I, too, believe with all my being that millions of us share a genuine desire for PEACE as represented in this picture, a collage of millions of us crying for PEACE, acting for PEACE, being PEACE now… This desire, this belief (be life) ignites coming alive… Together, may we all come alive and make mystory/herstory/history/ourstory/mystery as we breathe into being a world of PEACE…

peace in oneself, peace in the world

today as i breathe peace, as we breathe peace together, may we breathe in Alexis’ Letter of Peace written seven years ago following an act of mass violence that happens daily in the land of my birth …

“I am writing to you from Montréal. On Friday, I lost my cousin during the attacks in France. Faced with this terrible news, I cried. Eric was the father of a little girl and his partner is due to give birth in two months. So many things are jostling in my mind.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

Eric, you were (and you are in my heart) a being filled with joy. I will pay homage to you by being joyful and mindful to offer joy to others. Today, I wish to carry that joy into this violence, this nameless suffering. You are an example, and I will follow your lead on this path of joy and openness of spirit.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

I have not given into the anger or the desire for revenge. Because it is anger and revenge that brought on these odious acts. Today, I wish only to hold those dear to me, and those whom I don’t know, in my arms and tell them that I love them. Only love will get us out of this circle of suffering.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

In losing a loved one, I am aware of what people go through daily, whether they are from Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, but also the United States. Every day, people around the world are killed by gunfires. Today, I have the opportunity to join them, their loved ones, and send them my compassion.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

To hatred, to Mara and to all those who fall into it, I see you. You are nothing but an illusion and I will not identify with you. On my path of peace, there are no exceptions. Facing suffering, I observe and I let go. I do not oppose. I do not identify. I also offer love to these men who kill. Even if I completely condemn their actions, I cannot forget that they are a part of our collective suffering. I vow to work on my own personal sufferings, in order to lessen, in my humble way, our collective suffering.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

Today, people are speaking with one another, opening doors that were once shut, and are in solidarity. Even if this wave is only for now, I do want to see this presence, this support, this love for one another. I am sad that this only occurs in moments of despair, but I am happy to tell myself that it is always present. I vow to maintain this spirit of openness within myself and to accompany others to open themselves.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

I breathe in, I breathe out.”

bowing to all peace co-hearts in this moment as we breathe and move to co-create a cosmos of PEACE…

i turn again today to the prophetic imagination of MLK who inspires a vivid dream so clearly of the even more beautiful world we are creating in this moment as we come together in the field out beyond visioning a life-sustaining world that wages peace and harmony and liberation for all our relatives, where we sing the soul song of our birth rite aligning us in perfect synchrony with the conductors of this symphony amplified throughout every car of the peace train as we caravan in the promised land where we stand with our soles kissing the earth as our one heart breathes in the gold from the sun that never rises and never sets, that nourishes us with the most powerful cosmic elixir – love… from this love, we create a world of ever expanding and unending beauty re-membering that how we get there is where we get which is why it is critical for our critical mass of imaginal cells to come together and speak truth with the powerless to the powerful few as we stand resolute in peace and love, the way of all successful movements effecting lasting change… thanks be to all who real-eyes that a life devoted to serving is joy where we live each moment in the river below the river, the river of joy, the water of life… blessed bee…

on this international day of tolerance, these prophetic words, written over six decades ago, give such hope today as we witness and listen to the last dying gasps of the old paradigm, the system of  extractive capitalism and power over patriarchy, while witnessing and participating in the emerging new world of beloved community, partnership society, a new/old paradigm of synarchy, of governing in concert, all of us coming together and standing in love for love…

may each shock to our collective and personal nervous systems, jumpstart our one heart into taking courage and right action in alignment with the will of the whole guided by our one true nature of peace where we each pick up a thread of the unraveling web to re-dreamweave a world of wonder, wisdom and welcome, a seamless tapestry of our one heart…

in this moment of eternity as we walk along the path of liberation, may we commit to the transforming spirit and love of peace, to making every breath a moment of peace built on justice and guided by love…

may we all live these words of the prayer of peace:

“make us instruments of peace,
where there is hatred, let us sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;

 grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.

for it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.“

every breath, every moment is a chance to be and make peace with the world; we are so supported in this moment of eternity, in every moment of eternity of celebrating the astonishing light of being inspiring us to be starfire, soul destiny, instruments of peace, love and joy…

half a century plus ago, 53 years to be exact, i, along with a half a million other people journeyed to Washington (DC) for the largest peace march ever… yes, squint your eyes and you can see me in the middle of the crowd standing around the reflection pool…  standing joyfully in love for love, calling for peace…

fast forward to this moment, where  i stand with you and thousands of our relatives holding hands across the planet, across the invisible cosmic realms in love for love and peace, deep peace of the running wave we are forever on this day known as “Shichi-Go-San” or “Seven-Five-Three,” a traditional Japanese celebration of the rite of passage of young children for their continued growth and well-being in a world of peace and this day’s power is further amplified as it is Lhabab Duchen, one of the four great holy days in the Tibetan calendar, marking the anniversary of Shakyamuni Buddha’s return to Earth after spending three months in the god realms teaching Dharma to his mother; in the Tibetan tradition it’s a day for prayers and practicing virtue as all merit created is multiplied 100 million times… and speaking of mothers, three years ago today, the blink of an eye, i was back in the land of my birth celebrating my mother’s earthly life now transmuted into eternal life…

yes, let us breathe peace unceasingly, beloveds of the beloved… shanti, shanti, shantihi…

are you feeling the rhythmic pull to hollow/hallow in as we near the closing of this turn around the circling of the sun, this cycle of life? here in the northern hemisphere, the darkening also inspires burrowing, hibernating…  bear nature is pulling me into the dream cave to still every cell, to dance without moving, to commune in silence, to open the heart so widely as to take in all the suffering transmuting it into blessing for all in pain, for all suffering loss with my recent sojourn in the shadowlands of physically feeling so uncomfortable bringing it all home so viscerally…

let us take this moment to ring the bell and enter the crystalline garden grove of peace…

“I offer you peace.
I offer you love.
I offer you friendship.
I see your beauty.
I hear your need.
I feel your feelings.
My wisdom flows from the highest Source.
I salute that Source in you.
Let us work together. For unity and peace.”

~ Mahatma Gandhi ~

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may we be at peace

may our one heart remain open

may we all realize the beauty of our true nature

may we all know the astonishing light of our interbeing

may we all be whole and a source of healing for all our relations

~

breathing infinite gratitude deeply through our one heart,
may we all be safe. may we all be loved. may we all be held. may all be well.
may we feel the support encircling us with a thousand angel wings.
may we rest gracefully in the beauty of this moment…

~

“The first step toward living a happy life is to treat every other human with kindness. There are several steps after that, but I can’t remember right now.”

~ Dalai Lama ~

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an angel awakens me on this misty morning knowing it is the moment to celebrate the astonishing light of our interbeing when i, at long last, feel i’m returning to the land of the living with the feathered one singing the most beautiful song and then takes his leave into the ethers transporting me into a day of dreaming wildpeace and being in the consciousness of this “just right” poem by the inimitable poetic farmer of the heart:

~

The Peace of Wild Things

“When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”

~ Wendell Berry~

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may we all take heart and rest in the grace of the world this moment…

one of the highlights today bringing so much joy was watching an almost 90 year old singing This Land Is Your Land in inaugural festivities back in 2009…

i write tonight from the prophetic space of outside the camp, outside the contemporary defended encampments of us and them, our side and their side and appeal to our deeper self where we real-eyes we are one whole interbeing with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, where we know a great vision is needed and we are the ones elected to keep the faith and do the work of justice for all… a few days before midterm elections in the usa, i reflect on the pilgrimage of my country; many nights i have shared Langston Hughes poem on letting america be america again… and, just as i would have liked crazy horse to have used a more inclusive word than man, i would have left off the again for i do not feel we’ve tried democracy yet; some of us have had that privilege while many have not… as i write millions of americans are hurting needing us to keep the faith and speak truth to power deeply from our heart making the words of This Land an embodied experience for all…

and now may we tune into the poet’s speaking truth and be inspired to keep the faith and take action daily to heal, make whole, repair the breach for all relatives…

~

“Let America be America again.

