Manifestations

2023-03-22T00:07:00.001-04:00

Manifestations - Fall 2010

2010-10-30T14:05:00.018-04:00

Welcome to the Fall 2010 issue of Manifestations,

the literary journal of the Fourth Order.

Enjoy the issue and please pass our link around to your friends.

This Issue Explores the intersection where inner and outer meet: the states of being and stations of the heart encountered on the way, lenses through which one aspect of truth may be experienced, where even illusion or delusion may reveal truth as we see in Flo Golod’s short story, Practicing for Heaven.

Diversity: Established and emerging writers and artists from six different faith traditions, four continents, from homeless veteran, veiled woman, seed banking farmer, scholars, even a red dressed cleavage exposing preacher, the sublime to the outrageous.

Interactivity: the new format allows your playful or serious written and artistic responses to individual work.

Challenge Submission for January issue: Along with regular submissions we are issuing a special challenge to create a youtube video of Hermit John's poem, En las Profundidades de Mi Ser, found in this issue. Your videos will be featured in the next issue of Manifestations.

The Collective Dreaming Project is dedicated to listening to the communicating World's Dream, and giving its voice to the human world. It seeks submissions of dreams of the earth and cosmos to collate them, and look for patterns and themes within the dreams. The Project is looking for a specific type of dream: dreams with images of the natural world that have strong feeling and resonance, that are radiant, peculiar, odd, out of place, even terrifying or horrid; as well as those dreams that have images in the human world that are artistic, handmade, beautiful and alive. Manifestations will dedicate space in its upcoming issues to submitters who respond to their dream with visual art and/or writing. See Submission Guidelines.

As always we are looking to penetrate experience seeking the unifying voice beneath the world's apparent divisions, a voice that hums in the timbre of the great cross cultural wisdom traditions. We are enchanted by works that reflect both the beauty and terror of life and dialogue in a vital way with the human condition.

Peace and all good to you from the wild and always somewhat in disarray companions of the Fourth Order.

Musa the Tailor

2010-10-30T11:34:00.007-04:00

(Editor's note: We begin this fall 2010 edition with this beautiful poem celebrating the feast of Francis of Assisi with a remembrance of his union with Clare - the union of the heart's enclosure and our response in the world, the earliest Franciscan rule.)

___________

The Ordinance

Runic fibres run, an echelon of intonation,

Through iconography refracted, Left and Right.

The ordinance of poverty, angelic, striking

Wayward hearts, hateful babble run through

And silenced by the enclosure of Clare’s women.

A cradle for infants, a sickness for tyrants,

The wanderer’s holy weaponry sings outward,

Through soil, upward, into branch, explosions of leaf and flower,

And then a harvest of fruit, falling, unseen: this darkened sanctuary.

Leave the sheikhs and scientists to their God delusion,

Leave them to their claps and whistles,

For the ordinance demands a chastity greater than that foul lapse

For the ordinance demands the truth function, the verdant Joy.

And so this midnight, I reflect that his charity was orbic universe in miniature,

Replicated by diamond response.

But then I am interrupted, my daughters’ cat sounds at the window

Asking to be let out into night air:

A kaleidoscope of cat and Clare and Kingdom.

Br. Robert Lentz, OFM

Copyright by Musa

Biography

Musa is both a Tailor and a professor of Computational Logic with the University of London. He lives in London with his wife, two daughters and their cat. His ongoing reflections on Sufism, reality and language can be found at The Tailor’s Doctrine thegoodgarment.wordpress.com and at the tailorofgoodgarment’s youtube channel. Be ready for a wild and wonderful romp in the hermeneutics of divine love.

Woody Wodraska

2010-10-29T20:37:00.011-04:00

Saint John and Me in the Desert

What do I even know about the man, the prophet, the baptizer? I picture him gaunt, dressed in skins, a wild man haranguing the crowd and standing knee-deep in the Jordan. A man with a message, making a spectacle of himself. Tough, a standup guy. Then languishing in Herod’s prison cell and finally, his head on a platter at a feast. “I must decrease while he [Jesus] increases.”

Contact #1 On the way to the monastery on the Rio Chama I spent a night at a hot springs resort in the San Luis Valley, Colorado. After a low budget night in the yurt, while I was outside and looking around, a lady dressed in one of the fluffy white robes they rent there for the treks from lodging to hot pools, this lady looked at me oddly from a distance, then walked to close the gap between us, clearly bent on telling me something.

She said, “You look just like John the Baptist, the way I saw you then, just taking a step forward. One of your ancestors could have posed for Rodin’s sculpture of John the Baptist.” And that was that…she walked on. Good thing, because I had no response to this, though I can vaguely picture the bronze she’s thinking of.

Contact #2 A couple of days later I was in Taos, staying with an old friend while waiting to go to the monastery. She brought out a copy of a painting, unframed but somewhat protected by a mat mounting. I don’t know the name of the painting, but it’s by Leonardo or Michelangelo and it shows Mary and her cousin Elizabeth, with the two boys, chubby and a year or so apart—a toddler, John, and an infant, Jesus. I hadn’t seen this painting in many years and gladly accepted when my friend said: “We had this when we were together in the 80s, and to me it was always your picture, so why don’t you have it with you from now on?”

Another few days and I arrive at the monastery, up the Rio Chama to the head of the canyon, with the chapel backdropped by rimrock and two crosses at the top; you crane your neck to see them catching the evening light. For me this is a firm intention, put into effect years ago—to be here with the monks—now manifesting. I’m humbled and exalted to be here.

Contact #3 I enter the chapel for the first time. An octagonal central space with a plain altar in the middle and flanked on four sides by great paned windows thirty feet high and 20 broad. Guests are seated just inside the big double doors, a ranking of 16 cushioned, heavy wooden chairs. The view for the guests is of the soaring rimrock, differently shadowed and colored as the sun makes its way across the sky, from Matins at 7:00 AM to Vespers at 7:30 PM. To the right and left of the central area are the choirs, seating a more or less equal number of monks at each office, chanting alternate verses. Their chairs are much the same as ours, but with arms and spaced farther apart. Behind the monks on the right is a niche with a statue of Mary. In front of them on the wall is a graphic, iconic, more than life size crucifix…the blood streaming and the expression agonized. Straight ahead is the door through which the monks enter, typically in one’s and twos, and leave in procession; both going and coming they bow to the altar. At the right of the door is a smallish icon, maybe the size of a breadboard, too far away to make out the details. I discover later that this one is changed every day or two.

And to the front of the monks on the left, in a niche next to the carved lectern from which homilies are delivered, is John the Baptist. Nearly life sized, tormented with his message of repentance, striding forth with a thin staff in the form of a cross in his right hand and a book in his left hand, improbably topped by a lamb the size of a cat. There he is again.

Contact #4 We go to the main meal, that first day, and there he is again, on the wall between the refectory and the kitchen, behind the main monks’ head table—another iconic picture of John, large-sized. And before we sit down we sing three songs of praise and thanksgiving, one of them a grace, another to the monastic founder Benedict, and one to John, the forerunner, The Troparion of Saint John the Baptist:

The memory of the just
Is mentioned with praise.
As for you O Foreruner, the
Lord’s witness is enough.
Indeed, you were greater than the prophets,
Since you were found worthy
To baptize in the waters the One
They could only announce.
You have fought for the sake of truth;
And proclaimed to those in Hades
That god who appeared in the flesh
Has taken away the sins of the world,
And bestowed his great mercy upon us.

Contact #5 The smaller icon, by the Brothers’ entry door in the church. After Matins on my last day at the monastery I crossed the altar area to have a look at it. Another iconic painting, of Jesus standing, leaning on a light staff in the form of a cross and pierced by the staff in the manner of a proclamation unrolled, a parchment with those words again: “I must decrease while he increases.” And on the ground in the left bottom corner, the bloody head of John in a basket.

Copyright by Woody Wodraska

Biography

When Woody Wodraska is not contemplating the head of John the Baptist, his hands are in the soil of mother earth and his work is family and community deep bio-dynamic gardening. Woody is a co-founder of Aurora Farm Family Foundation. The Foundation supports the Aurora Farm Seed CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) which provides non genetically modified open pollinated bio-dynamically grown heritage seeds to gardeners. “Food Sovereignty Begins with Seeds.” Woody is the author of Deep Gardening: Soul Lessons from 17 Gardens published by Trafford.

Deep Gardening: Soul Lessons from 17 Gardens, Biodynamic Memories

Hermit John

2010-10-29T20:17:00.003-04:00

En las Profundidades de Mi Ser

En las profundidades de mi ser,

In the depths of my being

Un sufrimiento callado se trasmuta

A quiet sorrow is being transmuted.

Y este dolor

And that pain

De sentir tu dolor

By feeling your pain

Se alimenta compasivo.

Is compassionately digested.

Como cuando baja el sol

Like when the sun goes down

En el ocaso

In the sunset

Pintando de colores el cielo.

Painting colors in the sky.

Mas, vendra la noche

But the night will come

Con sus silencios nocturnos

With nocturnal silences

A conectarnos a la vacuidad del Cosmos.

To connect us to the deep void of the Cosmos.

Y veremos

And we will see

Reflejada nuestra realidad

Our reality reflected

En las estrellas.

In the stars.

Y una vez mas

And, one more time,

Emergiendo del silencio de la noche

Emerging from the silences of the night

Brillara el sol

The sun will shine

En nuestras vidas

In our lives.

Y con el nuevo comienzo de cada dia

And, with the new beginning of each day

Una nueva esperanza compartida.

A new shared hope.

Por que invertir nuestras preciosas energias

Why should we invest our precious energies

Alimentando el mounstruo de tristeza y de la ira?

Feeding the monster of sadness and anger?

Por que seguir llorando

Why should we continue crying

Y aumentar en la tierra

And add to the Earth

El dolor profundo que la agobia.

Deeper pains.

Somos guerreros de luz,

We are warriors of light,

Canales de amor

Channels of love

Instrumentos de Dios.

Instruments of God.

Trasmutemos nuestros miedos

Let's transmute our fears

En el oro del Amor Divino y perdonemos.

Into the gold of divine love and forgive.

Trasformemos los fantasmas del pasado,

Let's transform the ghosts of our past.

Desechemos aquello que no nutre nuestro espiritu.

To let go to what doesn't nourishes our spirit.

Seamos nosotros el cambio que buscamos.

Let's be the change we are seek.

Hagamos de la compassion

Let's make of Compassion

Una alquimia cotidiana

A daily alchemy.

Donde la vida, nuestra vida

Where life, our life

Es el amor mismo que tanto anhelamos.

Is that same love we are looking for.

Que la busqueda de paz

May the search of peace

De nuestro silencio sagrado

Of our sacred silence.

Sea el Puente divino

Be a divine bridge

Que nos conecte a nuestra verdadera esencia.

That will connect us with our true essence.

Observemos nuestro ego, sin juicio y sin culpa

Let us observe our ego, without judgment or guilt

Dejando que se evapore

Allowing him to evaporate

En la indiferencia de un alma selctiva

Between the indifference of a selective soul

Que solo alimenta y engrandece

That only feeds and helps grow

Lo que es bello, puro y perfecto.

What is beautiful, pure and perfect.

Dejemos que nuestro ego se disuelva

And, let us allow our ego to get dissolved

Y muera de una vez de indiferencia!

And finally die of indifference.

Luchemos,

Let's fight

Una lucha pacifica

A pacific war

Alimentando la virtud y la paciencia.

Feeding virtues and patience.

Y en este fluir entre lo humano y lo divino

And, in that place; between the human and the divine

Evolucionemos con conciencia

Let's evolve, with consciousness

De homo sapiens a homo angelicus

From homo sapiens to homo angelicus

Irradiando la luz

Radiating the light

De la Unidad Divina

Of Divine Oneness.

Copyright by John the Hermit

Biography

Hermit John has been a hermit for 35 years. He serves as Prior for an international interspiritual group of hermits and solitaries. He lives in South Africa.

Hafizullāh

2010-10-29T20:12:00.223-04:00

God says:
“You are loved
and
you are Love, Itself.

what is it, then,
that you are so afraid of losing?

come! take my hand,
it’s all around you —
come out of that dank hole
you’ve dug for yourself.

come into the Sun!

if you can’t find My hand,
begin by loving your blind groping.”

From time to time
(according to me)
a window opens between two hearts
and one soul sees the other
as God sees the other
and goes a little nuts

with joy

Hafizullah has walked, stumbled, crawled, and danced the path of the Sufi since 1976. He resides in his native Seattle, “as close to heaven as I ever want to be,” where he flogs computer software for money and guides a circle of students in the Sufi path. His passion is sharing sacred space and spiritual practice with those who are awakening.

Richard Blanchfield

2010-10-29T20:05:00.002-04:00

An Ontological Grunt

In time of war a U.S. MARINE:

in truth, a man of peace,

either way, a man of courage.

Veterans trust dogs,

children under twelve,

masturbation,

the chair facing the door

and any weapon in the dark.

Paratrooper, Marine, grunt,

infantryman or medic,

armor, air, or artillery,

guerrilla, fighter or

counterinsurgent, gunslinger,

each man reborn in combat.

So God made the world,

God made man,

and God made Nam!

Since Vietnam

three things

hold my Universe together:

gravity, centrifugal force

and suffering.

The Nam was a mind fuck,

soul crusher,

body killer.

In isolated rage

I see the 58, 620 names

embedded on the black granite Wall.

I hear echoes: Waste them,

get some, ice them….

my soul an unhung murderer.

I am a Warrior,

and not a gentle man.

I see Christ in jungle fatigues,

Humping like a grunt,

Leeches bleeding him raw.

He says: fuck it

and becomes the tiger.

Ah, war, war, war.

Casualties taken on both side.

We come from nonexistence.

We got to oblivion.

And War and U.S. of A. denies us.

I am a Warrior

for peace

AND not a gentle man.

Copyright by Richard Blanchfield

Biography

Richard “Doc” Blanchfield, a founding companion of the Fourth Order, has been known to stand in frigid arctic rivers for hours whispering unspeakable sweet talk to salmon as they make they way onto his hook. He is quoted frequently in Doing It Another Way: the Basic Text of the Fourth Order and a brief but important segment of his story is told on page 141. He is a three tour Vietnam veteran, Navy medic, who was wounded in the Battle of Khe Sanh in 1968. Dick was involved with Operation Babylift, the evacuation of Amer-Asian children at the fall of Saigon; and with the founding of the Flower of the Dragon, a non-profit Vietnam veterans service organization created and run by Vietnam veterans in the 1970's which became the model for Vietnam Veteran Centers across the nation.

