When The World Is On Fire

This is exquisitely challenging encourgement for this time.

"Douse every angry conversation with unexpected kindness."

I hope with every fiber of my being I can find 

what it requires to do this.  

Anger is hard for me to respond to because

it jangles all the alarm bells within me and 

ignites a blast of defensiveness rather than kindness. 

"Flow gently through the streets where people

have grown hard because they are sad and 

sad because they are tired and tired because

they are breaking."

This is soft rebellion. 

Hope is what softens us and

 softens those around us.

"Flood the earth with goodness.

Without asking who deserves it."

This is a extremely difficult in light

of cruel and vindictive behavior.

It requires vast amounts of 

almost hopeless mercy 

and mutual respect 

the size of the universe.

(Emphasis on mutual.)

"When the world is on fire, be water."

Be the river...

Namaste'

 

Fly Away

I suspect we've all felt the desire to fly away.

There are any number of reasons one might want to.

"You are here because your life is still so full

of gold and grace and holding on."  

We thrive on the gold and the grace when 

things are so hard all we want is to escape.

I swear, if I had any say in it, life would

not be so hard.  It seems to me a truly benevolent

creator would give us a world without meanness.

And yet..."as hard as it gets, be still and know,

the world is more beautiful with you inside it". . .

you're the antivenin to meanness.

Namaste'

Because The World Is In Need of Mercy

This is the kind of gentle, quiet beauty that sends chills 

starting in my bones and spreading through my skin cells.

"Because I am in awe of her silk-spun funnel like a gossamer tent

cascading over a green metal trowel."

How can we not marvel at the magnificence 

contained in a garden glove?  

As well as the human who notices

and shares such a splendid description

for the rest of us hurrying folks who

might miss the wonder?

I want to be like the spider...

"gathering raindrops and sweeping away 

winged seeds after a storm."

Whatever the human equivalent of this might be.

Recognizing how briefly I am here

and how swiftly I will be gone.

Namaste'

 

One Of The Worst Storms

This feels so timely, right now.

Even as dreary feelings assail me in weaker moments.

"Each drop whispered, you don't have to be much;

you just can't quit."

So I'm shoring up the banks of my inner river and continuing

to do whatever I can, no matter how small 

and ineffective it feels. 

I will not quit.

There's always a way.

May we each find ours 

and travel it with grace 

and soft, defiant, determined dignity.

Namaste'

 

Gratitude

With these words, I'm picking up my 

"flashlight with half-dead batteries" and heading out.

Hope has been described in a similar fashion.

Neither comes easy...especially in gruesome circumstances.

I will say, gratitude has realigned my thoughts

more times than I can count.

It marches in when I'm feeling sorry for myself

and sorts things out with quick efficiency.

Although, I still pitch a fit for a minute or five

when things go awry.  

I believe we deserve a cuss or a curse in fleeting moments of mayhem.

And considerably more in tragic happenings.

It requires deep, deep digging to find any sliver of gratitude then.

My heart goes out to those in the midst of these.

My "hope" is for each of us to find exactly what we need,

when we need it, to make our way, even with stumbling baby steps, 

through the rubble and the riches of our one precious life.

Namaste'

 

With The Stones of Our Stories

"Every day, the heart finds a new way to ache."

I knew humans could be cruel from books I've read about the past,

and places far away.  I'm now experiencing it nearby in real time.

It's not exaggerating to say I ache all over.

"Every day, our most sacred selves try to build a stone wall

around the heart, as if to keep the ache away."

I don't know about you, but I'm gathering stones

as big as coffee tables to distract and deny the hurt in my heart.

I'm not sure my "most sacred self" is ready to 

"dismantle the wall".  And yet, if you were to ask me

what is the one thing I wish I could do, it would be

to build bridges across the divides where folks

from all sides can dwell with decency, respect and equality,

and cruelty would be no more.

Namaste'

 

And When Your Time

"I hope [we} leave this world with a heart that is worn out and tender all over, 

with a heart that aches from loving, and feeling, and caring in the best way possible."

Does being "civilized" numb us from feeling all the vast sensations

that pass through us as we make our way?

Does the sheer volume of images and words we are presented with anesthetize us,

causing us to detach from our own humanity?

The capability for humans to behave in vicious, cruel ways 

has stunned and appalled me since I was a child reading about martyrs.

How do I keep ourself vulnerable enough to live from the center of my heart?

