"If a man knew what a woman never forgets, he would love her differently."
-Terry Tempest Williams-
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Monday, September 8, 2014
what flying requires.
"In work of love, the body
forgets its weight. And once
again with love and singing
in mind, I come to what
must come to me, carried
as a dancer by a song.
This grace is gravity."
~Wendell Berry
forgets its weight. And once
again with love and singing
in mind, I come to what
must come to me, carried
as a dancer by a song.
This grace is gravity."
~Wendell Berry
Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Monday, August 18, 2014
unconditional
"I curse [and love] my curse
which is to love the curse;
to love unconditionally;
which is to love the lovers back to love;
to love the lost back to life;
to love when loving means losing;
to love when loving means losing myself;
to love when loving means losing
what I thought was wrong and right
[what I thought was black and white];
to love to love to love;
and to love to love to feel
all that comes with love."
(from before. 3/16/14)
which is to love the curse;
to love unconditionally;
which is to love the lovers back to love;
to love the lost back to life;
to love when loving means losing;
to love when loving means losing myself;
to love when loving means losing
what I thought was wrong and right
[what I thought was black and white];
to love to love to love;
and to love to love to feel
all that comes with love."
(from before. 3/16/14)
Saturday, June 14, 2014
Voices on love, particularity, integrity, gravity, and staying with.
"Sometimes the most radical act is to stay home."
"To bear witness [to know] is not a passive act."
"It all comes down to relationships" [and having] "a heightened curiosity of other."
"If we don't know who we live among, then when they vanish, there's no one to mourn that loss."
"The challenge is to stay. The challenge is to be present with that pain.
and "making commitments to do the real work, the hard work" [of being in relationship.]
--Terry Tempest Williams
"To love means to stay with.
[...]
to love means to stay with when every cell says 'Run!'"
--Clarissa Pinkola Estes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Staying home.
Coming home.
Knowing who we live with.
Knowing them so we can love them, honor them, protect them in their own integrity.
Then we can be in ours.
Standing ground.
Standing tall, in place.
Rising rooted like trees.
Rooted to the earth.
Rooted to each other.
[Tethered in the heart.]
The challenge is to stay.
The challenge is particularity.
To know and be known
truly and fully, and to stand in our own truth with integrity.
To be accountable to ourselves, and each other.
To hold to what is difficult.
To hold to the difficult in relationship
and see it through, to understanding,
acceptance, and love.
To hold to the difficult.
To not abandon each other.
To never abandon each other.
To never abandon the crying scared child in each other's deepest hearts.
To love each other back to life,
back to truth,
back to wholeness,
and the knowingness that we belong
here,
together.
"to gather the things within my reach and to protect them." -Will Falk (from his essay To Be a Warrior Poet)
To protect them. The things we are in relationship to. The particularities of our lives.
To not enact the violence of indifference and uncaring, that is perpetuated by cultural mindsets of separation, individualism, and interchangeability, hardness, distance, and cold reason.
To feel each other's pain.
Peggy O'Mara:
"Don't stand unmoving outside the door of a crying baby whose only desire is to touch you. Go to your baby. Go to your baby a million times."
Alison Rose Levy:
"Hearing the cries of the world means hearing the cries of a baby whether that baby is one month old or 100 years old and whether that baby is a human, a kitty, or an elephant cub.
This is offered to the people who know what to do, and the people who know but have forgotten. It is offered especially to those who were left crying because someone stood outside the door... either through hesitation, fear, numbness, hardness, or any other agenda or 'reason.'
May those who remember reach out for the millionth time.
May those who know but forget, remember.
For those who hesitate, doubt or fear, listen to the cry and allow it to move you to courageous action, more courageous than what any warrior pose can teach you.
And for those with numbness, hardness, and other agendas and reasons, only by allowing the cry to reach your heart and melt your plans, your agendas, and your reasons into a puddle that runs out the door, down the gutter and into the river, only then will you yourself heal, only then will you become capable of serving as an agent of healing, and only then will the empty space within the many words spoken be filled with the tears of truth.
And for those who cry out for any wrong or grief, any loss, betrayal or hurt, may you find consolation, may you find your natural community of protectors, may you draw to you those capable of deep caring-- and may your consolation become the consolation of the earth. Because as your soul swims softly outward on its outflowing tears and your heart speaks its truth and finds gentle listeners, so you become the bearer of the truth that lives in the heart of all and the one who always listens and answers.
Do you hear the call?"Clarissa Pinkola Estes:
"A tear, heard by anyone of heart, is understood as a cry to come closer."
Alison Rose Levy:
"It's not merely about the newborn either. We all carry that cry and when the duress becomes too great, it emerges. There are those who listen when the sound is no more than a whisper. And there are those who are deaf when a loved one or child is screaming-- or they blame that child. And that is the inhumanity that is upon the land and within many of us in these times."
Alison Rose Levy:
"From the right to know and the duty to inquire flows the obligation to act." You know people say, 'Don't get too involved in this, it's not your problem.' Like we all live in little boxes and what goes on beyond that wall doesn't exist. With enough acreage you can live like an ostrich and feel free while enjoying the view. This is exactly the fragmentation of community that is turning the earth into a hell zone."
