Category: Creative Writing

Life in Dialogue

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing, Creatrix20 Comments

Living is in our actions.
It is in our breaths,
our footsteps,
our pulses.

When we give a word, we extend our hands.
When we open our eyes to the written word,
we open up our ears, too.

When we read, we lend our shoulders.
When we read, we become tripods upholding a vision

Opening and closing
at just the right time,
to let in the light –

and just enough,
and not too much.

at once.

We      are       book-stands
for the young –
supporting small hands everywhere.

Let us support the growing, the honest, the innocent; the undefined.

The process.

*****

My life is long-lived and ripe.
I want to grow around you and all through you.
I am the vine of life.

Enjoy me speaking with you, through you.
Divining with you.

Together WE are God and Goddess.

Let none claim which is which.

For I am a witch who will not tell.

Hunger for Life

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing20 Comments

Cannot fall for deception when
hungry for life.

There’s an angel inside of me
her name is ‘faith.’

Life is eating, breathing, loving.
Loving is the eternal present
moment.

Every face is beauty
and it always works out somehow.
I don’t know how how, but it does!

The angel and the warrior in me
are merging. The face of what I cannot
see, nor need to believe.

I am alive now. What matters is
all the past is now gone. There’s this
wonderful now moment, even in the midst of fear.

I do not fear fear today.
Moving toward my life, living in my breath.
What other temple is there?

Sitting at the alter of my broken shadow,
loving all parts, and trusting in the sacred.
Seeing the monsters on the walls have
shapes that form into smiles, too.

I will hug myself through it.
I CAN do it!

Today I don’t have survivor’s guilt. Today I DO for my family, for my sangha.

Today I find a little bit more bravery than I had yesterday.

In the Razor-Sharp Focus of My Red Tail Feather

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Astrology, Creative Writing12 Comments

Make me into the softest
razor blade
of your truth-edged clarity,

chiseled by your loving warmth
and compassionate understanding.

Your [Mars-meets-Venus]
Soft Electric Love Touch –
Let the sparks fly!

You should know
that I am forged from the fire,
every day.

Yes, I am phoenix –
8th house
Mars and Pluto conjunction in Libra,
in love’s service.
Follow me and our spiritual marriage transforms!

I have seen my
own demons more than enough!

God dresses
up for Halloween.

The treats are always
the unexpected visitors that come
in and rescue any memory of OUR grace,

with a smile and a little open bag.

Jupiter and Neptune do not disagree.
While they transit,
they play Rummy.
I’ve got the leftover
potato chips to prove it – all those
notes I took for 20+ years of transits
are plenty crusty from love.

At the middle now,
I eagerly anticipate
sitting down
to attend
to the details
of expressing my perfection,

from the fruit of thy womb.

I am babe and elder
the in-middle years,
receiving and
sending off
souls of yours,
at your request.

Please do not
give me more than I can bear!

Love us, dear divine!
Bring us into an understanding where
the atheist, theist, pantheist do not
care if they agree or disagree.
The agnostic does not need to know
what she knows. It’s still none of
her business!

Where the word ‘I’ is
not a message in and of itself,
but a vehicle
for courageously attending to our truths
beyond divisions
and seeming perceptions
of splitting hairs.

‘I’ is one of the
tiniest words i know.
ya know? I still like it, though!

For all is
impermanent and pertinent.

Let us recover
the child lost to the shoreline of
warsome devastation,
Join in the only prayer worth
having:

A request for freedom in peace,
peace inside freedom, and justice for all.
Hallowed be thy…
Kingdom come.

Where and when the vague admissions of
the heart are seen as the clear
night and day offerings
of refuge.
We do not care
when we are needing help,
In Who’s arms we are held, just
that we are loved by you, Divine!

Here I am. Ready.
Amama, A’ho!

Universe Speaks through Dazzle

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing10 Comments

Going with the flow
I don’t know if I’m spreading myself
too thin. I see myself spiraling
in all directions, using more arms
than I was given, on a given day.

We’ve got thick skulls
and thick roots
and hefty rain boots here.
The diamond of compassion
nestled in our center, ironically as
soft as puppy nose kisses
can melt the age off of a face.

His name was Francis, yesterday
reminds me of the Sage Francis,
a rapper and priest for barbed
hearts and false starts
a lyrical collection of lonely hearts…

And driving through the rain. at night.

