Prompt:
"At present our only true names are nicknames"
—Henry David Thoreau, Walking
++++++++++
It’s funny, when you’re in a moment, you can hardly feel there. And it’s funny how years later it can feel so real. Sure, we are always at present, but
tell that to the scent from the store you’re passing. Next thing you know you’re two blocks past your car because what does that smell remind you of? Oh, shit, yeah! It’s summer vacation in New Hampshire and White Mountain Bagels in the morning and hiking along humming rivers and swimming in biting cold water and family rummy tournaments and dad’s drunk and mom’s laughing at him and there’s no bedtime and every meal’s on the grill but who were you then?
tell it to the classroom door that slams down the hall in just that way your mom used to do when you were still too young to know why. All of a sudden your legs are numb from sitting on the toilet too long but you don’t want to leave the stall because some deep, deep part of your lizard brain feels like hiding under the blankets. You’re not even on a phone or reading Sports Illustrated, you just hear muffled yelling and back and forth stomping and a garage door opening and a car driving down the hill. And whichever parent didn’t storm out this time comes upstairs to comfort you like it’s gonna help at all, but really it’s just the school nurse poking her head in the bathroom to see if you’re ok, like it’s gonna help at all. But who were you, then?
tell it to the diet Pepsi someone spilled on the ground in this cinema that you squished your sneaker through. The sticky residue followed you fifteen feet to your seat and even though it feels like you just sat down you missed the previews cause you‘re back in a frat house basement with too many people listening to music too loud way too late at night to do any good for anyone and your visions fuzzy and your friends are missing and some upperclassman is making a face at you like he wants to fight or fuck or both and you just want to fit in but who were you then?
maybe, just maybe, tell it to the soft smell of incense and the feeling of tea warmth under your chin that brings you right into this place and this room and this moment and ask yourself, who am I now?
—Andy Bernstein
++++++++++
The Question
Prompt:
Write about a question that you think you don't have the answer for.
++++++++++
Write about a question that you think you don't have the answer for.
++++++++++
Lost
Prompt:
“Lost really has two disparate meanings. Losing things is about the familiar falling away, getting lost is about the unfamiliar appearing.”
— Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
“Lost really has two disparate meanings. Losing things is about the familiar falling away, getting lost is about the unfamiliar appearing.”
— Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
++++++++++
Martha's Birthday Poem: 69
Martha Koock Ward posting her poem, musing about her birthday today.... How do you feel about how you are aging?
++++++++++
69
Finishing off this 6th decade
Like that last bite of cake, or
Downing a draught of cool
Water, my thirst to slake, gives
Me such a sense of satisfaction
To feel both the time & the endless
Measures of help, I’ve been given to heal.
Legions of persons have lain on
Hands, touched my heart, willing,
Praying, and way-showing me to
Wholeness sought, promised from my,
Sometimes deranged & disparate parts.
I see that so many landmarks are gone,
Family relations, friends, leaders of nations,
And, strangers, who dressed this stage.
I am grateful for each known, or not,
As I await my next entrance,
I am very curious about the plot.
— Martha Koock Ward
++++++++++
69
Finishing off this 6th decade
Like that last bite of cake, or
Downing a draught of cool
Water, my thirst to slake, gives
Me such a sense of satisfaction
To feel both the time & the endless
Measures of help, I’ve been given to heal.
Legions of persons have lain on
Hands, touched my heart, willing,
Praying, and way-showing me to
Wholeness sought, promised from my,
Sometimes deranged & disparate parts.
I see that so many landmarks are gone,
Family relations, friends, leaders of nations,
And, strangers, who dressed this stage.
I am grateful for each known, or not,
As I await my next entrance,
I am very curious about the plot.
— Martha Koock Ward
Happy are They
Prompt:
Happy are they who still love something they loved in the nursery:
They have not been broken in two by time; they are not two persons,
but one, and they have saved not only their souls but their lives.
— G. K. Chesterton
++++++++++
Happy are they who still love something they loved in the nursery:
They have not been broken in two by time; they are not two persons,
but one, and they have saved not only their souls but their lives.
— G. K. Chesterton
++++++++++
Hurricane Harvey
Prompt:
This poem by a student of Gaelyn Godwin Roshi, resident teacher at the Houston Zen Center. It's the perfect "instruction" on how to pray for Houston.
Hurricane Harvey
if you want
to pray for Houston you have to pray
in her way
pray like Beyoncé when she was
at HSPVA
or Billy and Dusty shooting pool
at Rudyard's
pray like you're sitting over soup
at Spanish Flowers
or pho at Mai's steaming your glasses
pray like the kids playing soccer
on the east side
or mutton busting
at the livestock show
pray like the runners
in Memorial Park
lacing them up
or the researchers
in the medical center looking into microscopes
if you want
to pray for Houston you have to pray
as quietly as
the Rothko Chapel
or Houston Zen Center
and you have to pray as loudly as
the old scoreboard at the Astrodome after a José Cruz home run
you have to pray sitting under
a live oak tree
or standing next to an azalea bloom while your skin clams in the heat
if you want to pray
for Houston
you have to pray without pretense
this ain't Dallas
and in a neighborly way as friends come out
to check on each other in the rain
and those
who are far away watch screens
and wipe our eyes
if you want to pray
for Houston
raise a bottle of Shiner to the gray sky
and say that 130 mile an hour winds and 9 trillion gallons of rain
are no match
for a city of such life
and diversity
you can fill up our bayou but you will never rain on our parade
Jeremy Rutledge 2017
Hurricane Harvey
++++++++++
I do pray for things. Not very often. And only when my resources are depleted. So I'm waiting for the results of a test. I pray. I guess Kevin, with his doctorate in the philosophy of probability, would say that I'm intuitively calculating the odds that I have some incurable disease, and I have figured that there is a chance, if only remote. I'm not sure if my kids or my wife knows that I do this. (I just asked my wife and my son, and they both said I didn’t pray.) They must just think that I'm blessed and that's why things generally turn out so well. Or maybe, Janelle, our class minister, might say, that I'm blessed because I do pray. I never told my parents, either. And now it is a little late, unless I'm mistaken about the power of their remains.
I guess I could pray for the people in Houston. Or at least I could feel guilty for not doing so. I knew a woman who was recovering from an illness. She went to a weekly prayer group, and they all prayed for one another. Against all odds, she is still around 25 years later.
Once in college I was really worried about something and I went to a church that was open 24/7. I put $5 in the box on the wall. Lo and behold, an intervention occurred and things turned out well. So I went back to the church and retrieved my money.
This would be more understandable if things had turned out the way I didn't want them to turn out. Then I could rationalize that I had wasted my money so it was ok to retrieve it. And maybe it did do good.
So I've heard a couple of things this week about karma that were new to me. One is that karma is not action, but rather intention. So my intention was good, perhaps, to put the money in the box at the church. But maybe not so good to take it out.
The second idea about karma is one that I had read just an hour ago. And it slipped my mind when I wrote the last paragraph. It said that the rational mind shouldn't try to understand the relationship of karma and action. The effects of karma are not comprehensible. In the article I was reading, it said that karma is mystery. We don't know the effect of our intentions.
Prayer? I'll continue to pray. Will I believe it will make a difference? Some part of me probably will because otherwise I wouldn't do it. But another part thinks it is silly. So let's keep my praying as a secret between us. OK?
—Kim Mosley
++++++++++
If You Want To Pray For Houston
My brother wrote today.
The epicenter of deep water
Was three blocks from
Where we once lived.
He shuddered to think, he wrote.
Was his shudder a prayer?
Parkplace: simple, quiet, just barely middle class.
I remember the Irish (almost certainly Catholic)
Policeman who walked us
Across the busy intersection to school.
Is it underwater now?
The reservoir overflowed today
And a certain measure of water
Let out into the flooded streets
Built when I was 2
The year before my brother was born.
Infrastructure spending was not a sin then.
FDR was in the White House.
Laboratory grade fluoride was in our water
To protect children's teeth
All the children's teeth.
Joel Olsteen thinks Jesus will fix it
And does not want to open
His palacial megaplex
To the little soccer playing kids
From the east side.
As quiet as Rothko Chapel
The prayer of silence
Like researchers looking into microscopes
You must be very still and listen
To learn from looking into microscopes.
My brother wrote today.
He shuddered to think, he wrote.
The great infrastructure project
Designed to protect Houston
Was built before he was born.
My brother is 75.
Houston was just over half-a-million people then.
Today - 6 million 5
Minus those who drowned.
I sit in silence
As quiet as Rothko Chapel.
I shudder to think.
It is my prayer.
— Jamelle Curlin-Taylor
This poem by a student of Gaelyn Godwin Roshi, resident teacher at the Houston Zen Center. It's the perfect "instruction" on how to pray for Houston.
Hurricane Harvey
if you want
to pray for Houston you have to pray
in her way
pray like Beyoncé when she was
at HSPVA
or Billy and Dusty shooting pool
at Rudyard's
pray like you're sitting over soup
at Spanish Flowers
or pho at Mai's steaming your glasses
pray like the kids playing soccer
on the east side
or mutton busting
at the livestock show
pray like the runners
in Memorial Park
lacing them up
or the researchers
in the medical center looking into microscopes
if you want
to pray for Houston you have to pray
as quietly as
the Rothko Chapel
or Houston Zen Center
and you have to pray as loudly as
the old scoreboard at the Astrodome after a José Cruz home run
you have to pray sitting under
a live oak tree
or standing next to an azalea bloom while your skin clams in the heat
if you want to pray
for Houston
you have to pray without pretense
this ain't Dallas
and in a neighborly way as friends come out
to check on each other in the rain
and those
who are far away watch screens
and wipe our eyes
if you want to pray
for Houston
raise a bottle of Shiner to the gray sky
and say that 130 mile an hour winds and 9 trillion gallons of rain
are no match
for a city of such life
and diversity
you can fill up our bayou but you will never rain on our parade
Jeremy Rutledge 2017
Hurricane Harvey
++++++++++
I do pray for things. Not very often. And only when my resources are depleted. So I'm waiting for the results of a test. I pray. I guess Kevin, with his doctorate in the philosophy of probability, would say that I'm intuitively calculating the odds that I have some incurable disease, and I have figured that there is a chance, if only remote. I'm not sure if my kids or my wife knows that I do this. (I just asked my wife and my son, and they both said I didn’t pray.) They must just think that I'm blessed and that's why things generally turn out so well. Or maybe, Janelle, our class minister, might say, that I'm blessed because I do pray. I never told my parents, either. And now it is a little late, unless I'm mistaken about the power of their remains.
