A New Year: returning to the origin of things

And stepping into the new year, a pause beckons to us from the shadows. "Slow down!" it whispers, inviting us to sit quietly, our focus shifted inward, reaching into the center and returning us to what is real, to what is original. "Original has two meanings," writes John Berger in Our Faces, My Heart, Brief as Photos. "It means a return to the origin, the first which engendered everything that followed; and it means that which has never occurred before."

In this new silence, the world (for but a moment and forever) still, may we learn to hold these tensions -tensions between the first things and that which has never occurred before, between the past and the present, the distance from and longing for - side by side, in a way that is no longer contradictory.

A piece of inspiration I caught recently on Studio 360- Origin Lessons by Amy Bender. Have a listen:

Now I feel the tenderness to which the season rots

"Autumn teaches us that fruition is also death; that ripeness is a form of decay. The willows, having stood for so long near water, begin to rust...

...Today the sky is a wafer. Placed on my tongue, it is a wholeness that has already disintegrated; placed under the tongue, it makes my heart beat strongly enough to stretch myself over the winter brilliances to come. Now I feel the tenderness to which the season rots. Its defenselessness can no0 longer be corrupted. Death is its purity, its sweet mud..."

- Gretel Ehrlich, The Solace of Open Spaces

posted for Deb.

Here Inside My Heart

Last night, as I slept,
I dreamt--marvellous error!--
that it was God I had
here inside my heart
Antonio Machado

To Love and Let Go

These photos are dedicated to Jane, a dear friend and kindred spirit who passed away yesterday evening. She taught me to live in Joy and with Curiosity, always seeking Truth. With an armful of daffodils and grape hyacinth, I went to visit her yesterday afternoon, hoping to fill her with the scent of spring (how she loved the days of spring!).

I found her in much worse shape than I anticipated and left in sobs, sadness lingering over my heart.

Upon returning home, I grabbed my camera and settled onto my new ladybug tree swing, spinning circle after circle, imagining myself a whirling dervish, gently urging my heart to Love and to Let Go.

Jane would have liked to hear about my new ladybug tree swing.

Toward dusk I returned inside. Soon after, I received a phone call from my mother. Jane Clawson had passed away, a bouquet of daffodils resting on her chest. I'd like to think that her last breaths were sweet, gently carrying her across the threshold of her life and into the welcoming arms of an eternal Spring.

The Infinite: dancing from the tips of our fingers through the bottoms of our toes...

"Growth is a spiral process, doubling back on itself, reassessing and regrouping..." Julia Cameron

To live deep within your heart

A Franciscan Benediction:

May God bless you with DISCOMFORT at
easy answers, half-truths, and superficial
relationships so that you may live deep
within your heart.

May God bless you with ANGER at injustice,
oppression, and exploitation of people so that
you may work for justice, freedom and peace.

May God bless you with TEARS to shed for
those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation
and war so that you may reach out your hand
to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough FOOLISHNESS
to believe that you can make a difference in this world
so that you can DO what others claim cannot be done.

And a link that will touch your heart: the places we live

The bridge between

"What is this flooding me, childhood or manhood...

and the hunger that crosses the bridge between?"

Walt Whitman

In honor of those things wild and free...

What I remember by heart

This morning I rolled out of bed round five, threw on some layers and headed to the trail. Lily (my pup) and I climbed the overlook tower just as the sky began showing colors of pink. I lit three tea candles and stood wrapped in my orange hoody, breathing in this moment that once, so long ago, I had remembered by heart.

#51

throwing flowers against evil

#46

#29

#15

Startled by God

Not like

A lone beautiful bird

These poems now rise in great white flocks

Against my mind's vast hills

Startled by God

Breaking a branch

When His foot

Touches

Earth

Near

Me.

-Hafiz

#12

"And our faces, my heart, brief as photos..."

John Berger

#9

"stars flashing through our hearts"

#4

shifting

"I feel that strong emotion must leave its trace;

and it is only a question of discovering how we

can get ourselves again attached to it, so we shall

be able to live our lives through from the start."

-Virginia Woolf, A Sketch of the Past