Prepare Him Room...

It came back to me this morning... just on the heels of telling Jill how, despite the delicious energy boost I get from morning coffee, it does pose a challenge at times. Before I "know it" I'm flying down the mental highway, completely in my thoughts, strapped in to the vehicle of an idea, a scenario... sometimes I love where these take me and then other times I find myself working ahead or obsessive about some potential problem or difficulty. The more clearly my mind paints the picture , the more I feel the pain, frustration, fear... Then, gratefully, I snap "out of it"... or back into the present. I shake it off wondering if we really need to have Starbucks every day of the week.
Well, anyway... it came back to me this morning, this invitation from Eckhart Tolle -- inviting me to listen to the quiet. The suggestion was to enter the present more fully by listening to silence, considering how despite its no-thingness... silence is a kind of fullness, a spaciousness that gives all other sound and stirring -- a place to be. To turn our attention into the depths of silence is to reach out for the presence of God -- the one whose present presence... envelops us, embraces us, offers a home in which to live.
What came back to me was this mantra... Silence without, stillness within.... each time I allow it to return me to the open spaces, it feels like a gift. I thought about that this morning and immediately felt like sharing it.
So, this Christmas -- to people like us and all those mired in the fears and frenzies of daily living, I commend this little mantra: Silence without, stillness within.... Silence without, stillness within.... may it help to create space for you, a place for peace and new life to be born.
I bless you all... with the kiss of Christ.
Merry Christmas

painful and glorious

How glorious it is - and also how painful - to be an exception.

--Alfred de Musset

"Prayer is dreaming in league with God..."

Thank you Heschel

open your present

... each moment is a gift

Open

Your

Present

(haiku)

If you think you can,
brace yourself against this Wind--
til foolish, you fly.

For my niece... Oh, That Kid...

Oh that kid...

Bring it on!...

complete dark unpredictable
unfathomable depth
cause I've got this
light...
she's a real being
just about 60 some odd miles away
with some pavement and stoplights, a Starbucks,
three or four towns, a speck on the map
a broad swath of land in between --

a surface I can move across
among a million trees with names, duney mounds
and sand, a lake to either side
and a river or 2 --
that's really all there is between us.

Soon she'll be getting into a car
maybe even barefoot on a summer day with just enough gas
winding along a prayer, a long boyfriend walk and talk for practice and a song
blinking a few times and pulling into my driveway
into my life with its

shadowy, cool constriction,
every offbrand sham
I've accepted as the prize --
till she rushes in with the bright smiling news
I've got it! I found it! Here it is!

... but for now I'll rest in the premonition
completely aware that

I've got this life -- in mine.
She's living out there ...
discovering, dreaming, putting it on pages for people to hear
my niece showing the world who knows what
opening hearts, hers first, stepping into the tall
timeless dance with God, swaying, saying
oh that kid --
bring it on, bring it on

It feels good

It feels good to feel good and
that is why I am feeling bad
about feeling bad when I do.

I'll be worried if you worry, my
own might even become a concern, because
I know for a fact that one
needs to feel free to feel free
and when we can or when we
do those around us feel free too
-- to feel good about feeling good, left
to wonder what wondering on that all
day long might do.

Cheese Please

Cheese please.

I've had my meat -- too bloody chewy, red death in a faraway
place, air freight made straight to the plate -- no thanks.

But Cheese, creamy life in wheels and shavings, oozing out
the sides, spread it on my days while I strain to hear that sacred mooing.

Cheese please, with a history of a life well lived one slice
at a time, that could've been curd, stayed cool in a cup all
clotted up -- plopped into the ripe-center of my melon
mornings or chilled in a glass, cold milk, that's class, drink
thick white love one sip at a time and leave it on your lip.

Cheese please... with the cow left in it and her long summer
day musings, the farmer with dreams of catnap's after lunch
and the sprawling yard with muddy clumps, the carpets of teaming
grass they lived on, the birds flying blessings overhead breathing blue
into their lungs, their lives, my cheese, my glorious cheese.

Big-city fun

ON THE BIKE PATH

Here is the message of evening in
early summer: watchful are those who see,
live as the Holy one you are.
Sunset comes early with a front
from the West.
I drive through the drying stream
of some old dogs urine --
some good mornings lappings
left over.
Weeds dry tawdry in tumbles,
flowers waft wild intoxication
and I notice to revere
the sweet attentive struggle
of an inchworm
on the bike path.

What holds us to the earth?