Sarah Alexander:
"We are strongly being pulled now to face our shadows squarely, honestly, without shame, in order to understand what is still holding us back and to let it go. It is hard enough to be honest with ourselves; much less with others. But every. single. time. we. take. a. breath. and. speak. truth. we become freer to act in integrity, and thus liberate humanity a little more from bondage."
Integrity. From Integritas, meaning Intact. Whole. Undivided. Sound.
Alison Rose Levy:
"For me, there is just no way of integrity in standing by while harm is happening and being tolerated. And to act far away and not be righteous up close doesn't count for much. Nor does being a warrior for yourself but not on behalf of those you love."
Sandra Steingraber:
"We are not beautiful by how we look but by how we love, not attractive by what we wear but by what we give and not smart in how we talk but in how we act."
Aloofness might just be the worst thing for this world.
It is like floating above, imaginally,
pretending to not be subject to the gravity
of the situation;
pretending that you are not connected to all everything.
It is in relationship that we feel the heavy weight of our connection. It is meant to be heavy. It is meant to be hard. That is how we know what is real. We can't turn away from that.
Gravity is here to hold us to what we belong to.
We can pretend to cast it off with carelessness, coolness, lightness. We can pretend that there is distance, that these particularities don't matter, aren't real. We can pretend that we can fly off easy into other spaces, novel, new, simple. We can try.
But here, now, we are subject to gravity, in all that we do.
We will be held to it. This is true accountability.
This is not something meaninglessly draped over us, weighting us down unnecessarily, keeping us from moving fast enough toward our dreams, or something we can cast off. Our dreams are bound in it, by it. Our dreams of freedom are bound in and by our relationships to each other. We cannot be free without them. We are bound to them, and our freedom is in how we embrace this.
That is gravity's law.
That is the weight, the heaviness, the difficulty of relationship.
And this is to be honored with our attention, with open, feeling hearts. Hearts that are willing to be heavy, willing to be bound, willing to be hurt.
Hurting. Bleeding.
That is love.
Not easy. Not floating. Not painless. Not free. But bound in one another's lives and love and pain.
Bound in promise.
Promise being the root of "response"
as in responsibility.
as in response-ability.
as in being present.
as in active relating.
as in spontaneous co-arising.
as in true relationship.
Ben Garrison:
"A choice to live sacred And because love would lead us to believe that we all belong to the earth and to each other.with hope and desire. bound to a future." [together.]
If we act as though everything is passing, and can pass without impact or float by without pain; if we act as thought we can float, unscathed, in a world of sharp edges trying to meet and fit in a better way; if we do not love particularly; if our love isn't heavy and doesn't hurt to hold some times...
then we are just kidding ourselves. What is any of that worth?
No. Gravity, heaviness, being bound together, that is what makes us creatures worthy and capable of love.
That we can hurt and love.
That we can love and hurt.
That we can love in spite of hurt
not in lieu of it.
Yes.
That we can love in spite of hurt, not in lieu of it.
And that we are bound to do so.
And that we then bind to each other.
And that we then, inevitably, hurt.
And that we then, still, again, hold to love, and hold to each other, despite.
And that we then understand and remember our responsibility to honor that love with our actions.
That is embracing gravity.
That is integrity.
"To bear witness [to know] is not a passive act."
"It all comes down to relationships" [and having] "a heightened curiosity of other."
"If we don't know who we live among, then when they vanish, there's no one to mourn that loss."
"The challenge is to stay. The challenge is to be present with that pain.
and "making commitments to do the real work, the hard work" [of being in relationship.]
--Terry Tempest Williams
"To love means to stay with.
[...]
to love means to stay with when every cell says 'Run!'"
--Clarissa Pinkola Estes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Staying home.
Coming home.
Knowing who we live with.
Knowing them so we can love them, honor them, protect them in their own integrity.
Then we can be in ours.
Standing ground.
Standing tall, in place.
Rising rooted like trees.
Rooted to the earth.
Rooted to each other.
[Tethered in the heart.]
The challenge is to stay.
The challenge is particularity.
To know and be known
truly and fully, and to stand in our own truth with integrity.
To be accountable to ourselves, and each other.
To hold to what is difficult.
To hold to the difficult in relationship
and see it through, to understanding,
acceptance, and love.
To hold to the difficult.
To not abandon each other.
To never abandon each other.
To never abandon the crying scared child in each other's deepest hearts.
To love each other back to life,
back to truth,
back to wholeness,
and the knowingness that we belong
here,
together.
"to gather the things within my reach and to protect them." -Will Falk (from his essay To Be a Warrior Poet)
To protect them. The things we are in relationship to. The particularities of our lives.
To not enact the violence of indifference and uncaring, that is perpetuated by cultural mindsets of separation, individualism, and interchangeability, hardness, distance, and cold reason.
To feel each other's pain.
Peggy O'Mara:
"Don't stand unmoving outside the door of a crying baby whose only desire is to touch you. Go to your baby. Go to your baby a million times."
