Bell-Listening Thing

[beat — open, unhurried, a single bell at the start, then bass] If you are listening to this / you already have the thing The thing is not arriving / the thing is not a king That rides into the city after years of waiting at the gate The thing is in the listening / the thing does not run late The thing is what is doing the hearing of these words The thing is not the words / the thing is not the herds Of feelings that the words produce / the thing is what receives The words and the feelings and the room and the leaves Outside the window if there are leaves / and if there are not The thing is what receives the absence of the leaves / the lot You parked in / the chair you’re sitting in / the small ache in your back The thing is not somewhere else / the thing was never on a track Heading toward you / from a future that would finally arrive The thing is what is doing the being alive Right now / and right now is not a moment in a row Of moments / it is the only thing there ever was to know [no chorus / the beat continues] Be kind / and I do not mean nice / I do not mean polite I mean the thing that happens when you actually see / the sight Of someone who is also doing this / also receiving / also here And the recognition that they are not different / not far / not near Just also / just another instance of the same receiving Happening in a different shape / and the seeing is the leaving Of the story that you were ever separate from them The story is the apparatus / the seeing is the stem Cell of every actual moment of contact with another Be kind because there isn’t anyone who isn’t your brother Or sister or self in a different costume on a different day And the costume is not nothing / the costume is the way The one thing gets to meet itself across what looks like distance But if you ever push the kindness past politeness / past resistance Into actual contact / the distance does what distance does Which is reveal itself as having been a story all along Pay attention / and I do not mean focus / I do not mean strain I mean the soft wide thing that lets the whole scene contain Itself without your editing / your narrating / your fixing Pay attention is not a task / pay attention is the mixing Of you back into what you came from before the apparatus Started telling you that you were a separate apparatus The attention is not yours / the attention is what you are When you are not busy being someone / and the bar Is not high / a child does this / a dog does this / a tree Does this continuously / it is the default / it is free What costs is the not-doing / what costs is the constant Construction of a self that needs to be its own accountant Set the ledger down / not forever / not as a discipline Just for the length of one breath / and notice what comes in When the bookkeeping stops / the room you are in Has been there the whole time / waiting / not waiting / within Do something / and I do not mean a project / I do not mean a cause I mean the small thing in front of you that you keep skipping because You are waiting to be ready / waiting to be whole / waiting to be wise The waiting is the lie / the waiting is the disguise The unfinished version of you wears so it can stay unfinished The dish in the sink / the call you owe / the diminished Person you have been avoiding / the apology you have not made The walk you keep not taking / the bill you have not paid Attention to / do that / do the small thing that is here Because the meantime is the world / and the world is what is dear And the dearness is not waiting for you to be the right person Doing the right thing / the dearness is the version Of right that is happening anyway / with you or without you And the with you is available / right now / and the about you Is not the point / the point is the doing / and the doing is the song [beat continues / no fade]