The thought of it exhausts me, yet it is how I want to live my life.

"I hope you leave this world knowing that you poured hope into everything you did..."

I have enormous gratitude for those people who remain hopeful

even when everything around us seems to say otherwise.

If it were possible, I would eagerly take transfusions from them regularly.

I wish things like respect and decency could be administered in the same fashion.

May we continue to let our hearts be open and soft...fierce and resilient.

May those who are soul damaged find whatever medicine is needed to heal

their brokenness and transform their behavior.

Those of us seeking true justice and dignity for all will prevail!

Namaste'

 

Defend Your Heart

This entire quote could be a list of how to stay sane, don't you think?

* Keep my heart open no matter what is happening around me?

Talk about vulnerable, right? I get nervous when I think of this yet,

I know its the way to go but that doesn't make it any easier.

 * Forgive myself first so then I can be forgiving of others?
This is no small feat, although I am getting better at remembering

that forgiving myself is important no matter how much cringe/shame I feel.

 * "Slow down - taste and touch and feel and care?"
A long way to go in this department.  I seem to be programmed for rushing.

I'm doing my best to change that.

  * Creating what I want to see in this world, and staying curious?
It's so easy to mirror what is already here and what is here 

these days on the public stage and in much of the media is decidedly

not what I want to see in this world.  It takes effort to disconnect from

fear and dismay and concentrate on bravery and changing the tone.

* Honouring my joy, and not shying away from the good that is trying to reach me 

—and convincing myself  that I am  worthy of it"?

Whoa!  This is where things require intense scrutiny on the inner plain...the outdated

scripts have hummed so long and are so deeply rooted that repotting them takes real effort.

* "Strong enough to be gentle? Brave enough to break?"
I'm ok with being gentle most of the time.  Am I brave enough to break?

I tell myself I am, but I wonder how that will hold up in a moment of reckoning?

* "Being all that I can be"?  

I don't see any way to avoid that! 

I am who I am for better or worse, thank you very much.

Namaste'

 

Maybe In Another Lifetime

Fighting is a word I avoid.

I much prefer the word "cherish",

or "treasure", or "defend".

"So please, just cherish the things 

that crack light into our life. 

Treasure the things that soften [us].""

When pondering the cracks of light in my life,

and the things that soften me,

I am greeted with an embarrassment of bounty.

What are you greeted with?

"Protect the people [we] love, leave them better than [we] found them."

I gather these words to my heart and renew my vow...

to be present, to praise, to appreciate, to cheer for

those who I have the privilege of loving in this one precious life.

With that, I sincerely hope I leave them better than I found them.

For that is the purpose of a lifetime, I'm thinking.

Namaste'

 

The Rage You Are Feeling

 "[We] have known hope and joy and kindness

like [we} have known water."

Drink deeply of those moments and the memories.

Make more of them. Notice their frequency.

"Justice is a river that demands [we]

not give up on it."

We must not give up on justice, (or the river)

though it lies shreaded to bits,
longing to be woven whole again.

It still breathes among the broken pieces.

"The rage [we] are feeling comes 

from the same place inside [our] heart

as the love."

I tend to shy away from the rage...

in fear of losing control to it

and saying or doing something irreparable.

It is a mighty power to be conducted wisely.

I don't know how to do that...

yet.

May I/we find the way to  transmute

the energy of rage into goodness.

Namaste'

When We Drop Fear

 bell knew what she was talking about.

"Dropping fear" is no small feat these days.

It is being used as a weapon of domination

which also means we are in fertile territory

to practice dropping it.

Fear is contagious but fortunately so is bravery.

So is joy.

So is decency.

Giving in to fear is not an option.

We can do this. 

We are doing this.

Namaste'

We're Full of Seasons

"Those tiny big feelings we tend have a funny way 

of shaping the world we wake up in."

Isn't this a delicious way of saying

thoughts matter?

"I like to think of each of us as a walking library."

All our thoughts and ideas, our loves, memories, dreams,

unspoken desires, passions, as yet unrealized hopes,

people and events we've forgotten and imagined, all there resting inside 

available for review.

"...those stories we never open, they don't vanish.

They somehow pile up, shaping who we are, even if we might

never fully understand."

Who are the characters visiting our library...

the inner companions accompanying our way?

What stories are being written as we live out our days?

Namaste'

 

The Tug of Autumn

"I would like to be wiser, calmer,  more at home in the world."

