[austintorn@aol.com]

Yin/Yang Balance

Each holds within itself the seed of the other—
Yin reaches climax, then retreats in Yang’s favor:
Cyclic movement of rotational symmetry.
Rounded life is the blend of Yin/Yang together.

Classicists drone toward mechanical perfection;
Romanticists drown in emotion’s affection;
Even worse, others alternate between extremes.
The way’s not this or that, but joined in direction.

Strive to maintain a dynamic balance—of light
And dark, hard and soft, Yin and Yang, and wrong and right.
Reality is found not in separate actions,
But in related events blended in twilight.

Edges dissolve when opposites are balanced—
Time and dimensional space are transcended.
Everything joins, yet remains as itself,
For what “is not” is as great as what “is”.

Opposites are just a different view
Of one fundamental phenomenon—
Light, beauty, and goodness are the inverse
Sides of darkness, ugliness, and evil.

I dare to walk the line, balancing fun
There between adventure and misfortune,
For the greatest blunder in life is to
Repeatedly fear that you will make one.

Not quite sober blest nor drunk to excess,
Never too foolish nor very reckless—
Yes, my passion is so reasonable
In this delicate state of awareness.

All feelings, sad, happy, or in between,
Crisscross the woven cloth of our routine.
They’re reflections of life’s sensations,
Forming the rainbow that colors the scene.

Life must be more like a mosaic done
Than a focused laser funnel of sun.
Since few lengthy pleasures are lent to us,
We build a stained-glass window of small ones.

(with apology to Lord Byron)
Let us have wine, lovers, song, and laughter,
Water, chastity, prayer the day after.
Such we’ll alternate the rest of our days—
On the average, we’ll make Hereafter!