I Forget How To Listen

"It's so painful to hear the rhetoric of hate."

We feel this pain.  It's like a sharp shock shakes

all the tender places within and makes them throb. 

 I cover my ears or turn off whatever is transmitting the onslaught.

It's a defensive manuever...survival instinct.

"What if I could hear the human in you and

not only the weapons of your words?"

It would be beneficial to know how to do this.

It's totally foreign territory in my world,

but that doesn't mean it can't happen.

"What if we left all our mouths at home 

and let only our ears gather in the streets?"

I think this is why silent gatherings are so powerful.  

What if congress held a silent session every now and then?

Members would come with one thing written on their sign.

And instead of arguing, everyone "listened" 

to the other's sign and attempted an understanding?

Disagreement and debate are not hateful.

Differences of opinion are not hateful.

I refuse to believe humans were created to be hateful.

"What peace might arrive, for a moment, if we listened,

all of us miracles, listening with the ears of our hearts,

as the cold wind swirls all around?"

What if the ears of our hearts hear hate as gibberish?

What if they were instantly ignored as meaningless babble,

not worthy of a nanosecond of our attention?

I remember the chant from childhood...

"sticks and stones might break my bones,

but words will never hurt me."

I'm wondering how much practice it will take

to get to the place where that is true?

To shift my thinking from "words matter"

to "not all words matter"?

Only words of respect, honesty, and decency matter.

To grow the ability to translate words of hate,

into words of someone wounded, crying for help?

What if the illness is not only hurting them, 

but hurting innocents? What if  it is contagious

and infecting others along the way?

 What kind of love does it take to heal that?

I'm listening.  Listening intently for the answers.

Namaste

 

Please, Do Not Wander

"Do not stray into crowded streets, cowardly corners--

it is not possible to drink from what is empty.

While I take her point, I loved walking the streets of Manhattan.

It felt like a jovial conglomoration of incredibly diverse humans

all doing their thing, attending to their day.

Cowardly corners I understand.  Cowardice is contagious;

so is bravery.  Bravery is the call for the times. 

"...they have learned that there is plenty--. . ."

 For many decades, those of us residing in this country have (mostly)

lived in a land of plenty, don't you think?

Not without exceptions, of course.

"if tiny birds can learn to share, maybe we can too.

Maybe despite the weight of this deep, dark,

relentlessly draining winter, we too can

learn to drink from the fountain of plenty, 

to resolve to stay and stay right where we are.

We are a sharing country when we're healthy.

Right now we are suffering from a serious disease

which must be healed in order for all of us to be the

kind and generous people we are in our hearts and souls.

We are tending to the illness...its widespread.

It will take time and much energy and, together, we will

care for the sick and heal what's wrong.

Namaste

 

One Garden

"I want to be discerning, knowing whatever I choose to grow might

appear soon in the soil of you, so I am cautious when sowing

bulbs of anger, saplings of judgment, thorns of certainty."

Attending to a garden within is a rich metaphor.

It feels wise to pay attention to the seeds I sow.

The challenging part is forgiving the "weeds"

for showing up and causing trouble.

Can we call angry outbursts fertilizer?

"I want us all to plant great beds of unanswerable questions

and tend the mystery together."

This is my favorite line.

Thinking of us all planting our seeds of decency,

dignity, mercy, generosity; the list goes on and on.

What are your unanswerable questions?

"How else might it change what these hands do 

when I trust every choice matters?"

Every choice does matter.

That's why, in my book, mercy and forgiveness are vital,

as is treating yourself with the same generous, loving spirit

you intend to bring to the world outside your skin.

Namaste

 

Come Out of Hiding

". . .are we willing to show up without the layers and 

layers of protection, . . .to not need to be “on” or right?"

This is an intense question.

Even imagining "showing up without layers" I feel uneasy.

When my layers are calm and attentive, I'd say yes.

When they're grumpy, gloomy and highly critical, I'd say no.

Who needs to hear that?  

That is the stuff for meditation and private journaling.  

"When we tell the truth.

