may we all be as openhearted as trees as we walk deeper into the way…
~
Monthly Archives: October 2015
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 307 – 10/19/2015
“Let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.”
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
did you awaken as i did to this moment re-membering the universe in each moment is making an irresistible offer? thousandfold thanks, Desiree, and everyone for conspiring to gift me with so many moments of savoring the two days of initiation into wedding and weaving the cosmic I AM presence into the lush field of the divine matrix… a day, truly, of love after love…
Love After Love
The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
Derek Walcott
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 306 – 10/18/2015
yesterday, we met in a field on the south side of the river and contemplated caring for the dying courageously and candidly; today, we cross the bridge to meet in a field on the north side of the river serving as seeders of the divine matrix, Einstein’s unified field.. in making this pilgrimage, i feel as if i have walked thousands of miles from one country to another connected only by a bridge, a bridge connecting everything, a bridge demonstrating we are one unified, radiant field of love…
yesterday, we were called to die to everything, today we are called to breathe life, to breathe love into everything with every thought word and deed…
may we be open, organically present in the emptiness of now, in this moment, in every moment, to what is as the love we are…
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 305 – 10/17/2015
Do not go gentle into that good night
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
~
today’s pilgrimage is monumental, transformational and grounding as five hundred brave souls gather together to initiate communing on our ever present companion, the very underwriter of our lives… death.
griefwalker Stephen Jenkinson calls us to enter this mystery play moment by moment with our whole hearts as we listen to and live the questions of dying wise by falling in love with each breath, by seeking and finding joy, by living life so organically that our whole earth family will weep and keen as we die wise…
~
“You Reading This, Be Ready”
“Starting here, what do you want to remember?
How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?
What scent of old wood hovers, what softened
sound from outside fills the air?
Will you ever bring a better gift for the world
than the breathing respect that you carry
wherever you go right now? Are you waiting
for time to show you some better thoughts?
When you turn around, starting here, lift this
new glimpse that you found; carry into evening
all that you want from this day. This interval you spent
reading or hearing this, keep it for life.
What can anyone give you greater than now,
starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?”
– William Stafford
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 304 – 10/16/2015
On this 4th night of Navaratri as we celebrate and honor Lakshmi, goddess of enlightenment, let’s call in Porcupine Goddess to share an ancient wisdom story…
long ago, in the coldest winter ever, many of our relations were dying… we of the porcupine council met and decided we’d nestle together to keep warm and stay alive… alas, we were warm but the quills of our neighbors were wounding us, so we decided to separate from each other to relieve the hurts of living in close quarters… although now we were protected from being wounded, we began to die one by one, alone and frozen cold… faced with our extinction or living as wounded porcupines, we chose wisely – deciding to return to being together… we learned to live with wounds caused by being in close relationship to receive the greater benefit of the warmth that comes from others. this way, we were able to not only survive but also to thrive.
may we be as wise as our porcupine relations in realizing interdependence, the way of the heart, is the way…
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 303 – 10/15/2015
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
― Albert Einstein
Like you, I see everything as a miracle and today is a miraculous journey indeed as I contemplate the eye’s amazing healing ability. Following a traumatic injury to my eye four months ago, all the doctors had told me that our eyes heal very slowly so that it’s done right but yesterday while at the hospital, I learned that eyes heal very delicately, they do not form scar tissue over the wound as that would block out light from entering and so no seeing on the outside. Isn’t it mind blowing to realize that our eyes, like everything else, know exactly how to heal?
I so love that the eye’s healing process mirrors on of my favorite quotations from Rumi…
The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
And as Leonard Cohen sings…
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
I am Re-Joy-Sing that we live in a cosmos where everything is a miracle; even, or especially, a traumatic wound, an imperfection is where we are most open to the blessing of divine light pouring in, grace flowing…
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 302 – 10/14/2015
On this 2nd Night of the Nine Nights of the Goddess, we pray asking for good fortune and longevity in our lives…
We offer our love and gratitude to the second Navakarri Goddess. We pray for your protection and blessings on this second night of Navaratri. You are our Divine Mother, and as your children, we ask that you bless us with good fortune, prosperity, and a long, joyful life.
~
How synchronistic that on this day of asking for blessings of good fortune and a day on the pilgrimage, like every other, of running like hell, aka dancing wholeheartedly, towards all that strengthens our wings, that my eye surgeon says he’s never seen such a miraculous recovery, that no one else with such a traumatic injury has any vision. I’m reminded of years ago doctors calling me a walking miracle; now, i get to be a seeing miracle as well… So, life is moving fortuitously here in Portalandia, aka Graceland, and i feel my clipped wings of four months ago regenerating gracefully… thank you, thank you, thank you…
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 301 – 10/13/2015
Happy 1st Night of Navaratri, the Nine Nights of the Goddess Festival!
in this moment, Divine Mother is so present on the earth mother… hear her hum as you tune into the rhythm of the cosmos… breathe in the Goddess through your heart, she is the power of consciousness, the miracle performing intelligence, the generator of compassion for all, the mother lion protectress, the blessing benefactress…
Durga, we pray to you to purify us. Offering infinite love and gratitude, we pray to you for protection and blessings on this first night. You are our divine mother, we open ourselves to receive your abundant grace…
Om Dhoom Durgayai Namaha
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 300 – 10/12/2015
now is the moment to smile in the divine feminine grace of sister moon
the moment to breathe her grace in deeply through our one heart infusing all that is
now is the moment to embrace with open hearts the many blessings overflowing
the moment to reverence our wild, cyclical sister surrendering to her sublime grace
~
yes, lady luna, we hear your call to celebrate beauty,
to dive in the ocean of love, to connect the dots seeing deeper meaning,
to appreciate our many blessings, to live eternally in the heart of beloved’s grace
~
Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 2 – Day 299 – 10/11/2015
Happy 89th Continuation Day, Thay!
Thousandfold thanks, Thay for a lifetime of being peace, of walking your talk to be an example for others, for introducing us to the miracle of mindfulness, for always being love and being present in the present moment, wonderful moment… may we all mindfully breathe with you in every precious moment…