Please, Would a Shambhala Warrior Borrow My Pen?

                                
                                                                    source

I.

When all of life is threatened,
and barbarians are strutting through
the halls of power,
when our future survival hangs by a thread,
it is said that is when the Shambhala warriors
will arrive.

They are bodhisattvas, beings of peace.
You may not recognize them -
(or you might: check out Joe Kennedy III
and Barack Obama. Look for eyes that shine
with empathy and compassion).
The Shambhala Warriors
will walk the corridors of power
armed with two weapons
- compassion and insight.
With courage and integrity,
they will dismantle the ways of death,
and lead us on a new path,
for the time has come
for a great Turning.

II.

When you feel this earth grief we carry
is too much to bear, take heart.
It is because you care
that you are alive at just this moment,
to assist the transformation
from the patriarchal to the divine feminine.
Women are rising up everywhere,
planting trees and gardens,
cleaning streams and beaches,
standing guard to protect the sacred waters.

Women are wise in the ways
of growing things: food, animals, children.
Women understand that all things
are connected, each of us
a strand in the web of life.

Mother Earth is speaking to us, now,
with all of her voices.
Let us hear her, add our voices to hers,
and heal this world back together again.

Bodhisattva Warriors come in all shapes and sizes.
You will recognize them
by their peaceful countenance,
and their ready smile. They are kind.
One may offer you a seat on the bus,
when it is packed and you are tired.

They are gentle. In the midst of discord,
shouting, crisis and panic,
watch for the one who is still,
who observes, then tries to help,
if he can.

You can tell a bodhisattva by the way they see
the good in human nature. They are peaceful warriors,
who spread compassion, rather than further conflict.
They will give the little they have
to those who need it more,
and be grateful for the giving.

III.

Bodhisattvas believe that, with kindness and love,
the crooked way can be made straight,
and the rough road made smooth*.

The best thing about a bodhisattva
is he doesn't know he is a bodhisattva.
He is humble, kind and serene, and,
when his out-stretched hand
is dealt a blow, he forgives
and quietly moves on.

This planet is peopled
with undiscovered bodhisattvas.
Their prayers keep us floating through space,
balance the toppling poles,
and bridge the distance between heaven and earth.

Their message is to turn from violence to virtue
before the Kingdom of Shambhala arrives.

 (* from Ecclesiastes)

IV.

Under the bodhi tree, the Buddha woke up.
May this whole world awaken.
Gandhi spoke of "the uplift of all".
In Sri Lanka, Buddhists speak of
everyone "waking up by working together".

The man-made ills of this world, they tell us,
can be mind-solved.

My friends, what world
shall we dream into being together?
Let us all become Shambhala warriors.
Let us write a new path into tomorrow
with our Shambhala pens,

open our eyes, our dreams, our vision
to the web of life to which we all belong.
With all of the sorrow, and hope and
love in our hearts, let us help our planet heal.

We have never felt so far from peace,
yet, somewhere up ahead, perhaps on the other side
of cataclysm, calamity and immense suffering,
I dream of a new world, shining and green,
dotted with buffalo, and trees,
and peaceful folk who have learned how to live
with respect for the land and its creatures.

In those times, whales will no longer starve.
The living waters will run clean, and wolves and bears 
will once again have forests in which to live.

We are alive in the times
of which the ancestors spoke.
I am waiting for the Shambhala warriors
to arrive. One lived in my pen
for a bit this afternoon. We dreamed
sweet dreams together
of the world that Could Be.

Some day, I dream, there will be
the thousand years of peace
we have been promised.
Not in my time, not in yours,
but I hold that vision in my heart,
to comfort me through these times
when it seems the whole wide world
has finally gone mad.


Many great Buddhist masters have prophesied that, when the forces of aggression amass on earth and no reason can turn them back, the kingdom of Shambhala will open its gates and its enlightened warriors will come forth into battle. Whoever they encounter will be given a choice -- turn from non-virtue to virtue or, by direct, wrathful intervention, be liberated into a pure land beyond suffering. 

It seems, now, given the right-wing, corporate-funded powers in many countries, that we will not make the conscious shift we need in time, but only after passing through terrible times of hardship, in response to cataclysmic events. But Mother Earth will heal. One day she will begin again.

for my prompt at earthweal: Consciousness Raising During the Apocalyplse. Hope and reality make strange bedfellows, but it's all we've got.