Saturday, September 21, 2013

Permission to cast off?


Sea said "No!" to captain and crew looking out beyond Indian Island from inside Rockport Harbor.  Fog and wind were disappointed they had no one to toss about.
“A laugh’s the best answer to all that’s strange in life.” (2nd mate Stubb to 1st mate Starbuck in Moby Dick, film 1956)
Then, helm hard over, come about.

Find home.

Stand-hard or Sit-yard thinking

The unkind, the cynical, and the self-serving try to convince us, "We should be used every day in this world."

The compassionate, the kindly, and the generous sit quietly, saying nothing, attending to the world.

Pay no mind to loud voices with shifty smiles.

Be the becoming transforming world with patient presence.


This is work that is alive,  
Effervescent, free, liberated,  
Gloriously enlightened, true,  
And great.  
Do you think it can be attained 
By people who shut the door 
And sit quietly with blank minds?  
-- Liu I-Ming (b.1737)
Yeah, actually, I do.

You see, the door and the blankness are working very diligently to teach us the mood of effortless engagement without ego.

Friday, September 20, 2013

Break it, take this

How we long to unowned the world!


   ROMEO
68   Art thou so bare and full of wretchedness, 
69   And fear'st to die? Famine is in thy cheeks,  
70   Need and oppression starveth in thine eyes,  
71   Contempt and beggary hangs upon thy back; 
72   The world is not thy friend nor the world's law;  
73   The world affords no law to make thee rich; 
74   Then be not poor, but break it, and take this. 
(Act 5, Scene1, Romeo and Juliet, wm shakespeare)
"It" is no longer it.

"This" is now this.

The world resides within nothing other.

Completing itself without ownership.

Thursday, September 19, 2013

no nest protecting mediocrity


Who'd'a'thunk?
Pope Francis, in the first extensive interview of his six-month-old papacy, said that the Roman Catholic church had grown “obsessed” with preaching about abortion, gay marriage and contraception, and that he has chosen not to speak of those issues despite recriminations from some critics.  

In remarkably blunt language, Francis sought to set a new tone for the church, saying it should be a “home for all” and not a “small chapel” focused on doctrine, orthodoxy and a limited agenda of moral teachings.  
... “This church with which we should be thinking is the home of all, not a small chapel that can hold only a small group of selected people,” he said. “We must not reduce the bosom of the universal church to a nest protecting our mediocrity.”  
(--from New York Times, re. Pope Francis)  
Our quasi-buddhist, semi-episcopalian, cranky Lincolnville bedraggled hermit friend, SSH, loves Francis. "I'm one of his biggest fans." (No chance, in hell, nevertheless, her becoming a catholic.) She's all, "I pray to him." ("Give me a break!" I say.) "I don't give a sh*t what you think about my praying to him," she says. "I don't give a rat's ass at my age," with concluding laughter.


Another civilized Thursday Morning Hospitality at meetingbrook. 

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

comes midnight


What a lovely moon!

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

So; much: lighter


A man writes cancer has spread to his liver. He will cancel surgery scheduled to obviate and forestall. 

"Like anything unwanted, carrying this news feels heavy and burdensome. It feels so much lighter to accept it, turn it over, and breathe fresh air. The sea, the beauty of the land, and the love of my friends in Nova Scotia have nourished me to stand straight, look at reality face to face, and claim my health and wholeness."     (His words; 16sept13.)

Correspondences present us with choices.
To face—with open hands—armed, shielded, gas-masked riot police is the greatest form of courage. Non-violence is how you expose the violence of the system, and not seeing as “other” those charged with carrying out physical violence is how you communicate with them directly.     (-- Paul Hawken, from "Upsurge"
http://www.tricycle.com/feature/upsurge
Dawn.

Praying itself.

As this.

Realizing itself.

Monday, September 16, 2013

Morning seminar

Coming to order.




Of course there's always a late arriver.

Pensée Universelle

I want to see
Love grow in me
Through this.
                       (merton bookshed,15sept2013, edited, nunc ipsum)


This pensée arrives in midst a universal plea as unseen mystery shining light across path before us.

Sunday, September 15, 2013

The tears in things

The roots were stronger.


Anonymous Four sings Sweet Hour of Prayer as mountain brook outside yurt makes tumbling turn toward Hosmer Pond. It is that hour on that day when, bidden or unbidden, sounds of beckoning transcendence call to quiet hearts.


Skittering shadows of stretching morning sun call from over stirring hills and wooded dampness as dogs' collar tags tell approach of sweet company chiding stealth ascent past outhouse and path debris of recent storm.


AFTER THE DIAGNOSIS


No remembering now   

When the apple sapling was blown

Almost out of the ground. 
No telling how, 
With all the other trees around, 
It alone was struck. 
It must have been luck, 
He thought for years, so close 
To the house it grew. 
It must have been night. 
Change is a thing one sleeps through 
When young, and he was young. 
If there was a weakness in the earth, 
A give he went down on his knees 
To find and feel the limits of, 
There is no longer. 
If there was one random blow from above 
The way he’s come to know 
From years in this place, 
The roots were stronger. 
Whatever the case, 
He has watched this tree survive 
Wind ripping at his roof for nights 
On end, heats and blights 
That left little else alive. 
No remembering now… 
A day’s changes mean all to him 
And all days come down 
To one clear pane 
Through which he sees 
Among all the other trees 
This leaning, clenched, unyielding one 
That seems cast 
In the form of a blast 
That would have killed it, 
As if something at the heart of things, 
And with the heart of things, 
Had willed it. 
(--from every riven thing, by Christian Wiman)

What entrances about screen doors is the enchantment of what is presented with inside out outside in.


Ours has a tear.