Here there’s no rain anymore
it’s all sunshine and yesterday I
joked with a hippy saying he was
really a troll because he told me
to get my head out of my phone.
Interesting imagery.
Sure he didn’t like being called a hippy either.
But he preferred it to troll..

It was an appreciative smile…
and a nod to our connection over big fish
and the pier. Words were carrier pigeons,
and the pigeons
did not represent words.

Still the Universe speaks
in people, in whispers
in loud car honks and the puppy
left alone who cries all day to the whole
neighborhood.

Those with ears like auricle satellites
don’t exactly rotate to precise coordinates
but vibrate on existing strings, historic
symphonies that the souls played
from time immemorial.

Here’s to tonight’s viewing of the Perseids
while the moon is silent in Leo.
And sitting in the darkness
is the best way to see the show.

Why not? Break the Silence…with Darkness & Sound

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing, Creatrix7 Comments

To make a sound, any sound
I may need the screech of pitch
or a certain definite
round-bound-pound
to break the glass in.

I interrupt this silence which
has seeped so deep inside of me.

This is not the calm silence of balance
and equilibrium, not the settled outcome
of a ripened meditational fruit-flower.

This is the compression of so much left unsaid,
unwritten. It gets caked up, stucktogetherinstuff-ness
and becomes downright flammable.
This is the build up of Movement-Qi without
Exit-Qi.

It is also natural,
when your busy-busy in a particular kind of way.

Crack! Awake!
And who are you? and what is this? How did we get
here in this blogcar, wearing our blogflipflops
and our blogshirts on blog-backwards with all the blogtags
sticking out under our bloggychinchins.

There is a fire in consciousness that’s exploding
With the wicked heat of thought; and
it’s building up, and it’s leaking out
Steaming the edges of Consciousnesses-es
Crisping the light-and-shadow contours
Spitting with energy, just to
release some pressure.
Water Filling-in complex edges with deep dimensional
ridges, building on a new Form.

We are molten and molted.

There’s no other poem I want to write now
than the one that leads me out here naked, and
leaves me wondering, How DID I get here?
Where ARE the Extraterrestrials?
How DO I account for this loss of time?

The release valve has been found, and the nozzle
ambitiously turned.

Once upon a time…when film was film

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn About Me, Creative Writing11 Comments

I have experienced so many profound things… and, I never wrote that story. I never became that professional photographer. I never found those words.  I never became the hero that I wanted to be. I couldn’t return to the townships in South Africa and say… Let’s play some music together again. I want to hit that drum with you again – join hands, transcend worlds…

So, here’s something from 2001.

Dear Woman, when the National Press Club notified me that I won the photo contest with your picture, I felt embarrassed. It took me a long time to find that smile you wore – to find it inside myself.

I could not afford to fly and see your image on the wall in the gallery. At the time, I could barely pay my rent. I wanted to see you again, not fly to Washington D.C. I needed the sunset and the sunrise to enter into my heart, just like it did when I could feel the whole jungle wake, as the funny monkeys stirred.

Old times, they do tug at my heart. People who I’ve met and exchanged with in depth of spirit, people on the journey. They moved on; we all just moved on.

Aloha.  Aloha. I love you. You have been in my heart all this time….

Your smile… is like no other I’ve ever seen. Here at Angkor Wat. Here at the temple where I continue to worship. The temple of shadows where smiles are forged from the hearts of connection. Where we don’t need things, or even hands, to smile.

Woman with smile_Angkor Wat

Dear Children, I want to see you free… free and free….

Children at home_Cambodia

Story of One

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn About Me, Creative Writing14 Comments

From the beginning
There was no beginning.
You and I were One.
And One, times One,
equals One.

It’s math for witnesses
It is Math
for multipliers,
Appreciators.
Math for the pregnant
Creators,

Who among them are
Male & Female
Yin and Yang

There’s a quality to the One,
which has Two basic flavors.

Each within and without.

From the beginning
There was no beginning.
Then there was One Who Observed Day and Night.

Poem & Photography by ©2015 Ka Malana

The Lady returns to Her Tower

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing9 Comments

John_William_Waterhouse_-_The_Lady_of_Shalott_-_Google_Art_Project

waterhouse_the_lady_of_shalott01

Stacked up
in old cases
are micro cassettes,
fragments
of conversations
made with coffee,
beer, and cigarettes.
spun together by the
wheels of travel,
and the comings and goings
of creation.