Alison Rose Levy:
"Hearing the cries of the world means hearing the cries of a baby whether that baby is one month old or 100 years old and whether that baby is a human, a kitty, or an elephant cub.
This is offered to the people who know what to do, and the people who know but have forgotten. It is offered especially to those who were left crying because someone stood outside the door... either through hesitation, fear, numbness, hardness, or any other agenda or 'reason.'
May those who remember reach out for the millionth time.
May those who know but forget, remember.
For those who hesitate, doubt or fear, listen to the cry and allow it to move you to courageous action, more courageous than what any warrior pose can teach you.
And for those with numbness, hardness, and other agendas and reasons, only by allowing the cry to reach your heart and melt your plans, your agendas, and your reasons into a puddle that runs out the door, down the gutter and into the river, only then will you yourself heal, only then will you become capable of serving as an agent of healing, and only then will the empty space within the many words spoken be filled with the tears of truth.
And for those who cry out for any wrong or grief, any loss, betrayal or hurt, may you find consolation, may you find your natural community of protectors, may you draw to you those capable of deep caring-- and may your consolation become the consolation of the earth. Because as your soul swims softly outward on its outflowing tears and your heart speaks its truth and finds gentle listeners, so you become the bearer of the truth that lives in the heart of all and the one who always listens and answers.
Do you hear the call?"Clarissa Pinkola Estes:
"A tear, heard by anyone of heart, is understood as a cry to come closer."
Alison Rose Levy:
"It's not merely about the newborn either. We all carry that cry and when the duress becomes too great, it emerges. There are those who listen when the sound is no more than a whisper. And there are those who are deaf when a loved one or child is screaming-- or they blame that child. And that is the inhumanity that is upon the land and within many of us in these times."
Alison Rose Levy:
"From the right to know and the duty to inquire flows the obligation to act." You know people say, 'Don't get too involved in this, it's not your problem.' Like we all live in little boxes and what goes on beyond that wall doesn't exist. With enough acreage you can live like an ostrich and feel free while enjoying the view. This is exactly the fragmentation of community that is turning the earth into a hell zone."
Sarah Alexander:
"We are strongly being pulled now to face our shadows squarely, honestly, without shame, in order to understand what is still holding us back and to let it go. It is hard enough to be honest with ourselves; much less with others. But every. single. time. we. take. a. breath. and. speak. truth. we become freer to act in integrity, and thus liberate humanity a little more from bondage."
Integrity. From Integritas, meaning Intact. Whole. Undivided. Sound.
Alison Rose Levy:
"For me, there is just no way of integrity in standing by while harm is happening and being tolerated. And to act far away and not be righteous up close doesn't count for much. Nor does being a warrior for yourself but not on behalf of those you love."
Sandra Steingraber:
"We are not beautiful by how we look but by how we love, not attractive by what we wear but by what we give and not smart in how we talk but in how we act."
Aloofness might just be the worst thing for this world.
It is like floating above, imaginally,
pretending to not be subject to the gravity
of the situation;
pretending that you are not connected to all everything.
It is in relationship that we feel the heavy weight of our connection. It is meant to be heavy. It is meant to be hard. That is how we know what is real. We can't turn away from that.
Gravity is here to hold us to what we belong to.
We can pretend to cast it off with carelessness, coolness, lightness. We can pretend that there is distance, that these particularities don't matter, aren't real. We can pretend that we can fly off easy into other spaces, novel, new, simple. We can try.
But here, now, we are subject to gravity, in all that we do.
We will be held to it. This is true accountability.
This is not something meaninglessly draped over us, weighting us down unnecessarily, keeping us from moving fast enough toward our dreams, or something we can cast off. Our dreams are bound in it, by it. Our dreams of freedom are bound in and by our relationships to each other. We cannot be free without them. We are bound to them, and our freedom is in how we embrace this.
That is gravity's law.
That is the weight, the heaviness, the difficulty of relationship.
And this is to be honored with our attention, with open, feeling hearts. Hearts that are willing to be heavy, willing to be bound, willing to be hurt.
Hurting. Bleeding.
That is love.
Not easy. Not floating. Not painless. Not free. But bound in one another's lives and love and pain.
Bound in promise.
Promise being the root of "response"
as in responsibility.
as in response-ability.
as in being present.
as in active relating.
as in spontaneous co-arising.
as in true relationship.
Ben Garrison:
"A choice to live sacred And because love would lead us to believe that we all belong to the earth and to each other.with hope and desire. bound to a future." [together.]
If we act as though everything is passing, and can pass without impact or float by without pain; if we act as thought we can float, unscathed, in a world of sharp edges trying to meet and fit in a better way; if we do not love particularly; if our love isn't heavy and doesn't hurt to hold some times...
then we are just kidding ourselves. What is any of that worth?
No. Gravity, heaviness, being bound together, that is what makes us creatures worthy and capable of love.
That we can hurt and love.
That we can love and hurt.
That we can love in spite of hurt
not in lieu of it.
Yes.
That we can love in spite of hurt, not in lieu of it.
