The kind people at end of harbor said no to our inquiry about a space for meetingbrook. It is not always easy to smile back at God.
Our death is our wedding with eternity.
What is the secret? "God is One."
The sunlight splits when entering the windows of the house.
This multiplicity exists in the cluster of grapes;
It is not in the juice made from the grapes.
For he who is living in the Light of God,
The death of the carnal soul is a blessing.
Regarding him, say neither bad nor good,
For he is gone beyond the good and the bad.
Fix your eyes on God and do not talk about what is invisible,
So that he may place another look in your eyes.
It is in the vision of the physical eyes
That no invisible or secret thing exists.
But when the eye is turned toward the Light of God
What thing could remain hidden under such a Light?
Although all lights emanate from the Divine Light
Don't call all these lights "the Light of God";
It is the eternal light which is the Light of God,
The ephemeral light is an attribute of the body and the flesh.
...Oh God who gives the grace of vision!
The bird of vision is flying towards You with the wings of desire.
(Rumi, Mystic Odes 833)
One by one they come in and say how badly they feel we are losing our lease. Like the uncertainty of a wake there's an awkwardness -- even if you consider the one dead to have been foolish and irresponsible, you realize that someone in earshot might have loved them. We're chastened by the unexplainable aspect of love.
The Guests
by Leonard Cohen
One by one, the guests arrive
The guests are coming through
The open-hearted many
The broken-hearted few
And no one knows where the night is going
And no one knows why the wine is flowing
Oh love I need you
I need you
I need you
I need you
Oh . . . I need you now
And those who dance, begin to dance
Those who weep begin
And "Welcome, welcome" cries a voice
"Let all my guests come in."
And no one knows where the night is going ...
And all go stumbling through that house
in lonely secrecy
Saying "Do reveal yourself"
or "Why has thou forsaken me?"
And no one knows where the night is going ...
All at once the torches flare
The inner door flies open
One by one they enter there
In every style of passion
And no one knows where the night is going ...
And here they take their sweet repast
While house and grounds dissolve
And one by one the guests are cast
Beyond the garden wall
And no one knows where the night is going ...
Those who dance, begin to dance
Those who weep begin
Those who earnestly are lost
Are lost and lost again
And no one knows where the night is going ...
One by one the guests arrive
The guests are coming through
The broken-hearted many
The open-hearted few
And no one knows where the night is going ...
(--Poem/song, The Guests, music and lyrics by Leonard Cohen)
Saskia says maybe we should contact the brother of our landlord who lives down under who's buying the cape and setting us loose. We laugh. Another deathbed conversion? We remember Nishitani's observation that when loss occurs the immediate response of the Western dualistic mind is to find substitute and replacement and go running back instead of allowing the all into radical emptiness, absolute nihility, and the becoming itself of itself.
A woman by back door sketched a woodblock depiction of three crosses as five of us read Rumi, Yeats, Rilke, Oliver, Strand, and personal creations.
A woman taking Catholic instruction says it was the Benedictine hospitality and open acceptance of the place that inched her to consider the path she is on.
A man who lives in war stories talks when no one else is around about the closer issues of his life. No footlights, only bare bulb on empty stage.
We'll be fine.
All of us.
For a while.
But then...
That's all there is.
Unless, of course, you consider the invisible to be the visible hiding in plain sight.
Fog drips from everything
I love
this morning in Maine.
(--wfh)
The woman turns to ascend the stair. She is singing the words, "Now is the time!"
We drive to Belfast to see what Fr. Joe has to say about the miracle and the guest no one understands nor anyone doesn't see.