Guest arrives to stay in bookshed/retreat.

I row beyond Curtis Island this sunny very warm October day after morning meditation practice. In evening when bright moon illuminates road and snow bowl field I walk for an hour in the lingering warm moonlight beside Hosmer Pond. Then listen to Compline in cabin sitting in stillness as the Shema is recited on this holy day.

The world holds beauty and sorrow in wide embrace.

Climbing Green-Cliff Mountain

Taking a little food, a light walking-stick,
I wander up to my home in quiet mystery,
The path along streams winding far away
Onto ridgetops, no end to this wonder at
Slow waters silent in their frozen beauty
And bamboo glistening at heart with frost,
Cascades scattering a confusion of spray
And broad forests crowding distant cliffs.

Thinking it's moonrise I see in the west
And sunset I'm watching blaze in the east,
I hike on until dark, then linger out night
Sheltered away in deep expanses of shadow.

Immune to high importance: that's renown.
Walk humbly and it's all promise in beauty,
For in quiet mystery the way runs smooth,
Ascending remote heights beyond compare.

Utter tranquility, the distinction between
"Yes this" and "no that" lost, I embrace primal
Unity, thought and silence woven together,
That deep healing where we venture forth.
- Hsieh Ling-yun (385-433)

When we are quiet there is no one not visiting in attendance to our receptive hospitality. Maybe that explains why we shun silence.

Tonight, no shunning.

Every one is here.

As God is.

Here.

Listen!

The call to prayer.

Let's be at one. It is the day of at-one-ment.

It's objective and it's scientific.

You can call it God if you want, but you don’t have to. Quantum consciousness will do. Nonlocality, tangled hierarchy, and discontinuity: these signatures of quantum consciousness have been independently verified by leading researchers worldwide. This experimental data and its conclusions inform us that it is the mistaken materialist view that is at the center of most of our worlds problems today. To address these problems, we now have a science of spirituality that is fully verifiable and objective.
(--Amit Goswami, PhD, Quantum Physicist)

As a Jew, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Shinto, Buddhist, Pagan, Atheist, Agnostic, all the above/none of the above -- I greet the night, the day, and the handing off of one to the other with nothing lost, nothing gained. As it is -- all and each in each and all.

It's time to walk our talk.

More than just theory, quantum activism is the moral compass of quantum physics that helps us to actually transform our lives and society.

’So let’s walk our talk, and make brain circuits of positive emotions. We just do it. We practice. Let some of us be good, do good. Be with God some of the time, be in the ego some of the time, and let the dance generate creative acts of transformation. With this resolution, with this objective in mind, I invite you to become Quantum Activists.’
(--Amit Goswami, http://www.amitgoswami.org/)

Morning in prison talking the moral conundrums of honoring life. Afternoon with circle of 80/90 year old companions reading poetry and marvelling at the revelations and disguises of words.

I am so grateful.

More than that.

I've eaten too many cookies.

Ten years.

War.

Afghanistan.

Amidst a thousand clouds and ten
Thousand streams there lives
One ex-scholar.
By day wandering these green mountains;
At night coming home to sleep
Beneath a cliff.
Suddenly spring and fall have
Already passed by,
And no dust has piled up to disturb
This stillness.
Such happiness!
What do I depend on?
Here it's as tranquil as autumn river water.
- Han-shan

Let's stop choosing death and destruction. Let's choose poetry and creative spirit.

There's a deeper conflict we seldom attend to. A struggle within human beings, a longing for community, prayer, and common respect.

Not war.

Thanks Steve.
You were a really big deal.
Apple to the core.

Sitting at dawn in chapel/zendo in silence. Feast of Francis. Mass at OLGH. Back in cabin at dusk for office of readings and vespers. Candlelight.

Walking this afternoon after reading about consciousness for course in car in rain by Rockport Harbor, I feel I could fall right there. And I wonder: Am I ready? Sure. What else is there?

plato told
him:he couldn't 

believe it(jesus

told him;he
wouldn't believe
itlao

tsze
certainly told
him,and general
(yes

mam)
sherman;
and even
(believe it
or

not)you
told him:i told
him;we told him
(he didn't believe it,no

sir)it took
a nipponized bit of
the old sixth

avenue
el;in the top of his head:to tell

him

(-e. e. cummings)

There is, it seems, a tenuousness about.

We, the world, seem...uncertain.

 I heard the words from the gospel story said before communion as: "Only say the world and I shall be healed." Yes, I think, let's try that!

 

It's all an empty boat, oars dangling free,
but return goes on without end. The year
begins, and suddenly, in a moment’s glance,
midyear stars come back around, bright
sun and moon bringing all things to such abundance.
North woods lush, blossoming,
rain falls in season from hallowed depths.
Dawn opens. Summer breezes rise.
No one comes into this world without leaving soon.
It's our inner pattern, which never falters.
At home here in what lasts, I wait out life.
A bent arm my pillow, I keep empty whole.
Follow change through rough and smooth,
and life's never up or down.
If you can see how much height fills whatever you do,
why climb Hua or Sung, peaks of immortality?
- T'ao Ch’'en (365-427)

My daily prayer is: Thank you for bringing me here!

