Would you believe, my lovable, lovely wife— should I leave first, this grace filled sphere of life— that all the words of love I’ve ever written/said can never/ever become dead? For even beyond whatever life they’ll have within your soul, they’ll also always live within whatever cosmic speck or spark becomes my role. Yes, I do believe we both know the truth of this, and deep within our knowing rests one infinite, eternal, sweetheart kiss.
Written by Bill in the 1980s or 1990s
I have finally scanned Bill’s book in as a PDF. A few of the pages are missing (November 2012), but I hope to find them soon.
Cafe Ariel, 12/28/92
Dear All,
My life has been a slow unfolding of the last gift I received from my Father. On his death bed one day in 1952 he told me that “second wind always comes”. He was speaking specifically to cross-country running. But as I have persevered on my sometimes soaring, sometimes stuttering personal peace pilgrimage, I have learned that the truth of “second wind” blows everywhere, always.
It is as simple as the rhythm of inhaling and exhaling once, twice…who knows how many times? It is as simple as sunrise and sunset – as winter, spring, summer, fall.
It is as tangible and miraculous, for me, as:
Then sudden deaths of two good friends recently within weeks of each other, the memorial service celebration for one in Paradise, California, and the coincidental visit to the Trampleasure family plot in Sunset View Cemetery in Corning, California, have added the only amendment necessary to find doctrine of “second wind”. The time comes, for us all, when “second wind” fades and suddenly it is the sustaining presence of “afterglow” that lights our way. (See “Frank and Ernest” comic attached.) [ed: I’ll try to find this and attach it]
As this poet once wrote, “go and glow, touch and torch”.
Peace, love, shalom, hallelujah, Bill
P.S. 1993’s 5th Sundays (1/31, 5/30, 8/29, 10/31) from 7:30 to 9:30 pm shall be Second Wind/Afterglow evenings at 1423. Join us? And join my gentle crusade to “Take Back the Mails” from domination by bulk business mail (“junk”) by writing more love letters, letters to editors and goverments, friendly postcards and such. TBTM!
love
is what matters
love
is what counts
win, lose or draw
it’s love
that amounts
to something
to everything
to all
in this life
so let’s live
and let love
* * *
here and now
we love and live
or here and now
we die
no far, fair land
no time sublime
beneath some cloudless sky
but here and now
wind blown,
storm tossed
we live
through love
then die
* * *
“Love endures all things”
but love likes to laugh and smile, too
and love doesn’t need all the things we do
just to prove that it can endure them
like flowers
they may need us to manure them
sometimes
but sun and rain
and even a kind word or gentle touch
have been heard to add much
to the blooming miracle
Bill wrote this poem “it must have been in the 60’s.” I recorded him reading it in 2008, then added the images to create this video.
Bill distributed these four poems on a flier in March of 1991. His introductions are in above each.
Dear friends,
Poetry has been good for me lately. This first day of spring seems right for collecting a few and sharing them with some of you. I owe some of you written copies of one or another of these. Others of you I simply share these with as time and circumstances (including our April trip East) permit.
Peace/love, Bill
(Asilomar, by the sea, 12-9-90, with friend Jon).
All engulfing song of surf, all encompassing, sequined sky - my ears and eyes applaud as my soul heaves sigh after sigh after deep and wide sigh.
(On my mail route, 2-4-91, after a lovely, clumsy moment shared with a beautiful human being, one of my postal patrons)
How long do we have to say anything? How long do we have to wonder if these words or those words are right or wrong? How long do we have to discover there may be no right, no wrong? How long do we have to embrace silence? How long do we have to discover there may be all the time we need? How long do we have to wonder how long we have?
(On Mt. Tamalpais, March 4th, 1991, early in the morning in a wild storm, by myself, near a cabin called “Peace in the Woods” where I was sharing a weekend with friends Jon, Bill and Frank)
March forth, dance on and sign your song. March forth dance on, the journey's long. March forth, dance on and as you do, remember, friend, somewhere, I'm marching, dancing, singing, too.
(First Unitarian Church of Berkeley, 2-24-91, during and after the 8:30 am Meditation Service, as later published and illustrated in the News Bulletin of the church)
Two chairs by the "In Memoriam" wall, in dialogue, in relationship. No persons present, but what presence of spirit of souls of silence as the phoenix takes wing between the songs of the windblown branches and leaves of the deeply rooted many trees of life.
I have a rosy view out to Talmapais and the Golden Gate where the mountain meets the sea. The Sleeping Princess may yet swing free out through the GAte to an ocean of emotion with a peaceful bent. Perhaps all of time has been well spent. A single rose a single word a single silent space A single woman single man A coupled life embrace. Two persons commune on the Rose Garden bench, letting their fingers do the talking. All around silent roses sign to us of life's joyful beauty embracing its thorny perplexities and paradoxes.
(By Bill, the postal poet, in celebration of the Berkeley Rose Garden’s first half-century. 1987)