Hissa Hilal - حصة هلال

2010-10-29T19:47:00.005-04:00

(Editor/translator's note: This poem is American English adaptation of a poem performed this year by Hissa Hilal in the United Arab Emirates’ capital, Abu Dhabi, on the popular poetry contest, "The Million's Poet" which is broadcast all over the Middle East. The poem addresses the Arab world but its word's are strangely applicable to the Western world as well. The translation from the video performance of Hissa Hilal is by Hadeel al-Barrack. The English language adaptation is by Barbara Flaherty. Below is both a video of her performance with another's translation as well. We offer our translation to Ms Hilal as a gift to a poet who inspires all creative persons to speak truth to power.)

Ms Hilal's Introduction

Fear of speaking out keeps poets silent,

while danger surrounds our nation.

Poets speak only of temporary needs,

and personal issues, here where real words

fearlessly spoken are the true need. This matters,

those who could speak choose to be speechless.
__________

Ms Hilal's Poem

I have seen evil in the eyes of men,

who talk as if they were religious men,

rude, not human, angry, they give their legal

orders to the faithful. Allowed things become

forbidden! They cover their ugly thoughts

with nice talk, but put on death and wrap it

under their belt, with terror up their sleeves.

We live in an era when forbidden things

are allowed! Political people terrorize

human beings, try to make peace their prey.

O my nation, you are between barking dogs.

I can see you in the dark.

Copyright of English language poem by Barbara Flaherty,

Biography:

Hissa Hilal is a published poet who has previously worked as poetry editor for the London-headquartered Arab daily Al-Hayat, as well as a proud mother of four. Born to a family of Bedouins from Al Malihan tribe, Hilal has been writing in both the classical Arabic and colloquial styles of poetry since the age of 11 and has two published poetry collections: “Lahjat Al Hail” and “Al Nadawi”. She chooses to use provocative language in her poems because “extremism is so strong and you cannot talk about it in any other way.”

Hissa Hilal has most recently edited a controversial collection of pre-1950s poems written by Bedouin women, titled “Divorce and Kholu’ Poetry - A Reading of the Status of Women in Tribal Society - Nabati Poetry as a Witness.” The 297-page anthology was published by The Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage’s Poetry Academy and is divided into two main sections. The first section is titled “The Right of Choice”; the second speaks of “Rejection and Resistance.” (Source: Muslim Women, an online journal)

Charles Cameron

2010-10-29T19:33:00.006-04:00

The Empty Quarter

Signature

I shall have to admit that the way wind dances

across the surface of a pond or lake, the shimmer

and ripple of it, could be a form of writing –

of music, of painting too -- have I noticed

there's more than one way the surface of water

reflects? Wind has as much skittering practice

as any brush and paints as fair a picture -- a wind

and water way of writing. Why, then -- when

your needle draws blood through the tapestry

of life, is this not in the same calligraphy? Where

fire flames out, is it not cursive in the same

tongue? There is a piercing within every trace

of paint: all beauty bleeds, all flesh is afire

as the devouring signature of all turns all to ashes.

__________

The Weave

The way a maple tree in full leaf

like a ship under full sail fingers the sky,

the way sky gloves the maple,

as wind, holy, fills the sails: one

breath, one hand, the one calligraphy.

__________

The Empty Quarter

Rub' al Khali

Supposing an elevator doesn't function:

perhaps you can take the stairs,

you're a minute late, he's slightly

miffed, you kiss and make up, the

taxi horn blares downstairs at the same

moment it would have, he

picks up his keys, you reach

the restaurant just as if the elevator had

been working, but elsewhere a shooting

star fails to fall, there's a slight

shift in the wind, the dunes configure

themselves differently in

the Empty Quarter, the signs

of God read differently, it's a new world... .

Copyright@2010 by Charles Cameron

Biography

Charles Hipbone Cameron passion includes designing playable variants on Hermann Hesse's Glass Bead Game, and talking about why mythological logic has important contributions to make in a slew of areas ranging from dream interpretation to conflict resolution. He worked during the millennial rollover as Senior Analyst at The Arlington Institute, a beltway think tank in Virginia, on the social impact of large and surprising changes, and was a Principal Researcher with the Center for Millennial Studies at Boston University. Right at the moment, he is focusing on the Middle East and developing a tool for conflict analysis -- and hopefully, eventually, resolution!Charles is a frequent contributor to think tank blogs.

Letter I: Charles Cameron commenting on a remarkable conversation between Leah Farrall, a former Australian counterterrorism official, and Abu Walid al-Masri .
Letter II: Abu Walid al-Marsi letter of reply.

Judith Lethin

2010-10-29T16:29:00.007-04:00

Antevasin

Antevasin: a sanskrit word meaning one who lives at the border, an in-betweener. A person who leaves the city to live at the edge where the spiritual masters dwell. One who has sight of both worlds, but looks toward the unknown.

Antevasin,

The Companions live there,

on the border, away from the

center of the city;

we shelter

voles

driven by the heat of the day

into holes

beneath cactus and mesquite.

Hungry children

cling to mother’s skirts,

frightened children

disappear into the riffled folds

of fabric,

pretend an invisibility

impossible to achieve.

Dark places, riffled places,

habitat for a hapless god

who hides there,

In dark places and riffled places,

with us.

II.

The poor are drawn to the border,

chickens

drawn to the

bang of the old screen door

early in the morning;

drawn to the cluck, cluck of the

old woman and the

sound of grain swirling

in an old tin bucket;

drawn to the border,

to the silence and

simplicity of a place

away from the city,

away from the invisibility

of the city.

Chicks seek the

warmth of their own mother’s

thrust-down wings

and riffled breast

tremble.

III.

The Coyotes have come

to the edge,

the cut-off place

where dreams collide with violence

where spiritual masters collide

with mercenaries

who cut off the

heads of hapless dope sellers,

so many chickens

slaughtered on a Monday or

a Tuesday (it’s a job, you know,

somebody has to do it).

The bodies pile up

on the edge of the village

where voles hide and children

dare not go.

IV.

The Companions wait

in the still, cold church;

the funeral begins,

a father and son

found

in the pile

at the edge of the village.

Shhhh…….whispers the priest.

stay inside,

don’t show your face on Saturday

or you’ll be killed.

Chicken vultures look for blood,

timid foul take refuge

in the early morning

in cement houses

and adobe houses.

Humvees paid for

with drug money from America

rumble the streets,

shattering the early morning stillness,

shaking the fragile

walls and windows

and sensibilities of

passionate mothers

who fear for their sons lives.

Come home, they plead,

then riffle the folds

of their skirts

into ever widening circles,

until the cement houses and

the adobe houses

and the dust filled yards and

the pocked marked streets

are filled with the

riotous sound of their own

heart beat….

Come home,

stay home.

Antevasin

leave their homes

and live on the edge,

away from the city,

where spiritual masters dwell.

Companions,

drawn to the border,

to the dark places

and riffled places,

bear witness,

with a hapless god

who bears witness with us.

Copyright by Judith Lethin

Biography

The Rev. Judith Lethin, the flying preacher, a companion of the Fourth Order, grew up a cowgirl and never lost that wild edge. Judith is an Episcopal priest from Alaska. Her work has included innovative programs for alcohol and other drug treatment and suicide prevention in rural isolated villages. She is the President of the Board and founder of Our Lady of Las Palomas Interfaith Retreat Center, serving the poor of both New Mexico and Mexico.

Nizam Rose

2010-10-29T16:11:00.007-04:00

(Editor's Note: This moving reflection on the Easter Tridentine would typically be published with the season of the year. There is another season, the heart's season, where the great mysteries are alive in every moment. In that spirit we present Nizam Rose's powerful poem, On This Day.)
__________

On This Day

on this day

glorious voices from our beloved africa

raise up my spirits

though never forgetting that it is a

paradox that creates such beauty

while shots fire and villages

burn to the ground leaving

a foul smell and broken bodies, broken hearts.

on this day

we remember the mother's milk

that fed our savior, our spirit,

though never forgetting that

in the dark, war-torn east,

those same breasts are cut

from the chests of african women,

a 'statement' that they would nourish life no more.

on this day

we hear the nails, we see the face in anguish

we feel the blood spattered upon our faces

as the master is sent on that final journey

from this world to that,

never forgetting the millions of our

brothers and sisters in africa,

enduring the plague of aids,

ancients, babes, mothers, fathers, friends.

on this day

we watch the sky, so blue, untouched

by ought save the sun's light

never forgetting that under the same\

blue sky, our african family stares

hopelessly waiting for rain

on this day

we purify ourselves

as our lord's body was washed

after agonies finally ceased

never forgetting that the rivers

run dry, the desert grows

in our beloved africa

on this day

the sound of spring birds

both weeping and celebrating

the renewal of life given by

body and blood so precious,

never forgetting the same cries

and laughter of children still innocent

in our beloved africa.

nizami

good friday, 2007

__________

a journey

when i first came to the desert

i saw it clearly,

an endless ocean of sands

drifting. walking eastward into the rising sun

was peaceful, silent, yet full.

i was well wrapped, knew my

destination, knew my lord..

silence and peace remained

my companions during the first days,

until i found east had become west,

light into darkness, and the sky filled with sand.

inside my makeshift tent i waited for

the howling storm to abate. i was there

for a long time, sleeping and praying.

as silence fell once again, i came out

into the open, into a new world.

the light was so bright i could not see,

and thus continued in a wayward direction

tempted by thoughts of sweet water

and the touch of warm oil soothing my skin

despite all, my lips cracked, water supply

dwindled,my mind began to wander

from the light into the darkness where i could not

hear my lord's voice.

i began to hear another voice,

sweet and long desired

calling to me, calling for me.

in the distance my eyes created

a pearl-like marble palace

where trees and water beckoned

parched, half-crazed, i ran

toward it, the whispers still

inviting me with promises

of rest, sustenance and

pleasures undreamed of.

arriving, i ran through the

needle's eye, ecstatic.

i jumped into the fountain

was surrounded by beauties

that served me with fresh

viands and sated my desires.

for forty days i remained thus,

until my lord took pity upon me

and unveiled the truth of this vista.

i lay covered in my own filth

in a puddle fouled by

carrion seeking animals who ventured

to that spot. a scraggly date palm

had given up its sour fruit that i had

taken for sweet meats and delicious ices.

for three days i wept in self pity, shame

and rage at myself, at my lord, at myself.

finally i slept, drained of tears, sweat, emotion.

in the morning, i woke to find myself clad in

clean, fresh garments with a water bag, dried fruit

and goat cheese to sustain me. i tasted and drank

sparingly, made prayers of repentance and gratitude,

and once again turned east, chastened,

but with renewed courage to reach that place

i knew as home.

nizami

holy saturday, 2007

__________

into the light of peace

waking on cold stone

in a cave where i sought refuge

from the winds and rains of the night

a fragrant smell, the sweet sound of bells,

a holy light surrounded me,

has the journey ended?

this seems unlikely, and yet

the same simple cotton on my skin,

the water bag and provisions lay next to me.

it might be a dream, of course. on the

long journey across the desert many dreams

had come bearing signs of the deeper peace

i sought.

a prayer to lord ganesha to remove

obstacles was whispered into my ear -

a prayer of thanks for bounty of body, heart

and soul that makes peace possible.

in a troubled dream, while i sat quietly, i heard

the words of he who taught the way to freedom

from suffering, "Now this triple world, all is my domain;

the living beings in it - all are my children.

but now this place abounds with illness and calamity,

and i alone am able to save and protect them."*

the three who attended the birth of a savior prayed

"may understanding obedience conquer ignorant disobedience.

may harmony triumph over discord,

and generosity of spirit over covetous avarice

and may respect replace derision!"**

as war threatened daily to destroy them

my jewish brethren prayed, "eternal god,

the guide of humanity, you have called

us to peace, for you are peace itself."

"let there be enlightenment and knowledge.

let there be acceptance and love.

let there be confidence and trust.

let there be freedom and justice.

let there be prosperity and health.

another vision had taken me far into the

future where war and strife threatened

once again to deliver all into evil and waste.

but one was seen by god as he prayed,

"o god, you are the peace. the everlasting

peace is from you and it returns to you.

o our sustainer, grant us the life of true peace,

and enter us into the abode of peace.'****

god heard the prayer and once again led

us from the darkness of ignorance through

the greatness and humility of the one who

spoke that prayer.

then in that cave where i had sought shelter

a great light blinded me and i beheld the

prince of peace, returning from a journey

into the darkness, as i had myself. "do you

not know me?" tears of joy filled my eyes

as i knelt and kissed the hem of the robe.

whatever ills befall us and lead us astray

or into ungrateful despair, those comforters

of the broken-hearted, supporting those in need

and befriending the lovers of truth,

they also shall come as promised

to hold aloft the light of truth amidst

the darkness of human ignorance.*****

Jai! Namo! Ashem! Adonai! Abwoun! Allah!.........

Peace, Bringers of Peace, and Keepers of Peace

Be Blessed in this Holy Season of Remembrance and Renewal!

nizami

Easter, 2007

with deep gratitude to kismet and all

beloved collaborators

Copyright by Nizam Rose

*from "Essential Teachings" of the Dalai Lama

**from "Textual Sources for the Study of Zoroastrianism"

***from the "Elements of the Qabalah"

**** from "The Universal Spirit of Islam"

***** from the Universal Worship Service of Sufi Inayat Khan

Biography

Nizam Monica Rose has been a child and family therapist, teacher, musician, lover, wife, step-mom, fighter for social justice and world peace. Her poetry springs from the heart and she hopes to write a screenplay soon. She is an aspirant on the Sufi path living in Gulf Breeze, FL.