Maybe the hardest thing is thinking our lives 

are supposed to look different than how they look, 

that we are supposed  to look different than how we look."

This is something I practice, practice, practice.

Every time I find myself fussing about what is,

a little chime goes off....remimding me loving where I am

and what I have is the way to contentment.

"How much of ourselves are we willing to be?

Our gifts are hidden in what is hidden. "

This is where creating comes in I'm thinking...

revealing myself to myself and the world by making things...

to discover the intricate, hidden parts,

the good, the bad and the ugly.  To witness them without censure.

And be grateful for their complexity.

Namaste

 

Silent Teachers

I think of crows as quite noisy so I did some research. Here's AI's response:

 Crows generally fly silently when they are trying to avoid detection by predators, moving to a nesting site, or traveling to a communal roost in high-stakes situations.  While they are known for being loud,

social, and communicative, they are capable of becoming "absolutely silent" to avoid

drawing attention to themselves.

Tree's silence is something I'm gratefully familiar with although

I have heard them murmur and sometimes roar in wind...

I've also witnessed large bits of them flung to the ground,

and heard them creak with limbs rubbing close together.

"Then, I learned of silence from the soil that holds centuries 

of our suffering without a sound."

It holds suffering and astonishment in its silence;

and every other emotion humans live through.

It hold the remains of loved ones and a miraculous

world of activity...all in silence.

"like a field of dappled light in the quiet company

of each living mystery before me."

 

The Greatest Country on Earth

"Instead of ranking countries by happiness or wealth, 

by military might or the sum of our gross wasted products, 

we could perhaps study the conditions for gratitude, 

measure the impact of tenderness, map out the many ways to grieve, 

and how to yield with humility.

This is a breath of fresh air in today's offensive atmosphere.  

What if we could banish departments of war?

No need for trillion dollar defense budgets

 while people struggle to make a simple living.

My favorite phrase is: gross wasted products.

"We could abandon comparison for acts of compassion. . .

appraise all the ways to plant trees instead of judging beauty. . .

 how often we say thank you, and just how wide 

the aperture of awe holds us in reminder 

of the astounding possibility of being here at all."

My heart aches to live in a world where leaders

attend to the needs of the people rather than charging

out with their own ego-driven agenda.  

That is how I would like "here" to be. . .

in a land of mutual respect, decency, 

and consideration for all living creatures. 

That's not reality in this moment of time.

Yet, I can live my one miraculous life

bringing the world I want to exist into focus...

planting it deeply into my heart, 

breathing it into my body and out again,

practicing, practicing, practicing...

showing up and paying attention 

with kindness and curiosity;

forgiving myself and others when intentions go awry.

Inching the world I want to inhabit into reality

by acting as if it's already here.

Namaste

The Heavy

"We are carrying the heaviest things these days."

Everyone has their own brands of heavies,

 debilitated siblings in need of our care,

growing children requiring constant attention,

demanding jobs depleting our energy banks,

volunteers filling in the gaps others can't manage,

distruptions to our well laid plans,

our own illnesses or those of family members,

unforeseen calamities that must be addressed.

The list goes on.

"All of us staggered by the weight of cruelty

and meanness of a corrupt leader and his

minions in what we used to think of as

our country, the land of the free,

the home of the brave."

We don't know how long it will be

before a strong recalibration occurs.

It might be wise to condition ourselves

in case its a longer struggle than we foresee.

So let us, just for a moment, put down

the heavy, rest our arms, take a load off.

Let us write. . . today will be my peaceful day.

Then breathe mindfully, sending

kindness and compassion into the world.

Today will be my peaceful day...

belly breathe and relax the tight muscles

on guard against the barrage.

Concentrate on kindness and compassion.

Wherever we go, breathe it into the atmosphere.

It will feel like so little. It may look

like nothing. But, the monks would

tell you, it is everything to awaken

the peace that lives within us all.

May it be so...peace like a mighty river

moving anything obstructing its path 

with gentleness and determination.

We are moving this river with our 

neighborliness, our self care, 

and our big-heartedness.

Namaste'