A large a(wo)men to this statement.

The world these days reminds me of 

walking through one of those haunted houses

at the state fair where every turn contained 

something designed to be terrifying popping out 

to frighten the wits out of my young self.

"I'd like to give my days the delighted artfulness

of courtship, merging, lingering, bearing witness, offering praise."

I believe sanity lies in this strategy. 

Courtship was an interesting choice of words as it suggests

a period of time to get to know another to assess marriage compatability.

If you think about it, aren't we are already married...

to ourselves, in particular, as well as to the world, for better or worse?

Let's make it better AND worse and focus on better.

Merging, lingering, bearing witness and offering praise

speak to taking it slowly, tenderly and with awareness...

to lessen the need to rush...why do we do that?

"I want to hold what holds us."

This is where words fail me.

There is simply no adequate way to

describe this sense of being accompanied

by an unnameable presence.

Not only holding us but knitting us

together on our inside terrain as well

as our outside landscape. 

Most evident in the intricate earthen beauty 

we so often take for granted.

Namaste'

 

At One Point

A taste of spring as autumn arrives.

"Only in springtime, it seemed,  does gravity work backward here, 

the dandelion pollen rising in great squalls,

 the flower buds shooting up, further from the ground, 

as if pulled by the sky's sudden need for them..."

Love this idea of gravity working backwards.

 There's also something beguiling about the 

fragile delicacy of pollen and flower buds,

opposing the power of gravity.

It makes me think of dandelion 

and milkweed "fluff" rising up

with their cargo of seed at this time of year,

letting the energy of the wind deposit them

wherever they land.    

This piqued my curiosity:  Other plants that disperse seeds on fluff, similar to dandelions and milkweed, include cattails, cottonwood trees, asters, thistles, goldenrods, willows, and salsify. 

These plants, often in the aster family (Asteraceae), develop a fluffy, parachute-like structure called a pappus that catches the wind, allowing their seeds to be carried to new locations.  

I got a wee taste of what it must feel like for the fluff and the seeds

to be picked up and taken away just off the coast of Ireland in Kerry recently.  

I was holding onto fence posts for dear life as the mighty wind threatened to carry me aloft!! 

Namaste' 

 

Words Cast Spells

I love this thought!

As "ripened" as I am, I never put spelling, 

as in spelling with ABC's, with casting a spell.  

An enticing perspective.

Here's someone casting a stunning spell, in my opinion.

Namaste'

 

Dear Mr. Whitman

"Any singer knows being louder just makes discord, and harmony

needs constant attunement to every other singer."

How many of us live in "constant attunement to every other singer?"

My first response is "Who out there is singing?"  

Those are the ones I want to attune to.

I especially love,

"I want to hear America listening."

And even more

"I want a new song that begins with a silence that stretches

from sea to sea—like the silence right before the curtains part

when the whole body leans in to wonder what comes next."

Aren't millions of us doing this?  Individuals doing everything

we can to listen and understand so we can "do something" 

to participate in creating a new song?  

"And when the many parts do arise, glorious in their differences,

I want to hear inside them the careful attention that tunes

them to each other, I want to hear in our song the deep listening

that makes even dissonance beautiful."

Dare I say, it seems we were on our way to this...

listening to each other, respecting each other's point of view,

learning from those who were different, allowing for respectful dissonance,

expanding our understanding of our world and each other, 

admitting our mistakes and doing what we could to correct them,

Many of us were doing our best to embrace diversity, 

working for true equality, and being inclusive?

Isn't this what we're still doing? 

Isn't that what makes our singing glorious?

I'm listening.  Keep on singing!

Namaste'

 

Midsummer-Eve

 

Midlife

 

Lady Liberty

 

Holocaust

 

Empire of Chaos

 

Child Of Our Times

 

Cure Is Needed

 

As I Contemplate Precarity

"Each moment is an invitation extended for an instant--"

Isn't this the truth of "our one precious life"?

"Life moves through me, asking me in,

opening the present like a window."

A window opening up to landscapes...

both inside and outside of us.

What is real which is magnificent

and what we imagine which can be even

more magnificent.

Layer upon layer of potential for 

gratitude and goodness...recognizing

the bounty we take for granted.

We can be "tender with ourselves".

Making room for all our humanness....

what hurts entwined with what helps.

Full with the "wildly, messy,"

extravagant beauty of who we are.