Yossi Lopez-Hineynu

2010-10-29T15:46:00.004-04:00

Heart Will Free

The man sits there, on earth
at the gate, terra cotta skin
deep eyes half open, half closed
you'd swear he sleepeth

wrapped autumnal-coloured
blanket
sandals on feet
watching nothing, seeing all

he as old as the hills
young as morning dew
moves not, blinks barely
pine green knit cap covers his head

he comes from nowhere
going no place
yet Time stands still
in his presence

his lunar solemnity embraces
yet, not too close
as solarized passion seethes
from every pore

he raises earthen hand
not old not young, old
Wisdom beckoning
any who'd dare approach

stallionspeed winds
whip and tear
hurricainic sands cut
no light no dark just NOW

Disciple's skin lay silken ribbons
bones but dust, eyes naught
hair but dandelion puffs floating
only one thing left

heart parched, laid bare, open on the
dusty ground, macabre
four-chambered cacophony
deranged bagpipe

then heart wrapped
cloudine sheets
soaked honeywine milkiness
waterfall blessing

loveness notes sing
heart knowing Source
loose binding cords
of Should

true home Source
freedom stability
not salty doctrine
but heart will free

beating to Moment's
cadence Creation
knowing salvation blessing
to Self be true
__________

Love's Prayer Bliss

capture moment

you exist Christ

spirit soars eagleness

pentecostal exuberance

goldwhite essence shineth

flowing gentle breeze caress

saints high and low

praise

selves remain, transfiguring waltz

diamondine radiance

no sun moon

Lux Christi

Trinity's Persons

one deferring other, always loving

three yet

One God eternally Personal

royal blue embrace

fillest Divine

never same

Eden's blooms bursting

rough-and-tuble browngreen earth

Kingdom of fools and misfits

feet planted firmly

Cross too

highways byways

desert a city

emptyhollow

fill love's prayer's bliss

Biography

Yossi Lopez-Hineynu is an interspiritual hermit and poet living in Chicago. He plans to matriculate at Starr King School for the Ministry to pursue an M. Div. with the goal of being ordained and serving as a hospice chaplain. His root practices are Bikram yoga, labyrinth walking, meditation, and those from the Sufi tradition.

Valerie Kameroff

2010-10-29T15:40:00.003-04:00

Grandmother Poems

Standing

She is taking up her fire

bringing her Self

to dance in the glow

of her rhythm.

Rising to her feet

with magic in her hand

She quit asking.

She quit begging.

The moon has slanted.

The balance is here.

She is taking up her

Heaviness,

this new offering

to her Grandmothers

to her Children.

The Song is flowing rich now.

The Creator whispers.

We are all here

Now.

We are all here.

__________

Grandmother

Grandmother The Old One

she shuffles close beside me

speaking softly repeating secrets

of the Long Ago and of the Healing.

She sits in front

of my slouched body

peering into me

chanting The Ancient Song

Of Life.

Draped in brown cray paper skin

her hands tend the seal oil lamp

so that I may see

when I care to open my eyes.

Young and stubborn

I cling to struggle as a lover.

She touches my young hair

whispering Un guck gook.

All my life her deep voice

from Ages and Generations

The Old Woman Un guck gook

Medicine Woman.

She is patient

and waits

for my heart

to listen.

__________

How Grandmother Speaks

Something happened

then, I lost the place

I put it.

Something says Something

then leaves.

Some Words

Hang in the bowl

of my stomach

then disappear

only hinting

when they will

bring their sisters

so I can eat

and talk about

this Magic

so I can ask

What’s happening to me?

Of what has been taken

Of my mother?

Here I surround myself

with cigarettes, caffeine,

books, and excuses

for the rent.

This Magic

this Miracle

struggling for its

own survival

steals thoughts

begs for a moment

of my time.

I can not turn myself again

to the place

where the souls

of my feet

will gather

ashes

and

dust.

__________

Motherland

This is my Motherland.

This is the Womb.

She has cradled me

and all of my Ancestors.

She carries the basket

Full

of our memories

together.

I will stand

Here

in front of Everyone

and sing

loudly

my birth song

the one she sent

from the water.

I will stand

Here

in her wounds

from screeching steel

and cement

you have called gifts.

I will stand

and sing

My blood

Her blood.

__________

Myself – An Ancient Memory

On this ground

I have swayed

in silences

the trees

remembering my brown hands

pulsating drums.

I can hear them

in the far off distance

with my eyes closed

to the street lamps.

My vibrations

have taken shape

and solidified in my bones.

I am the miracle

my ancestors have concentrated

into being

a solid truth

listening.

__________

Lofty Expectations

gathered

myself

among the trees

today

cross-legged

holding

my Breath

listening

for their message.

“Nothing Urgent,”

they laughed.

just wanted

to see your

brown hair.

Biography:

Valerie Kameroff , a Yupik Eskimo woman from Alaska, had the freshest most radiant smile. Val studied for a time at Dartmouth, read at Stanford, and came back to Alaska where she performed her poems with the Wild Women’s Poetry Ensemble. Val died at the age of 28, a loss to us all. After she died her family came to my workplace and handed me an envelop with her hand written poems, “Do something with these.” Every few years I publish them on the web. Val’s voice is strong and tender and needed. On the second anniversary of her death she came to me in a dream and said, “Now I know that everything is made of nothing but love -remember this.” I leave you with these words. Remember them. – Barbara Flaherty

Richard Cambridge

2010-10-29T15:14:00.046-04:00

Returning

There are scars on my soul:

ghosts of ghosts of longing

left their mark when they left,

starved for longing.

My stomach flips

to my throat.

I've been away

for a long time.

Yellowbird did you follow me

to see I arrived safely?

Your song is a thorn

of longing.

Are you God's messenger,

a witness to me?

A promise of return?

Your song winds my heart,

a vine of longing.

Beloved Bird, golden, black-winged—

part sun, part night—

Your song is a vine of longing!

____________

If I Could

die right now

it would be

after my own hands

had just squeezed

the oranges

and before my lips

could sip

the fresh coffee

___________

Canticle for Breakfast

The table is round. The plate, the glass, the cup

I place upon it are round. The juice in the glass

is orange like the sun on a good day; the coffee

creamed to brown. The pancake on the plate is round

and its skin is the color of all the races, from the lighter

tones, through the coppers, to the deepest browns.

The plate, the glass, the cup from earth were drawn

and shaped by hand and fired into form.

Beloved One who formed the fiery sun,

the earth from space appears your Loving Eye.

This earth each day you warm and clothe with light.

At night you wrap us in a shawl of stars.

___________

Ten Flowers

This morning I picked ten flowers—

primroses, pale-yellow and gold—

for the cream pitcher-vase on the altar.

When I finished praying I said,

In Thy Name and by Thy Flowers, Amen.

I thought to correct it, but God said, No,

Let’s try flowers instead of power today.

What if, in the place of an angry fist

a bouquet of flowers broke upon a face?

Instead of a bloody lip, the question—

Who have you been kissing this morning?

What a day could follow from a question like that!

Why get out of bed, or leave the altar?

Do Nothing! Proclaim it Holy!

Let the generals do the fighting!

A child’s hand will overturn their chessboard.

The scent of primroses is early morning spring rain.

__________

As I was about to pray

I heard a bird chirping

outside my window.

What are my prayers

to this beautiful sound?

So I folded my prayers

in the song of the bird,

in the wings of the song

rising to God.

__________

Offering

Today I wear red—

for blood— for the Tribe

and all my relations.

The sun is shining in my face

as I look out to the blue-gray sea.

Cigarette between two fingers

burns down to the filter—

incense of a sort:

tobacco from my Mother.

I break it off as a sister taught me:

feel the burn— a light penance.

“If you must smoke,” she said to me once,

“then break it off at the end and scatter

the last bits of tobacco on the earth.

But Mother— she doesn’t like the filters.”

I was going on about offering,

my blood, wearing red for the tribe,

the sun and the blue-gray sea,

and this feeling I have of being alone

but being connected to all living beings

that are rooted, that walk and swim and fly

over this thin crust of earth we call our home.

If there are holy places,

surely this island is one of them.

With its cleansing wind, wildflowers,

silent moors of scrub, and the gulls

calling to the salt in my blood,

this body I dwell in

becomes a temple filled with prayer.

Heart kindles, burns.

Words escape my lips.

Incense circles upward—

Offering.

__________

Last Thoughts, Nantucket '94

The last thing I did before leaving

was squeeze three oranges.

The mouth of the juicer was misaligned

so the first drops missed the glass,

spilling on the counter.

I got upset but God said, Leave it,

that's My Portion, so I let it be,

a pool of orange spreading around

the glass. When I finished, the juice

filled right to the brim and God said, See—

it would have spilled anyway,

but being who I AM, well, you know,

first fruits. I went outside and

raised the glass to the sun and gave thanks,

orange to orange, for the gift of God

and thought how it got to where it was—

squeezed in a glass in my hand; the grove

where it was grown; the farmer,

and all the machinations of commerce

to get them to the store where I bought them;

the machine I used to squeeze the fruit

rather than just by hand (though I used

my hands) and gave thanks to myself

as I did to God, and to the ones

who gave so I could receive, and said,

This is good, all good, and drained the glass.

__________

The Gift

is being here in the space

of all there is.

The bedspread is green,

covered with flowers

or birds,

I cannot tell.

My heart is not empty

and needs to be.

I withhold substance

for space to grow

and sweetness

to sharpen the longing.

The bed is almost un-made;

the corner turned down for you.

All poems Copyright by Richard Cambridge

Biography

Richard Cambridge’s poetry has appeared in The Paterson Literary Review, Nantucket Journal, Asheville Poetry Review, and other publications. He was a member of the Boston Championship Slam Team in 1992, and won the Masters Slam at the National Poetry Slam in 1997. He is recipient of numerous awards including The Allen Ginsberg Poetry Prize, a finalist for a residency at the Fine Arts Work Shop in Provincetownde-force” by the Boston Globe, with featured runs at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston Playwrights Theater, and Little Flags Theater. He is a long-time resident of Cambridge, MA where he curates the Poets’ Theater at the legendary Club Passim. In 2003 he received the Cambridge Peace and Justice Award for the contributions of his art and activism. In 2004 his book of poems, “PULSA— A Book of Books” was published by Hanover Press. In 2005 he was appointed a Fellow at the Black Earth Institute, a progressive think tank based in Wisconsin. He has just finished RIDE, a hitchhiking memoir. An excerpt recently won Honorable Mention for Short Fiction in the New Millennium Writings Contest.

“On This Island of My Longing” is a manuscript of selected poems written on and about Nantucket where he has spent early summer since 1981.

Patricia Monaghan

2010-10-29T13:28:00.022-04:00

Getting To Black Earth

Start with ocean. A shallow sea, populous

with plankton, and giant fish that feed on it.

Let storms and sunlight flash across the sea.

As bodies die, let them drift down to mud.

Then let there be light. And fire. And heaving:

rock on rock. Let the sea sink. Let it

Pour away into other, younger seas.

Let the land rest, damp, exhausted, rich.

Now, let ice appear from north and east

and west. Let it move south to form an isle

of green in a sea of snow. Let this happen over

and over and over for half a million years.

Let low pink granite hills hold back the ice.

Let lakes appear beyond, inland seas

with coastlines of blue snow. Let eagles float

above the blue and icy waves, fishing.

Now, catastrophe: Let water break

through ice, drowning sleeping bears still

in their caves, and wolves, and fleeing deer, and mice.

Let a great pathway open on the land

marking the pathway of the flood. Let creeks

and rivers deepen crevices in rock,

and gullies form and soften under wind.

Let oaks take root, and shagbark hickory,

and elderberry, yarrow, bee balm, clover,

big and little bluestem, rattlesnake master,

downy gentian, boneset, dogbane, ragweed,

and thickets of sumac, blackberry, blackcap, rose.

Let black soil deepen over limestone seabed

except where it erupts on crowns of hills.

Then let people come, not long ago.

Start with ocean. End with Black Earth.

__________

Celebration of the Ordinary

“Rule,” it means: “the order

of things.” From Latin ordo,

“a row or rank,” from

an even older syllable

meaning “to assemble

skillfully.” Ordinary:

sustaining tasks, how we

move through the day,

turning now and again in

comfortable familiarity, in

familiar comfort, to hold

each other’s gaze. And

especially: the way of nature,

not just a garden’s straight

rows but the winding paths

that deer cut on the prairie,

not only the season’s patterns

but a week’s changing weather.

“Ordinary” does not mean

predictable, unwavering,

routine, for there is order

seeded into chaos, whose

gorgeous twining patterns

are too huge to discern

from this garden on this day

when we plant ordinary

seeds in ordinary soil,

row upon row upon row,

while across the valley

deer skillfully assemble

networks of pathways

connecting the apple trees.

__________

Planting the Vines

An act of faith:

that thin brown sticks

will soften and bud;

bring forth new leaves;

climb to the trellis

and flower and bear;

to plant, we kneel

in black earth.

__________

Confiteor: A Country Song

Evening. Red sky. Standing at the door

I sense a shadow presence here:

the one who loved this land before.

These harmless hills bear scars of war.

Someone stood here, full of fear.

This is not a metaphor.

Above me, turkey vultures soar;

below the garden, seven deer.

Someone loved this land before,

loved it as I do, maybe more.

She did not simply disappear

and she is not a metaphor:

This was some woman’s home before

pale soldiers came to clear

a land that someone loved before.

What to do with facts like this? Ignore

them? Hope they disappear?

Someone loved this land before.

None of this is metaphor.

from The Grace of Ancient Land, forthcoming chapbook from the Voices from the American Land series.

All Poems copyright by Patricia Monaghan

Biography

Patricia Monghan is a full professor at the School for New Learning at DePaul University, where she teaches classes in arts and environmental sciences. Patricia is interested in the intersection of folklore and science and continues to study ways in which artists dialogue with science. She has published on the French poet Rimbaud's objection to Descartes' division of mind and matter. She is a founding member of the Black Earth Institute,"a progressive think-tank dedicated to re-forging the links between art and spirit, earth and society." Patricia's four books of poetry include Winterburning, Seasons of the Witch (winner of the Friends of Literature Award for poetry and the COVR award for best multimedia work), Dancing with Chaos and Homefront. The Grace of Ancient Land uses the framework of the traditional Mass to express the power of rural life in America's heartland. Patricia recently republished a two volume set as The Encyclopedia of Goddesses and Heroines. She has edited a three-volume collection of essays entitled Goddesses in World Culture, to be published in late 2010 by Praeger. She is the author of The Red-Haired Girl from the Bog: The Landscape of Celtic Myth and Spirit, a travelogue of Irish heritage sites and their relation to goddess figures. Her other books on this subject are The Goddess Path and The Goddess Companion.