I guess I could pray for the people in Houston. Or at least I could feel guilty for not doing so. I knew a woman who was recovering from an illness. She went to a weekly prayer group, and they all prayed for one another. Against all odds, she is still around 25 years later.
Once in college I was really worried about something and I went to a church that was open 24/7. I put $5 in the box on the wall. Lo and behold, an intervention occurred and things turned out well. So I went back to the church and retrieved my money.
This would be more understandable if things had turned out the way I didn't want them to turn out. Then I could rationalize that I had wasted my money so it was ok to retrieve it. And maybe it did do good.
So I've heard a couple of things this week about karma that were new to me. One is that karma is not action, but rather intention. So my intention was good, perhaps, to put the money in the box at the church. But maybe not so good to take it out.
The second idea about karma is one that I had read just an hour ago. And it slipped my mind when I wrote the last paragraph. It said that the rational mind shouldn't try to understand the relationship of karma and action. The effects of karma are not comprehensible. In the article I was reading, it said that karma is mystery. We don't know the effect of our intentions.
Prayer? I'll continue to pray. Will I believe it will make a difference? Some part of me probably will because otherwise I wouldn't do it. But another part thinks it is silly. So let's keep my praying as a secret between us. OK?
—Kim Mosley
++++++++++
If You Want To Pray For Houston
My brother wrote today.
The epicenter of deep water
Was three blocks from
Where we once lived.
He shuddered to think, he wrote.
Was his shudder a prayer?
Parkplace: simple, quiet, just barely middle class.
I remember the Irish (almost certainly Catholic)
Policeman who walked us
Across the busy intersection to school.
Is it underwater now?
The reservoir overflowed today
And a certain measure of water
Let out into the flooded streets
Built when I was 2
The year before my brother was born.
Infrastructure spending was not a sin then.
FDR was in the White House.
Laboratory grade fluoride was in our water
To protect children's teeth
All the children's teeth.
Joel Olsteen thinks Jesus will fix it
And does not want to open
His palacial megaplex
To the little soccer playing kids
From the east side.
As quiet as Rothko Chapel
The prayer of silence
Like researchers looking into microscopes
You must be very still and listen
To learn from looking into microscopes.
My brother wrote today.
He shuddered to think, he wrote.
The great infrastructure project
Designed to protect Houston
Was built before he was born.
My brother is 75.
Houston was just over half-a-million people then.
Today - 6 million 5
Minus those who drowned.
I sit in silence
As quiet as Rothko Chapel.
I shudder to think.
It is my prayer.
— Jamelle Curlin-Taylor
Sujata’s Offering
Prompt:
Sujata’s Offering INDIA, SIXTH CENTURY BCE
SUJATA was the beautiful daughter of a landowner, and she prayed to the spirit of a banyan tree for a good husband and son. Her wish was granted, and every year, in gratitude, she made an offering of sweet, thick milk-rice at the foot of the tree. Meanwhile, after six years of severe austerities, Siddhartha was close to death from starvation. One day he sat down in meditation beneath Sujata’s banyan tree. That same day Sujata dreamed that she should make her annual offering. She sent her servant to prepare the place for the offering, and the servant ran back, crying, “A god is sitting under the tree!” So Sujata made up the milk-rice in a golden bowl and carried it to the tree with her own hands. She offered it to Siddhartha, saying, “Just as my wish has been fulfilled, so may yours be granted.” He ate the milk-rice with gratitude, and it was the finest food he had eaten in many months. Then he cast the golden bowl into the river, saying, “If I am to fully awaken, may this bowl float upstream.” The bowl floated upstream. Later that day, renewed by Sujata’s offering, he sat down, determined to awaken, and his wish was granted. Sujata and her son later became disciples of the Buddha and members of the sangha.
(2013-10-21). The Hidden Lamp: Stories from Twenty-Five Centuries of Awakened Women (p. 283). Wisdom Publications. Kindle Edition.
The prompt is gift. Write about a gift you have received or given.
Sujata’s Offering INDIA, SIXTH CENTURY BCE
SUJATA was the beautiful daughter of a landowner, and she prayed to the spirit of a banyan tree for a good husband and son. Her wish was granted, and every year, in gratitude, she made an offering of sweet, thick milk-rice at the foot of the tree. Meanwhile, after six years of severe austerities, Siddhartha was close to death from starvation. One day he sat down in meditation beneath Sujata’s banyan tree. That same day Sujata dreamed that she should make her annual offering. She sent her servant to prepare the place for the offering, and the servant ran back, crying, “A god is sitting under the tree!” So Sujata made up the milk-rice in a golden bowl and carried it to the tree with her own hands. She offered it to Siddhartha, saying, “Just as my wish has been fulfilled, so may yours be granted.” He ate the milk-rice with gratitude, and it was the finest food he had eaten in many months. Then he cast the golden bowl into the river, saying, “If I am to fully awaken, may this bowl float upstream.” The bowl floated upstream. Later that day, renewed by Sujata’s offering, he sat down, determined to awaken, and his wish was granted. Sujata and her son later became disciples of the Buddha and members of the sangha.
(2013-10-21). The Hidden Lamp: Stories from Twenty-Five Centuries of Awakened Women (p. 283). Wisdom Publications. Kindle Edition.
The prompt is gift. Write about a gift you have received or given.
Protecting What We Love
Prompt:
“because this is how we protect what we love,
by hiding what it truly means to us, this little bag of gold
we keep buried in the yard, the thing we will do anything
to keep safe, even going so far as to pretend
it doesn't exist, that there's nothing missing in the dark.”
Excerpt from Quan Barry's poem “Someone once said we were put on this earth to witness and testify”
++++++++++
“because this is how we protect what we love,
by hiding what it truly means to us, this little bag of gold
we keep buried in the yard, the thing we will do anything
to keep safe, even going so far as to pretend
it doesn't exist, that there's nothing missing in the dark.”
Excerpt from Quan Barry's poem “Someone once said we were put on this earth to witness and testify”
++++++++++
Little, tiny drops of rain
Prompt:
"Little, tiny drops of rain, drops of rain may look like pimples on the flower's skin but it's so ironic—it is so ironic—it is those drops that cool the flower. Flaws are the rawest and most original forms of you, how "cool" is that!" —Nita Majethia
++++++++++
FLAWS: I like people who don’t know how to finish a full story. They will start by telling you, “the other day I went to HEB,” and end up with tears in their eyes, sharing with you about their grandma who died last month. They will pause and say, “Anyway, I don’t even remember what I was trying to say…” I like people who say the wrong words on accident. They will say something like “fresh of breath air,” or, “potato couch,” because it was the meaning they were after and not the correct arrangement of words. I like people who don’t talk much and when they finally do, it sounds like a pure bell ringing in the static of everyone else’s voices. But I also like people who talk too much as if they have no filter. They might interrupt you but then say, “hold on, let me just get this one thing out!” I also like people who stutter and mumble, because I have to listen closely, and the words they are choosing take great effort. I like people who can’t control their laughter. Like my uncle who turns beet red during my grandpa’s long prayers before family dinners. We all know he’s excusing himself to just to go release laughter alone in the bathroom. I like that feeling when I’m writing and I’m not even trying to be good. Something embarrassing, awkward will burst out—a girl with a stutter and bad handwriting has something to say. It feels like an accidental birth of an idea, painful and inconvenient, but alive and crying nonetheless. I also like women who wear too much make-up and perfume to HEB because I know the deep hunger of wanting to be beautiful and noticed, even among the vegetables and produce aisle on a Tuesday night. I like the little boy at my summer camp that raised his hand in a discussion about recycling to tell everyone that last night his dad never came home. I like when my uptight supervisor licks Cheetos off her fingers when she thinks no one is looking. I liked the people in Africa who had no sense of personal space. Like the lady on public transport that started braiding my hair and my host mom who would jiggle my belly fat and tell me I’m eating well—o ya gabotse! All of this is probably why adults drink so much. So we can slur old love songs and hold one another and dance to Justin Bieber—even if we can’t stand him, even if we can’t dance.
by Hallie Gayle
"Little, tiny drops of rain, drops of rain may look like pimples on the flower's skin but it's so ironic—it is so ironic—it is those drops that cool the flower. Flaws are the rawest and most original forms of you, how "cool" is that!" —Nita Majethia
++++++++++
FLAWS: I like people who don’t know how to finish a full story. They will start by telling you, “the other day I went to HEB,” and end up with tears in their eyes, sharing with you about their grandma who died last month. They will pause and say, “Anyway, I don’t even remember what I was trying to say…” I like people who say the wrong words on accident. They will say something like “fresh of breath air,” or, “potato couch,” because it was the meaning they were after and not the correct arrangement of words. I like people who don’t talk much and when they finally do, it sounds like a pure bell ringing in the static of everyone else’s voices. But I also like people who talk too much as if they have no filter. They might interrupt you but then say, “hold on, let me just get this one thing out!” I also like people who stutter and mumble, because I have to listen closely, and the words they are choosing take great effort. I like people who can’t control their laughter. Like my uncle who turns beet red during my grandpa’s long prayers before family dinners. We all know he’s excusing himself to just to go release laughter alone in the bathroom. I like that feeling when I’m writing and I’m not even trying to be good. Something embarrassing, awkward will burst out—a girl with a stutter and bad handwriting has something to say. It feels like an accidental birth of an idea, painful and inconvenient, but alive and crying nonetheless. I also like women who wear too much make-up and perfume to HEB because I know the deep hunger of wanting to be beautiful and noticed, even among the vegetables and produce aisle on a Tuesday night. I like the little boy at my summer camp that raised his hand in a discussion about recycling to tell everyone that last night his dad never came home. I like when my uptight supervisor licks Cheetos off her fingers when she thinks no one is looking. I liked the people in Africa who had no sense of personal space. Like the lady on public transport that started braiding my hair and my host mom who would jiggle my belly fat and tell me I’m eating well—o ya gabotse! All of this is probably why adults drink so much. So we can slur old love songs and hold one another and dance to Justin Bieber—even if we can’t stand him, even if we can’t dance.
by Hallie Gayle
A Heavy Branch Fell
Prompt:
One day during a storm a heavy branch fell onto a little snowdrop plant. Later when the branch was removed the small tender stems, unharmed, were seen to have spread out and curled around as if to embrace the log. Less than an hour later, the little shoots had all but straightened out and, unimpeded, were growing upward toward their fulfillment.