Waves

Innumerable,
hushing in soft -- I see that
giving is God's way

Green

Spring field rising up
with a spirit hand, waving
light in shades of green

Parting

Let these be my parting words: I hated loving you.
Always have. Always will.
I'm not going to say it hurts, not going to talk
about feelings -- never had a feeling in my life actually.
Goodbyes just as good as hello.

And this partings got me thinking about all
of those unfortunate people with their
connection, affection,
finding, binding, bonding, losing, grieving, mending, moving on.
Nine ways at least to waste one's vitality.

I'll loath the silence before the last words
we say to each other, and all of the predictable tears
over limits and why can't things last
and I'll never be the same and it's forever I promise.
I've no use for statements about what things meant,
no patience for what some say they'll always mean
-- in fact, who's got energy for everlasting anything?
Feel it and fling it, I say, I'll not wring out every drop for meaning.

Along the finest stretches, enjoy the road if you must,
look out the window, count the hilltops, kiss the breeze
but handle the brunt when the bend comes.
Wave a hand at what's grand and let go;
permanence is a brand of perpetual boredom.

MY FACE

I have never seen a face more beautiful than my own --
like it was in the restroom just after noon where I stopped to look,
where I reached for my own eyes
those dark wonders calling out
"come inside, dive in where it's warm and real,
you can stay here."

Those same eyes have traced the lines of lips, the ones
she said once were nearly perfect -- she was almost right --
the ones that live soft around my language, that form words,
that get bit by furious fangs, that hold in what can stink
and soothe and save the souls of millions each of whom have lips --
should I apologize for loving mine most more than any other anywhere?

Sure -- the mirror masks what's pimply inside,
a countenance that's clear as sand, man,
or the sea touched by the light just right revealing glory.
And woe is me, indeed and yes and how, till
Wow and radiant here I am --
in a glance, for a moment,
Sent with moist mouth, deep loving eyes to the mirror
where you and I collide and twirl the blushing world.

Take-home: Every person on this earth should love their own face most and first.

Today a River

Today I live as an unbroken stream, a river of life. My banks are ceaseless bravery and humility and their harmony guides my movement along moments. The sky turns above, casting shadows, touching and tarrying on while I bubble in the rapids, white-capped with current curling skyward, splashing sound out to the forest universe. Later then, and again with time, my song will quiet and flow like words from a still, speaking heart... "dream, run-effortless, cool the place with seamless peace."

Embrace the grace

All day I embrace the grace,
no matter where the time or place,
the fullest swell, the faintest trace...
all days, all ways I shall embrace.

"Put me down!" I scream.
But the one holding me up overhead replies
"Why won't you just let me love you?"

So, like you, I'm given a view from above
though I never asked for it.
And I need to tell you all
it's all so very small
the great big thing you're in
the thing worth killing for
the thing that fuels the fitful night
the thing you won't stop working on
the thing you're convinced you're so close
to mastering, conquering, quieting.
From above its already done,
the Words been spoken, the wide world's body broken,
reassembled, complete as a reverie, with hands and feet.

So be Lifted up
be raised you ancient doors and little ones,
Springs bud falls in a lifetime --
the relentless kingdom comes,
grave lives release from grumbling,
Grace drains unwilling eyes of their darkness.

Look and see
throw not one more stone,
the heart you spare shall be your own
and all there in your midst be found
as God's good dream encircling ' round.

What Eyes Did We Bring?

What eyes did we bring to the world of the visible?

Those that knew the weight of tears held in the clouds above,
those that saw the space between, the dire divide instead of love?

Were they empty taking notice of the void, counting chasms
rather than fitting places to draft bridges, boardwalk's,
and ways to cross over?

Did they strain and dart about trying to let the demon out
with glory all around, and pain and enemies
and ecstasies and every other real thing?
Did they watch wild and worrisome with darkness in the wings,
were they hungry for the truth, red with thirst for living things.

Or maybe they were full as sky is of blue,
as birds and children are of dreams, as ripe as flight
in the gusty firmament, the ready womb, the open page,
one deep-driving breath of God.

What eyes did we give to the canvas of our lives,
to each other, to the place lit by this other Light?

We gave the ones we had,
the ones we shaped by day and night,
and enjoyed of earth and heaven
what we offered with our sight.

Merrily float in your mediocre boat softly down the mainstream.
Wear your thorny wreath, grind your lonely teeth
and try your best not to scream.
For they'll surely give praises
for all the bland phrases
that moved them not more than a yard,
till with them resigned to soften in spine,
you've drowned all thats vital and holy and hard.