A longtime member of the Society of Friends (Quakers), Patricia is also a companion of the Fourth Order.

Jim Bean II

2010-10-29T12:02:00.004-04:00

The Story of the Flags

Flags were raised just half the way.

The bands played soldiers songs to show our pride.

For all who died to keep their country STRONG…

Then, 25 years of history would pass and the children

who grew up during World War I went off

to fight in World War II. All over the earth. And again…

Flags were raised just half the way.

Bombs fell like thunder storms.

We passed the graves,

Saw children pray,

That daddy wasn’t one.

Five years of history passes, and conflict called Korea occurs. But again…Flags

Were raised just half way.

This time new jets were sent to kill the Reds,

And show the rest that they were somehow safe.

The next conflict would be the longest yet…

And some would claim we passed the flag,

And closed the door when Vietnam grew strong.

The ones who fought and made it back,

Had lost their only home.

After 19 years of history, Saddam Hussein sent an army of pain to peaceful place

Called Kuwait.

Minds of fear…Many tears…

Cross the sea to set them free!

Battleships, folly dresses.

Yellow ribbons, some regrets,

Letters stained from far away.

Desert Storm, have you gone away?

Conclusion: keeping in mind the less than 300 years of peace throughout the 6,000

Years, I ponder the next possible war, and start with a question.

Flags were raised just half the way?

The biggest bombs now sit in place.

Who knows the day when they will say,

Was there a flag that won?

Copyright by James Bean II

Biography

Jim Bean is a poet from Boston, a lover of the Red Sox, Fenway Park, and the road. I met Jim by the side of a New Mexican road. He was sitting with a sign that said "Poetry for Sale." I pulled over immediately. Jim and I talked for a time about poetry, Boston, the Red Sox and War. He is a Vietnam veteran, one of the those who have spent years wandering and making his way. He sold poems for a dollar by the sheet of paper. I bought this one, and asked if he would let me publish it. It was a handshake deal. - Barbara Flaherty

Louis Alemayehu

2010-10-29T11:40:00.008-04:00

Akhenaten’s Dream: SunRise!

Beyond your flesh
Beyond your room
your house
your piece of ground,
your town.
Beyond your state, region or country,
Beyond your continent or island,
Beyond the 3rd Stone from the Sun – our sweet Mother Earth,
Beyond your mother, father, family, nation, race, class and gender
Beyond all that…

Yeah, beyond capitalism, socialism, racism, class-ism, nationalism,
and the FASCISM that loves all our ISMS of what ever flavor,
Yeah, beyond Jesus, Jonah, Buddha, Mohamed, Musa, Joseph Smith,
and all the Devine Mothers cradling us,
cradling us all, all,
Beyond our hunger for oil, gas, coal, uranium and wood
burning, burning, burning,
daily choking
the life from the precious air we breath
and all that breathes us,
Beyond roach dust,
mercury and lead choking the life from the lungs, brains and nervous tissue of our babies,
Beyond our tears of joy or rage
Beyond all our graves!
Beyond
Politics,
Sociology,
Spirituality,
Our humanity or the latest theory -
Which we now think explains it all,
Beyond all we believe is either grief or joy
Who really knows distances in this vastness called Universe?
Who really knows the cost of our comfort?
Of all the petty energy consuming stuff we think we have a right to:
“Central heating
Air conditioning,
Cars,
Airplanes
Electric lights
Inexpensive clothing,
Recorded music, movies, hip replacement surgery and
Your national defense!”
If you love your Country more than the Earth that cradles her,
If you keep burning the fuel of fossils,
You are dumping in your living rooms
You are torching your rafters
Feeding your babies a formula full of arsenic, mercury and lead.

Wake up and live now
In Sunflower Splendor!
Open Morning Glory!
Wake up for the first time and LIVE!

What you have a right to is the Natural World.
What you have a right to is your movement through Seasons.
Embodied or not, as everything turns, turns, turns…
We are dancing inside Nearness
Dancing in the Sacred Web of Life made of
Mud and starlight
Semen and seasons
Novas and notions
Stardust and the chorus of all singing planets known and un.
(What? There’s a new one now???)
Anthills’ industrious grit and constellations spilling
‘cross the unnamed expanses of sweet home AllWhere,

Ultimately, who we are is not the bag of skin we are in.
Our energy spreads throughout all that is Creation:
Tendrils woven and weaving through all Mother-matter, touching.
We are touching all things all the time in Unity,
whether we know it or not.
We are flying-spinning through Space,
All the time timelessly, endlessly, eternally, infinity!
What a trip! Feel it!

And now I press my palm against your heart-breast,
I speak softly to you, as you see it and feel it now too:
I see you now with the eyes of my heart,
No enemy, no other…
Transformed, revealed, awakened and naked,
Crying for a Vision now quaking,
Beyond this global war zone of our own making,
The stuff of conflict, greed, arrogance & fear,
Will this be the inheritance of our babies’ babies’ babies?
Will our babies have babies?
Will they survive?
Will they want to?

Touch me brother with kinds hands,
Embrace me sister with hope-heart (we are safe in this wisdom).
Death has no dominion over Life,
Death is a twin to Life - a ying/yang unity of unending Life
In all its forms and possibility.
Touch beyond all boundaries and identities fearlessly,
Let us all Touch the Earth with naked feet
And be glad!

For the Earth to live America must die…
Yeah I said it!
For the Earth to live America must die!
For the Earth to live ALL nations must die.
For the Earth to live Germany
Spain
England
Egypt
Azania
China and Guatemala and all their sisters,
All must die, must be transformed.

The Snow will make us friends.
The Rain will make us family.
The Sun will melt all hearts,
All Gods chillin gonna have rhythm now.
The Wind will teach us a New Song that everyone can sing,
ROBUSTLY! Rooted in a Deep Democracy beyond what we know now.

*Listen!
My friends are committing suicide now…
To me it says something about how toxic our environment has become.
They don’t want to be here anymore.
It’s become physically, spiritually - toxic!
To me it begs the question of,
How do we recognize what is Sacred in our lives and be centered in that?
How do we recognize the green sprouts coming through the concrete and treasure that?
How do we recognize where the renewal is emerging and become one with that?
How do we “Walk the Way of the New World”?

Wherever we are going, We must all go together or not go at all!

There are spaces in the Heart as vast as the Universe,
And who knows distances in this vastness…?
I see you now. I see you now. I see you now…
So touch me now with kind hands
In this mornings’ glory!
Transformed, revealed, awakened, naked
With kind hands, hand in hand in hand…
Gripping! I got you now! I got you now!
Stepping gently on this Holy Earth
Striding toward…
SunRise!

Copyright by Louis Alemayehu

Biography
Louis Alemayehu is a writer, educator, administrator, poet, father, grandfather, performer and activist of African and Native American heritage. Louis is a cofounder of the Native Arts Circle, the oldest Native American artists organization in the Upper Midwest. In 2000, Alemayehu's poem, Thrones, was cast in bronze and installed within the Phillips Urban Gateway, an inner city public art installation in Minneapolis. Along with composer/musicians Carei Thomas and David Wright, he was a founding member (1981) of the poetry/jazz ensemble, Ancestor Energy. Both the Loft and IntermediaInterMedia Arts. In 1993 he was awarded a LIN (Leadership in Neighborhoods) Grant from Saint Paul Companies as a community based artist. In 2003 the Headwaters Foundation gave Louis an award for life-long commitment to social justice. Currently, Alemayehu’s work focuses on teaching, writing, performance, mentorship, community organizing, charter schools and organizational development. Samples of his Ancestor Energy CD, AllWhere, can be heard online at cdbaby.com. Today, Louis works deeply across multiple cultural communities with Ce Tempoxcalli for Chicano arts and education; with AfroEco for food security; with Environmental Justice Advocates of Minnesota for green economic development; with Multicultural Indigenous Academy for intercultural education; with the Women’s Environmental Institute on health disparities and Finote Tibeb for Ethiopian cultural arts and language preservation. In 2009 the Minnesota Spoken Word Association recognized Louis for his 30 years of excellence and innovation in performing spoken word in the Upper Midwest.

CD Ancerstor Energy: Allwhere

Coleman Barks

2010-10-29T11:36:00.009-04:00

(Editor's Note: In the following poem we hear again the spirit of the Troubadour on the borders of heart, soul, and nation state. The poem predates the attack on Iraq, but its message is timeless. Barks read this poem at the Washington National Cathedral in hope that it may inspire the rest of us to envision our common future with such vitality and creativity. The poem is included in his book, Scrapwood Man. )
______________________________________________________________________________________________

Just This Once

President Bush, before you order air strikes,

imagine the first cruise

missile as a direct hit on your closest friend.

That might be Laura. Then twenty-five other

family and friends.

There are no survivors. Now imagine

some other way to do it. Quadruple

the inspectors. Put

a thousand and one U.N. people in. Then

call for peace activists to volunteer to go

to Iraq for two weeks

each. Flood that country with well-meaning

tourists, people curious about the land that

produced the great saints,

Gilani, Hallaj, and Rabia. Set up hostels

near those tombs. Encourage peace people

to spend a bunch of money

in shops, to bring rugs home and samovars

by the bushel. Send an Arabic translator

with every four peace

activists. The U.S. government will pay for

the translators and for building and staffing

the hostels, one hostel

for every twenty activists and five translators.

The hostels are state of the art, and they belong

to the Iraqis at the end

of this experiment. Jimmy Carter, Nelson Mandela,

and my friend, Jonathan Granoff at the U.N.,

will be the core organization

team. No one knows what might come of this.

Maybe nothing, or maybe it would convince some

Iraqis and some of the world

that we really do not wish to kill anybody,

and that we truly are not out to appropriate oil

reserves. We're working

on building a hydrogen vehicle as fast as we can,

aren't we? Put no limit on the number of activists

from all over that might

want to hang out and explore Iraq for two weeks.

Is anything left of Babylon? There could be informal

courses for college credit

and pickup soccer games every evening at five.

Long leisurely suppers. The U.S. government furnishes

air transportation, that is,

hires airliners from the country of origin and back

for each peace tourist, who must carry and spend the

equivalent of $1001 US

inside Iraq. Keep part of the invasion force nearby

as police, but let those who claim to deeply detest

war try something else

just this once, for one year. Call our bluff.

If this madman Saddam's WMD threat is not, somehow,

eliminated by next February,

you can go in with special ops and do it that way.

Medical services, transportation inside Iraq, along

with many other ideas that

will be thought of later during the course of this

innocently, blatantly foolish project will all

also be funded by the U.S.

government. There's a practice known as sama,

a deep listening to poetry and music, with sometimes

movement involved. We

could experiment with whole nights of that,

staying up until dawn, sleeping in tents during

the day. Good musicians

will be lured, with modest fees, to come: cellos,

banjos, oboes, ouds, and French horns. Hundreds

of harmonicae and the entire

University of North Carolina undergraduate

gospel choir. Thus instead of war there's much

relaxed, improvisational

festivity from March 2003 through February

2004. It could be as though war had already

happened, as it has.

And now we're in the giddy, broken open

after time. So let slip the pastel minivans

of peace and whoa be

they who cry surcease! I'll be first

to volunteer for two weeks of wandering winter

desert reading Hallaj,

Abdul Qadir Gilani, dear Rabia, and Scherazade's

life-prolonging thousand and one Arabian Nights.

I am Coleman Barks,

retired English Professor emeritus living

in Athens, Georgia, and I don't really consider

this proposal foolish.

Copyright by Coleman Barks

Biography

Coleman Barks is a gourd growing Southern boy who occasionally talks with Emily Dickenson over a bourbon in the late sweltering heat of a Georgia night. He is the author of several books of poetry including Winter Sky, Scrapwood Man, Tentmaking, and Gourd Seed. He is well known for his prolific translations of such mystical poets as Rumi, Lalli, and the Sixth Dalai Lama.

Barbara Flaherty

2010-10-29T11:30:00.023-04:00

The Opportunity of Interesting Times

The old curse, “May you live in interesting times,” has been running through my head in the wake of the Qur’an burning pastor and the chaotic dance we are all doing right now. Extremists seem present in all arenas forsaking all reason, all discretion, all true communication and the hard work of justice and peace making. Demagogues are on all sides using rhetoric and media to inflame our emotions, gain power and turn us into a mob for their own benefit. Name calling is popular, and all in the name of God. God’s name is everywhere used to justify all sorts of violent and inflammatory behaviors that are contrary to the tenets of most faiths.

In the United States we have people playing our very real grief as if it were a toy instrument in the composition their own music. Most of us are still in shock and traumatized by the events of 9/11. Old feelings are brought forward and people are swallowed in them as if a great beast had come and taken us away from ourselves. Traumatized people don’t think clearly, they react. Demagogues know this.

We must have mercy on our own condition. We must recognize it, see it , understand and care for it with consciousness. What is at stake in the United States is our own values, our own constitution, not somebody else’s but ours. What is at stake is our very real safety, and the safety of the world.

The Effects of Post Trauma on Community and Nations

I write this as an American who loves her country very much, and right now I am thinking with the mind of my former profession - counselor for both individuals and communities who have suffered trauma. Post trauma symptoms are interesting in that they are a set of full bodied responses which are most often triggered by stress and/or sensory stimuli. The person suffering from post trauma defaults into the actual emotion/physical/perceptual state of the trauma often accompanied by a sense of danger, anxiety, panic, and attendant reactions. As an example of a simple intense response - while facilitating a group, a helicopter flew low over the building. The patient next to me, a veteran, lunged at me, threw me on the floor and covered me with his body. There was no thought in this. He just responded in a knee jerk reaction to the perceived, though unreal, threat. The trauma had interfered with his ability to distinguish between reality and perceived reality. That’s a serious condition. We can be blind to what is actually there because the full trauma response is interfering with our judgment. To judge wrongly now, to not be able to actually see the lay of land, so to speak, is dangerous for us as a nation and for the world.