Murshida Sitara Brutnell
The Sufi Way, England
From Prayers for a Thousand Years
(ed. Elizabeth Roberts & Elias Amidon, Harper San Francisco)
++++++++++
Lava Ferns
Lava flows settle and solidify
in sheets upon sheets of
brittle, porous planes, like
Phyllo dough for baclava,
left out to dry, now stuck
solid.
Cooled surfaces relent to
Nature's thrust, Persephone
rising from Hades lair, seeking
Demeter's embrace.
Fronds of ferns peak out of the lava's
cold darkness, curling back on itself,
like hieroglyph of hope ascending,
spreading slim wings of green.
Spores lifted by the moist motion of the
oceans pounding love against stone-fired shore.
Having broken through the molten manacle
made from within, ferns called forth other
greenings, prehistoric.
And the breeze carried their collective cry,
"It's time to begin again."
by Martha Koock Ward
++++++++++
WITNESS AND TESTIFY
When everything is over and all this is left on the floors of this
earth is Styrofoam, cockroaches and broken Apple products – what voice
will emerge from the dark? What wind will be left to tear and carry
the remains around and around in a stir of chaos? When all the books
have been torn from the shelves and there are no people left to testify
– what wound will infinity feel in her massive black claw? Which held,
for a time, a rise and fall of oceans, lovers who whispered poetry
about rain, chords on the piano that responded to what was missing in
the dark.
Will she, the dark mass, rise up like an oppressed beast? Will she
shake off the waste, bite into the blood of roaches who live off the
dead? What cry of disorder will spring out a lust for life, like the
voice in Genesis, which responded to the void with a word?
Some people say the earth will end in a fire. And then perhaps a
return to complete silence, with only the remnants of our life longing
to hold form. To re-create.
I hope that this is all that survives, old prayers echoing in
nothingness like particles of dust.
by Hallie Gayle
One day during a storm a heavy branch fell onto a little snowdrop plant. Later when the branch was removed the small tender stems, unharmed, were seen to have spread out and curled around as if to embrace the log. Less than an hour later, the little shoots had all but straightened out and, unimpeded, were growing upward toward their fulfillment.
Murshida Sitara Brutnell
The Sufi Way, England
From Prayers for a Thousand Years
(ed. Elizabeth Roberts & Elias Amidon, Harper San Francisco)
++++++++++
Lava Ferns
Lava flows settle and solidify
in sheets upon sheets of
brittle, porous planes, like
Phyllo dough for baclava,
left out to dry, now stuck
solid.
Cooled surfaces relent to
Nature's thrust, Persephone
rising from Hades lair, seeking
Demeter's embrace.
Fronds of ferns peak out of the lava's
cold darkness, curling back on itself,
like hieroglyph of hope ascending,
spreading slim wings of green.
Spores lifted by the moist motion of the
oceans pounding love against stone-fired shore.
Having broken through the molten manacle
made from within, ferns called forth other
greenings, prehistoric.
And the breeze carried their collective cry,
"It's time to begin again."
by Martha Koock Ward
++++++++++
WITNESS AND TESTIFY
When everything is over and all this is left on the floors of this
earth is Styrofoam, cockroaches and broken Apple products – what voice
will emerge from the dark? What wind will be left to tear and carry
the remains around and around in a stir of chaos? When all the books
have been torn from the shelves and there are no people left to testify
– what wound will infinity feel in her massive black claw? Which held,
for a time, a rise and fall of oceans, lovers who whispered poetry
about rain, chords on the piano that responded to what was missing in
the dark.
Will she, the dark mass, rise up like an oppressed beast? Will she
shake off the waste, bite into the blood of roaches who live off the
dead? What cry of disorder will spring out a lust for life, like the
voice in Genesis, which responded to the void with a word?
Some people say the earth will end in a fire. And then perhaps a
return to complete silence, with only the remnants of our life longing
to hold form. To re-create.
I hope that this is all that survives, old prayers echoing in
nothingness like particles of dust.
by Hallie Gayle
From Blossoms
Prompt: The poem is called "From Blossoms" by Li-Young Lee
Here he is reading it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApMG6YQb6OI
++++++++++
++++++++++
Flowers
I had an idea that Rich might bring a prompt about flowers. Thinking about flowers, I had a flashback from about 50 years ago. My aunt Reggie, my wife, and I walked by some flowers in Reggie’s garden. She went totally ape over these flowers as she pointed them out to us. She started exclaiming how they were so beautiful ... And she started jumping up and down like gorillas do when they meet a long lost friend. Or when a dog jumps all over her long lost master. I had never seen any human so excited about anything. I am kind of a dead beat and often say to myself, “bah humbug.”
Isn’t that what Ebenezer Scrooge would say in that Dickens' A Christmas Carol?
My grandkids started calling me grandpa no fun, until I adopted the name myself and took the fun out of that.
Reggie's excitement about the flowers was especially poignant because she had experienced a couple of tragedies. Normally our family didn’t do tragedy. Experience tragedies, that is. One of Reggie’s sons turned out to be severely disabled and then Reggie had a surgery that limited the use of one side of her body. And yet she was all there, like a cheerleader, telling that flower how beautiful she was and how much joy that flower had given her. Joy to die for, as the curious expression goes.
I was in a store the other day and the free sample lady gave me some chocolate and said it was to die for. I said that if you died you couldn't taste it. At first she tried to object, but then she looked at me and said, “you're right... It is something to live for.”
I was jealous of how Reggie could get so excited over a flower. Part of me thinks that one thing is just as beautiful as another. I decided one semester in college to photograph the ugliest thing in my life. It was a beige coffee cup from the vending machine in our art building. Finally I started to make beautiful images by cutting it up (which I took as cheating a bit). The Dallas Museum of Fine Arts owns one of the prints. But never did I jump up and down over that not-so-beautiful cup.
My painting teacher at the time, who was a great influence on me, claimed his greatest discovery was that corners pick up dirt. He would get excited about that idea. I never saw him excited over flowers.Though Indian turquoise jewelry tickled his fancy.
This takes me to the sirens that sang so beautifully that they'd lure the sailors into the rocks. Do flowers do that for some? Some find peace in flowers. Reggie, on the other hand, found ecstasy. I don't remember the flowers themselves. But I sure remember Reggie, and marvelled at her enthusiasm for these flowers of hers. Here’s a documentary on Reggie: http://jklabs.net/million.html
P.S. After everyone read their writing about flowers, and two women complaining that their lovers had been so inept at giving them the right flowers, and another saying that she and her girlfriends give each other flowers (because men don’t have a clue?)… I scooted over to Central Market to get my wife flowers… only to find that there was a power outage, and CM said I could come in, but could not buy anything. A week ago my wife had bought herself flowers and pointed them out to me, saying “look at the flowers I got from you.” I had the combined thoughts that I was glad she was getting what she wanted… and a little guilt that I wasn’t the one to get them.
P.P.S. Easy to please a woman? I asked her what kind of flowers she wanted today. She said carnations. But by the time I got to the store this morning, I wasn’t sure what she had said. So when I came home, I told her I couldn’t remember if she had said carnations or what. She said “carnations, but that she didn’t like all carnations.” So I took a picture of the ones “I had bought her last week” that were starting to wilt. She also said there were some other flowers she liked, but she forgot their name.
P.P.P.S. We did an exercise the other day at a Zen temple. We each took three minutes to describe a gift we had received in the past. What was surprising was that it was not the gift that had really touched us, but really it was the connection that had formed with the giver. The gift itself of little consequence in the interaction. What are we really saying when we pick apart the gift?
—Kim Mosley
++++++++++
Here he is reading it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApMG6YQb6OI
++++++++++
 |
| Photo by Janelle Curlin-Taylor (altered by Kim) |
++++++++++
Flowers
I had an idea that Rich might bring a prompt about flowers. Thinking about flowers, I had a flashback from about 50 years ago. My aunt Reggie, my wife, and I walked by some flowers in Reggie’s garden. She went totally ape over these flowers as she pointed them out to us. She started exclaiming how they were so beautiful ... And she started jumping up and down like gorillas do when they meet a long lost friend. Or when a dog jumps all over her long lost master. I had never seen any human so excited about anything. I am kind of a dead beat and often say to myself, “bah humbug.”
Isn’t that what Ebenezer Scrooge would say in that Dickens' A Christmas Carol?
My grandkids started calling me grandpa no fun, until I adopted the name myself and took the fun out of that.
Reggie's excitement about the flowers was especially poignant because she had experienced a couple of tragedies. Normally our family didn’t do tragedy. Experience tragedies, that is. One of Reggie’s sons turned out to be severely disabled and then Reggie had a surgery that limited the use of one side of her body. And yet she was all there, like a cheerleader, telling that flower how beautiful she was and how much joy that flower had given her. Joy to die for, as the curious expression goes.
I was in a store the other day and the free sample lady gave me some chocolate and said it was to die for. I said that if you died you couldn't taste it. At first she tried to object, but then she looked at me and said, “you're right... It is something to live for.”
I was jealous of how Reggie could get so excited over a flower. Part of me thinks that one thing is just as beautiful as another. I decided one semester in college to photograph the ugliest thing in my life. It was a beige coffee cup from the vending machine in our art building. Finally I started to make beautiful images by cutting it up (which I took as cheating a bit). The Dallas Museum of Fine Arts owns one of the prints. But never did I jump up and down over that not-so-beautiful cup.
My painting teacher at the time, who was a great influence on me, claimed his greatest discovery was that corners pick up dirt. He would get excited about that idea. I never saw him excited over flowers.Though Indian turquoise jewelry tickled his fancy.
This takes me to the sirens that sang so beautifully that they'd lure the sailors into the rocks. Do flowers do that for some? Some find peace in flowers. Reggie, on the other hand, found ecstasy. I don't remember the flowers themselves. But I sure remember Reggie, and marvelled at her enthusiasm for these flowers of hers. Here’s a documentary on Reggie: http://jklabs.net/million.html
P.S. After everyone read their writing about flowers, and two women complaining that their lovers had been so inept at giving them the right flowers, and another saying that she and her girlfriends give each other flowers (because men don’t have a clue?)… I scooted over to Central Market to get my wife flowers… only to find that there was a power outage, and CM said I could come in, but could not buy anything. A week ago my wife had bought herself flowers and pointed them out to me, saying “look at the flowers I got from you.” I had the combined thoughts that I was glad she was getting what she wanted… and a little guilt that I wasn’t the one to get them.
P.P.S. Easy to please a woman? I asked her what kind of flowers she wanted today. She said carnations. But by the time I got to the store this morning, I wasn’t sure what she had said. So when I came home, I told her I couldn’t remember if she had said carnations or what. She said “carnations, but that she didn’t like all carnations.” So I took a picture of the ones “I had bought her last week” that were starting to wilt. She also said there were some other flowers she liked, but she forgot their name.