Then, T'ao Ch'en's words: "At home here in what lasts, I wait out life."

To all my Franciscan ancestors and companieros -- Buona fortuna!

Transitus.

Going through earth to God.

 

Chapter VIII
How Saint Francis, walking one day with brother Leo, explained to him what things are perfect joy.

One day in winter, as Saint Francis was going with Brother Leo from Perugia to Saint Mary of the Angels, and was suffering greatly from the cold, he called to Brother Leo, who was walking on before him, and said to him: "Brother Leo, if it were to please God that the Friars Minor should give, in all lands, a great example of holiness and edification, write down, and note carefully, that this would not be perfect joy." A little further on, Saint Francis called to him a second time: "O Brother Leo, if the Friars Minor were to make the lame to walk, if they should make straight the crooked, chase away demons, give sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb, and, what is even a far greater work, if they should raise the dead after four days, write that this would not be perfect joy." Shortly after, he cried out again: "O Brother Leo, if the Friars Minor knew all languages; if they were versed in all science; if they could explain all Scripture; if they had the gift of prophecy, and could reveal, not only all future things, but likewise the secrets of all consciences and all souls, write that this would not be perfect joy." After proceeding a few steps farther, he cried out again with a loud voice: "O Brother Leo, thou little lamb of God! if the Friars Minor could speak with the tongues of angels; if they could explain the course of the stars; if they knew the virtues of all plants; if all the treasures of the earth were revealed to them; if they were acquainted with the various qualities of all birds, of all fish, of all animals, of men, of trees, of stones, of roots, and of waters - write that this would not be perfect joy." Shortly after, he cried out again: "O Brother Leo, if the Friars Minor had the gift of preaching so as to convert all infidels to the faith of Christ, write that this would not be perfect joy." Now when this manner of discourse had lasted for the space of two miles, Brother Leo wondered much within himself; and, questioning the saint, he said: "Father, I pray thee teach me wherein is perfect joy." Saint Francis answered: "If, when we shall arrive at Saint Mary of the Angels, all drenched with rain and trembling with cold, all covered with mud and exhausted from hunger; if, when we knock at the convent-gate, the porter should come angrily and ask us who we are; if, after we have told him, `We are two of the brethren', he should answer angrily, `What ye say is not the truth; ye are but two impostors going about to deceive the world, and take away the alms of the poor; begone I say'; if then he refuse to open to us, and leave us outside, exposed to the snow and rain, suffering from cold and hunger till nightfall - then, if we accept such injustice, such cruelty and such contempt with patience, without being ruffled and without murmuring, believing with humility and charity that the porter really knows us, and that it is God who maketh him to speak thus against us, write down, O Brother Leo, that this is perfect joy. And if we knock again, and the porter come out in anger to drive us away with oaths and blows, as if we were vile impostors, saying, `Begone, miserable robbers! to to the hospital, for here you shall neither eat nor sleep!' - and if we accept all this with patience, with joy, and with charity, O Brother Leo, write that this indeed is perfect joy. And if, urged by cold and hunger, we knock again, calling to the porter and entreating him with many tears to open to us and give us shelter, for the love of God, and if he come out more angry than before, exclaiming, `These are but importunate rascals, I will deal with them as they deserve'; and taking a knotted stick, he seize us by the hood, throwing us on the ground, rolling us in the snow, and shall beat and wound us with the knots in the stick - if we bear all these injuries with patience and joy, thinking of the sufferings of our Blessed Lord, which we would share out of love for him, write, O Brother Leo, that here, finally, is perfect joy. And now, brother, listen to the conclusion. Above all the graces and all the gifts of the Holy Spirit which Christ grants to his friends, is the grace of overcoming oneself, and accepting willingly, out of love for Christ, all suffering, injury, discomfort and contempt; for in all other gifts of God we cannot glory, seeing they proceed not from ourselves but from God, according to the words of the Apostle, `What hast thou that thou hast not received from God? and if thou hast received it, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it?' But in the cross of tribulation and affliction we may glory, because, as the Apostle says again, `I will not glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.' Amen." 

To the praise and glory of Jesus Christ and his poor servant Francis. Amen. 

(--from Chapter VIII of the Fioretti, THE LITTLE FLOWERS OF SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI)

Mirroring the passage each makes with Christ through the realization of what is human, the realization of heaven through earth beyond suffering.

The requirement is love.

The gift is love.

As it is given.

So, it is received.

In perfect joy.

Maybe I do have one watching over me.

Angel of God,
my guardian dear,
to whom God's love commits me here,
ever this day,
be at my side
to light and guard,
to rule and guide. 

(catholic - prayer to the guardian angel)

Maybe becoming Christ mirroring the life of God in the world is the call of holiness.

Tonight I feel heavy with dampness and soaking rain.

But it is October.

Month of Francis.

A good man.