Unthinking Knee Jerk Reactions

Back to our Qur’an burning pastor, the appeal to higher values by many different church leaders and by the President of the United States did not dissuade him. Even when Gen. Petraeus suggested he was putting troops in harm’s way, when Secretary of State Clinton suggested he was putting the men and women in embassies in various countries in harms way, when church leaders suggested that he was putting Christians in other countries in danger, our pastor seemed not to have even considered that. Some might say it was no-brainer to figure that one out. When the President suggested that perhaps this pastor was doing the extremist criminals a recruitment favor he never had considered that.

As a minister this man knew the power of the symbolic act. Church people know about the strength of the symbolic. He knew he was provoking, but he was blinded to its actual consequences. He led grieving traumatized Americans filled with rage at the anniversary of 9/11 into that symbolic process; and those who followed apparently did not think their actions through either, even to the serious consequences to the men and women who protect them. This is a communal knee jerk reaction, a serious blindness, and its working can only bring grief to the world.

Hypervigilance

Some expressions of post trauma in the individual are modified daily thought processes or behaviors. When I taught at university, on the first day of class there would always be one to four men in the back of the room with their backs against the wall where they could see the door. I used to always joke with them by specifically welcoming the veterans at the back of the room. The always laughed. They saw their own condition, and because they saw their own condition they could manage it, and move on to new things and ways of being. In a sense as Americans we are all like those defensive veterans, keeping our backs to the wall and an eye on the door, watching and waiting for the next criminal gang who acts in the name of Islam. Could be our neighbor, or the guy building the mosque. We are watching and waiting. This has its proper place in a dangerous world with threatening people, but it can also blind us to who our friends really are, and we need friends.

Reenactment

Another response is the reenactment of trauma. Examples are the incested child who becomes a promiscuous adult reenacting the original trauma attempting to find some kind of good resolution, to make it stop, to make it be better; or the veteran thrill seeker who engages in activities that put life and limb at risk in order to keep the feeling of anxiety at bay, to make it stop, to get it over with. 9/11 was a shock and a trauma to our nation. The news broadcasted the pictures over and over again with the words of the extremist criminals replaying, “Islam will destroy you.” The word “Islam” became charged for Americans. How much of the reactivity we see in the United States that seems to have a provoking element to it such as the Qur’an burning pastor, how much of it is this need for release from the intensity of grief, trauma, fear and shock? To keep the feeling of anxiety at bay, make it stop, come to a good resolution where we “win” this time.

Today in the United States we see patterns of volatility, name calling, emotional reactivity that could be dangerous to our wellbeing. These post trauma responses are clearly present: the knee jerk defensive postures and unthinking actions; back against the wall watching the door for the enemy in the conditioned regular daily responses to the news of ongoing threats; the need to provoke to re-enact and make it come out differently, and finally the need to make the anxiety go away by eliminating the reminders of anxiety (Islamophobia). In other words, we allow ourselves to be in danger because we choose to react without discernment, not act with discernment.

There are always those who choose vengeance and fear as a path. But most adults understand the hard work involved in attaining peace. If we are ignorant of our own condition and do not manage it, do not pursue the road of discernment, become unable to distinguish friend from foe in the Islamic world, we put ourselves and our children, and the world itself in danger.

According to the dictionary a demagogue is “a leader who obtains power by means of impassioned appeals to the emotions and prejudices of the populace.” In other words they attempt to obtain power by cultivating the herd instinct and seeking to move people by emotions in the direction of their agenda. In our post trauma we are vulnerable to that type of thing. The voices of demagogues from all sides and the media itself play our very real grief, trauma, fear moving us to unthinking knee jerk reactions that may not be a benefit to us and our nation. It is imperative that we do not listen to them, that we acknowledge and care for our emotions and cultivate our independence of thought.

Demagoguery

How do we know the voice of a demagogue? There are basic criteria. Their civic conversation and speech

Targets your emotion, especially fear and cynicism;
Uses broad generalized sweeping statements to cultivate that emotion;
Lacks specific developed reasoned content, defaults to simplistic statements;
Appeals to specific values without reference to other values of equal importance;
Finger points, targets and blames the other (a specific group) with generalized name calling as if the individuals of that group are totally lacking in integrity; shared values, or insight.
Invites people to forsake their own reason, shared history or law to deal with this other group. (The end justifies the means.)

Don’t get me wrong here. I am not suggesting we naively ignore the very real and present danger of criminal extremists in our world today. We have to keep an eye on terrorists, a continuing eye. These are turbulent times. What I am saying is if we don’t address the rise in demagoguery we will not be able to do that effectively. Post trauma reactivity makes us vulnerable to this kind of thing. Our own self knowledge protects us from walking into that bear trap. We need our brains now. We need the American capacity of independent thinking and actual civic conversation. Perhaps we need to demand that of our leaders and refuse to put up with less.

America has a dual reputation in the world. We are loved because of our promise, our freedom, our values, our constitution and rule of law, our democracy. We are loved because we are willing to share. America is the largest giver of public and private charity in the world. A city of light set on a hill. But what casts a great light also casts a shadow. We are also the holder of much of the world wealth. We have backed tyrants and violent regimes. Put yourselves in the shoes of the citizens of those countries who suffered poverty, death, injustices of all kinds under those American backed dictators. The eye of suspicion is as understandable as the eyes of love we are given.

Terrorists are waiting for us to feed that suspicion by throwing out in our post traumatic response the first amendment rights of American Muslims. What a recruitment coup. Right now the eyes of the world are upon us, not to see if we bend to their will, but to see if we are ultimately trustworthy by holding us accountable to our own highest values and law.

In my experience with community healing from trauma it took a community effort to develop a conscious awareness of their condition in order to manage that condition to move forward with strength and wisdom. What it took was an immersion not only in the grief, can’t stay there forever, but in their strengths, to be bathed in the highest and most noble values that the community possessed. Any individual process that was lasting occurred within that container. And that is why at this point in history we Americans as a people must remember who we are. We need to bath each other in the nobility of our constitution, the resiliency of our character, the American capability to act fluidly and with creativity in any circumstance.

The Muslim World

Many Muslim people of the world are living in war torn violent places. No one can deny that we are implicated in that violence. But the very criminals that blew up the Twin Towers are also blowing up mosques, shines, sacred sites of those Muslims. In many areas people can’t go to a wedding or a funeral, or weekly worship without fear. You can’t go to the market. Death, grief, loss, fear are everywhere. A quick non comprehensive web search of these attacks (in places outside of the obviously violent Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine) reveals over 400 people killed in terrorist attacks in the last few months in sacred and historically significant shrines, mosques, and places of public congregation.

Dr. Shams Hamid in his article of Oct 7, 2010 in the Pakistani English language journal, newkerala.com regarding the recent attack on the Abdullah Shah Ghazi shrine in Pakistan wrote,

“Al-Qaida follows the rigid, literalist and violent teachings of Wahabism that is the state religion of the royal kingdom of Saudi Arabia….. There are 1.57 billion Muslims in the world with 10-13 percent Shia, and the rest are Sunni Muslims. The Sunni Muslims are further divided into around 40 percent Hanfi, around 30 percent Shafii, around 15 percent Maliki and around 5 percent Hanbali. Wahabis are less than 2 percent and they consider the 98 percent Muslims to be unbelievers. …Islam never condoned attacking innocent people. Even in wars against non- Muslims, Muslims are not supposed to kill women, children and old people…they (suicide bombers) should not expect heaven in return for their heinous violent acts.”

For these people what is at stake is the Muslim religion, its values, and the values of each country’s way of life. Criminals who wish to be known as Jihadists target everyone, especially Muslims, mosques and shrines. They want to be called Jihadists because it makes them appear noble and “pure”. They want Westerners to call them “Islamic” because it sets the stage they need, and is a fine recruiting tool among the young and disenfranchised. Discernment begins with this realization that the war on terrorism is with criminal elements of fundamentalist extremists, not with Islam. Islam itself is our first defense against these extremists.

Islamophobia

Muslims have been in the fabric of American society since the 1700’s. Muslims fought in the civil war, and have defended the United States in all the successive wars. Muslim Americans were instrumental in the successful prosecution of the first attack on the World Trade Center. Without the men and woman of Islam who seek justice and do not abide criminality our country is at risk. We have seen it before where the presence of good steadfast people eventually defeated the elements of criminality.

Newer immigrants today are undergoing the typical rites of passage of new immigrant populations to the United States with the added stress of stereotypical identification with terrorists. Perhaps Irish Catholic Americans who repudiate the IRA for the violence and deaths it has caused innocent people understand what its like to have a renegade element hijack your faith and patriotism for their own advantage. Islamophobia thrives on stereotypes of extremist criminality. Perhaps Italian Americans, who had to endure this kind of a stereotyping because of the Mafia understand what's happening here. Most of us have know the sting and bite of intolerance and prejudice from the good old white boys to the people of many faith, colors and cultures. We know it does not work; does not promote wellbeing of anyone in the final say.

In America Islamophobia plays right into the hands of criminal extremists. It isolates the young and most vulnerable and sets them up for the freelance internet criminal terrorist operatives to do their work. American Muslims are working hard to protect the young from this kind of dual victimization, on one hand prejudice and lack of acceptance at home in America, and on the other, the internet recruitment tactics of unscrupulous anti-American terrorists that would have these children blow themselves to dust in the name of their own violent agendas. For an example of one form of American Muslim intervention in this particular situation check out this very short video made to counteract terrorist recruitment of youth in the US.

To view more videos, read articles, or examine some American Muslim work plans to counteract terrorism check out for yourself the website of the Islamic Society of North America.

American Muslims are uniquely prepared through their knowledge of the religion and cultures of Islam to creatively bring their energies to the task of confronting terrorism at home and in the world community. Unfortunately their energies are having to refocus on defending themselves, their faith, families and communities from the prejudices of their fellow Americans as well. Islamophobia sabotages the very people we need to be supporting in their efforts.

If Americans allow the reactivity of post trauma to continue with broad based stereotypes, name calling, and hateful and threatening language we will isolate and disempower our friends, placing ourselves in greater jeopardy. Criminal terrorism is a real threat. Managing our fear and rage and acquiring knowledge is an important element in deciphering the chaotic events in the world today.

Discernment

Discernment is based on knowledge tempered with wisdom. There are books, films, and online journals that allow Westerners to begin that process of acquiring real knowledge.

For a broader engaging perspective on world Islam and Sufism, the mystical branch of Islam, go to the website of Sufi News and Sufism World Report. Sufis in America and all over the world are in the front lines of the work against terrorism. Perhaps that is why their shines are popular bombing sites for threatened terrorists. Interestingly Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf of the Park 51 Center (formerly Cordoba Center) is one such Sufi whom President George Bush asked to represent the United States abroad in discussions of tolerance and diversity. Recently State Department spokesman P. J. Crowley said of him:

"His work on tolerance and religious diversity is well-known and he brings a moderate perspective to foreign audiences on what it's like to be a practicing Muslim in the United States," He added that the department's public-diplomacy offices "have a long-term relationship” with Rauf - including during the past Bush administration.”

Imam Feisal has been maligned, quoted out of context, misconstrued in the politics of the fear and intolerance so visible today. Check out Imam Rauf for yourself. Read him in context. Make your own reasonable decision away from the name calling and fear mongering.

In The American Muslim Journal you will see many things addressed including the paradoxical struggle to defend American Muslims and American Islam from both terrorism and the pain and fear that is engendered by American Islamophobia. The headline as I write today is, “Firing Juan Williams Was Wrong, Despite His Offensive Comments,” a report on The Muslim Public Affairs Council to intercede on behalf of Juan Williams. The journal also contains much about Islamic culture, arts and poetry, and works of compassion for the poor and suffering. Its links page is extensive. Check it out - be a covert operator and see what Muslims are actually saying to one another, not what the news says Muslims are saying, but the real deal. Get to know your neighbor.

Part II

Fair warning: in this journal of spiritual conversation I am now writing as a person of faith. People of faith have the unique capacity to form these bonds of real knowledge, to forge deep friendship, to know the other through the grace of divine love, and the practice of that love. Hospitality toward the other is a gift older then written scripture itself. People of faith have the obligation through their scriptures to extend invitations of friendship and peace. One clear way is to invite interaction between communities, mutual works of service in the greater community. By working with one another to serve our neighbor and the poor– a divine mandate found in most religions and spiritual paths- we enter the territory of holy wisdom together. The territory of fear is a closed and self predicting prophesy. Faith allows us to put our trust not in humans but in the divine writ itself and be brought into God’s kingdom of mercy and compassion.

Once there was a time in western history when that kingdom flourished, when the three Abrahamic faiths flowered together. The great beauty, the golden age of Andalusia has been celebrated by those three faiths for centuries in poems, songs, books, and films. If you are a Jew, a Christian, a Muslim today you and your faith are still benefiting from what happened in that time. For a history of this period you might want to view PBS Cities of Lights. That Islamic Spain could hold this beauty for a century speaks well of Islam, just as its failure speaks of the seemingly endless history of human frailty. These flowerings in human history, those great moments, reveal our very real possibilities.

Andalusia is celebrated and remembered in the introduction to fourth order basic text, Doing It Another Way. “On the Iberian Peninsula of Spain Jewish, Muslim and Christian mysticism flowered together in Andalusia. The mystic text of Kabbalah, the Zohar, the Book of Splendor, was written. In this cross fertilization the seeds that flowered in John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila were planted.” Ibn Arabi, the Islamic saint, mystic and philosopher, wrote from his Andalusian roots,

Wonder

A garden among the flames,

My heart has become capable of every form:

a pasture for gazelles

a convent for Christian monks,
a temple for idols,

the pilgrim's Ka'ba,

the tables of the Tora,

the book of the Koran.
I follow the religion of Love,

whichever way his camels take.

That is my belief,

My faith.

Tarjuman al-Ashwaq, Muhyyeddin Ibn Arabi (1165-1240 CE)

Fear and intolerance are with us always, boring companions of the soul unlit by faith. But even for the best of us in turbulent times they can rise up to blind and overtake us. Turbulence also offers opportunity for the new, as yet unseen possibility of beauty to emerge. In such times we need a vision that carries us into God’s kingdom of mercy and compassion.

