The poems I have presented here are excerpts from my most recent writing project called, Gathering of Butterflies A Wizards collection of Stories and Love Letters.
Some of them were written by me and others were written by a number of remarkable women that have been great teachers for me. I feel deeply in my spirit that I made a promise to them ages ago that I would be of service to them by letting the art of their voices be heard. I hope you enjoy these acts of power and find them inspiring. --Anthony
Two Ships Spirited Away a Misguided Interpretation Unfounded in Fact
Two Ships Spirited Away a Misguided Interpretation Unfounded in Fact
One afternoon I sat in the passenger seat of a car that drove down some sun heated road in Santa Fe.
Lazily looking out the passenger window I saw a man and a woman in a car.
He was driving and directed the car to turn in the opposite direction we were turning.
The woman who had dark hair turned to look at me in profile.
I found myself startled because for a moment she looked like you.
Then a moment later she was completely different.
That was the fourth time in so many days that such a jump had happened in my heart.
May 31rst was the day that two spirit vessels passed each other upon the waves of life’s ocean.
These waves churned my heart with a hope that in moments my mind told me was a fantasy.
“She could not possibly be here in this desert land,” it said.
My dream that morning as I talked in my sleep, was of holding this woman that my mind told was by the ocean in Oregon.
Why did I keep having these imaginings that tugged at my emotions?
Just yesterday I saw that there were some photos on a page of faces.
White Sands New Mexico and playfulness.
It was a lovely place that was so close yet so far away.
It seems that we speak a different language at times.
You say, “I am Dreaming of you. I wonder what is in the deeper waters?”
You acted on it. I did not even imagine you would. At least not right then.
When I say, “I am Dreaming.” I mean that I have not yet made up my mind. I am still debating.
When I decide I say, “I am acting on it now.”
Two different love languages, two ways of touching the earth. Both are wonderful.
I am searching for a way to bridge the grand canyon of our different perceptions.
I stood on the rim of a Grand Canyon saying good bye to something that passed away.
A California Condor flew over my head and landed for the night. The number 23 was on his wing.
I wished that you were there.
A condor has the power to translate death back into life.
I pray that Spirit and the Great Mother will help me craft a Rosetta Stone.
So that I may translate my communications with greater skill.
I feel sad in my heart that you came all that way to cross a bridge.
I didn’t know you were coming so I was not there to meet you.
If I had known I could have found a way to make space in my plans.
I could have thought to ask you what you were saying to me. I should have responded with a message sooner. But as with all things, every event has its place.
These two ships, these two spirit vessels came so close to docking in the same port for a rest.
But instead found themselves in different harbours trying to send Morris Code in a vibration that was not yet in alignment. My tap tap tap tapping heart seems out of sync with a code that is not received.
I will try another way. Maybe this time the message will be heard by the receiver who captains the wind and the rain and the flowers.
You are welcome in my home now. I have realigned my life. The house in the East that literally did not let me have guests from the West has been exchanged for a warmer fire. This new house has a cleaner heart. There is room.
Blessed be Dear One
I must add an addition after the fact.
And in the end there was a truth revealed to me by informants and friends.
You were never there when I thought I saw you.
You had never left the forests of Oregon on the days I thought you were in the deserts of New Mexico.
I saw some posted photos and I didn’t ask you, so now I have sent you the first part of this poetry.
I can only guess that your silence to all of my writings tells the story of your disenchantment in me.
Now you see my flaws and imperfections. It is not so attractive an infatuation as it once was.
The love spell has been broken and the truth I had sought for so long ago has been answered.
Those dreams of kisses I had of you while sleeping and our lovemaking.
They were not a revelation of prophecy, of things that would come to pass.
They were just communications of love from one soul to another on waves of higher understanding.
It was never meant to be something in the physical world. I did not see this, but at least I suspected.
My little mind once awoken in this physical world wanted it to be more than this.
But I suspected. I have walked this trail many times before.
This time however I did not try to grab hold of the vision I saw. I questioned it for its truth, and I tested it to see if it held up to the mirror of my inner truth.
The fantasy did not hold up and I walked away from it.
Funny how this time I have no broken heart. I suppose that is how one creates a heart that does not break. One listens to the current of the soul and tests the ice to see if it will hold ones weight.
I followed my heart and I am victorious with the gift of gratitude.
Thank you for being the one to be My Teacher; you were the best woman for the job.
© Copyright Gathering of Butterflies Productions By Anthony P Pauly Jr 2007-2011By Anthony P Pauly Jr
November 23 2010
My Best Friend Was a Fat Yellow Cat
I woke up one morning and I lay in my bed day dreaming.