And that we are bound to do so.
And that we then bind to each other.
And that we then, inevitably, hurt.
And that we then, still, again, hold to love, and hold to each other, despite.
And that we then understand and remember our responsibility to honor that love with our actions.
That is embracing gravity.
That is integrity.
That is love.
"The weight of the world
is love.
--Alan Ginsberg"The weight of the world
is love.
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
Gravity
[Reflections on home and relationship, in interpretation of Alfonso Cuarón’s movie Gravity.]
That we are floating
That we are held down
That we are alone
That we are one
That we are lost
That we are in the right place.
That we have a home.
That we have love.
Soil.
Soul.
Mud.
That we are all
That we are none.
Gravity.
Can't stop crying
can't stop reaching
can't stop trying to grab hold
of everything that's floating away
from me.
Tethered in the heart.
We must hold on to love.
Gravity.
That we all belong to the earth.
Gravity.
That this is home.
That we are bound.
Gravity.
Binding.
Gravity. Weighting without crushing.
Gravity. Holding us to what is ours.
Holding us to what we belong to.
Gravity.
Love.
Same thing.
Love.
Same thing.
We can float in easy silence
or we can stand
feet pressed in
in the buzzing world
alive
together.
Gravity.
Howling into the abyss.
Gravity.
Howling our hearts into the silence.
Gravity.
Howling Howling.
Wailing. Howling. Screaming. Loving. Howling. Moaning. Loving. Barking. Barking. Howling.
Howling.
Wholing.
Wholing.
Homing.
Coming home
to the heavy gravity
of particularity,
relationship.
Gravity. Coming home.
Gravity.
Surrendering to the weight
of what we belong to.
written 3/10/14
all images from gravitymovie.warnerbros.com
Thursday, April 10, 2014
the conversation
I've been
shying away from writing because I have been standing at the edge of an
ocean, dug in, while waves of truth and love wash over me, over and over
and over, and I haven't had the time or words or perspective to
synthesize all of it, or any. But I am seeing now that it just may not be the time for
synthesis, but for living in the washing over and over, and expressing
purely whatever it is that washes through me.
Being vulnerable is probably the most important thing I've ever done.
These are the themes.
Being vulnerable is probably the most important thing I've ever done.
"As it happens, the wall between us is very thin.
Why couldn't a cry from one of us break it down?It would crumble easily, it would barely make a sound."
Rilke
~~~
Conversation is about finding understanding.
Breaking these walls
or discovering
that they were never there.
[Listen]
[Talk to me]
Everything is a conversation.
Everything is a puzzle.
How do these two,three, four things
people, pieces fit together?
A puzzle.
How does my hand fit the rock?
Perfectly. Just there.
Particularity.
My hand.
That rock.
Fit.
And so I climb
there,
that wall
and suddenly
the wall is not a wall
it is my life.
We are one.
~~~
Particularity.
Love particularly,
though
love
is not
particularly
particular
about who, what, how it loves.
Or it is.
I'll say it again though:
Love particularly.
Love the particularity of
his face
her voice
that sunset
my own words
that day.
That day.
That moment
of heart-shattering breath.
But then
love all-everything,
everyone.
Because
how could you not?
Because
one
is all,
right?
[At last, I have to admit it. Because I stood at the edge of that ocean screaming in the night and I was screaming too, and the stars were there, and I was there, and there I was: one, all.]
But don't forget what you are bound to.
Don't forget the decay of time
and who you will rot with
and where you will rot.
And don't forget
that tree
that you've placed your hands on and sung to
songs of promise
a hundred times.
And don't forget
the particular slope of that land
that hand
that rock
the curve of that neck
of that lip
of that tooth
in his mouth.
Remember it like your tongue remembers the exact shape of the space inside your molars,
the exact edge of your incisors
overlapping
[over and over]
against each other.
~~~
The problem:
If you feel each particular thing
with this particular love
then you start to love
every
single
inch
of the world.
And then
I'm afraid the particularity will start dissolve
into the stale suburbs
and crowded streets
of generality.
Because
who doesn't want to be the person
someone's swift-swimming eyes settle upon
and rest
in the perfect peace of finally finding
what they'd been seeking
?
Who wants to be just one face in the crowd
in a sea of love?
But love is a sea
washing over and over
me.
I fall
and I fall
and I fall
in love
with everything.
~~~
So how do I know
who and what I belong to
except by
continuing the conversation
hard as it may be
and it will be
and it is.
But this is probably the most important thing that I can do.
But this is probably the most important thing that I can do.
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Monday, March 17, 2014
a small part
full virgo moon
low starry-night tide
lifting-wings winds
blowing rain in
feet swim
shedding
walls cell-thin
between me
and all
everything
low starry-night tide
lifting-wings winds
blowing rain in
feet swim
shedding
walls cell-thin
between me
and all
everything
Sunday, March 16, 2014
Monday, March 10, 2014
closer
"That time
I thought I could not
go any closer to grief
without dying
I went closer,
and I did not die.
Surely God
had his hand in this,
as well as friends.