The mystic flowering of God’s grace that happened for a brief century in Andalusia was not a dream, an unattainable utopia of the imagination. Andalusia was a reality of grace, a living book of love and unity opened for us to read and remember, a reality which bore fruit for centuries in all three Abrahamic faiths. It is this memory that Cordoba Center’s name was to evoke. The community center is designed to accommodate spaces of worship for all three Abrahamic faiths. It is a pity that post traumatic fear and rising intolerance blinded America to the beauty of that name and its calling, a calling so closely associated with the American dream itself where people of many faiths thrive together learning from one another. But with the help of God it is not too late to open our eyes.

The entire interconnected interrelated world is lit with the light of God’s presence and unity. In times of chaos when we dance with God in the turbulence, possibilities arise for a new and unexpected flowering. We can choose to remain in fear and intolerance – it’s a familiar path leading to familiar results; or we can choose the path of the holy fools of God, love dogs catching the scent of the divine Master in the most difficult times.

Moses, Jesus, and Mohammad, all guide us to the worship of God and the care of one another. No one of the faiths that emerged from the life of these men will deny the truth of the words of Jesus when asked to sum up the law. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” These are both the preconditions and contents of the kingdom of God. Sure we can pull out all sorts of scriptures to defend our fear like the equivocating man who asked Jesus just who those neighbors are and are not. Jesus’ reply with the parable of the good Samaritan demolished the concept in God’s world of the outsider, the other. We are brothers and sisters of the same Source. The Hebrew Testament, the Christian Testament, the Qur’an won’t let us off the hook.

It’s risky business to confront our fear and intolerance of the other in a violent world with its capacity to betray. Criminal terrorists with their agendas of destruction exist. We have the right and the responsibility to defend ourselves. How we do that matters. Everyone has their share of violence today, both in the giving and receiving. No matter who you are its hard work to catch yourself in post traumatic reactivity, fear, anxiety, or rage. It’s uncomfortable to be the one to reach out in a world afire with Islamophobia, stereotyping fears, and voices of scoffing hatred.

We know little of Francis of Assisi’s eighteen months in Andalusia, a pilgrimage made on hard roads with bare feet. We know more about his journey crossing the lines to seek peace during the fifth crusade. No one thought he would survive. He endured their scoffing and dire predictions to follow the God given vision in his heart. The Muslim Sultan al-Malik al-Kamil surprisingly held back the predicted sword. Both men knew the virtue of dancing in the arms of Guidance.

When we have the courage to listen to the deepest guidance of our faiths a criteria for discernment and action actually emerges - a shocking radical simplicity at the core of divine unity. We are not asked to approach each other armed with creeds and agendas. We are instead led to a fierce embrace. God turns the worlds of our personal and collective egos with their fearful defenses upside down and inside out. He brings us into His kingdom.

People and communities of all faiths have a choice. It’s easy to turn aside from the other actively through reactive prejudice or passively by simply disappearing from the conversation. It’s risky business to step through the door into God’s Kingdom. You never know what is going to happen. It’s His crap shoot, not yours. Whatever you see in difficult times or good is His audacious love garden. What kind of love garden is this? It is the garden of the heart. There is an old saying attributed to God, "Neither my heavens nor my earth contain me, but the heart of my faithful believer contains me."

The kingdom of God is at hand – always here – always now – in this moment – in this time – in this age – in this epoch – in this vision – in this risky wild love that knows no bounds. Yes, we live in interesting times, and in this crazy sometimes scary world, God is always messing with us with that divine impulse to mercy, compassion and justice. Who knows what beautiful divine flowering can occur if we dare to listen to that Guidance.

Biography

Barbara Flaherty MA CDCII has a habit of falling in love with men from the 13th century who lead her into beautiful adventures in the here and now. Her passion for Francis of Assisi produced the book, Holy Madness. Her enduring love for Muireadhach Albanach Ó Dálaigh, the Irish/Scot medieval bard has got her into all sorts of trouble lately, and inspired the soon to be published Spelling The World. She is a former counselor for traumatized individuals and communities. Barbara is the founding companion of the Fourth Order of Francis and Clare, and the author of Doing It Another Way: The Basic Text of the Fourth Order.

[i] Fourth Order Basic Text Introduction

Flo Golod

2010-10-29T10:52:00.007-04:00

Practicing for Heaven

You’re an over-achiever. That’s your problem.

All I wanted was a little help, some support. But you have to analyze everything. You couldn’t just look a few things up for me or stop by when I needed to talk. No.

You had to know why I wanted the information. I had to make an appointment to see my own sister. So now I don’t need you anymore and you’re all grief stricken. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate what you said at the funeral. You’re good with words and I don’t think anyone else would have known what to do. But I wish that you’d listened to me when I told you something was wrong. I really was sick and I was worried that you’d get sick too. There are some real toxic influences out there and I was onto them. I knew stuff that I couldn’t really explain but you wouldn’t listen. You thought I was paranoid.

It’s not so bad out here. All that bullshit about heaven and hell makes people think they’ll end up floating in the clouds with little wings or burning up forever. The death lottery. You win or lose. But it’s not like that at all. We’re all kind of bumping up against each other in this brown fog. Molecule to molecule. Reminds me of being butt to butt at a rock concert but out here no one is hot or ugly or tall or thin. Just those molecules bumping around each other. You can feel the vibes though. Some bumps feel good, friendly. Others are hostile, really evil. You can tell they’re the particles of some real asshole. But you don’t do any reacting out here. You just bump around a little more and the asshole is gone and you’re bumping against something that feels pure and clean. I bet those sweet molecules belong to kids who died.

What I really like about it out here is that I’ve lost all sense of time and I’m not that upset about the things I was upset about. But I’m still mad at you. My molecules are probably mad molecules. I wonder how long I’ve been here. I feel like I’m new but then I don’t know because the molecules don’t seem to be old or young or big or little. I’m still concerned about what’s going on where you are. Not just you but the whole family. Hell, the whole town. I think everyone’s in danger.

___________

Having a crazy sister makes you question your own sense of reality. When Lulu first started acting really weird, it seemed more like a bad trip than a fundamental change in her personality. She was always on a tear about something. For years, she was obsessed with real estate. Convinced she could make a fortune if she could just buy the right place, fix it up and then sell it. But something always went wrong with the deal, and it was always somebody’s fault, the seller changed his mind and wanted more money, the bank screwed up or the inspector was on the take and wrote up false orders.

Another time she was going to be a model. Could have. Tall, built, gorgeous. But then the photographer messed up her pictures or the guy who interviewed her really wanted to shoot porn or you needed to be under 18 or you couldn’t get in the door. Or or or. But but but. There was always a reason Lulu couldn’t get through to the other side.

So when she started telling me that the neighbors were watching her and putting poison in the yard, I just rolled my eyes – it helped we were on the phone – and told her I doubted it and why did she think so.

“They hate me. The guy tried to put the make on me, and his wife knows it so they’re trying to get rid of me.”

“By poisoning your garden?”

“Well, for practice. I think they’re after Cody.”

“Cody? Why would they poison your dog?”

“To get at me. Without the dog, they could get in here. That or they just want me to move.”

“Hmmm. I hope you’re wrong.”

“You’re handling me. I hate it when you handle me.”

“I hate it when you get paranoid and talk like a lunatic.”

Sound of phone crashing in my ear.

So there were conversations like that for a few months and then I stopped calling because I didn’t want to hear it. I called a help line and inquired about assistance for those with delusions. The nice helper explained that the deluded had to seek help or else be so far gone that they posed a danger to themselves or those around them. Earlier suggestions to Lulu that she might need help had been met with scorn and curses. As Lulu’s birthday neared, I realized it had been three months since I’d talked to her. I called and left a message. Her machine message sounded cool and rational. Maybe it had just been an episode. But she didn’t call back. I called again two weeks later. Same deal. So, I dropped her a card and told her I was sorry if I was mean but that I was worried about her and would she let me know she was ok.

No answer.

A few months later a cousin we both like was coming into town. So I called and left Lulu a message again. I got a card addressed to Craig, care of me. Pretty carefully written:

“Geeze, I’ve never been blown off this formally. What’s going on with Lulu?”

“Craig, I’m worried about her. She was getting paranoid and I challenged her a few times and then she just disappeared. Wouldn’t return my calls, didn’t answer the apology note I sent her.”

“Have you called Mary Anne?”

“Are you kidding?”

“Well she is her mother.”

“She’s my mother too, remember?”

Craig shrugged an apology,

“Don’t be embarrassed. Mary Anne was, is and will always be a piece of work. I haven’t talked to her in years and Lulu only calls her when she’s broke or needs a place to park the dog while she moves.”

“Well, up to you. I suppose we could go over to Lulu’s place and knock.”

“Craig, I don’t want to drag you into this. Lulu has gotten so weird that I don’t think it would be a good idea to surprise her. I feel horrible about this but I’m going to leave Lulu alone for now.”

___________

Seven in the morning, a Sunday yet, and my phone starts ringing.

“Beanie, it’s Mary Anne.”

“Mary Anne, it’s seven on Sunday morning and no one calls me Beanie. It’s Betty, remember? Or Elizabeth. I stopped being Beanie 15 years ago.”

“I know Beanie but I’ve got a problem here. I keep calling Lulu and leaving messages and she won’t call me back.”

“Well she won’t call me either so we’re in the same boat.”

“I’ve got a dog in my boat. Lulu dumped Cody here a month ago because she was moving. I want this goddam dog out of here. He howls and the neighbors are getting fed up. You’ve got to find Lulu for me.”

“Mary Anne, I don’t got to do anything for you but I’ll try to find her because I’m worried.”

“If she doesn’t show up in a week, I’m going to take that dog to the pound.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll find her.”

So I call and leave a message that Cody’s fate is on the line. No answer. I write a note because I’m still squeamish about just showing up on her doorstep. “Lulu, Mary Anne is going to kill your dog for you. Call her. If you don’t call her by the end of the week I’m going to call the police and report you missing.”

“Beanie, she called me up and cursed me up and down and said I should have just called you about the dog.”

“What about the dog?”

“She said you’d take the dog.”

“Mary Anne, that doesn’t make any sense.”

“I don’t care, that’s what she said. You taking Cody or does he go to the pound?”

So I have a dog.

_________

I’m getting the hang of this existence. New molecules turn up and we just hang out here in the fog. I think I told you the fog was brown, dense. Well it’s not so brown any more, kind of a nice smoky grey and the molecules are still bumping around but there’s more space between bumps.

Also, and this is really great, there aren’t as many bad bumps, or bumps into bad matter. No one really explains anything out here but you gradually absorb your new reality. Whatever I was or am now gets diluted as time goes by. Whoever I was, I’m fragments of her in the grey fog and, it’s hard to explain really, I’m drifting further away. From you, from myself.

And I’m not really mad anymore. I wish that you had tried to understand what I was telling you, because it was important. But I didn’t have credentials and you thought I was crazy. That hurt. But you took care of Cody.

Cody’s out here too. It’s not like I recognize his molecules, his particular matter. I just have this sense that I’ve been bumping into him sometimes. You can feel a little magnetic pull to other molecules sometimes. It doesn’t last but it’s kind of exciting for a moment. Whatever a moment is. I haven’t figured out the time thing but what is really cool is that it doesn’t matter

____________

Sometimes I could kick myself for being such a bitch. Other times, I want to wring her neck. Lulu’s toxins poison me too.

Someone beeped in on the other line while I was setting up an interview. I’d been trying to get this guy to talk to me for weeks and finally, we’re on the line, we’ve got our calendars and, beep, “Betty, this is Lulu.”

“Lulu, I’m on the other line and it’s important. Can I call you right back?”

“No, I’m at a pay phone. I’ve got to talk to you, now.”

“OK, let me tell the guy and I’ll be right back.”

Beep. “Say, I’m really sorry but a relative is calling from a pay phone and needs my help pronto. Can I call you back?”

He sounds irritated but says yeah and I am fairly certain that I will never get this interview.

“OK Lulu. This better be good because you just lost me a gig.”

“Hey, I’m in some serious trouble here. You have to come and get me.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“Well, the poison is really in me now. I don’t think I’m going to last long.”

“What poison? The neighbors, again?”

“No. There’s this woman who said she could help me. She said she could use herbs and help me detoxify but she was a liar. She put poison in the antidote.”

“How do you know? Did you go to a doctor?”

“No, the doctors do it too. They just give you poison and tell you to go home to rest. Come and get me and I’ll explain it.”

“Lulu, where the hell are you?”

“I’m in Harry’s Bar in Ely.”

“Lulu, why are you in Ely?”

“Please don’t give me the third degree now. I only have a couple quarters left and this is the only phone in this town. Up here they all use cells.”

“You want me to drive 250 miles and find a bar in a town I hardly know? Give me a break. Why are you there?”

“I told you. The healer who is just a fraud, she poisoned me. She lives out here in a cabin.”

“How did you get there?”

“I took a bus and she picked me up in town and I stayed with her until I figured out she was killing me so I left and hitched a ride into town. You’ve got to get me. I think the guy who gave me a lift is following me.”

“Lulu, if I left now I wouldn’t get there until after dark. Do you have money to stay in a motel and take the bus back? Just get to Duluth and I’ll come and pick you up there.”

“I can’t stay up here. It’s a small town and they all know about me. They want the poison to work so I’ll die and I won’t be able to tell anyone what happened.”

“What happened?” I could have kicked myself for asking.

“I’ll tell you about it when you get here. I can wait at the bar, in the ladies room until you get here.”

“Lulu, it’ll take me at least five hours from Minneapolis and you can’t wait in the ladies room that whole time.”

“I can manage. Just get here.”

“I can’t believe you’re ordering me around. You haven’t returned a call for over three years and I’ve got the dog you dumped on me without asking. Are you crazy?”

“For Christ’s sake, you’re my sister. I need you.”

“Lulu. I am not driving to Ely. Go stay in a motel and I’ll come up there tomorrow.”

“No, you’ve got to come tonight. I’m not going to make it and I have to explain to you what happened.”

__________

Well, I know you still don’t believe it but I was right. I was poisoned. There’s no cancer in the family. It’s environmental. I read a lot and tried to tell you about it, but you just blew me off. Your paranoid nut sister. Half sister. Helps explain the difference between us. Ms. Well-Informed with your very well-informed father. My father, Mr. Who Knows. One picture of this good-looking dude and a few postcards. My paternal legacy.