P.P.P.S. We did an exercise the other day at a Zen temple. We each took three minutes to describe a gift we had received in the past. What was surprising was that it was not the gift that had really touched us, but really it was the connection that had formed with the giver. The gift itself of little consequence in the interaction. What are we really saying when we pick apart the gift?
—Kim Mosley
++++++++++
Childhood Furniture
Prompt: Think of a piece of furniture or an item from your childhood/young years and write about it or let it write about you.
++++++++++
I was very sickly and confined to the couch. The couch was large as a house and had many rooms where I could seclude myself. Sometimes a doctor would visit and listen to my lungs wherein dark waters sloshed. When I was very still I could feel the tiny waves they made. The doctor brought the medicine and I breathed it in through a mask while the noisy machine fed me through tubes. I remained sickly for some time. My mother vacuumed the carpet everyday while I received my treatment and this sound soothed me, her machine having a conversation with mine. Presents were delivered to me to make me feel better but I was too weak to open and enjoy them. When left alone, I retreated into the furthest rooms of the couch. Where was my father?
There was a place called outside that I could see through the windows, but I was not able to go there. The green waving things seemed friendly enough, but the light was too bright and harsh, and the dark seemed full of fearful things that I did not want to think about.
The couch was mine alone, unless my father was home, in which case I had to share. Sometimes he would fall asleep during the day, with a thin quilt pulled all the way over his head. He looked like a mummy. I would quietly sneak over to where his head lay and listen to the strange sounds rattling around in his mouth and throat and chest; I imagined the bones of small animals were dancing in there and I worried he might choke.
I grew up into a big man, but I have carried with me the sickly little boy that I was, always providing for him the familiar comfort of a couch with many quiet rooms. Despite the largeness of my frame and the strength in my limbs, I am still that boy, wondering where my father would go when he was not mummified on the couch, and what were some of the delicious foods served at my mother’s table, and when exactly did I grow up and shed my sickness, and how much of it remains dormant in me still, and what happened to the dark, magic waters that I could hear moving inside me?
Am I perhaps at this very moment asleep and dreaming on the couch, conjuring this world that I inhabit? Did I slip into one of the moving picture shows on the big black box and forget to find my way back out? Am I still there on the couch, too weak to raise my arms, delirious with noise and medicine and wanting, imagining that I grew up big and strong and capable of walking on fire without getting burned?
_______________________________________________________
My couch is big enough for a family and I will make a fine father someday. All the provisions we need for a good and happy life are right here in the folds and recesses and secret compartments. I’ve amassed a small fortune in loose change and so we need want for nothing. We will have a comfortable life. We will host many wonderful guests. We will live happily in a cuddle-puddle and no one will be forced to eat broccoli if the smell of it makes them ill. All will be welcome on our family couch and no one will be turned away for arriving in an unshowered condition. On our couch there will be room for all beings to find a seat that suits them; all honored and even the dishonored ones will find comfort and ease when their weary rumps come into contact with our cushions.
My couch is your couch.
We’re all couched in this life, together, so don’t be shy—just grab a seat and settle in next to me here. Pull that lever right there by your feet and see what happens—ha! I bet you didn’t think a couch could do that!
—Ryan Stennet
++++++++++
++++++++++
I was very sickly and confined to the couch. The couch was large as a house and had many rooms where I could seclude myself. Sometimes a doctor would visit and listen to my lungs wherein dark waters sloshed. When I was very still I could feel the tiny waves they made. The doctor brought the medicine and I breathed it in through a mask while the noisy machine fed me through tubes. I remained sickly for some time. My mother vacuumed the carpet everyday while I received my treatment and this sound soothed me, her machine having a conversation with mine. Presents were delivered to me to make me feel better but I was too weak to open and enjoy them. When left alone, I retreated into the furthest rooms of the couch. Where was my father?
There was a place called outside that I could see through the windows, but I was not able to go there. The green waving things seemed friendly enough, but the light was too bright and harsh, and the dark seemed full of fearful things that I did not want to think about.
The couch was mine alone, unless my father was home, in which case I had to share. Sometimes he would fall asleep during the day, with a thin quilt pulled all the way over his head. He looked like a mummy. I would quietly sneak over to where his head lay and listen to the strange sounds rattling around in his mouth and throat and chest; I imagined the bones of small animals were dancing in there and I worried he might choke.
I grew up into a big man, but I have carried with me the sickly little boy that I was, always providing for him the familiar comfort of a couch with many quiet rooms. Despite the largeness of my frame and the strength in my limbs, I am still that boy, wondering where my father would go when he was not mummified on the couch, and what were some of the delicious foods served at my mother’s table, and when exactly did I grow up and shed my sickness, and how much of it remains dormant in me still, and what happened to the dark, magic waters that I could hear moving inside me?
Am I perhaps at this very moment asleep and dreaming on the couch, conjuring this world that I inhabit? Did I slip into one of the moving picture shows on the big black box and forget to find my way back out? Am I still there on the couch, too weak to raise my arms, delirious with noise and medicine and wanting, imagining that I grew up big and strong and capable of walking on fire without getting burned?
_______________________________________________________
My couch is big enough for a family and I will make a fine father someday. All the provisions we need for a good and happy life are right here in the folds and recesses and secret compartments. I’ve amassed a small fortune in loose change and so we need want for nothing. We will have a comfortable life. We will host many wonderful guests. We will live happily in a cuddle-puddle and no one will be forced to eat broccoli if the smell of it makes them ill. All will be welcome on our family couch and no one will be turned away for arriving in an unshowered condition. On our couch there will be room for all beings to find a seat that suits them; all honored and even the dishonored ones will find comfort and ease when their weary rumps come into contact with our cushions.
My couch is your couch.
We’re all couched in this life, together, so don’t be shy—just grab a seat and settle in next to me here. Pull that lever right there by your feet and see what happens—ha! I bet you didn’t think a couch could do that!
—Ryan Stennet
++++++++++
Ordinary Miracles
Prompt: Ordinary Miracles
++++++++++
The miracle isn't walking on water, it's walking on the earth.
— Thich Nhat Hanh
The TV tells me of the miracle
of modern manufacturing. I look.
The first one rolls off the line, perfect.
The second one just like it, the third
is boring, the fourth not a miracle
The sorcerer's apprentice waved
his master's wand, the broom grew arms,
picked up the bucket and started
to fill the basin, a miracle.
A second, a third, and so on.
The miracle turns ordinary.
A miracle by definition isn't repeatable.
These are not miracles. Now each tomorrow
is not a day we've ever seen before.
Each person, dog, tree we meet
is a miracle that will not be repeated.
See that in every person, every rock & tree,
everyday. Each a miracle.
Seeing that is a miracle.
++++++++++++++
Eames Rocker
What is style before it is hip,
before it's part of a school, has a name?
When it's affordable, but innovative, before
it's Mid-Century Modern and authentic
vintage competes with authentic reproduction.
I came out of the Eames Studio, built
of fiberglass, rather ordinary metal, two
wooden rockers of solid, commonplace wood.
I sat family, company, small children
two at a time. Turned over
I was a tank, a submarine, inspiration
for B.C.'s bird riding a turtle. I've
lost count of how many times
I've been moved, tossed in on top
of a trailerful of clothes, books,
other furniture. Somewhere along the way,
imperceptibly, the surface coat's worn off,
the wooden rocker cracked and repaired,
the children, one then the other left me
upright, just a chair among adults
without the imagination to turn me
over into a tank, a cave, anything
other than a vintage Eames rocker,
too hip to discard, too fragile to be used,
too far from affordable & innovative, too
worn to be the museum display for
Mid-Century Modern!
— Jeffery Taylor
++++++++++
++++++++++
The miracle isn't walking on water, it's walking on the earth.
— Thich Nhat Hanh
The TV tells me of the miracle
of modern manufacturing. I look.
The first one rolls off the line, perfect.
The second one just like it, the third
is boring, the fourth not a miracle
The sorcerer's apprentice waved
his master's wand, the broom grew arms,
picked up the bucket and started
to fill the basin, a miracle.
A second, a third, and so on.
The miracle turns ordinary.
A miracle by definition isn't repeatable.
These are not miracles. Now each tomorrow
is not a day we've ever seen before.
Each person, dog, tree we meet
is a miracle that will not be repeated.
See that in every person, every rock & tree,
everyday. Each a miracle.
Seeing that is a miracle.
++++++++++++++
Eames Rocker
What is style before it is hip,
before it's part of a school, has a name?
When it's affordable, but innovative, before
it's Mid-Century Modern and authentic
vintage competes with authentic reproduction.
I came out of the Eames Studio, built
of fiberglass, rather ordinary metal, two
wooden rockers of solid, commonplace wood.
I sat family, company, small children
two at a time. Turned over
I was a tank, a submarine, inspiration
for B.C.'s bird riding a turtle. I've
lost count of how many times
I've been moved, tossed in on top
of a trailerful of clothes, books,
other furniture. Somewhere along the way,
imperceptibly, the surface coat's worn off,
the wooden rocker cracked and repaired,
the children, one then the other left me
upright, just a chair among adults
without the imagination to turn me
over into a tank, a cave, anything
other than a vintage Eames rocker,
too hip to discard, too fragile to be used,
too far from affordable & innovative, too
worn to be the museum display for
Mid-Century Modern!
— Jeffery Taylor
++++++++++
Tables
Prompt: A list of types of tables
++++++++++
Operating Table
At surgery number four, the anesthesiologist said, "You're almost seventy, we ..." I thought, "Wait, I just turned sixty-five. What do you mean, almost seventy?" He continued, "... are going to drop the memory drug." Oh, I thought it was the chemo messing with my memory.
So they hooked me up and wheeled the gurney down the hall. This is where my memory usually ended. The aide elbowed the door switch. I realized this is why the switch is so far back, a gurney's length, from the door. The doors opened their funny way, one inward, one outward, and we continued on into the operating room. He lined the gurney up with the operating table and asked me to move myself onto it. I'm sure this had happened every operation, but I didn't remember because of the memory or twilight drug.
Lying on the operating table, a memory came back, "I've been here before", but no memory of which surgery it was.
When I was settled, they strapped my arms to swinging leaves of the operating table and swung them out of the way. Only then did the anesthetist nurse say
they were giving me something and I was out.