Still, I was bent,
and my laughter,
as the poet said,
was nowhere to be found.
Then said my friend Daniel,
(brave even among lions),
"It's not the weight you carry
but how you carry it -
books, bricks, grief -
it's all in the way
you embrace it, balance it, carry it
when you cannot, and would not,
put it down."
So I went practicing.
Have you noticed?
Have you heard
the laughter
that comes, now and again,
out of my startled mouth?
How I linger
to admire, admire, admire
the things of this world
that are kind, and maybe
also troubled -
roses in the wind,
the sea geese on the steep waves,
a love
to which there is no reply?"
- Mary Oliver
I thought I could not
go any closer to grief
without dying
I went closer,
and I did not die.
Surely God
had his hand in this,
as well as friends.
Still, I was bent,
and my laughter,
as the poet said,
was nowhere to be found.
Then said my friend Daniel,
(brave even among lions),
"It's not the weight you carry
but how you carry it -
books, bricks, grief -
it's all in the way
you embrace it, balance it, carry it
when you cannot, and would not,
put it down."
So I went practicing.
Have you noticed?
Have you heard
the laughter
that comes, now and again,
out of my startled mouth?
How I linger
to admire, admire, admire
the things of this world
that are kind, and maybe
also troubled -
roses in the wind,
the sea geese on the steep waves,
a love
to which there is no reply?"
- Mary Oliver
Saturday, February 22, 2014
[not] polarities
liberation or love?
holding hard lines
or being flexible
patient
understanding?
hardened heart or hope?
holding hard lines
or being flexible
patient
understanding?
hardened heart or hope?
Friday, January 10, 2014
Whales and Wholeness
I always regard that day as one of the best days of my life. What a privilege to live among such powerful creatures in this world.
This is why I feel what I feel (anger and indignation at humanity's continual abuse of the living earth); why I believe what I believe (that harmful human processes must be stopped at any human cost in order for the living earth to continue living); and why I do what I do (activism and awareness raising, calling for radical personal and systematic change to our lifestyles, worldviews, and power structures).
I see myself, and humanity, as a member of a life community. We must stop acting as though our voice is the only one that matters, that our choices, our drive, our technology supersede the rights of other creatures, other beings (water, air, plants, trees, microbes included) to exist and flourish in in-tact ecosystems, unpolluted, unfractured, WHOLE.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPXdHEhnhSY&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DwPXdHEhnhSY&app=desktop
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
[magnetic]
he said
but let the morning's eyes bloom
so full as they could
and almost still
beneath tree night moon
dropped every shell, like tears
after a wild stream
howling
Friday, August 16, 2013
Monday, August 12, 2013
on love
When love beckons you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you, yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you,...
believe in him.
Though his voice may shatter your dreams
as the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your
tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them
in their clinging to the earth.
Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may
become sacred bread for God's sacred feast.
All these things shall love do unto you that you may
know the secrets of your heart, and in that
knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart.
But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace
and love's pleasure
Then it is better for you that you cover your
nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but
not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of
your tears.
~Khalil Gibran
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you, yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you,...
believe in him.
Though his voice may shatter your dreams
as the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your
tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them
in their clinging to the earth.
Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may
become sacred bread for God's sacred feast.
All these things shall love do unto you that you may
know the secrets of your heart, and in that
knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart.
But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace
and love's pleasure
Then it is better for you that you cover your
nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but
not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of
your tears.
~Khalil Gibran
Saturday, July 6, 2013
Intimacy
I spend my days
barefoot
walking spinning
weeding.
It's intimate
to pull up roots that lay
so lightly just beneath
the surface of mulch
O Horizon.
Oh horizon I watch
the mountains in the distance
dreaming of you
for almost two weeks
I am good.
And not just good--humble
noble--am I?
I walk outside
barefooted night
barefooted sky
baring my skin my soul
to the stars on high
to the trees whose roots lie
so solid beneath
the surface. And yet
for four days I crouch
crawl sit and think
I am good
for pulling up the roots of another thing
and calling it a weed--
diligent in digging
each piece and snatching up every heart-
shaped leaf of morning glory
[bindweed]
Morning Glory.
I am good.
I am good.
Revitalizing, renewing this place
but it's the destroying that follows
me into my dreams as obsession--
beetles
displaced, spiders
scattering.
I can hardly escape it
under the stars.
A possession.
An intimacy.
What am I?
Am I good?
The hearts follow me
into the forest and my eyes are frantic
for the row of green hearts
up, up, up,
like an embroidered pattern
on 90's preteen jeans
--something I want to erase. But these,
they follow me into the woods
and I only see things
to pluck and pull,
and tame
What is wild?
What am I?
Am I good?
The hearts follow me.
Be noble
Be noble
Be noble
each successive one tells me as it winds up
the precious trees I try to protect,
try to
control this wild virus.
It won't stop. Winding. Spinning.
Up. up. up.
And then I spin
and I spin and dance with other people
to the tune of explosions, and the black smoke
from the marina, rising, dances too.
What is good?
Watching those flames engulf and rise and spread and
die enlivens me, and I dance
and I spin and I fall.