So Mary Anne, our common denominator. She’s a nutcase too, a mean one. Whatever my frailties, I was never mean. Everyone is a bitch once in awhile but I didn’t sit around and think about how to make everyone else miserable. On that we always agreed. Mary Anne worked at being a bitch. It was her art form.

And I know you think when I stopped talking to you that I was being mean. But that wasn’t it at all. I was protecting myself. They were trying to poison me and I knew they’d use you. You’ve got that social worker streak and it would have been real easy for one of my neighbors, or some doctor, to convince you that I needed help and then you’d help them poison me, thinking it was medication and you were curing me.

_________

So, I drive to Ely on a Wednesday night. Cody in the back seat. I could have left him with someone but I had a feeling. I thought I might need him. It’s a long drive to Ely from Minneapolis, and the roads get quiet and dark once you’re up north. Driving along through endless tunnels of tall pines, I chided myself for never getting up there for a camping trip, to enjoy the beauty of the thick dark woods. But the thick dark woods when you’re all alone, except for your dog who is looking a little wary himself, and your car is old and no one really knows where you are, this is not the way to experience the wilderness. I’d checked my cell phone at the last gas station and we were out of the service area. Me, Cody and my very old Toyota barreling along on a mission. And no one but Lulu knew where we were or where we were bound.

I was also unclear about the nature of the mission. Mercy? Rescue? Was I going to save Lulu or confront her? Could I get her committed? What was I going to do with her once I got her? These questions circled around like annoying bugs. I could swat at them but not with answers. Lulu is right. Normally I am pretty methodical, possibly overly rational. But I could not narrow the puzzle of Lulu down to one question with a range of possible answers and then analyze them for their merits. I realized that Lulu was so unknown to me now that I was afraid of her. I had no idea who I was meeting or what to expect.

___________

One of the reasons I like it out here is that I know I’ll never have another night like that last night. There aren’t even days and nights and that is really cool because there’s no dealing with getting to sleep, not getting to sleep, waking up, not waking up and there’s really no dealing with other people and their noises and voices. Molecules don’t talk. They’re just the essence next door or in back of you or where ever it is you are.

That last night, there were so many people talking to me that I thought I’d explode. People were telling me they were going to cure me and they were going to give me something to drink that would make me feel better and that they knew my father and I was just like him and that they’d killed my dog and they were going to lock me up for my own good. You read about torture in places like Iraq. It was like that. I couldn’t see them but I could hear them and I knew they were going to get me.

I also felt seriously ill. When the poison gives you cancer, there’s nothing you can do. Oh sure, you can let a doctor give you more poison and call it a treatment but what’s the point of that? At first I thought that fake healer was on my side. She said she didn’t believe in western medical science and that cancer can be cured by a combination of diet, meditation and homeopathic remedies. I’d read up on it and it made sense. But then she wanted me to take my clothes off and put on this robe and sit with her and drink something she’d made and I started really listening to her and her voice was like theirs. She was in on it.

I put my coat on and told her I was leaving. She offered to give me a ride to town but I knew she was just going to drive me to some house with a bunch of fake healers and they’d use me for experiments. Straight out of Charlie Manson. No thanks. I took off and hitched a ride with this old lumberjack. He looked like a regular north woods guy, plaid shirt, red beard, cap etc., but he had two voices. One voice was a regular dope,“What’s a girl like you doing up here alone?” voice, and the other was really hard to explain. High pitched and shrill like a little gnome was under his hat telling me to eat part of his sandwich and drink coffee out of his thermos. I know that trick. No one is going to get me to drink out of some stranger’s thermos. That guy was already poisoned and he had that other voice from the poison and neither of them was going to get me to drink his coffee.

So when we got to the edge of the town and he asked me where I was going, I saw the Harry’s Bar sign and said I was going to Harry’s. I could tell he didn’t believe me but he pulled up in front of Harry’s and dropped me off. All fake worry he said, “Are you sure you’re ok?” and the voice inside his head started laughing, a really evil laugh.

__________

Ely is a two street town with almost no lights and it was late, after ten. I saw the neon Harry’s light and pulled up in front of the bar. Now what? Cody whined so I grabbed his leash and we got out. I walked him down the street and he lifted a leg on a tree and then sat down. OK, really, now what? I walked him back to the car and he jumped into the back seat looking at me expectantly. He thought I was going to get back in and we’d drive some more. I stood there wishing I could. Just get back in and drive all night to Minneapolis. Listen to the radio. Call someone when I got into range. Having no plan at all, I turned my back on Cody and walked into the bar.

__________

All the things that used to mess me up seem so remote now. The gray fog is fading to a soft blue and it seems like there’s lots more room, or time, not sure which, between molecules. It feels like I moved out into the country, a quiet remote and peaceful place. Not like that country around Ely. That was like the woods out of Grimm’s Fairy Tales.

That bar was full of trolls, too. I used to spend a lot of time in bars. They were familiar territory. And, not to brag, because of my looks, somebody always bought me a drink and plugged the jukebox with songs I wanted to hear.

But the last thing I wanted to hear was that it wasn’t God who made honky tonk women. That song was so loud and the three trolls at the bar were all leering at me and then there was a woman, kind of old and dumpy, and she was leering at me too. Not those lecherous leers, but real villain leers. They were out to get me. I decided to play it cool for a while because I knew I was outnumbered.

“Excuse me, can you tell me where the pay phone is? And the ladies room?”

The three guys and the fat woman all stuck their thumbs back towards the dark part of the bar behind the pool table. They wanted me cornered back there.

Well, I had no choice. I called you and then I went into the can, used it for its purpose and then just sat there for a long time, trying to figure out how to survive the hours until you’d show up. I noticed a high window, one of those transom deals with a hinge half open, the window cocked a little to make up for the ventilation they don’t have. I’m pretty tall so I could just barely reach the bottom frame of the window but I couldn’t get an angle to push it further open. I wasn’t feeling well, actually I was dizzy, but I had to get out of there. So I put the lid down on the toilet and stood up on it to push the window open. That’s all I remember until the hospital. I’m getting more detached but that still pisses me off.

__________

I hate walking into bars by myself. The stares intimidate me and I’m never sure how I’m supposed to act so I almost never go to bars unless I’m with someone. I won’t meet people at bars because I can’t stand sitting by myself for even five minutes, looking like I’m a loner or a looser that got stood up. I realize this is self-involved but it’s kept me out of bars, which is just as well.

So I walked into Harry’s. It’s after ten and there are a couple guys sitting on bar stools and a tired looking woman wiping the bar off. They look at me in the weirdest way. I realize that a woman alone walking into a small town bar late at night is, well, weird, but the stares are more than curiosity. They look apprehensive.

I walked up to the bar at the spot closest to the door and furthest from the two guys and cleared my throat.

“Excuse me, I was supposed to meet someone here. Has there been another woman in here, alone . . . who seemed to be waiting?”

A long silence and they look at each other. Lulu has been here and, as usual, something untoward has happened.

“Why you looking for her?” asks the bartender who I’m guessing owns the tavern.

“Well, she’s my sister and she was, well, kind of stranded up here and she asked me to come and get her.”

“You talking about the redhead?”

“Yes, she has red hair and she’s kind of tall.” I hadn’t seen Lulu in years. I was glad to hear her hair was still red. I didn’t feel confident of much but I was pretty sure that she had not shrunk.

“Your sister took a tumble in the washroom and we had to call an ambulance.”

“What happened?”

“Well, hard to say exactly because she was in the washroom and, of course, the door was closed. And locked. Which made it hard to help her.”

“How did you know she needed help?”

“We heard a crash.” This from one of the guys at the bar. “It was really loud and then we didn’t hear anything and then we got worried.”

“So I went over and knocked on the door, real loud and asked if she was ok.” said the bar lady. “No answer. I waited and knocked again but I knew something was wrong so Hank, who was here then, used a screwdriver and popped the lock. We couldn’t get the door open all the way because your sister was on the floor and knocked out.”

“We were trying to move her legs so we could open the door. When the ambulance got here, one of the paramedics, a wiry little guy, managed to push his way in and step across her. She’d cracked her head and had bled all over but the guy said her pulse was good and we got the door open all the way and they got her on a stretcher and took her to the hospital. It’s a couple miles from here.”

“How could she fall that hard in a little bathroom?”

“Well, that’s what we were wondering but her purse was in the sink and we saw a nail file up on the window ledge. We think she might have been trying to get out the window. God knows why.”

“Oh, dear. I think I know why. She’s been having a lot of trouble lately and she thinks people are going to hurt her. She was probably trying to escape.”

“She scared the devil out of us. Nothing like that has ever happened here.”

“When did it happen?”

“A couple hours ago. I just finished cleaning up in there and Hank followed the ambulance to the hospital to make a report. I hope she’s ok.”

“I do too. Can you tell me how to get to the hospital?”

__________

Actually, I don’t remember much about the hospital. I woke up and my head was throbbing. I tried to touch it but they’d restrained my hands. I heard voices but I couldn’t tell what they were saying. I had heard about people talking in tongues and maybe that’s what was going on.

But there wasn’t much more they could do to me. The poison was finishing me off. I could tell. I could tell they’d doped me too because it didn’t hurt. I couldn’t tell if I still had a body. Being knocked out is not like being a molecule. When you’re knocked out, you’re blank. No dreams, no realities, just blurry numbness.

But the doctor dope wore off a little and then I knew I was in a hospital and I thought I heard you talking to a nurse. It was nice to hear your voice but I was too tired and dopey to start a conversation. I was glad that you’d come to meet me but I knew that the nurse would brainwash you and . . . well, it didn’t matter. I was almost gone.

__________

“Oh Jesus!” I grabbed the nurse’s wrist. She was a pretty good sport about letting a freaked out stranger clutch her. “I can’t believe that’s Lulu. I haven’t seen her in years. She looks awful.”

“Well, she has a concussion and we believe that she has cancer, very advanced.”

“Why do you think that?”

“The doctor palpitated her abdomen, which is quite distended, and felt a significant mass there.”

“But she’s so thin.”

“Well, probably the cancer is consuming any nutrition she tries to take in.”

“Lulu, poor Lulu. First crazy, and now cancer.”

“What can you tell me about her?”

“She’s my half-sister. I haven’t seen her in three years, or more. She began having some pretty serious mental health problems and then she cut contact off. I tried to talk to her and tried to get her to get help but she cut me off.”

“Any other family?”

“Just our mom. She’s seen Lulu a couple times but she isn’t a particularly reliable witness herself. She’s no help to anybody.”

“That’s tough. But when mentally ill people isolate themselves, there’s not a lot you can do.”

“I know, thanks. I tried. I called a crisis clinic and they told me they couldn’t do anything unless she posed harm to herself or someone else. She was harming herself but . . .”

“Well, it pretty much takes a suicide threat to get that kind of intervention.”

“That isn’t her style.”

“I’m going to let you sit here for a little bit while I look in on a few other patients. Then I’ll be back and I’m afraid I’ll have a lot of forms for you to fill out and I’ll ask you to give me contact information for your mother. Do you want to call her?”

“Mary Anne, God no.”

“No worries. We’ll notify her.”

“Thanks.”

__________

I heard your voice but it was all tangled up with the nurses and I didn’t want to show my cards. But then it was just your voice and I could feel you patting my hand. That felt good. So long since anyone had touched me. And since I knew I was dying, I wasn’t afraid of getting poisoned anymore. I wanted to talk to you but the dope and the other poisons were wearing me out. So I just let you pat me. I knew how Cody felt but I didn’t have a tail to wag.

___________

Lulu died the next day, while I was in the bathroom. I stayed at a motel that night, snuck Cody in and went back to the hospital early, since I couldn’t sleep and I wanted to get Cody out of the motel before we got busted. Pretty soon everybody in Ely would know about the Campbell sisters.

When I got to the hospital, the nice nurse was gone and the day nurse was busy so I didn’t know what to do. I sat down next to Lulu and took her hand again. The night before, she squeezed a little but by the next day she was pretty inert. I said “Lulu” but got no response so I patted for a while and stared out the window. It seemed like hours but later I figured it had had been only a half hour or so. I went to the bathroom and when I was coming into Lulu’s room, I heard a nurse tell the assistant, “I think she’s gone.”

It was like watching a movie in slow motion. The assistant held Lulu’s wrist and the nurse was watching the monitor, scowling at it to see if it was telling the truth. No pulse and no beeps.

They noticed me but since they didn’t know me we all just stared at each other.

“Are you looking for . . ?”

“Her. She’s my sister. I just went to the bathroom and . . .”

“Oh, sorry, we knew about you from the chart but we didn’t see you here. The station nurse noticed the heart monitor stopped and asked us to check. There really isn’t anything anybody could do.”

“I know. It just feels weird that she died while I was in the bathroom. And she fell in the bathroom too.”

“Well, there are more accidents in bathrooms than any other room in a house but I think this is just a coincidence. Would you like to sit with her a minute before we call the coroner?”

“Actually, no. I sat with her last night and this morning. If she knew I was here, that’s good but I don’t want to look at what’s left of her anymore.”

The nurse pulled the sheet up over Lulu’s pale face, her strong jaw already slack.

I felt ill. But Cody was in the car and would need water, food and a pee. The needs of the living. It was time to push on.

__________

I’m in the blue now and the toxins are all gone. My molecules are clean, I can tell. I feel free, and light. You don’t have to worry about me anymore.

Biography

Flo Golod has the gift of imagination and vision not only in her writing but in her work as a consultant to grassroots, social justice and education organizations. She has been a charter school executive director, and a board member and consultant for Community Shares of MN at CSUSA, a non-profit devoted to issues of justice, equality and cooperative ventures.

Lorenz Gude

2010-10-28T23:08:00.006-04:00

Lumiere: Visual Meditations

These one minute subtle visual meditations incorporate the Lumiere process. Sit, breathe, watch, watch deeply.

Australian Wildflowers

Cockatoos and Traffic Compete in Armadale Western Australia

Ambiguous Reflections on the River Canning

If you enjoy these meditations check out thepencilofnature.net where Lorenz and his son, Julian Gude experiment with the power with these unique moving still shots.