The rain on roof was dripping onto the patio creating a staccato drum beat.
I was relaxed and remembering the dream that had awoken me.
I dreamed that I was playing with a large white cat.
He looked like Snow and that was his name.
I had seen him five days before at the shelter.
I couldn’t make up my mind as to whether to take him home with me that day.
Snow had crawled onto my shoulder as if that was the place to rest.
That day five days before he suckled on my ear, begging me to listen to his spirit.
I left him there undecided.
Sadly when I came back he had already been chosen and went home with someone else.
Feeling bad I looked around at all the other feline tenants and wondered.
I stood looking as a fat yellow cat came up to me reached up and placed his paws on my leg.
There he stretched full length and purred.
I knew he was the one and I took him home that day not wanting to lose this one also.
That night as I sat meditating on my floor the fat yellow cat came and curled up in my lap.
He stayed there and in my heart for seven years.
One day I came home from work and found my best friend dying in the dirt.
His body covered in dirt mud and dry grass.
He was so damaged and so broken I could not at first tell what it was that I was seeing.
There in my car the realization hit me.
It was my fat yellow cat.
He had been hit on the road and for some unknown reason he had dragged himself home.
He lay there in pain and loyalty waiting for me before he would die.
Running inside my home I grabbed up a towel to wrap him and keep him warm.
His crying was terrible my touch the only thing that soothed his agony.
I had to drive him to the vet as fast as I could, taking my hand off him to steer the car.
Each time my touch left him he would howl, and my heart would sink.
My best friend left me that day and I was sinking in guilt,
for not being in the emergency room with him.
He was gone and now I had an empty form with no spirit to bury.
Time passed and he came and dreamed with me.
I missed him so much it hurt and he gave me such joy to remember about that fat yellow cat.
Now the other day I dreamed him again but he was gray and white and a girl.
I went out a few days later to the farm up the road.
A small fat grey kitten came up to me and looked me in the eye.
I saw his eyes looking back at me and knew that my friend had come back to me.
I had a little dream and her name is Dream.
She and I dream together just as we always have.The Lessons My Mother Taught MeLife lessons are a funny thing.
They can come in many ways with two main types.
One is strait forward. You see it face to face.
The other is like looking into a mirror to read a coded message.
It comes to us the backward way.
With this sort one does not recognize it until the proper perspective is brought into alignment in our awareness.
My mother taught me both of these forms.
Very likely without realizing it.
So with these words I will tell her what I have learned.
First the lovely which was obvious to me.
From her came to me a love of growing things, gifted I was my own garden by the side of the house.
A love of food and good cooking.
Long conversations.
I wish we had talked more so I would know I had a voice that would be heard.
Reading and the written word.
I am a hopeless romantic, no doubt the result of romance novels when I was in her belly.
I wish she had read something to me.
I have no memory of this. Awareness can be painful at times Mom.
I don't blame, I just remember.
True poetry is like that it doesn't hold back, it must stir emotions.
It is a bridge to the divine.
That is its nature. This is my nature also. To be a bridge to the divinity within my own heart and soul.
This understanding is one of the backward lessons. It came to me only when I became a man. When I began to wake up from the darkness of anger.
You see Mom there are things I have never mentioned to you.
I remember the suffering of your early years. Not every detail, just enough.
Enough to know that you have always secretly wanted more from life.
I have seen the weight of guilt and shame you bare upon your shoulders.
I can hear the voices inside your head that accuse you.
(I am not a good mother for not stopping the past. Those things that happened.)
These voices are thieves and liars. Put into your pockets to steal your hands and voice.
They never belonged to you. You where too young when you were told to carry them around.
Just as I was too young, when these same thieves put things into my pockets.
I am just beginning to let them go. It may be challenging, but I hope someday you won’t believe the liar’s.
They are very smart and clever after all it is their voices inside our heads all day long. Judging and criticizing. Worrying and fearing.
I can also hear the voices in your heart that speak a different language. One of love, trust, passion, and faith. Do you ever listen to them?
These same voices are in my heart because all hearts are connected.
I have begun to hear this voice of trust. I have found that the song in my heart is my true voice because it is connected to the song of my soul.
This song is the bridge that I walk, this rainbow bridge of my own divinity.
This song connects me to the sacredness that created all that is manifest in creation. You, me, everything.
I am made of this sacredness as are all of the world’s people, as is all matter that is in form. Including you, my Sacred Mother.
The liar’s are very smart they told us not to believe this. They told us we were separate from the divine from God that we were born into sin.