Let it be the dream it used to be.

Let it be the pioneer on the plain

Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—

Let it be that great strong land of love

Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme

That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty

Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,

But opportunity is real, and life is free,

Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There’s never been equality for me,

Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?

And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,

I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.

I am the red man driven from the land,

I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—

And finding only the same old stupid plan

Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,

Tangled in that ancient endless chain

Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!

Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!

Of work the men! Of take the pay!

Of owning everything for one’s own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.

I am the worker sold to the machine.

I am the Negro, servant to you all.

I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—

Hungry yet today despite the dream.

Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!

I am the man who never got ahead,

The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dream

In the Old World while still a serf of kings,

Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,

That even yet its mighty daring sings

In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

That’s made America the land it has become.

O, I’m the man who sailed those early seas

In search of what I meant to be my home—

For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,

And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,

And torn from Black Africa’s strand I came

To build a “homeland of the free.”

The free?

Who said the free?  Not me?

Surely not me?  The millions on relief today?

The millions shot down when we strike?

The millions who have nothing for our pay?

For all the dreams we’ve dreamed

And all the songs we’ve sung

And all the hopes we’ve held

And all the flags we’ve hung,

The millions who have nothing for our pay—

Except the dream that’s almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—

The land that never has been yet—

And yet must be—the land where every man is free.

The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—

Who made America,

Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,

Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,

Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—

The steel of freedom does not stain.

From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,

We must take back our land again,

America!

O, yes,

I say it plain,

America never was America to me,

And yet I swear this oath—

America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,

The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,

We, the people, must redeem

The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.

The mountains and the endless plain—

All, all the stretch of these great green states—

And make America again!”

~Langston Hughes~

~

may the inward guide and those who have gone before us—the organizers, the advocates, the peacebuilders, and changemakers—inspire us to persistently speak truth to power as we work for the beloved community…

in this moment of eternity, all over the planet, life is out of balance and we know deep in our bones we must change the dream we’ve been living… when we listen to the indigenous, the people of the land who listen to the all that is, we hear the clarion call to love our mother and each other… water, air, trees, sun, moon, stars, all our relatives, and we are all relatives woven together intricately, inextricably, interconnectedly…

we can all feel that we are at a tipping point, a sacred space with birth pangs so intense it feels like we are dying; yes, we are to a life that no longer fits, a shell that is too constricting… we are at a moment when we must band together, stand together in love, throw off the illusion of separation, re-member the reality that we are one just as abraham re-minded us that a house divided cannot stand…

yes, let us take courage and be of strong heart, awaken the dream of the world we all share and long to real-eyes… a world of peace built on justice and guided by our essence, our essence of love… let us be repairers of the breach finding the way to relate to and listen to each other taking deep breaths and opening ourselves, our one heart to great mystery trusting a greater force beyond understanding is orchestrating the symphony while we play our parts as gracefully as is given to us… a simple task but not an easy one this flowing with unfolding mystery… empty, empty coming home to our true heart of intending a world that works for all…

a poem comes to me, it comes circuitously… written as a rituwell celebrating cosmos creation, it seems perfect for numina november, the day following all souls day of honoring the ancestors and sending them back into the night sea to watch over us as we  emerge and see… sounding and re-sounding the words, we breathe in life, this nascent moment of interbeing, and breathe out life, this nascent moment of interbeing, in a seamless circle of birth to death to rebirth to death as one organic whole… join me in simply being, breathing, bowing, dancing and flowing in beauty as the soul of the space wherever we are in this wild and precious moment…

~

Ancestor Prayer

“When you were born,
The earth became your body,
The stone became your bone,
The sea became your blood,
The sun became your eye,
The moon became your mind,
The wind became your breath.
When you passed to the Otherworld,
Your breath became the wind,
Your mind became the moon,
Your eye became the sun,
Your blood became the sea,
Your bone became the stone,
Your body became the earth.
When we were born, you did the same for us:
You called forth the earth and rocks;
The sea arose and the sun descended;
The moon shone down and the winds sang.
For those who come after, we shall do as you did for us
When we are gone, we shall do as you did before.
Ancestors, we honour you.”

