my dangerous dark brown eyes.
I speak out loud to the homeless and to the deaf;
Just saying it, means everything.

Suadela

Slipping beneath her tongue.. Between the edges of rose petal lips; I am a deliberate sweat; the honest panting and the tremor of your caves. A traitor to ordinary; slave to the seduction of rivers – always running to the sea.
/ She seduces my bare kiss with the promise of a sunrise. Crimson gold meteor showers; birth of my unyielding lust.
/ Oceans envy her. The depth of her mysteries; fireflies marvel at her glow; she is the hushed murmur of jaguars; Female child, diamond of earth.
/ Gentle sway with the graces of west Indian jasmine, bronze legs and the soft tips of her elegant fingers. Barefoot, running through my throbbing veins; heir to volcanoes.
/ The beautiful curve of her arched back; chin tiled back; eyes tight shut; her mouth pressed against my heart, beating fast, breathe quick.
/Devour my mind.. devour my rebellious dreams and my dark brown eyes. Obey no one; only remember the thirst that guides your naked tongue and your lust for raindrops. you are the daughter of enchantment;
/ Sapphire of my tiger dreams.