So far I have completed the following combinations:
Year of the Fire PigYear of the Earth Oxen
Year of the Earth Rat
Year of the Metal Tiger
Year of the Metal Rabbit
Year of the Water Dragon
Year of the Water Snake
Year of the Wood Horse
Year of the Wood Sheep
Here is The Year of the Fire Monkey for 2016
Ho you Fire Monkey
Adorable Familiar of blessed places
Resourceful, enchanting
Cunning when need be
Your chatter flattens the dolts of ignorance
When you take
[Original art by Ingmar Pema Dechen, 2016]
Ho you Fire Monkey
Adorable Familiar of blessed places
Resourceful, enchanting
Cunning when need be
Your chatter flattens the dolts of ignorance
When you take
Charge in a carpe diem kind of way
Your ballast of confidence
Lifts our spirits
Your ballast of confidence
Lifts our spirits
Seer of the future
Interlocutor to lost opportunities
Let’s take to heart
the ease of your swing from here to there
Always awake in the fire
YEAROF THE EARTH DOG -2018
Needless to say these are not “great" poems but they are interesting. Over the years many people have expressed appreciation. My process is not any official astrological training or reference. Nor do I intend any disrespect to the Tibetan tradition of astrology closely aligned with training in Tibetan Medicine.
Interlocutor to lost opportunities
Let’s take to heart
the ease of your swing from here to there
Always awake in the fire
YEAROF THE EARTH DOG -2018
Oh you Earth Dog come
Now happiness wagging
Your familial greeting
That cheers us up as I bend to you my lovely
In display of your canine Sagacity
Ever Loyal--
Ever Reliable
Follow your keen scent
For sniffing out what’s apparent
Bury the bone of your content
Within our breast
For Safe Keeping
Humanitarian sustenance of justice
With your nose to the grindstone
Bark at shadows wrecking havoc at our door
Growl baring teeth to terrify
Cowards who roust our peace
Lift a leg to leave your mark
While yet you enliven our joy lest we forget
The great companion you are
Forever by our side
Text by Jacqueline Gens
Illustration by Ingmar Pema Dechen
Needless to say these are not “great" poems but they are interesting. Over the years many people have expressed appreciation. My process is not any official astrological training or reference. Nor do I intend any disrespect to the Tibetan tradition of astrology closely aligned with training in Tibetan Medicine.
Mainly, I meditate on the animal, then the element which I combine with a kind of intuitive sense of the year at hand. These particular poems seem to write themselves. The results are strangely in harmony with the “official” forecasts. They also reflect my own personal mind training at the time. I’d like to compile the complete version of all 60 animal/element combinations as an offering to future communities of practitioners in the Vajrayana and Dzogchen lineages.
They are meant to inspire and encourage people on the long and enduring path towards realization.
My main inspiration comes from my teachers and poetry mentors including Chogyam Trungpa, Choegyal Namkhai Norbu, Lama Tsultrim Allione, Anne Waldman and the late Allen Ginsberg. Many Thanks to dharma and poet buddies sharing the path. Thanks everyone for all your support over the years.
I am currently focusing on birth poems for friends and personalized poems for hire (by donation.
Here is my most recent addition: Year of the Wood Rooster for 1945, birth year for many poet friends. This one in honor of my friends Anne Waldman, Vernadah Porche and Richard Wizansky.
Jacqueline Gens
Shelburne Falls, MA
Last updated February 5, 2016
The newest composition is a private commission for Year of the Water Tiger with original art by Ingmar Pema Dechen
They are meant to inspire and encourage people on the long and enduring path towards realization.
My main inspiration comes from my teachers and poetry mentors including Chogyam Trungpa, Choegyal Namkhai Norbu, Lama Tsultrim Allione, Anne Waldman and the late Allen Ginsberg. Many Thanks to dharma and poet buddies sharing the path. Thanks everyone for all your support over the years.
I am currently focusing on birth poems for friends and personalized poems for hire (by donation.
Here is my most recent addition: Year of the Wood Rooster for 1945, birth year for many poet friends. This one in honor of my friends Anne Waldman, Vernadah Porche and Richard Wizansky.
[original art by Ingmar Pema Dechen]
Such iridescent display
Cockadoodiling us awake
Each day without fail
As reliable as the sun
you rise to summon forth
Bright scrys of portend
Acuity for the larger meanings in the scheme
Of so-called phenomena
Beneficent scribe to the downcast
Outsiders, end stop
You set the bar high
A million hands in the fire
No task too daunting
Harbinger of new, always fresh
Our number one
Jacqueline Gens
Shelburne Falls, MA
Last updated February 5, 2016
The newest composition is a private commission for Year of the Water Tiger with original art by Ingmar Pema Dechen
Behold the Water Tiger
Worldly navigator
Among all things adventurous
At home in the unknown
Buoyed by the ease of water
Even the heaviest notions
Lightly flow by twists and turns
Where no one else dares to go
You are the harbinger of mystery
A playful glint of luminosity
Amid roiling turbulence
Flash of certainty in the deep swell
Of aquifer forever brave
Our Sleek innovator
All accomplishing to the end
Jacqueline Gens
5/8/2016
Worldly navigator
Among all things adventurous
At home in the unknown
Buoyed by the ease of water
Even the heaviest notions
Lightly flow by twists and turns
Where no one else dares to go
You are the harbinger of mystery
A playful glint of luminosity
Amid roiling turbulence
Flash of certainty in the deep swell
Of aquifer forever brave
Our Sleek innovator
All accomplishing to the end
Jacqueline Gens
5/8/2016
Original art by Ingmar Pema Dechen