And I fall and fall
from grace
for you, from you, with you,
with him.
What am I
but happy to see him in the morning's glory?
We start (and end) our day with embrace
and I don't know why
but my heart flutters
up, up, up
when I see his smile.
The clouds cover the mountains.
A storm brews around them
and I wonder
[where you are, what this is]
at the intimacy of standing
side-by-side silent
awkward as we learn
how to stand in place nobly,
humbly,
tall and strong, in self
in place,
together.
Our roots intertwine
and who am I
to pluck them from their place
these hearts
growing together
up, up, up
binding, spinning, winding
up
until...
my head spins
drunk//tilting
horizon cloud-
cover my eyes
blindness engulfing
I sit at the bar brain spinning
and the heart vines winding
climb the stool beneath
entangle my legs
my belly my
heart with hearts.
I stumble
spinning.
~~~
Just now
I remember that book.
It said to pluck the weeds
before they dig in deep.
I try
to extract, try
to control, but just one clip
and it will grow
again.
~~~
For almost two weeks I am good.
[What is good?]
For four days
I clear-cut a whole forest
of weeds. And now
they trail behind me in my dreams
leaving seeds; taking root in my
bare feet and string along
strewing hearts, stringing hearts
as I go on.
What is good? What am I? Why?
He drives me home,
not my own, but home
of one who held me on
before.
I wonder and the green hearts
bind in my stomach
in my chest, my arms,
in his green car as my head spins.
are lifted up to him
and pull him in.
He pulls me in
embrace. I collapse
safe.
It feels good. So good. What is good?
I don't care.
I rest, chest on chest
head on shoulder. Hand to neck.
Heart to heart.
I try to let go
but my tendrils have hold
and he is holding me
up
up
up
for now.
And then
I breath
I breath, and carefully
unfurl my arms uncurl my fingers
so carefully so not to drop
any leaves.
And I smile say goodbye
and--oh [my heart]
I leave [leaves].
~~~
Some call it bind weed
but I still prefer morning glory
and it will come back surely.
Do I pluck it
or let it grow?
~~~
I spend my days barefooted
walking
spinning
weeding.
It is intimate.
barefoot
walking spinning
weeding.
It's intimate
to pull up roots that lay
so lightly just beneath
the surface of mulch
O Horizon.
Oh horizon I watch
the mountains in the distance
dreaming of you
for almost two weeks
I am good.
And not just good--humble
noble--am I?
I walk outside
barefooted night
barefooted sky
baring my skin my soul
to the stars on high
to the trees whose roots lie
so solid beneath
the surface. And yet
for four days I crouch
crawl sit and think
I am good
for pulling up the roots of another thing
and calling it a weed--
diligent in digging
each piece and snatching up every heart-
shaped leaf of morning glory
[bindweed]
Morning Glory.
I am good.
I am good.
Revitalizing, renewing this place
but it's the destroying that follows
me into my dreams as obsession--
beetles
displaced, spiders
scattering.
I can hardly escape it
under the stars.
A possession.
An intimacy.
What am I?
Am I good?
The hearts follow me
into the forest and my eyes are frantic
for the row of green hearts
up, up, up,
like an embroidered pattern
on 90's preteen jeans
--something I want to erase. But these,
they follow me into the woods
and I only see things
to pluck and pull,
and tame
What is wild?
What am I?
Am I good?
The hearts follow me.
Be noble
Be noble
Be noble
each successive one tells me as it winds up
the precious trees I try to protect,
try to
control this wild virus.
It won't stop. Winding. Spinning.
Up. up. up.
And then I spin
and I spin and dance with other people
to the tune of explosions, and the black smoke
from the marina, rising, dances too.
What is good?
Watching those flames engulf and rise and spread and
die enlivens me, and I dance
and I spin and I fall.
And I fall and fall
from grace
for you, from you, with you,
with him.
What am I
but happy to see him in the morning's glory?
We start (and end) our day with embrace
and I don't know why
but my heart flutters
up, up, up
when I see his smile.
The clouds cover the mountains.
A storm brews around them
and I wonder
[where you are, what this is]
at the intimacy of standing
side-by-side silent
awkward as we learn
how to stand in place nobly,
humbly,
tall and strong, in self
in place,
together.
Our roots intertwine
and who am I
to pluck them from their place
these hearts
growing together
up, up, up
binding, spinning, winding
up
until...
my head spins
drunk//tilting
horizon cloud-
cover my eyes
blindness engulfing
I sit at the bar brain spinning
and the heart vines winding
climb the stool beneath
entangle my legs
my belly my
heart with hearts.
I stumble
spinning.
~~~
Just now
I remember that book.
It said to pluck the weeds
before they dig in deep.
I try
to extract, try
to control, but just one clip
and it will grow
again.
~~~
For almost two weeks I am good.
[What is good?]
For four days
I clear-cut a whole forest
of weeds. And now
they trail behind me in my dreams
leaving seeds; taking root in my
bare feet and string along
strewing hearts, stringing hearts
as I go on.
What is good? What am I? Why?