Hersey-Unbeliever-Convert or die. In the name of my God I kill you.
Without our fear they cannot exist. Fearful people can't see the divinity around them or within, thus making us easy to control.
So who are the voices? This is a mystery that can't be answered with the same mind that is caught in the net they created.
Only divinity has the answer to that and no man or woman can give an answer to this. No matter what book they are carrying.
Many who carry books use them to brutalize the spirits of others, so to avoid the fact that they are disconnected from the very divinity that they say they represent. Without anything but a piece of paper for proof.
Jesus said ``the kingdom of heaven is found within``. Why have so few asked what this really meant?
The kingdom of heaven is so close that it was put within our very souls. Waiting like a seed in the darkness for nourishment and light.
This world of convincing illusion is that dark soil. Strangely, miraculously it is the greatest of gifts. We come here into these precious gifted bodies of form to learn and grow.
Our other gift, too forget and then remember the divinity within. God trusts and loves us so much that we were are even allowed the possibility to destroy ourselves to learn. God knew full well that we would eventually find the way home.
No matter how long it took. And when we got home and God answered the door (not being a man or a woman), God said, “I love you my Precious One.”
Not, “look at all the horrible things you have done.”
Standing there when we finally stepped past fear and looked up into the face of God, we saw ourselves and all of creation looking back loving us unconditionally.
It is because of the healing I sought for my own soul in my work with my teachers that I came to see all of this.
I needed to find this healing for myself because the anguish of not being able to unburden you of your hurt haunted me.
I made a promise once to your soul long before I came into this world that I would find these truths and share them with you. I also promised to allow you to do with them as you wish.
If you burn these pages and never mention these things again that is how it will be. I will let it. Because I love and have faith in you.
If you become angry at my revelations and won’t speak to me as much as that will pain me I will trust that this is the correct way for you. Unless you tell me otherwise.
I am glad and so very full of joy that you became my mother in this lifetime.
You have the perfect soul that has been most lovely for the job.
I know in the depths of my being that we have walked together through many lifetimes together. Maybe as friends, brothers, sisters, or dancers.
I also know that independent of the form of bodies we have existed as souls in friendship so profound a length of time our tiny human memories can’t comprehend.
We are as all things spiritual eternal.
I love you My Mother.
Sweet Dreams.
Tony
By Anthony P Pauly Jr
Mother’s day May 10, 2009
**********
July 20, 2010
Dear Anthony,
I have to just tell you while it is fresh in my mind that your poem to your mother which is on your web-site touched my soul completely. I felt as though it was everything that I wish that I could say to my own mother-written perfectly. The honesty that I felt you expressed has entered a special place in my heart and helped me to begin to heal and also to prepare some words for my own mother- a conversation that is long overdue. I have always felt that I am here to help her heal as well and I have always prayed that the burden of pain and anguish she is feeling be lifted from her as we are all but simply- sparks of light in our current human form.
Blessed be my brother and peace be always with you.
~Amy---Jewelry Designer, Burlington VT
Anthony- This poem is an excerpt from my book Gathering of Butterflies it was written by my dear friend Sara Reseigh who I have written about in my book.
Willow Woman
I think about my heritage
and the life I have lived.
I ponder about what name
I could justly take.
Woman Who Lives Like
Weeping Willow
Sad even in times of celebration.
There for all who is in need.
-Sara Reseigh, 1997
Anthony- This poem is an excerpt from my book Gathering of Butterflies, it came to me nearly in a complete form in a dream during the early summer of 2001. The dream as I know it, was a very clear prophesy of the inevitable relationship I would have with my partner Suzanne. You can look forward to reading the whole story when I find a publisher for my book.
Open Up That Door Again
Open up that door again.
Open up that door again.
Point the crystal at the wall
prepare for a new world.
Open up that door again.
The port hole opens to you
step strait on through.
And look into your truth.
Can you find the courage within
to look into the depths of you soul.
When you get there
what do you see?
Is that love or is that
your fear?
Cleansing powers of electricity
are flowing from my voice.
Compassion wells up from my heart.
And you standing to my right.
Innocence in child form
takes the center floor.
It waits behind us for us
to see its there.
Oh crystal cluster of towering
pure quarts.
Handed to me almost to you.
By an unseen woman's hand.
The dream fades I awake.
The song still in my mouth.
My heart
My soul
By Anthony P Pauly Jr
Anthony- This poem is also an excerpt from my book Gathering of Butterflies, I am amazed to say that it also came to me nearly complete in it`s form during a dream in the early morning of October 23, 2001.
Moving On
I found it impossible to continue on
threw the grocery store.
