Where Am I?

Where Am I?
Feb 19, 2010

Where Am I?
Feb 19, 2010



Where am I?
Yes, I know…California, planet earth,
solar system, milky way, local galactic group,
Great Wall Galactic structure, further strings and shapes of galaxies
in structures too big to see, yet, part of a thing
called Universe, and then , then…
where am I? Large or small, or in between?
fractal geometry reveals that size
is meaningless, macro is the same exact shape
as micro, and if that is true,
the “where” of am I could put me at the very center
of….of what? Not too big, not too small, just right?
If our universe “banged” some fourteen billion years ago,
then evolved into the shape we now see,
this universe is temporary, it’s passing on through,
truckin’ down the road. What’s fourteen billion years?
Nothing much. An expanse of time. It’s not Forever.
So where am I? Let’s leave alone the “what am I?” question.
I have a feeling that the Where will reveal the What and the What
will reveal the Where, but man, this thing is complex and subtle.
Wrap your mind around the most brilliant idea EVER thought,
an idea that dwarfs Einstein’s most stunning insight,
an idea that has Steven Hawking playing with wooden blocks
that have letters carved in simple relief, “A”, “B”, “C”,
that’s very good Steven, very good Albert
very good deepest thinkers of our world,
you’ve gotten us off our tricycles,
but we don’t know where we are, don’t know what we are,
and surely don’t know why we are,
so it looks like I’m going to have to keep asking,
I mean doesn’t EVERYBODY ask?
Maybe not everybody but a lot of us would like to know
and we put all these frustrations into books
and call them religions and maybe they soothe the frustration a little
but they don’t put a face on my location in the scheme of things
so I just want to grab this super smart Intelligence, Force, Creator,
Joker, whatever it is, grab it by the collar and say just like a movie tough guy,
“Hey! Where am I? I want some answers! Quit fucking around!
Can’t you show us a formula, an artifact, a document that’s less ambiguous than Koran Bible Torah, send an angel or flying saucer person, or something to change me from frustrated to fulfilled?
Can’t you do that right now, huh?”
Uh oh. I know I’m not as smart as Einstein much less this thing that casually
tosses universes out like a tennis ball machine, bang!
whoops we missed, Bang! There it goes again. Universes all over the place that support life, no, encourage life!
This is not someone you grab by the collar and get tough with, anything could happen. And does. Everything happens!
It makes me kind of tired. My eyelids droop from the effort of all this
ravenous curiosity.
I think I’ll go to sleep. Maybe I’ll find the answer in a dream.
Wouldn’t it be funny if I had that dream,
and then couldn’t remember it?

Everything Is In A Look

Everything ã1999
written 1972

Arthur Rosch



Everything is in a look.
Yet still, everything
is in looking away.
Unable to breathe suns from each other,
we turn to contemplate
lonely space,
and wash our hearts
with what warmth remains.
And again, that look,
rending the cosmos,
pours from the vat of creation
in our eyes.
The unspeakable love dashes its silences
to death,
against the perimeters of our exiles.
Yet, and there is always a yet,
to be born, to be resurrected
in a touch. The miracle is
that my skin was made to meet your skin,
that unknowable lightnings are our servants
to carry the burdens of love and loneliness.
Somehow my universe gathers energy
and spreads, with the vague arms of an amoeba
to some call on the horizon.
No matter that horizons always receed;
for if you too were to will your stars and dust
towards the furthest reach,
perhaps we would meet on some plain
lit by the ecstasy of celestial collision.
And perhaps we must die
to know each other.

Look! I would fling off my skin
like a cloak,
to show you the sun that burns within.
But as it is, only my face,
and what desperate radiations that can pass
through this terrible cloak
may reach you.
Know me! Know me!
Not by my escapes into smiles
but by my facelessness,
too full to shine,
too lonely to weep.
We are infinity
yet the mystery is always a deeper note
than we can hear.
Hearken to the remotest timbre,
it rises from our source
but hides its silence.
Listen to the mask of music,
behold the facade of suns,
yet be ready to fling them away
to peer into the depth beyond depth.
Love only wears faces to entice us
in our simplicity.
God dons the robe of the cosmos
that we may not plunge into her nakedness
before we ourselves are naked love.

A Worthy Destination

A Worthy Destination
Jan 28, 2003
revised Feb 15, 2010




I haven’t found peace.
I don’t own peace,
rent peace,
buy or sell peace,
though I do encounter peace
from time to time.
Peace is like a friend
who comes for a surprise visit.
As my life takes on a shape
in which peace feels comfortable
I see peace more often.
Peace is not easily found in this world.
Peace comes like an accident,
a good mishap.
Peace lands in my heart like
a bird that’s raised its young
and is looking for a new place to nest.
I thought I would know peace by now,
but it’s taking longer than I expected.
The biggest problem is my mind.
It’s like a bag turned inside out, its contents
are the world, spilled and crazy.
Peace is not comfortable
in the world. When I’m with peace, I feel as though I’ve brought a guest
to the kind of party
that’s broken up by the cops after midnight.
I need to make peace more welcome here.
I should send peace an invitation, find a good solid tree
where peace can perch and sing
before taking flight
to a more worthy destination.