He drives me home,
not my own, but home
of one who held me on
before.
I wonder and the green hearts
bind in my stomach
in my chest, my arms,
in his green car as my head spins.
are lifted up to him
and pull him in.
He pulls me in
embrace. I collapse
safe.
It feels good. So good. What is good?
I don't care.
I rest, chest on chest
head on shoulder. Hand to neck.
Heart to heart.
I try to let go
but my tendrils have hold
and he is holding me
up
up
up
for now.
And then
I breath
I breath, and carefully
unfurl my arms uncurl my fingers
so carefully so not to drop
any leaves.
And I smile say goodbye
and--oh [my heart]
I leave [leaves].
~~~
Some call it bind weed
but I still prefer morning glory
and it will come back surely.
Do I pluck it
or let it grow?
~~~
I spend my days barefooted
walking
spinning
weeding.
It is intimate.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
sun and rain
(from journal)
I stood in the sun and watched the deep grey clouds approach
the wind rushed through that stand of trees but not this one
I love the currents of motion that we can only see by hearing and can only hear by how it moves
another.
The sound of waves washing through the branches
And then the misty rains come with crisp air
filling me with the sacred connection of life, breath, air, water,
earth fills every crack of skin on my hands.
A rush of wave through my body as the sun slips
behind the deep grey--the color of comfortable sadness.
It holds me.
Straddling light and dark. Juxtaposition.
This is where the beauty of this world lies.
This is where I find the deepest love
and truth
and love.
I held in my hand, today,
a baby snake,
the size of a large worm.
I found him coiled up sweetly under a bed of pine needles.
I thought, at first, it was a millipede or some bug, or even a worm.
But as I picked it up it uncoiled and coiled again
and slithered across my hand. A snake.
He looked at my thumb as though he was looking in my eyes, with curious fear
or hope.
I didn't hold him long--this tiny beautiful
black-grey and yellow-orange snake.
I never knew a snake so small could exist.
His perfection, beauty, loneliness and contentment
almost brought me to tears.
And then the rain.
I love this dear world.
I stood in the sun and watched the deep grey clouds approach
the wind rushed through that stand of trees but not this one
I love the currents of motion that we can only see by hearing and can only hear by how it moves
another.
The sound of waves washing through the branches
And then the misty rains come with crisp air
filling me with the sacred connection of life, breath, air, water,
earth fills every crack of skin on my hands.
A rush of wave through my body as the sun slips
behind the deep grey--the color of comfortable sadness.
It holds me.
Straddling light and dark. Juxtaposition.
This is where the beauty of this world lies.
This is where I find the deepest love
and truth
and love.
I held in my hand, today,
a baby snake,
the size of a large worm.
I found him coiled up sweetly under a bed of pine needles.
I thought, at first, it was a millipede or some bug, or even a worm.
But as I picked it up it uncoiled and coiled again
and slithered across my hand. A snake.
He looked at my thumb as though he was looking in my eyes, with curious fear
or hope.
I didn't hold him long--this tiny beautiful
black-grey and yellow-orange snake.
I never knew a snake so small could exist.
His perfection, beauty, loneliness and contentment
almost brought me to tears.
And then the rain.
I love this dear world.
Monday, April 15, 2013
both
(from journal)
I don't want to be ignorant. I want to fill the world with truth.
I don't want to be cynical. I want to fill the world with love.
I don't want to be ignorant. I want to fill the world with truth.
I don't want to be cynical. I want to fill the world with love.
Sunday, April 7, 2013
Finding Beauty in a Broken World [Each Day]
(from journal)
The past few days I am practically brought to tears by nearly every living creature I encounter--a miniature dragon insect on Cam's ceiling; a buzzing fly who I release into the outdoors; my cat in my arms like a baby (and there is sadness there, as he is confined from wildness); the beautiful blond child at the PDC workdays; the tiny bird with hummingbird wings at the window feeder the Stellar's jay at the top of the tree at the corner of Cam's window, swaying in the strong winds and rains of the long, hard afternoon (a grounding, a guardian); a baby squirrel at the window, eating the seeds fallen on the ground; the bees in the movie tonight who I now feel such reverence for; the crows circling, diving, riding the winds; the frogs chirping in the pond out back this night, as I walk around the house. The thought of the creatures pulls at my heart--just the thought of my shared existence with them at this time in life, in time--just the thought of my communion with them as inhabitants of this world. Do they hold me in any such reverence? Do they hold me?
Flashes:
wanting...longing to be a small, soft animal that someone holds and loves so sweetly; that is not so impacted by gravity; that does not feel so much weight from the world.
a picture of a child sleeping against a wild mountain ox of some sort, resting together in the harmony of an alpine world; relaxing into their shared existence and the privilege of each other's company.
This softness and pure love and co-compassion contrasted with something like industrialized animal farming is enough to break my heart many times over each day. The violence and force inflicted upon beings with heart and soul practically destroys me. I feel the pain of it inside me. I feel it. I feel the clear-cutting of life on my heart. Barren patches where joy, vitality, and complexity have been stripped.
I want them back.