Log Tables
For most science and engineering students in the 70s, two items stayed with you through school: a slide rule and a Chemical Rubber Company book of
Standard Mathematical Tables and Formulae. Both cost \$30, a significant expense in those days. The CRC Handbook came with a sheet of gold foil to
emboss your name on the spine. Log tables were needed for some calculations with logarithms where more precision was needed than you could get out of a
slide rule. Those and the differential calculus formulas were the sections I used. As I found my path, I switched from straight electrical engineering to
the computer science option and used them less and less. Instead I increasingly used The Art of Computer Programming. When I graduated and moved
from job to job, both sets of books went with me to show I was a real engineer. Only after retirement did I donate them to the library. The subject area switch, the advent of affordable calculators, and improved programming libraries had made them superfluous.
Circular Table
My first jobs were in the Silicon Valley. Much of our joint eating out was at Chinese restaurants. Occasionally there were enough of us and we were well
known enough that we were seated at one of the banquet tables. They were big enough for 8--10 people with a lazy susan in the middle so serving platters
didn't have to be passed, just the whole thing turned. But people were impatient or didn't want what was in front of them. Serving platters were still passed, jumping ahead or behind in rotation.
++++++++++
Operating Table
At surgery number four, the anesthesiologist said, "You're almost seventy, we ..." I thought, "Wait, I just turned sixty-five. What do you mean, almost seventy?" He continued, "... are going to drop the memory drug." Oh, I thought it was the chemo messing with my memory.
So they hooked me up and wheeled the gurney down the hall. This is where my memory usually ended. The aide elbowed the door switch. I realized this is why the switch is so far back, a gurney's length, from the door. The doors opened their funny way, one inward, one outward, and we continued on into the operating room. He lined the gurney up with the operating table and asked me to move myself onto it. I'm sure this had happened every operation, but I didn't remember because of the memory or twilight drug.
Lying on the operating table, a memory came back, "I've been here before", but no memory of which surgery it was.
When I was settled, they strapped my arms to swinging leaves of the operating table and swung them out of the way. Only then did the anesthetist nurse say
they were giving me something and I was out.
Log Tables
For most science and engineering students in the 70s, two items stayed with you through school: a slide rule and a Chemical Rubber Company book of
Standard Mathematical Tables and Formulae. Both cost \$30, a significant expense in those days. The CRC Handbook came with a sheet of gold foil to
emboss your name on the spine. Log tables were needed for some calculations with logarithms where more precision was needed than you could get out of a
slide rule. Those and the differential calculus formulas were the sections I used. As I found my path, I switched from straight electrical engineering to
the computer science option and used them less and less. Instead I increasingly used The Art of Computer Programming. When I graduated and moved
from job to job, both sets of books went with me to show I was a real engineer. Only after retirement did I donate them to the library. The subject area switch, the advent of affordable calculators, and improved programming libraries had made them superfluous.
Circular Table
My first jobs were in the Silicon Valley. Much of our joint eating out was at Chinese restaurants. Occasionally there were enough of us and we were well
known enough that we were seated at one of the banquet tables. They were big enough for 8--10 people with a lazy susan in the middle so serving platters
didn't have to be passed, just the whole thing turned. But people were impatient or didn't want what was in front of them. Serving platters were still passed, jumping ahead or behind in rotation.
— Jeffrey Taylor
++++++++++
A Happy Birthday / Counting Backwards
Prompts were "A Happy Birthday" by Ted Kooser and "Counting Backwards" by Linda Pastan
++++++++++
Physics of Acceleration
It’s the physics of acceleration I mind,
the way time speeds up.
But of course to go through that barrier
at the end of life we need
the momentum to carry us through.
Those who don’t, stall without the traction
or momentum to carry them.
Months or years on the cusp, not
a pleasant place to be. Then
comes the slow grind, digging in
deeper and deeper until they find
the solid footing necessary
to push through.
Progress
Ken says, “Oh, that won't happen.”
I ask, “Can you prove it?”
Ken was younger, faster, but prone
to bogging down short of the goal.
Slow is faster if you don't have to stop
or backtrack.
Zanshin—Perfect Finish
I will ride this day down into night
continue the work though
there is not light to read, there
is light tunneling through the thin places.
Just because work/motion is ended
take care not to fall into laziness.
Let your stillness be impeccable.
Watershed Moments
There are watershed moments.
From the other side, seeing back
is difficult. Memory is often
thin, lost, or hazy.
From the pass you see
both and compare. Maybe
decide to return,
the old appears fairer.
Or proceed into the new, simply
because it is new, unknown, unwalked.
From a mountaintop,
you see many watersheds.
—Jeffery Taylor
++++++++++
Physics of Acceleration
It’s the physics of acceleration I mind,
the way time speeds up.
But of course to go through that barrier
at the end of life we need
the momentum to carry us through.
Those who don’t, stall without the traction
or momentum to carry them.
Months or years on the cusp, not
a pleasant place to be. Then
comes the slow grind, digging in
deeper and deeper until they find
the solid footing necessary
to push through.
Progress
Ken says, “Oh, that won't happen.”
I ask, “Can you prove it?”
Ken was younger, faster, but prone
to bogging down short of the goal.
Slow is faster if you don't have to stop
or backtrack.
Zanshin—Perfect Finish
I will ride this day down into night
continue the work though
there is not light to read, there
is light tunneling through the thin places.
Just because work/motion is ended
take care not to fall into laziness.
Let your stillness be impeccable.
Watershed Moments
There are watershed moments.
From the other side, seeing back
is difficult. Memory is often
thin, lost, or hazy.
From the pass you see
both and compare. Maybe
decide to return,
the old appears fairer.
Or proceed into the new, simply
because it is new, unknown, unwalked.
From a mountaintop,
you see many watersheds.
—Jeffery Taylor
The Dance of Anger
War
Red star, bright star;
So very near—so very far away.
What life awaits you on the morrow?
What color are your dreams?
Can you see me now—a reflection
in your glow?
a spark amidst your flame?
My light is pale, your urgency brilliant!
Don't let me lose control,
For my blood is your life.
Within me lies your creation, your destruction.
What color are your dreams,
Red star, bright star?
—Paul Causey
++++++++++
In all the 25 years I’ve known Drew, he still surprises me sometimes. When he was instructing me to do writing exercises about my dad, he noted how long he thought I been angry.
I’m not sure that I felt anger as much as confusion, fear, and ultimately frustration. I remember when I saw my first therapist during college—an intern I didn’t have to pay—I remember telling him that I couldn’t remember ever feeling angry, really, truly angry.
I never let myself. It wasn’t “productive.”
Years later, when I saw another therapist, she tried to make me feel okay being angry; she encouraged me to feel the feelings.
I’ve learned that no one can give you permission for that; it has to rise up within you.
It was years even after that that I started to feel angry. My anger is so tinged with sadness—for myself and for the unformed role models who couldn’t take care of themselves, much less me.
And when it came down to it, when my father was dying last year, any anger I had was replaced by intense compassion.
Seeing another human suffering, mentally and physically, as he was erased any inkling of being angry. It was not the time to yell, point fingers, make him understand all the things he did and didn’t do, not the place for scorekeeping or retribution.
My job in those last hours we spent together was simply to be present. There was no room for anger. There was no space for anger. There was no time for anger.
I was overcome with sadness for his state. The frustration with which he grunted and recoiled from the too-salty puréed food and the lack of cooperation from his hands in spooning it were palpable. Unable to endure more, I excused myself from the table. I walked purposefully down the hallways, around three corners to a pair of chairs set in a nook. I watched myself as I had since entering this building, purportedly to help my aunt with my dad’s paperwork.
I’d immediately dashed beyond the door to my father’s room to the common area where Bryan and I organized his paperwork and I covertly read the will I’d been written out of. Then I knew that any interaction that we’d have was pure; it wasn’t because I’d get anything out of it or owe him anything.
I pushed myself to walk by his room again, and I caught a glimpse of white: white hair, pale skin, white blanket, white sheets, beige hospital bed.
The tension in my body was great, but the fear was subsiding. I was in control. I could leave at any moment, whenever it became too much. The parts of myself pushing and gauging my tolerance were keeping me safe.
I told my aunt that I thought I could walk in, could see him, could maybe have a conversation. My uncle announced us when we came in.
Over the hours we spent in the ensuing days, we were physically closer than I could ever remember.
I sat at the foot of his bed. He’d lost so much weight that he didn’t fill it. We didn’t talk a lot. I showed him a video of our dog. He liked the idea that we had a dog. I told him a little about my job. But we didn’t talk about anything important, anything that mattered.
That’s for the best.
My anger is mine to deal with just as the sadness that his anger dissolved into was his.
As I approached the pair of chairs in the hallway, I released the tears that had been building for so long: for myself as a child, for the father I had, and for the one that I didn’t.
—Lori
++++++++++
The Dance of Anger
A dance is a poem in space
Instead of words—bodies
Instead of rhyme—gesture
Instead of meter—flow
When many bodies join
The Dance of Anger
Their movements become
A "movement"
A movement that can
Bless or curse the world.
Bodies Gestures Flow
Expressions
To call upon The Lord of the Dance
Or to spin mindlessly out of control
The Dance of Anger
Narration with bodies
Tells a story
Too powerful for words.
A vessel for the Spirit
Creation or chaos?
—Janelle Curlin-Taylor
++++++++++
The Danger of Anger
The dance of anger is
awesome to behold.
If you ask the dancers,
"What are you seeking?"
They will reply, "Justice", but justice
has two faces:
restoration or retribution.
Which you choose leads
to what leads,
you or the anger.
Choose one and you lead,
anger provides the energy.
Lead well and you can
transform an injury
into a partnership,
a force for peace.
Choose the other and anger drives
you deeper where there was already
pain. The Chinese say,
"Before you embark
on a journey of revenge,
dig two graves."
Choose well.
—Jeff Taylor
Sensitivity to Words
One of the major symptoms of the general crisis existent in our world today is our lack of sensitivity to words. We use words as tools. We forget that words are a repository of the spirit. The tragedy of our times is that the vessels of the spirit are broken. We cannot approach the spirit unless we repair the vessels. Reverence for words - an awareness of the wonder of words, of the mystery of words - is an essential prerequisite for prayer. By the word of God the world was created.
—Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
++++++++++
In a class on Buddhism, one of the teachers was a Jōdo Shinshū pastor. He explained that when teaching the children the First Noble Truth, they expressed it as "Life is a bumpy road." Several years later I read that the literal translation of the Pali word dukkha, usually translated as suffering or dissatisfaction is "bad hole," referring to a poorly made cart wheel. What a fascinating metaphor.
Compassion is Latin for "to suffer with," or as Bill Clinton said it, “I feel your pain.”