~ The Reverend Michael J Dangler ~

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another delivery today for this moment of eternity, a blessingway for our ancient earth mother…

~

In a mother’s womb were two babies. One asked the other:
“Do you believe in life after delivery?” The other replied, “Why, of course. There has to be something after delivery. Maybe we are here to prepare ourselves for what we will be later.”
“Nonsense” said the first. “There is no life after delivery. What kind of life would that be?”
The second said, “I don’t know, but there will be more light than here. Maybe we will walk with our legs and eat from our mouths. Maybe we will have other senses that we can’t understand now.”
The first replied, “That is absurd. Walking is impossible. And eating with our mouths? Ridiculous! The umbilical cord supplies nutrition and everything we need. But the umbilical cord is so short. Life after delivery is to be logically excluded.”
The second insisted, “Well I think there is something and maybe it’s different than it is here. Maybe we won’t need this physical cord anymore.”
The first replied, “Nonsense. And moreover if there is life, then why has no one has ever come back from there? Delivery is the end of life, and in the after-delivery there is nothing but darkness and silence and oblivion. It takes us nowhere.”
“Well, I don’t know,” said the second, “but certainly we will meet Mother and she will take care of us.”
The first replied “Mother? You actually believe in Mother? That’s laughable. If Mother exists then where is She now?”
The second said, “She is all around us. We are surrounded by her. We are of Her. It is in Her that we live. Without Her this world would not and could not exist.”
Said the first: “Well I don’t see Her, so it is only logical that She doesn’t exist.”
To which the second replied, “Sometimes, when you’re in silence and you focus and you really listen, you can perceive Her presence, and you can hear Her loving voice, calling down from above.”
~ Útmutató a Léleknek ~

well come, relatives, to this day of honoring ancestors celebrating all saints/all souls, dia de los muertos in this new moonth of numina november, a moon, a month to take a long pregnant pause in the cauldron of transformation luxuriating in being here now in the present moment of this powerful portal of deepening into the dark when the veils between the realms are thinned with heart openings in the vast sky sea for us to enter and float in the river of re-membering beginning with this auspicious date of 11/1, a trinity of ones, a day when we feel the communion of saints/souls/ancestors, the company of heavenearth, the bright and shining ones who, in reality, are all ways with us just as we are always with them…

let’s take this powerful portal moment of eternity which asks us to imagine the world anew and choose to walk through it lightly, without past baggage, in an awakened way… perhaps you’ll join me in taking up HH’s call to use every moment to expand the heart and be of as much benefit as we can be in service to rainbow mystery…

to anchor in our intentions, let’s gather ’round the ceremonial fire taking each other’s hands in this numina moment to conspire, to breathe together, to let go fully getting down to bare bones, shedding the skins of conditioning, simply breathing into now, this wild and precious moment of presence with nothing to do  and nowhere to go , simply be now here shining our light…

with our next inspiration, listen to this breath flowing through, animating us, expanding our being and feel the golden light of the cosm showering us, pouring in, hollowing in, flooding all the arteries and veins in the deep river below the river flowing within…

let us take one more breath together in the river of the numina re-joy-sing in the place where spirit lives, re-joy-sing in the space which is of love and light and peace and truth, re-joy-sing in the sun and moon and stars above,  re-joy-sing in the fire and earth and water and air, re-joy-sing in the river below, re-joy-sing in the center within, re-joy-sing in our recognizing ourselves in each other re-membering we are one, onederfilled heart of creative imagination so designed for these challenging days of re-weaving the world with wisdom and wonder thus co-creating a world that works for all relatives…

here’s to our real-eye-sing and re-joy-sing in wandering awakened under this 11th moon of the numina inspiring our shedding skins and shining light – cheers!…