So I stopped in the produce department
along by the potatoes.
I found that a false and toothy grin
can no more carry the spark of life
than a empty lifeless body.
So I continued threw in spirits fashion.
I found a path and gateway that led me
threw addictions.
That spirit gateway wound down a trail upon a
four times clock wise circling Monarch
Butterfly.
This is were I found rest on the
dreaming lap of a curly red haired mother.
Then suddenly within a Friday late morning
an omen dream propelled me to ancient holy paintings.
To speak to the spirits of place
one last time.
Old rock wall.
We were saying goodbye.
Two by two they came onto me.
Two women two men four in all.
Each one with an other. Just as in the Dream.
One woman was young blond and beautiful.
I collected feathers.
Forces earlier than I intended pushed me
out and off down the highway.
To Southern places I would travel. So
that I would have the influence of
bay and harbor.
I left behind the Comet and thieved with me
the meteorite.
In the blanket was the direction wrapped in dreams.
Storm Eagles were waiting for me in my school.
I am now at the last atom of the funnel
of my old life.
- Anthony
October , 23 2001
I am I
<O> <O>
under the luminous fibers of the starlight
I wandered the wilderness in darkness
Thorns piercing into my cloth covered feet
obliging me to go slowly and, carefully
echoes of crickets coyotes, scorpions, and many desert wildlife
shadowing my air stream with fear
hugging the great grand rocks I climb
up to the highest peak points on mount OM
Three black ravens circle above
cradling the bright moon in their feathers
gust of mountain winds the sound of flames
as my hair blows dancing up into the sky
head, arm, and legs outreached like a star
I join the luminous fibers of the firmament
sensing the pulses though my fingers an toes to my life blood
I embrace the omniverce and embrace the essence of all
I AM I BE
YOU ARE YOU BE
I am I
we SEE we
from all the timlessnessspace that is
we danced in the dreamtime and sang to the spirits of the knowing be
all the while in the physical I played alone
shrouding myself in shadow veils searching for the mirrors that I feel
seeing only masks reflected
seeing only lies in the eyes
till I flew above the clouds
and crawled below the valleys
to the sacred porthole into the dreamtime
finally there with my physical body
now to be and see and taste and hear and touch and feel
your light is real
never will I be alone again
I sense you now and I know that you sense me too
I know that it is real
I know that you. That it is real
so be well
I will be well too
thank you
~~ Elixir ~~
June, 2004
Little Sisters
Blessed are the little butterflies,
who have comforted me and led me home.
Beings with shiny wings who kiss me in my dreams,
and let me rest my head upon there laps.
I will push out of this old world skin of primordial protein chaos.
I will spread my wings.
I am remembering my song.
It is the fluttering of wings,
and the chiming of crystals.
It is the fluttering of my heart when I see the eyes of my lover.
When I am held in her arms,
and she helps me take off my mask.
by- Rainbow Bridge
(Anthony P. Pauly Jr)
Butterfly Kiss
In a dream.
I am walking.
The path is cast before me.
A flicker of movement gathers my attention.
At me it flies.
Then away.
Then again.
Little and white.
A butterfly is dreaming me.
As I am dreaming it.
I ask.
Little butterfly spirit what do you want me to see?
Away it flies.
Then again.
Landing on my cheek.
With it’s tongue I am kissed.
Hello Butterfly Woman.
-Rainbow Bridge
(Anthony P. Pauly April, 2008)
Once again this poem was found in my dreaming.
Dedicated to my spirit sister Kristin.
Thank you for whirling into my life.
Me
I’ve studied Taoism,
I’ve studied numerology,
I’ve studied astrology,,
I’ve studied herbology,
I’ve studied face and body – language.
I’ve studied animal behavior & medicine.
Years of study to ensure my families well being.
I’ve discovered my intentions are to meet Everyone’s expectations
Being Human is trial and error.
We can only meet our goals to manage ourselves..
How small the act
- Poem written by Heidie Carol Ann Madocks (May, 2008)
Hello Dreamer
Shimerings, rustlings, crystalline resonance.
I am hearing a story on the song of the wind.
It is calling you, calling too you.
You who are asleep, in bed and in the world walking.
Hello Dreamer, hello Dreamer, can you hear me calling you?
I see you there in the mirror of my own eyes.
I hear your nameless name in my spirit ears, can you hear me?
Hello Dreamer my sister, little girl, mother, crone.
Oh brother are you there? Are you sleeping like our fathers?
Many times in life we create a dream of mastery.
Many times in these lives, we see not the mastery that we are creating.
Let us hold our hands together in prayer, so that we may walk through the dream together.