These
are the fingerprints
and logbooks
of times gone uncatalogued,
but recorded.

Laced among these
etchings of memory is the
antique smell of old wishes,
Fingerprints of old selves’ images
cobwebbed around
corners, breaking the rhythm patterned
slats of black and white into some
gossamer diagonals.

Even the cobwebs have shadows!

What were once
only some dog-eared remnants are now
the blackened, forgotten
bones of unchew-ed material,
rendered unidentifiable by time
and the consequences
of improper scrapbooking.

Time has lost its identity
and persons no longer care
about the era of happenings.

Edges fade in the total room
of all things attic-bound.
Behind the curtains of civilization
how the peopling of these
selves somehow happened
in conjunction with planetary
transits and their unmistakeable North Nodes
plastered to fate of the Earth, Moon, and Sun.

The bittersweet musk of unrequited love
descends like light rain
while the sound of a passionate banjo
breaks the air
and movement steps
to kick up some dust in order
to go forward.

Dust, falling like un-trained rain,
just scatters…

What’s left are the new
finger prints of recent visits
and the markings
of an explorer who has
left the continent of
the outside world
to traverse again the terrain
of his unkept inner chambers.

A rich collection
of untouched photographs
and other stains of memories
Layers of interpretation gone
missing. The witnesses
dissolved into their own stories.

Now with the lantern beside her,

The Lady of Shalott who is only
“Half-Sick of Shadows” returns
For she knows
there’s more area under the dark of the sun
than in all the light in the universe of awareness.

And holy ghosts visit
among the dead as much as the living
Marking each traveler as
a historical vagrant, an elusive shutterfly

One who becomes the reluctant
commentary of classical books
Lives on the island of the misfits

Here’s where all the fires are still
lit, and the inhabitants are most
unapologetic for their long dark shadowy arts.

Welcome back to the tower my dear!
May it enchant you with all the surprises and
remembrances of its forgotten inhabitants.

Ancestral welcoming

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing8 Comments

WE’ve got ancestral
gifts and diseases.

my virtue is collecting them
all, from where I am. Whatever is in reach.

My virtue is whatever name you
want to call me.

My virtue is showing up.

We’ve got aches and pains
that begin at the roots,
and touch every branch.

We’ve got friends with similar
diagnoses. Each leaf is a name
for what is really just pain.

What is pain but energy,
and I’m sorry but I only
took one creative writing class.
I got an A.

Grades don’t matter, but I got an F in Satire
AND I didn’t do that on purpose just to prove a point.

Do you know what does matter?
Your answer is flesh, made real.

We’ve got crayons in heaven with our
names on them. Do you know how
beautiful you are?

We’ve got superhero bandaids for
every single one of us.
For showing up.

You made it. You arrived. You cared enough
to keep arriving, to keep showing up.
You want to be a helping hand. You are curious,
how will all this go?

What can we do when we work together?
If I build it, will people come?
That’s not a question anymore.
I don’t even know who asked it first?

Who gets credit for creation, but God, and isn’t God,
also us? And you know how many names for God there are?
Shouldn’t there be as many names for God as there are particles of matter?
And what about the particles we haven’t created?
What about the unborn?

Can you sing a song with me? I want them to enter this world, welcomed.

Thank you.

YOU

On By Ka Malana - Fiestaestrellas.comIn Creative Writing9 Comments


For you,
Each and every one
I wake up.

For you, with tears in your eyes
With sadness in your grip
Your betrayal. The grief of being unsupported.

You: who aren’t seen.
You who are lost in the masses.

I rise up. I wake for you.
You, I see in every moment,
A heart beating.
Your life gone…
Few at your funeral. Fewer in the hospital
As you pass… truly your most sacred moment.

For no matter WHO you become in this
Life: Just know that you were someone to me.

You are the reason.
I will cram.
I will lay down before you.
YOU are my sacred chamber, my lost
Vessel, my unborn.

I may never meet you: because
There’s so much work to be done,
And I see you everywhere,

asking for my attention.

I can be a better mother to you
By being a good friend to all.

I can be only imperfect. Do you still want me?