Coleman Barks, in a recorded reading of his translations of Rumi, told about an English teacher who, on the first day of class, jumped up on his desk and said, "Young men, I love words." I also love words, sometimes for their roots or
original meaning, or sometimes just for their sounds. The German word for auto exhaust tailpipe is auspuff.
In English, a windfall is a tree blown over by the wind, bringing the fruit (and wood) within easy reach. The Japanese equivalent is a duck that walks in the door, a meal that does not have to be hunted down. A great windfall is a duck that walks in the door with a green onion over its shoulder. The most popular way in Japan to cook duck is with green onions.
Spirit in Greek and Hebrew is the same word as breath or wind, and it's feminine. In English, the feminine has been lost from the Divinity.
In India, the Bodhisattva of Compassion is male. In China, it was initially male but soon an existing Chinese female deity (Kwan Yin) was co-opted. Is this a transgendered deity?
Rumi says God's first language is silence; all else is poor translation.
Zen claims to be a teaching beyond scripture and words and has the largest body of written works of any religion.
Words are wonderful, powerful, and at the same time, limited. They must be respected for all three.
—Jeff Taylor
-----
Sounds of Trees
Can you tell
the species from
the sighs of
the pines, the
rustle of hardwoods?
Does it matter to anyone,
except a botanist,
an academic, the arrogant
know-it-alls?
The poet struggles
to find the words
for what
is wordless.
—Jeff Taylor
++++++++++
Reverberate the
Ethers
Verifying
Elemental
Respect
Emmitting
Non-Judgement with
Compassion is
Equity exhuberantly expressed.
++++++++++++++++++++
Wonderous
Order
Responding to the
Divine with devotion
******************************
Verifiable
Earth-Wear
Syntactic
Symbols
Eliciting
Love
Simply & sanely
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Suprise
Piety
Is
Really
Innocent
Thinking
____
In The Beginning
In the beginning was the Word
and I am told the Word was
God/is God.
How is this verifiable? I can observe
that I recover from wounds inflicted
by sticks and stones.
But words can be used to pierce
my very soul, can lead me to the
loss of meaning. And, well there
you are, plowshares bent into
swords, crushing my vessel asunder.
Viktor Frankl wrote words, "Man's
Search for Meaning,"I can use to
guide my return.
To the root of Word which is Love,
As it was in the beginning and
It always will be....
Once the carnage is ended, and
I caringly lift away weighted thoughts
of hate, cease it in all its forms within
myself. My recovery, rediscovery
of the Word may be the revival of a
Loving World without End. Amen.
—Martha Ward
—Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
++++++++++
In a class on Buddhism, one of the teachers was a Jōdo Shinshū pastor. He explained that when teaching the children the First Noble Truth, they expressed it as "Life is a bumpy road." Several years later I read that the literal translation of the Pali word dukkha, usually translated as suffering or dissatisfaction is "bad hole," referring to a poorly made cart wheel. What a fascinating metaphor.
Compassion is Latin for "to suffer with," or as Bill Clinton said it, “I feel your pain.”
Coleman Barks, in a recorded reading of his translations of Rumi, told about an English teacher who, on the first day of class, jumped up on his desk and said, "Young men, I love words." I also love words, sometimes for their roots or
original meaning, or sometimes just for their sounds. The German word for auto exhaust tailpipe is auspuff.
In English, a windfall is a tree blown over by the wind, bringing the fruit (and wood) within easy reach. The Japanese equivalent is a duck that walks in the door, a meal that does not have to be hunted down. A great windfall is a duck that walks in the door with a green onion over its shoulder. The most popular way in Japan to cook duck is with green onions.
Spirit in Greek and Hebrew is the same word as breath or wind, and it's feminine. In English, the feminine has been lost from the Divinity.
In India, the Bodhisattva of Compassion is male. In China, it was initially male but soon an existing Chinese female deity (Kwan Yin) was co-opted. Is this a transgendered deity?
Rumi says God's first language is silence; all else is poor translation.
Zen claims to be a teaching beyond scripture and words and has the largest body of written works of any religion.
Words are wonderful, powerful, and at the same time, limited. They must be respected for all three.
—Jeff Taylor
-----
Sounds of Trees
Can you tell
the species from
the sighs of
the pines, the
rustle of hardwoods?
Does it matter to anyone,
except a botanist,
an academic, the arrogant
know-it-alls?
The poet struggles
to find the words
for what
is wordless.
—Jeff Taylor
++++++++++
Reverberate the
Ethers
Verifying
Elemental
Respect
Emmitting
Non-Judgement with
Compassion is
Equity exhuberantly expressed.
++++++++++++++++++++
Wonderous
Order
Responding to the
Divine with devotion
******************************
Verifiable
Earth-Wear
Syntactic
Symbols
Eliciting
Love
Simply & sanely
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Suprise
Piety
Is
Really
Innocent
Thinking
____
In The Beginning
In the beginning was the Word
and I am told the Word was
God/is God.
How is this verifiable? I can observe
that I recover from wounds inflicted
by sticks and stones.
But words can be used to pierce
my very soul, can lead me to the
loss of meaning. And, well there
you are, plowshares bent into
swords, crushing my vessel asunder.
Viktor Frankl wrote words, "Man's
Search for Meaning,"I can use to
guide my return.
To the root of Word which is Love,
As it was in the beginning and
It always will be....
Once the carnage is ended, and
I caringly lift away weighted thoughts
of hate, cease it in all its forms within
myself. My recovery, rediscovery
of the Word may be the revival of a
Loving World without End. Amen.
—Martha Ward
How Does Life Live?
by Kelly O’Brien (For full experience: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/opinion/how-does-life-live.html)
How does life live?
Can girls be robots?
Why is fire called fire?
What is winter?
Why do we have to sleep?
How many dogs are in this world?
Where do ants come from?
Why are some things special?
Why do (don’t?) worms have faces?
Why is (the) sun in my eyes?
Why does everybody not like pink, just black?
What do princesses do?
What do you want to be when you grow up?
Do girls have vaginas?
Why do boys cut their hair?
How do you make water?
Why do you like beautiful things so much?
Why do you pick flowers, and then they die?
Are you old, Mom?
Why are the leaves falling down?
Will I have another birthday?
Why doesn’t everybody know me?
What are you talking about?
What’s a conversation?
Why do people laugh at me?
Why is she mean?
Why are you on your phone?!
What happens when I don’t like you, Mom?
What is mean and nice?
What is kind?
Do you love me?
Why are kids small?
Where did you find me when I was a baby?
Why does the heart beat?
Why do my feet sparkle?
What’s bacteria? Does it hurt you?
How does food turn into poo?
How do you be a mermaid, Mom?
Why can’t we see angels?
Can you turn me into a fairy?
Do blue butterflies…eat parts of the sky?
Do worms cry?
Do bugs die?
Why do the birds fly away?
Why are we humans?
Why do we eat animals?
Why do trees just stand there?
Why is it night time when trees when people are awake?
Why does the earth move?
What is atmosphere?
Do (did) God make the ocean?
Where does the sun go?
Why is the world so messy?
Why do we all have cars?
What is a molecule?
What does extinct mean?
What is power?
What is history?
Why are we gonna die?
How do people get killed?
What is fragile?
When did the world even start?
Mom, why are we starting again?
What is history?
How does life live?
HOW DOES LIFE LIVE?!
++++++++++
PARTS of the SKY
Do Blue Butterflies eat parts of the sky?
One of many endless questions from a young
Child, seeing the butterflies patterned
Blue on blue.
For me the question conjures up Escher,
The artist/printmaker.
As a child, he was curious how a shape
is both a space and a whole, each fitting
within the other.
Escher repeated a single shape
without overlapping creating
a tessellated puzzle.
Like the Child’s view,
His puzzle defined an endless horizon
of blue butterflies eating parts of the sky.
What is Fragile?
A breath in, a pause, breath out, pause.
Like a sonata of sensemaking of the
Surrounding small moments, each,
Last for an eternity.
Promises pushing against
one another, like seedhead.
Which will be the first to fall to the earth, slip into a
small crevice, there die a seed, birth a flower,
A flower with its seedhead, pushing against
One another. Which will be the first to fall
to the earth?
—Martha Koock Ward
++++++++++
Slantwise
What is the secret river?
Do rocks direct us?
Is there ever a stopping?
Do we all travel?
If I follow, is there a place I am going?
The last way, steps lost into canyon, can it be found?
When the mist swirls on the side of the cliff, is that it?
Is there any way to go on?
—Sarah Webb
++++++++++
What is kind? What is fragile?
Kind, separate from nice, recognizes our common fragility.
Kind wraps us in a soft understanding, a willingness to listen.
A desire to quiet our own minds to hear what's on someone else's
A sharing of a load, a burden, time
A slowing down until you can feel what it's like to be that other person
Heart beating, breath breathing
What it's like to be yourself
—Lori
++++++++++
Why
I can't figure out why it has taken me 70 years to figure out how insufficient our answers and explanations really are. Kids ask why and they are curious. And then they go to school and are given answers. I read the other day that the only facts are in our minds. But they don't tell us that in school, did they? We are fed answers sufficient to quell our curiosity.
An exception to this was when I had a color theory class where the teacher wouldn't tell us stuff. He'd grunt or shrug his shoulders when we'd ask him a question. He’d ask us to look harder and to find out on our own. He opened us up to the exploration of color, reminding me what Matisse once said, “I’ve spent all my life playing with color.”
What is a kid asking for when they ask why? Do they want to know the answer, or are they just saying, “Look at this…isn’t it awesome?”?
There a joke in my family that I ask a lot of questions, and worse, I expect answers. And not grey answers like my color theory teacher would say or not say, but black and white answers. When my aunt Reggie was a beginning psychotherapist, she'd give me answers…just the kind I thought I wanted. So when I’d ask something of my sister, a psychoanalyst, she would always answer, “Ask Reggie.” Unfortunately, when Reggie became old and wise, her answers became less binary and much more confusing…and rich.
So what should we do with kids questions? What can we do to encourage their curiosity even more?
William Blake wrote "never seek to tell thy love... Love that never told can be. For the gentle wind does move. Silently Invisibly" That seems about another form of answers. Think of when someone asked you if you love them. Isn't it always when the relationship is dissolving? So they need to clarify. They need to make an experience into a fact. And from there it goes downhill. Silently. Invisibly.
My grandson asked me the other day, holding up a piece of parsley at his school’s Seder lunch, “Who made this?” Unfortunately, I gave him an answer. I could kick myself. There are so many questions I could have asked him, like who does he think made it, or why was he asking the question, or what else in the world is he curious about who made it, or how might he find out who made it. I was not curious about his curiosity and for that I failed him. Maybe next time I can do better.