Biography

Lorenz Gude, a founding companion of the Fourth Order, grew up on a farm in New Hampshire where he remembers one evening seeing God in the eye of a Jersey cow. Lorenz was the publisher of the infamous "C" Press which was the early venue for the New York School featuring covers by Andy Warhol and the works of poets such as Ted Berrigan and Ron Padgett. Lorenz’s photographs document that period in American literature in several books. Lorenz has taught media and photography in the US and Australia, has been a Harley dealer, a consultant in Aboriginal education, a therapist, and a gold miner in Zimbabwe. Lorenz lives in Western Australia and blogs at Yankee Wombat and New Media Theory. Currently Lorenz is collaboration with this son, Julian, on short photographic video meditation pieces at their site Pencil of Nature. His work can also be found on YouTube.

Ms Lila's Odd Sermon

2010-10-28T22:39:00.004-04:00

If I said these words were coming from the center of my heart I would be fooling you. I would be laying a shovel full of shit right on your doorstep. If you smiled back dancing around the pools of excrement I would know this is a useless conversation.

Now, I don’t want you to close the door or slam it or anything like that. I want you to smile that smile we get when we willingly open our mouths for the hook. It’s the awareness that counts.

If you have lived long enough you know there are stories after stories with varied interpretations. It’s a bloody business. You can hear a story but you got to get it in your sites, got to get that tension on that trigger finger and aim right for the heart of the matter. We are going to dress down a full bull moose, flay that sucker, butcher it, separate its organs, and bury the gut sack off the side of the road so it doesn’t poison anyone.

With that analogy the nice people have fled. The clean people are in the bathroom washing themselves. And you and I can get down to a real conversation. Don’t let this fancy red dress with the cleavage fool you. I have a monk’s robe underneath it and I have taken vows. Well it’s not exactly a monk’s robe and not exactly the big three vows. You know, Poverty, Chastity and Obesity. If you keep looking at me like that I won’t be able to continue. So open your mouth because the hook is coming now.

I have been a woman all of my life. Some there are that come into my body. Some there are that come out of my body, and some are voices that dwell in my soul. Hot on my lips are words from a thousand mouths. Each one is speaking, singing, uttering moans, cries and truths. They say mama. They say come here, baby. Let me touch your sleek skin. They say virgin, whore. They call me beloved. They say lies.

In the beginning of the twenty first century I’m heading for Africa holding some Paleolithic goddess in my mind when she says she is really living in my tits and between my thighs.

I got my kids, my heart and two hands, a plot of dirt and friends I make life with. I got faith when words fail and eyes that open like the dawn each day. I got a body made for life and dance, a sound in my voice and voices to sound, an old woman living in me, so old she just nods at life and death. Another weeps at the sound of rain, the smell of dew.

I got white women, black women, even got men in me, and babies, babies wailing in the night. I got war in me, bombs falling, bodies dropping, hate splashing just like blood.

I got hunger and pain, tears I never cried. I got land in me, mountains and a meadows full of berries, oak trees and oceans and flowers wild and tame. I got spirits in me, animals and chanting men, women who live under the sea. I got love in me and doubts and fears, the bread of heaven in me, breasts and vulva and womb space for life. In my heart sometimes, sometimes, I have silence.

Some kind of power moves in me, it feels like life, some kind of power singing me, it feels like faith, some kind of power weaving me, it feels like courage. Love, deep love smiles, it laughs in me, rage, pain, grief got a s-ound in me, a h-iss, a g-rowl, it r-oars.

Who is me? Sow cow woman with the teats of a buffalo, woman with the teats of a swan, woman with the teats of a elephant. I see sows in the sky, winged sows stretching themselves, how high the heavy burdened things can fly astounds. Astounds, a sound down from the sky.

I would land in the lap of luxury and warn them all of the sorrows of their ways, O the burdens of rent paid, the stench of the greenbacks hidden under the sink. I would beat that old rug, that prayer rug, I would beat those beads and make them sing finally fine sound found, howls, growls, free forms.

I am here to tell you, if you got the heart for it, change is possible, going to tell you a tale, a brazen tale, but worth the telling. Now I was sitting in church when I noticed a twitch between my legs. You may have had this problem yourself. I tried to ignore it but this twitch it kept a twitching and a twitching. My poor body seemed to be blaspheming, so I prayed to the Holy Spirit when Jesus came.

He say to me, “Woman, you got yourself an idol. You got to kill it.” I was hesitant to say the least but I know what happens eternally to them that's got themselves an idol. I did not want that to happen to me.

I stammered, “I am dust and ashes. I am dust and ashes. Lead me to the priest.”

Well Jesus, he lowered his glasses and looked at me hard. He said, “Honey, you had better go to your soul and seek some wisdom.”

“Soul”, I cried, “my body is blaspheming, ” when a voice roared out, “BLESS THAT BODY.” There was a wild wonder within me, a sort of singing in my cells.

“SouI”, I cried, what is your name? She said, “I AM.”

Well, I am not fighting any more. I'm not trying to be good or bad. I am singing now, singing rock songs of sitting still. I am moving no more. I am not moving with your drum or his or hers or even mine any more. I am not fearing the life within me. I am not a courting death. I’m not defending no more. Wind is blowing through my body. I don’t hold on any more. I am sorry if you find me poor, sorry if my life offends your heart. But I am not fighting any more. I’ve got no excuse. I just is.

Hey granny, where you going, granny, with your bright hat and lipstick on? Hey granny, got you a dance you’re moving to? Granny smiles all the while. She’s a drooping sow but cow no less. She got wings and a pair of moccasins for earth visits. She got memories of how many lives she led in this one life like a man with a kaleidoscopic third eye ball watching the race toward nowhere.

Got you a dance, mister, some kind of jazz tune that stirs. Forget the blues. There’s a saxophone wanting to play a note that no one has ever heard. Some old street woman is talking the blues with a yellow eyed man on the move. It’s a show worth seeing and getting free from to be free for something that moves like the flow of a river, like the sound pounding in the blood, the cows chewing on the cud digesting life.

I am in country now. I am in a place that is my own. I am that place. Country dwellers know. In country I gave birth. In country I am fertile ground. I am food and the flower of the land, big mama with heavy tits, country talk for country living folks. I breathe air, take up space. My blood flows.

For the longest time I could not remember my own screams until the dreams of women burning, until the screams of women burning woke me in the night. Fiery mamas called my name. I saw their faces in women who passed each day. At night I covered my ears and wept. One morning I looked in the mirror.

Now I nestle my children, my daughters, my sons, sisters, brothers, husbands and friends. I nestle them in and I push them out. Three naked trees stand outside my window. They chide me, Child, remember, take your hand from the flame. I'm country now. I know my boundaries well.

You speak of redemptive love as if you think when the fish has finally flavored the sea with his life some sort of debt has been fully paid. I say no. I write with my left hand now. That crazy old woman keeps laughing. That crazy old woman keeps laughing and laughing and laughing. She won't sit still.

She tells me, take the scales from your eyes, girl. Now I can't sit still. I'm wiggling in my chair. Talk about wiggling, I feel like a damn worm woman. She says, when you gonna dance girl? When you gonna get your ass up and dance?

That crazy old lady's just wiggling in me and she won't stop laughing.

Pretty soon I'm gonna be laughing in church. When the preacher gets up I'm gonna be just laughing. Someone's tickling my belly button from inside. Jesus, what am I gonna do? He says, “When you gonna get your ass up and dance?”

I freed myself from the grip of myself. I liberate and levitate. I no longer sit in my fear. The spells I cast are CLOUDS IN THE SKY, MOON ABOVE MOUNTAINS.

You understand the necessity of silence but do you see the indispensability of drum sounds in our community. That’s what the man said. I heard him and I heard the bird tapping at the wood of the tree. And I heard the first word of my heart pounding.

“You’re walking like a woman whose body’s got a rhythm,” that’s what he said, stepping from his tent, selling incense at the Saturday Market. Don’t get me wrong this isn’t about a come on to me. What he saw in this woman just made him plain happy. JET PLANES MOVING THROUGH MY SOUL. LOUD LAUGHTER SINGING ME.

The first day my car died I walked the highways, RUSHING CARS WHIRRING BY ME. Waited at the bus stop, then stumbled to a seat. In the rhythm of the bus I found my peace. NEXT STOP ALLELUIA STREET. Thank you, they yelled as they left their seats. God bless you, man, they yelled as they left their seats. SWEET RHYTHM, SWEET DRUM, SWEET NOISY BEAT.

Adjusting my body to the space around me, making room for the sounds and rhythms abounding Is a meditation I had ignored, a pure awareness of physical joy, a healer’s gift to unbind me.

Consider that some things you do, some ways you have, some states of being you feel are full of wild babies, the colors of paint, the smell of clay. Some bellies are pregnant with the work of wild babies reaching out through womb and heart and sex. Those children stay to be born over and over in dirty hands in eyes of fire and words.

Some babies play in pain, labor to be what they are. Some bellies are full. They contract, push forth wild babies. The tongue flicks to lick the birthing blood of their wild wild way. And I, and maybe you, are hungry for their taste.

Honey, I see that heavy sack you are carrying, those fancy shoes, and those technological gadgets that own your soul, those “have to’s”, those dutiful social time thieves. It doesn’t take a psychic with a silk scarf wrapped around her to see those credit cards, each nailing your poor foot to the dance floor, like the “have to’s” do, until it’s the wax museum of your life – a statuary of slavery, something owning you.

I feel the heavy shame bag, self -judgment, the quite despair on your hunched shoulders, all the voices telling you how you have failed. It’s a love crisis. Now, you tell me when the fish has finally flavored the sea with his life some sort of debt has been paid for your soul’s failure to move with the ecstatic dance. It is THE invitation, HIS invitation.

I say the gulls are calling. The gulls are calling. They're ready to pick bones. They say, when you gonna get your ass up and dance?

Biography

Ms Lila is obviously a spiritual woman. She has called out her message from sidewalks, street corners, bars, poetry slams, a Chautauqua circuit, and even a legit theater.

Book Review: Acts of Faith by Eboo Patel

2010-10-28T22:29:00.006-04:00

Acts of Faith is a gripping odyssey of a young man’s rite of passage, a truly American spiritual pilgrimage as Patel, the son of immigrant Indian Muslims who insisted on the Islamic value of service to those in need, recounts growing up in the American Midwest and his journey from infatuation with American materialism into the heart of the American spiritual landscape, and out to the world.

Who could believe a book such as this would be a page turner? It is. In this inspiring story of American religious pluralism and the coming of age of an American Muslim man, Eboo Patel leads us on a sacred journey past the obvious differences into the heart of our religious traditions. He does not avoid the serious questions, such as the recruitment and investment in youth by fundamentalist groups with divisive and violent agendas, or the failure of mainstream people of faith, and the interfaith movement itself, to equal that investment. But he doesn’t get stuck in those failures either, he moves us on.

Patel traces the life of a young man of color from the angst of the American high school scene, through YMCA youth leadership programs, Dorothy Day’s Catholic Worker Houses; from university identity politics to the gripping and powerful American voice, James Baldwin, but we don’t stop there. We get to meet the living people who mentored him from the unknown ordinary soul to the most famous people, from a Catholic monk, an Islamic scholar, the Dali Lama, and his own grandmother, a tower of faith, service and justice.

As a university student practicing Buddhism Eboo travels with a Jewish friend to India, his parent’s country of origin. Like so many Americans who make the journey “home” he discovers his roots in Indian culture, and with that he also discovers his uniquely American identity, one forged in the vision and diversity of the American dream. Through his grandmother he rediscovers the depths of his own Muslim faith.

This is a book in which the voices of the young sing us forward. Beginning in Chicago with the development of an interfaith youth group dedicated to working together in the service of the community, we are taken to the Parliament of World Religions, held in South African in 1999 where the youth delegates begin to forge an identity born out of their own interfaith experience in the pluralistic world of today, “Our generation has to tell the story of interdependence,” and I would add cooperation for the well being of all, a call to lives of action and service, a common imperative in all the major faiths. This is a book that is riddled with respect.

Eboo Patel is the founder and executive director of the Interfaith Youth Core, an international nonprofit building the interfaith youth movement throughout the world. He is a member of the President’s Advisory Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

If you are young or old, if your skin is dark or light, if you have felt alienated or in despair about the future, this book is for you. In a world of apparent religious division and fundamentalist violence Acts of Faith offers practical hope and a sense of direction for the future. This is a book about destiny and spiritual calling, not only of one man, but perhaps a destiny we all are called to as we forge meaningful life in the wake of 9-11.

Interfaith Youth Core

The Washington Post On Faith – The Faith Divide Blog

The White House Office of Faith Based and Neighborhood Partnerships

A Report on Nazareth College‘s first-ever Interfaith Understanding Conference

Submissions

2010-10-28T22:22:00.021-04:00

Guidelines for Submissions
Poetry, short story, nonfiction, book excerpts, essays, interviews, book reviews, and visual art and media that address interfaith edges, archetypal themes of spiritual passage from any tradition, or the spirituality of relationship with the earth/cosmos are encouraged at this time. All submissions must in someway speak to the spiritual life. They may reflect a religious tradition or not.

The Collective Dreaming Project: For those who submit their dreams to the Project, and who respond to those dreams with visual art, multimedia, or poetry, you are encouraged to submit both the dream and the response to Manifestations. We have designated space in the upcoming issues for The Collective Dreaming Project. We do not guarantee publication. The submission must meet our criteria as a literary journal.

The Multimedia Challenge

Create a youtube video of Hermit John's poem, En las Profundidades de Mi Ser, found in this issue. Your videos will be featured in the next issue of Manifestations.

Submissions for the Odd Sermon
The Odd Sermon is a writer's work in self discovery, a poking fun at his/herself. God sends the odd unexpected audacious and sometimes wacky preacher from within to confront the writer, and the rest of us as well, with a holy unexpected truth. The Odd Sermon is published anonymously to give the writer the latitude needed for such playfulness.

Interviews
Written interviews must be accompanied by a recorded track the verifies the authenticity of responses within the interview.

Visual Arts

Submissions for visual arts should be made in jpg or png formats. The work must be your own and reflect on a spiritual theme.

Submission Agreement
By submitting any writing you are granting one time online publishing rights to Manifestations, and guaranteeing it is your own work and free from copyright restrictions. Submissions should be sent to bflaherty@ymail.com with Submission to Manifestations in the title box.

Both The Fourth Order and its literary journal, Manifestations, are clothed in the threads of holy poverty. We have no money to offer you, but thank you for the gift of creativity you offer to the world.