Each loss is another gash and I am spilling blood and love all over every day.
I am not hopeless, nor defeated. I am not destroyed.
I am alive. Preparing. Ready.
I am built for this time, for this world.
I can find the beauty and piece it back together into something new.
I feel the collapse in my chest. I feel the pain. I feel the harshness and the suppression. I live it. It is part of my world. I will stand in it and in another. I will marry them until beauty overcomes. Beauty is always present. I don't know if I believe that. The possibility for beauty... finding beauty... no... yes...
healing.
Well, it exists in the pain. Isn't that my duty as an artist (well, a writer)? To find that beauty? Find the beauty in the broken world. In these creatures whom persist in the world even as it crumbles, or whom hold together the world my species is attempting to erode? I have such reverence and love. It fills me to the brim and I burst. The pain and love become one, and they fill me, and I burst with the anguish of loving something more than can ever be expressed.
"Finding beauty in a broken world is creating beauty in the world we find." --Terry Tempest Williams
Yes, but I don't even need to create it. It is there, in the eyes, wings, and wonder of all creatures, all beings. I only must bear reverence and love for them and all the burdens that follow with such love. And yes, I will try to create beauty from the filth of hatred, and try to understand how hatred can breed such awfulness when it is so clearly driven by desire, and love. I will try to direct my own desire, my own love into creation and not deterioration.
Yes:
I love a broken world
a whole broken world
a whole world broken
a world whole in its brokenness
but perhaps I can only see that because as a person with a poetic heart, that is what I want to see. But I think I can also feel it. As I explore this pain, I at least feel a fullness which is a golden thread of hope that connects me to a deep [and distant?] faith. And in that...
"Finding beauty in a broken world becomes more than the art of assemblage. It is the work of daring contemplation that inspires action." --TTW
The past few days I am practically brought to tears by nearly every living creature I encounter--a miniature dragon insect on Cam's ceiling; a buzzing fly who I release into the outdoors; my cat in my arms like a baby (and there is sadness there, as he is confined from wildness); the beautiful blond child at the PDC workdays; the tiny bird with hummingbird wings at the window feeder the Stellar's jay at the top of the tree at the corner of Cam's window, swaying in the strong winds and rains of the long, hard afternoon (a grounding, a guardian); a baby squirrel at the window, eating the seeds fallen on the ground; the bees in the movie tonight who I now feel such reverence for; the crows circling, diving, riding the winds; the frogs chirping in the pond out back this night, as I walk around the house. The thought of the creatures pulls at my heart--just the thought of my shared existence with them at this time in life, in time--just the thought of my communion with them as inhabitants of this world. Do they hold me in any such reverence? Do they hold me?
Flashes:
wanting...longing to be a small, soft animal that someone holds and loves so sweetly; that is not so impacted by gravity; that does not feel so much weight from the world.
a picture of a child sleeping against a wild mountain ox of some sort, resting together in the harmony of an alpine world; relaxing into their shared existence and the privilege of each other's company.
This softness and pure love and co-compassion contrasted with something like industrialized animal farming is enough to break my heart many times over each day. The violence and force inflicted upon beings with heart and soul practically destroys me. I feel the pain of it inside me. I feel it. I feel the clear-cutting of life on my heart. Barren patches where joy, vitality, and complexity have been stripped.
I want them back.
Each loss is another gash and I am spilling blood and love all over every day.
I am not hopeless, nor defeated. I am not destroyed.
I am alive. Preparing. Ready.
I am built for this time, for this world.
I can find the beauty and piece it back together into something new.
I feel the collapse in my chest. I feel the pain. I feel the harshness and the suppression. I live it. It is part of my world. I will stand in it and in another. I will marry them until beauty overcomes. Beauty is always present. I don't know if I believe that. The possibility for beauty... finding beauty... no... yes...
healing.
Well, it exists in the pain. Isn't that my duty as an artist (well, a writer)? To find that beauty? Find the beauty in the broken world. In these creatures whom persist in the world even as it crumbles, or whom hold together the world my species is attempting to erode? I have such reverence and love. It fills me to the brim and I burst. The pain and love become one, and they fill me, and I burst with the anguish of loving something more than can ever be expressed.
"Finding beauty in a broken world is creating beauty in the world we find." --Terry Tempest Williams
Yes, but I don't even need to create it. It is there, in the eyes, wings, and wonder of all creatures, all beings. I only must bear reverence and love for them and all the burdens that follow with such love. And yes, I will try to create beauty from the filth of hatred, and try to understand how hatred can breed such awfulness when it is so clearly driven by desire, and love. I will try to direct my own desire, my own love into creation and not deterioration.
Yes:
I love a broken world
a whole broken world
a whole world broken
a world whole in its brokenness
but perhaps I can only see that because as a person with a poetic heart, that is what I want to see. But I think I can also feel it. As I explore this pain, I at least feel a fullness which is a golden thread of hope that connects me to a deep [and distant?] faith. And in that...
"Finding beauty in a broken world becomes more than the art of assemblage. It is the work of daring contemplation that inspires action." --TTW
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