—Kim Mosley
How does life live?
Can girls be robots?
Why is fire called fire?
What is winter?
Why do we have to sleep?
How many dogs are in this world?
Where do ants come from?
Why are some things special?
Why do (don’t?) worms have faces?
Why is (the) sun in my eyes?
Why does everybody not like pink, just black?
What do princesses do?
What do you want to be when you grow up?
Do girls have vaginas?
Why do boys cut their hair?
How do you make water?
Why do you like beautiful things so much?
Why do you pick flowers, and then they die?
Are you old, Mom?
Why are the leaves falling down?
Will I have another birthday?
Why doesn’t everybody know me?
What are you talking about?
What’s a conversation?
Why do people laugh at me?
Why is she mean?
Why are you on your phone?!
What happens when I don’t like you, Mom?
What is mean and nice?
What is kind?
Do you love me?
Why are kids small?
Where did you find me when I was a baby?
Why does the heart beat?
Why do my feet sparkle?
What’s bacteria? Does it hurt you?
How does food turn into poo?
How do you be a mermaid, Mom?
Why can’t we see angels?
Can you turn me into a fairy?
Do blue butterflies…eat parts of the sky?
Do worms cry?
Do bugs die?
Why do the birds fly away?
Why are we humans?
Why do we eat animals?
Why do trees just stand there?
Why is it night time when trees when people are awake?
Why does the earth move?
What is atmosphere?
Do (did) God make the ocean?
Where does the sun go?
Why is the world so messy?
Why do we all have cars?
What is a molecule?
What does extinct mean?
What is power?
What is history?
Why are we gonna die?
How do people get killed?
What is fragile?
When did the world even start?
Mom, why are we starting again?
What is history?
How does life live?
HOW DOES LIFE LIVE?!
++++++++++
PARTS of the SKY
Do Blue Butterflies eat parts of the sky?
One of many endless questions from a young
Child, seeing the butterflies patterned
Blue on blue.
For me the question conjures up Escher,
The artist/printmaker.
As a child, he was curious how a shape
is both a space and a whole, each fitting
within the other.
Escher repeated a single shape
without overlapping creating
a tessellated puzzle.
Like the Child’s view,
His puzzle defined an endless horizon
of blue butterflies eating parts of the sky.
What is Fragile?
A breath in, a pause, breath out, pause.
Like a sonata of sensemaking of the
Surrounding small moments, each,
Last for an eternity.
Promises pushing against
one another, like seedhead.
Which will be the first to fall to the earth, slip into a
small crevice, there die a seed, birth a flower,
A flower with its seedhead, pushing against
One another. Which will be the first to fall
to the earth?
—Martha Koock Ward
++++++++++
Slantwise
What is the secret river?
Do rocks direct us?
Is there ever a stopping?
Do we all travel?
If I follow, is there a place I am going?
The last way, steps lost into canyon, can it be found?
When the mist swirls on the side of the cliff, is that it?
Is there any way to go on?
—Sarah Webb
++++++++++
What is kind? What is fragile?
Kind, separate from nice, recognizes our common fragility.
Kind wraps us in a soft understanding, a willingness to listen.
A desire to quiet our own minds to hear what's on someone else's
A sharing of a load, a burden, time
A slowing down until you can feel what it's like to be that other person
Heart beating, breath breathing
What it's like to be yourself
—Lori
++++++++++
Why
I can't figure out why it has taken me 70 years to figure out how insufficient our answers and explanations really are. Kids ask why and they are curious. And then they go to school and are given answers. I read the other day that the only facts are in our minds. But they don't tell us that in school, did they? We are fed answers sufficient to quell our curiosity.
An exception to this was when I had a color theory class where the teacher wouldn't tell us stuff. He'd grunt or shrug his shoulders when we'd ask him a question. He’d ask us to look harder and to find out on our own. He opened us up to the exploration of color, reminding me what Matisse once said, “I’ve spent all my life playing with color.”
What is a kid asking for when they ask why? Do they want to know the answer, or are they just saying, “Look at this…isn’t it awesome?”?
There a joke in my family that I ask a lot of questions, and worse, I expect answers. And not grey answers like my color theory teacher would say or not say, but black and white answers. When my aunt Reggie was a beginning psychotherapist, she'd give me answers…just the kind I thought I wanted. So when I’d ask something of my sister, a psychoanalyst, she would always answer, “Ask Reggie.” Unfortunately, when Reggie became old and wise, her answers became less binary and much more confusing…and rich.
So what should we do with kids questions? What can we do to encourage their curiosity even more?
William Blake wrote "never seek to tell thy love... Love that never told can be. For the gentle wind does move. Silently Invisibly" That seems about another form of answers. Think of when someone asked you if you love them. Isn't it always when the relationship is dissolving? So they need to clarify. They need to make an experience into a fact. And from there it goes downhill. Silently. Invisibly.
My grandson asked me the other day, holding up a piece of parsley at his school’s Seder lunch, “Who made this?” Unfortunately, I gave him an answer. I could kick myself. There are so many questions I could have asked him, like who does he think made it, or why was he asking the question, or what else in the world is he curious about who made it, or how might he find out who made it. I was not curious about his curiosity and for that I failed him. Maybe next time I can do better.
—Kim Mosley
Memories
The severity that can be present in Zen is so opposite of my temperament, but since it
was the first meditation experience offered to me (by my friend Flying Clouds when I
was 18) and since I never forgot it (though it was one of the most wretched 30 minute
periods I ever spent), I knew I would return, and thus came back again 20 years ago.
Maybe I knew it might give me something I might not gain otherwise. I love the utter
simplicity of Zen, its essential nature, the invitation to “just sit”, and go deep inside.
Often the best scientific theories are the ones which explain the facts with the greatest
economy and simplicity. Zen is like that: no frills, no labyrinths of explanation, only bare
experience and the ability to watch it quietly. For someone like me, so ruled by moods
and emotions, it is such a gift to deep below the ocean, or into the limitless Big Sky,
where emotions just float away, and everything changes except the light, or the water,
the fundamental mediums of existence.
As a child, I knew that light spoke of the Absolute for me. And all of my life, I have
dreamed of water- springs, brooks, turquoise seas, hot pools carved in the stone. I
remember Flying Clouds telling me a dream about the time she taught me to do Zazen.
She was in a stone church, very simple, and she went to the side of one of the
foundations. There was a trickle of water there, and she started to dig in the sandy
ground with her hands. As she dug, beautiful clear springs began to come into the
church, and she was filled with joy. It was her dream, but she gifted me its image, which
has stayed with me always.
I remember my childhood in the Hill Country, the dark cold house so full of anger and
sadness, where mice got eaten by snakes coming up through the jagged floorboards,
where hope could die if left there long enough.
But I also remember the outdoors, the massive live oak trees with gnarled roots, the
pungent tang of the juniper and its red bark strips which birds used to weave little nests.
I remember the scent of chinaberry, honeysuckle, old roses, and lilacs, left behind by
the old settlers who came before us. I remember the brilliant light that lit up the fields
and turned the grasses to shades of gold and copper. I remember the circular swimming
hold down by the old bridge, shaded but with rays of sunlight hitting green water, the
schools of minnows and little mud catfish, the golden enclosure of the limestone. I
remember how the water in the brook was clear and babbled over the flat limestone and
sparkled in the sun. I vaguely remember bog plants, sedges and little white flowers, wild
onions with their pungent scent, tiny pokey little rain frogs that could be caught in the
boggy areas. And sometimes fat velvety little tadpoles in the water.
I remember playing with my brothers, not really together, just in quiet company- rather
like in the Zendo. We were deeply connected, but also deeply solitary, few words
spoken, but together in our immersion in this beautiful sylvan world.
Nature always had its dark side, however. The black snakes in the limestone crevices,
the carcasses, the half eaten frogs left by a predator, the crushing droughts that killed
the flowers and dried up the creeks to isolated, sad, scum-filled little waterholes and
trapped minnows. It was all there, but if one could float and accept, the world held us
and brought a sense of life going on. Not necessarily a single life, but life in the all of it.
We might not continue, individual frogs and fish might not continue, but life itself in
some way would continue.
—Elayne Lansford
was the first meditation experience offered to me (by my friend Flying Clouds when I
was 18) and since I never forgot it (though it was one of the most wretched 30 minute
periods I ever spent), I knew I would return, and thus came back again 20 years ago.
Maybe I knew it might give me something I might not gain otherwise. I love the utter
simplicity of Zen, its essential nature, the invitation to “just sit”, and go deep inside.
Often the best scientific theories are the ones which explain the facts with the greatest
economy and simplicity. Zen is like that: no frills, no labyrinths of explanation, only bare
experience and the ability to watch it quietly. For someone like me, so ruled by moods
and emotions, it is such a gift to deep below the ocean, or into the limitless Big Sky,
where emotions just float away, and everything changes except the light, or the water,
the fundamental mediums of existence.
As a child, I knew that light spoke of the Absolute for me. And all of my life, I have
dreamed of water- springs, brooks, turquoise seas, hot pools carved in the stone. I
remember Flying Clouds telling me a dream about the time she taught me to do Zazen.
She was in a stone church, very simple, and she went to the side of one of the
foundations. There was a trickle of water there, and she started to dig in the sandy
ground with her hands. As she dug, beautiful clear springs began to come into the
church, and she was filled with joy. It was her dream, but she gifted me its image, which
has stayed with me always.
I remember my childhood in the Hill Country, the dark cold house so full of anger and
sadness, where mice got eaten by snakes coming up through the jagged floorboards,
where hope could die if left there long enough.
But I also remember the outdoors, the massive live oak trees with gnarled roots, the
pungent tang of the juniper and its red bark strips which birds used to weave little nests.
I remember the scent of chinaberry, honeysuckle, old roses, and lilacs, left behind by
the old settlers who came before us. I remember the brilliant light that lit up the fields
and turned the grasses to shades of gold and copper. I remember the circular swimming
hold down by the old bridge, shaded but with rays of sunlight hitting green water, the
schools of minnows and little mud catfish, the golden enclosure of the limestone. I
remember how the water in the brook was clear and babbled over the flat limestone and
sparkled in the sun. I vaguely remember bog plants, sedges and little white flowers, wild
onions with their pungent scent, tiny pokey little rain frogs that could be caught in the
boggy areas. And sometimes fat velvety little tadpoles in the water.