I can not carry you through the doorway, but I can walk in the same direction.
I can't live your dream or be your joy.
But I can dream that you are living your greatest dream, and that joy is all you are.
I read in a book some place that we are playing with the Goddess Maya.
I and you are Lord Brahma cut to pieces with a sword of light.
Maya told us the games rules were that we should forget who we are.
Then when we did forget she put us in an intelligent body that we dreamed into being our self.
She sang her song and we descended into ignorance.
Still she sings to us the game that we should now try to remember who we are.
So hear we are playing this game for ages of time.
Oh look what was that flash of light? It's name was Krishna.
Oh look there is another, it's name was Buddha.
And yet another flash called the Magdalene.
She danced as a master with a master and they were more than equal in unity.
We call out side our fathers selves who art in heaven hallowed be thy name.
How will heaven come down on us when we are already there?
How is it that when I was a child no one told me that the Kingdom of Heaven was within me?
The words were written write there on the page they read to me.
How did they not bother to notice.
Well now some one dared to tell me, so I tell you Dreamer my love.
I say also to you because I love you and myself.
Don't get caught in the dream my love.
Being lucid means to realize that we are dreaming.
If you do not know that you are dreaming then you are not lucid.
What an amazing symbol of truth resonating in the air.
It is a miracle that our dreams can show us all truth with out the mind saying, no!
Hello Dreamer can you hear me, Hello Dreamer can you see me?
Wake up Dreamed One because you are made of light, because you are sacred.
Look in the mirror of the world you created.
Wake up because you love yourself, because I love you.
The Gods cant carry our dream for us any longer we must carry it ourselves.
If it is heavy it is because you have to many beliefs put them down and lighten your load.
Hello Dreamer.
Hello me.
By Anthony Pauly Jr November 2, 2009
Marriage Of Self to Self
Dear Friendship
You woke up this morning dreams still in your chest.
Feeling the same old feelings you are looking for something new.
Why when I walk or sit, do I feel as if I lean more to one side?
When my eyes are closed?
Some time ago did you realize that some thing felt like a whole inside?
As if someone wasn't there?
It must have been powerful when you could see that the someone was a part of you?
That he or she was you. A me.
All our lives we look out into the world for someone to be joy for us,
our Goddess or God.
And indeed we do find joy interacting with lovers, friends, family, and our children.
But how many tears have fallen onto the pages of our life,
when time washes them away.
Still we crave. Crying lonely in the night. Tear puddles are our companions.
Coming over when there is no other. Lighting candles for warmth of heart.
This simple truth finds us even if we wont give her a name.
When there is no one else and all else has gone away.
We must face ourselves, that other half of us.
We can't run away from Me.
One day I woke from a dream and I knew the name of my own Femininity.
Her name (is) Caroline, she is made of Spirit and light. She likes to ware masks.
I have seen her looking through the eyes of many of my teachers.
She is not manifest, but is in fact the aspect of my self that is female.
It was in these dreams that she and I were married to each other.
It was a marriage of self to self.
My physical maleness unified and united to my feminine spirituality.
It was because of the love for Caroline who is myself,
that I learned how to sing the song of light.
If you are a woman what is the name of your maleness?
If you are a man what is the name of your femininity?
Who is this Goddess or God within you that cries to be heard.
Do you remember that you are your greatest teacher,
that no one will ever love you as much as you can love yourself?
When you wake up in the morning,
how many days of each year are you in love with yourself.
I have had more days than I can count where I have forgotten
to feel this kind of love.
More days in fact, of no love than days with it. Is this familiar to you?
I must be clear that conceitedness is not the same as self love.
Self love is seeing the divine withing your very life force, connecting you with all things.
Seeing in this way is wisdom not pride.
If your wish is to find balance in the world between the male and the female,
as a seeker you must first recognize and create a space within you for this birth to happen.
Only when it is within will it manifest in the world.
Today let us talk and dream our wisdom into being.
Let us all, even us men nourish our own whom so that the child of light within can be born.
For us to grow spiritually we must as individuals learn this art.
As a world of people we must become very direct and forward about this reality.
There is no place else to run, we must unify or this dream will end.
I truly feel that we will succeed even if it does not look that way.
Spirit can not be destroyed. We are made of Spirit, so what dose that say?
To all of you that are also me I love you.
--by Anthony P Pauly Jr November 7 2008
To all those that read these poems if you are so inspired to send in a poem I will display it on my website should you wish me to do so. Just send it to me along with your permission and your name to
© Copyright Gathering of Butterflies Productions By Anthony P Pauly Jr 2007-2011