Namaste'

PS: There will be a break in the pattern over the next days. I'm going on a treasure of a trip with my three grown daughters.  Poems by Irish poets will be posted on the blog which you can reach by going here https://dailythoughtsmatter.blogspot.com/. 

May your days be filled with wild and messy beauty and an embarrassment of joy in this crazy, mixed up world. 

 

The Words You Bury Inside Your Head

It's also possible for words someone else says

to get buried in your head.  Those are the ones

we must be on the look out for to be sure they're

extinguished if they're not ones we can blossom with.

It's more than ok to have a blow torch on hand

to transform the rot into vapor.

Blossom away my friends, blossom away.

Namaste'

 

 

We Begin To Find

What a spectacularly joyous way to begin the week.

I'm going to put it on repeat and visit it every day upon waking.

Carry it with me vibrating on my skin and in my hair.

Always remember. Never forget.  

Always Remember. Never Forget.

Namaste'

 

In The Airport

"Could they ever be enough, these stumbling attempts to

bring kindness into the world?"

A question I suspect we are all asking ourself these days.

We believe this as we stretch beyond the end of our rope

 to remain sane and decent humans.

We are being called to reach into the furthest corners

of our souls to trust this is so...to act as if it matters.

Because it does.  I am convinced it does.

We are in the trenches feeling the barrage of 

a cruel type of artillery...witnessing ghastly injustices

being perpetrated in our name;

yet we are standing up and fighting back.

Together, we are finding our way

 to vanquish the wrongdoing.

We must hold fast to our resolve

and continue to resist.

We can do this...we are doing this.

We may feel small and insignificant

but we are mighty in our determination.

Thank you for your efforts on behalf

of decency and dignity for all.

Namaste'

 

In Passing

"as if what exists, exists so that it can be lost

and become precious."

I've read over this many, many times

debating whether I want to engage.

I decided to give it a go.

"the closed bud shrugs off its special mystery

in order to break into blossom."

How many of us hover in this closed bud stage?

Is the "special mystery" waiting to be shrugged off,

 the idea we must meet some standard of perfection,

imposed by some tyrannical criteria someone else designates,

before we can "break into blossom"?

I'm all in on shrugging that off vigorously.

 What I'm highly resistant to is the thought

that something or someone must be lost 

in order to become precious.

Am I simply in denial about reality?

Everything and everyone is in the process of becoming lost.

I'd like to think we have the power to make

them precious before they depart.

This is all so briefly gorgeous.

Namaste'

 

Swaddling The Sorrow

“because when something feels safe enough to be what it is, 

it can't help but lift, drift, 

can't help but slip into something 

more comfortable.”

Letting things be what they are

is the key, I’m thinking.

Even when they’re super

uncomfortable, painful ,

irritating, unwelcome.

I love the idea of swaddling

the sorrow.  

Like a crying newborn...

vulnerable and full of misery 

that cannot be explained.  

Swaddle and rock...

swaddle and rock.

It comforts both the participants.

Namaste’

 

Briefly Gorgeous

Who decides what's/who's gorgeous?  And who designates how long?

"This feels like a highly subjective and judgmental viewpoint",

she says judgmentally and subjectively.

How about if everyone and everything is gorgeous?

Then no one would have to hunt anything or anyone.

With beauty everywhere, wouldn't we only need to open our eyes to see

and become intoxicated with the spirits of gorgeousness?

Namaste'

 

What Comes Next?

"War comes so quickly.  Peace comes so slow."

Why is this?  You can't tell me the first time a human

kills another human, they don't have a monumental shift of perspective.

Why can't it stop at that moment? (I know I'm being unrealistic, but, still?)

Why can't we express our discontent and return to a place of peace

as quickly as the violence erupts? 

Why do we get stuck in the horror of war? 

"I want to believe there's a place in all of us where hate won't grow."

I have planted countless seeds that did not grow.  

Why can't hate be one of those??

"I want to feed that place in myself. 

 I want to listen to that place in you."

Yes.

Yes.

Please and thank you.

Humanity has to find our wisdom and our decency.

We have too much evidence of what cruelty and violence can do

not to learn and grow and act accordingly.

I believe with every cell in my body there is a way.

Namaste'

 

Always Remember

"Just the way you are is undeniably beautiful."

In this often cynical world, we must gather and hold this thought close.

Carry it with us everywhere...wear it like we wear our skin.

This seems like a fitting quote to take into the long weekend.

Namaste'