I remember playing with my brothers, not really together, just in quiet company- rather
like in the Zendo. We were deeply connected, but also deeply solitary, few words
spoken, but together in our immersion in this beautiful sylvan world.
Nature always had its dark side, however. The black snakes in the limestone crevices,
the carcasses, the half eaten frogs left by a predator, the crushing droughts that killed
the flowers and dried up the creeks to isolated, sad, scum-filled little waterholes and
trapped minnows. It was all there, but if one could float and accept, the world held us
and brought a sense of life going on. Not necessarily a single life, but life in the all of it.
We might not continue, individual frogs and fish might not continue, but life itself in
some way would continue.
—Elayne Lansford
The Prize
“I have a tape of a Tibetan nun singing a mantra of compassion over and over for an hour, eight words over and over, and every line feels different, feels cared about, and experienced as she is singing. You never once have the sense that she is glancing down at her watch, thinking, “Jesus Christ, it’s only been 15 minutes.” Forty-five minutes later she is still singing each line distinctly, word by word, until the last word is sung.
Mostly things are not that way, that simple and pure, with so much focus given to each syllable of life as life sings itself. But that kind of attention is the prize.”
-Anne Lamott
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
++++++++++
The Prize
“That kind of attention is the prize.”
What is the competition?
How many prizes are given out?
What if the struggle is not
against another, against nature,
against scarcity, real or imagined.
If the struggle is against ourself,
there is enough
for everyone.
Michelangelo or some other sculptor claimed
not to create anything but merely
to remove the stone surrounding, revealing
what was already there all along.
The nun has removed, discarded,
chipped away all distraction
until all that remains is
pure, simple attention.
There is time enough to do
what needs to be done.
Do not hurry, but
there is no time to waste.
Reciprocation
“Mostly things are not that way,
that simple and pure, with
so much focus given to
each syllable of life as life sings itself.”
Or maybe it is
giving each syllable of life
that much focus unwraps
a life simple and pure.
Taizé at Mercy Chapel
Taizé at Mercy Chapel—
there are instruments
to set the pitch, nothing more.
We sing four lines, maybe eight,
over and over. Time loses
its significance, the small orchestra
invisible beneath the press of voices, hundreds strong.
We sing, more than once,
less than many, no matter.
We sing until our voices warm,
are held, entranced
by songs, words repeating, forgotten,
still sung, it's the song that lifts,
not the words.
—Jeffery Taylor
Mostly things are not that way, that simple and pure, with so much focus given to each syllable of life as life sings itself. But that kind of attention is the prize.”
-Anne Lamott
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
++++++++++
The Prize
“That kind of attention is the prize.”
What is the competition?
How many prizes are given out?
What if the struggle is not
against another, against nature,
against scarcity, real or imagined.
If the struggle is against ourself,
there is enough
for everyone.
Michelangelo or some other sculptor claimed
not to create anything but merely
to remove the stone surrounding, revealing
what was already there all along.
The nun has removed, discarded,
chipped away all distraction
until all that remains is
pure, simple attention.
There is time enough to do
what needs to be done.
Do not hurry, but
there is no time to waste.
Reciprocation
“Mostly things are not that way,
that simple and pure, with
so much focus given to
each syllable of life as life sings itself.”
Or maybe it is
giving each syllable of life
that much focus unwraps
a life simple and pure.
Taizé at Mercy Chapel
Taizé at Mercy Chapel—
there are instruments
to set the pitch, nothing more.
We sing four lines, maybe eight,
over and over. Time loses
its significance, the small orchestra
invisible beneath the press of voices, hundreds strong.
We sing, more than once,
less than many, no matter.
We sing until our voices warm,
are held, entranced
by songs, words repeating, forgotten,
still sung, it's the song that lifts,
not the words.
—Jeffery Taylor
Let It Go
Prompt: Let It Go by Danna Faulds
++++++++++
The sadness and grief have hardened me;
the laughter and love soften me.
The space between them is empty,
ready to accept the next fleeting moment,
to hold it briefly,
and be forever changed.
—Lori H.
++++++++++
Riding the Wave's Crest
To ride the wave,
you must catch it,
paddle or swim hard,
match direction and speed
to arrive in style.
Or wash up on the beach.
—Jeffery Taylor
++++++++++
Invaders
Bunches of small pink bunnies beat
Their drums, relentlessly, wrecking
The wall of my R.E.M, bringing me
Crashing into awake.
The search for the long sought lands
Of somnambulant Shangri-La foiled, again.
How am I to attract Delta & Theta into
The labyrinth of my greying matter
With all that racket being made?
The government has invaded me, too!
Launching drones of Daylight Savings Time
Obliterating legions of sleepy eyed Sandmen,
Who are armed only with buckets of dreams.
Each stumbling, defenseless, against
The glare of the blazing sun.
Wailing Smart Phones and iPad screens scream
“Wake Up! You are Missing SOME THING!”
—Martha Ward
++++++++++
It takes so much energy for me to not let it go, yet I hold on with dear life, as the expression goes. It has a life of its own. It could be the pristine surface of a new car. It could be my ability to climb walls when I was 20. It could be any number of things that went away on their own. The scroll in the zendo tells me that everything changes. Holding on tight doesn't really keep things from changing. It just prolongs that change a little.
I had to meet her dad to take her to the prom. He didn't want to let go. How I would love to meet him now, learning that 50 years ago he may have been the primary person responsible for splitting the atom at the University of Chicago. But then it was just a dad who couldn't let his daughter go. And now she may still be held tight by her dad, long ago deceased, who won't let her go.
I was thinking about letting go of my stories. Which one should I start with? How about the one that I can do anything by myself. That's a joke. So many tools were given to me that enabled my survival and my happiness. People for thousands of years worked their tails off so I could type on this ipad. And so many people went way beyond the call of duty to nudge me on. So I'll let go of my thought of being self-reliant.
I could let go of my story that I'm any better than I am. When I goofed up today and forgot to give the chant card to the head student, I was embarrassed. Someone might have noticed that I wasn't as good as I wanted them to believe. I screwed up, as I do most days in one way or another. Major screw up ;). Yet if I let go of me being any better than I am, then I would just look at my major screw up as indicating I'm just a beginner.
I could let go of the fact that I know anything at all. In ancient China, if you said you've seen a painting, that would mean you could replicate it from memory. So what have I seen, even of my own work?
Let go of friendships too? Why do we think that friendships are forever? Maybe some are, but others change or die. Is that ok? It doesn't matter. Everything changes, right?
I read yesterday that both men and women speak an average of 16,000 words a day. I wonder if I should let go of the idea that I said anything other than to express a lot of confusion. How many of those words were needed? How much more would I have learned if I had shut my mouth and listened? I must let go of the idea that I have something to say. And maybe convert that energy into having something to hear...or even just to be.
When my father was dying he was very brave, yet he had a lot of trouble going to the other side. My sister was yelling at him over the phone, telling him he didn't need to hang on—that he could let go now. It was as if he was holding onto a rope holding himself hanging from a branch on a cliff. He couldn't let go, even knowing that he also could not hold on.
I realized last night that holding on is much harder than letting go. Maybe I think I'm a loser if I don't hold on tight, even if it does little good. What can I let go of next? How long can I hold the rope, anyway?
Kim Mosley
++++++++++
The sadness and grief have hardened me;
the laughter and love soften me.
The space between them is empty,
ready to accept the next fleeting moment,
to hold it briefly,
and be forever changed.
—Lori H.
++++++++++
Riding the Wave's Crest
To ride the wave,
you must catch it,
paddle or swim hard,
match direction and speed
to arrive in style.
Or wash up on the beach.
—Jeffery Taylor
++++++++++
Invaders
Bunches of small pink bunnies beat
Their drums, relentlessly, wrecking
The wall of my R.E.M, bringing me
Crashing into awake.
The search for the long sought lands
Of somnambulant Shangri-La foiled, again.
How am I to attract Delta & Theta into
The labyrinth of my greying matter
With all that racket being made?
The government has invaded me, too!
Launching drones of Daylight Savings Time
Obliterating legions of sleepy eyed Sandmen,
Who are armed only with buckets of dreams.
Each stumbling, defenseless, against
The glare of the blazing sun.
Wailing Smart Phones and iPad screens scream
“Wake Up! You are Missing SOME THING!”
—Martha Ward
++++++++++
It takes so much energy for me to not let it go, yet I hold on with dear life, as the expression goes. It has a life of its own. It could be the pristine surface of a new car. It could be my ability to climb walls when I was 20. It could be any number of things that went away on their own. The scroll in the zendo tells me that everything changes. Holding on tight doesn't really keep things from changing. It just prolongs that change a little.
I had to meet her dad to take her to the prom. He didn't want to let go. How I would love to meet him now, learning that 50 years ago he may have been the primary person responsible for splitting the atom at the University of Chicago. But then it was just a dad who couldn't let his daughter go. And now she may still be held tight by her dad, long ago deceased, who won't let her go.
I was thinking about letting go of my stories. Which one should I start with? How about the one that I can do anything by myself. That's a joke. So many tools were given to me that enabled my survival and my happiness. People for thousands of years worked their tails off so I could type on this ipad. And so many people went way beyond the call of duty to nudge me on. So I'll let go of my thought of being self-reliant.
I could let go of my story that I'm any better than I am. When I goofed up today and forgot to give the chant card to the head student, I was embarrassed. Someone might have noticed that I wasn't as good as I wanted them to believe. I screwed up, as I do most days in one way or another. Major screw up ;). Yet if I let go of me being any better than I am, then I would just look at my major screw up as indicating I'm just a beginner.
I could let go of the fact that I know anything at all. In ancient China, if you said you've seen a painting, that would mean you could replicate it from memory. So what have I seen, even of my own work?
Let go of friendships too? Why do we think that friendships are forever? Maybe some are, but others change or die. Is that ok? It doesn't matter. Everything changes, right?
I read yesterday that both men and women speak an average of 16,000 words a day. I wonder if I should let go of the idea that I said anything other than to express a lot of confusion. How many of those words were needed? How much more would I have learned if I had shut my mouth and listened? I must let go of the idea that I have something to say. And maybe convert that energy into having something to hear...or even just to be.
When my father was dying he was very brave, yet he had a lot of trouble going to the other side. My sister was yelling at him over the phone, telling him he didn't need to hang on—that he could let go now. It was as if he was holding onto a rope holding himself hanging from a branch on a cliff. He couldn't let go, even knowing that he also could not hold on.
I realized last night that holding on is much harder than letting go. Maybe I think I'm a loser if I don't hold on tight, even if it does little good. What can I let go of next? How long can I hold the rope, anyway?
Kim Mosley
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