The Unfathomable Deep - Edward Thomas

I have come to the borders of sleep,
The unfathomable deep 
Forest where all must lose
Their way, however straight,
Or winding, soon or late;
They cannot choose.

Many a road and track
That, since the dawn's first crack,
Up to the forest brink,
Deceived the travelers,
Suddenly now blurs,
And in they sink.

Here love ends,
Despair, ambition ends,
All pleasure and all trouble,
Although most sweet or bitter,
Here ends in sleep that is sweeter
Than tasks most noble.

There is not any book
Or face of dearest look
That I would not turn from now
To go into the unknown
I must enter and leave alone
I know not how.

The tall forest towers;
its cloudy foliage lowers
Ahead, shelf above shelf;
Its silence I hear and obey
That I may lose my way
And myself.

Edward Thomas
1878-1917

with thanks to Death Deconstructed

~

Photo by Cate Kerr
Beyond the Fields We Know

 

The Loom of Creation - Ginny Lonsdale

called out
sung into being
through the loom of creation
dipped
coloured
immersed
kneaded
patterned
woven again

re-woven
I
came to Be, HERE.

Somewhere, along the
colour, spin and weave
of YOUR material story,
I remembered:

it is YOU

singing and breathing me.

- the rapture and exultation,
ardent love for YOU,
the treasure of your earth,
tears of joy outpour from a heart
filled with gratitude and wonder
for the privilege of being called forth,
to take a place HERE.
it is Our joy to hug and welcome each other.
Why not love
that which you have made?

it is Our joy to hold hands and dance.
Why not love
that which breathes me, adores me?

it is Our unity
that allows me to disrobe
and live in your clearing

HERE...

I am enfolded in your eternal embrace
naked and secure
in Your immeasurable Peace.

[.....]

Ginny Lonsdale

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
Light shining in sink :)

 

Fly With Me - Amata Goldie

Fly with me, to the horizon of eternity

Let us cast away our mortal suits

Let us fly into the divinity

Of who we truly are.

Come and fall into my embrace,

Only the Holy can reach us here

And the demands of tomorrow shall disappear

Into the continuum of time forgotten

Follow me into the light of your longing

The desert of your soul is parched Beloved

Turn away from it all,

In surrender to the Holy,

To the pulse of your immortality.

Do you hear your soul humming?

Come, unfurl your petals of purity.

Turn now, towards only the light.

Come and fall into my embrace,

Only the Holy can reach us here.

Fly with me to the horizon of eternity.

Let us taste once again

The jewel of Love that we are.

Amata Goldie

with thanks to No Mind's Land

Photo from the Internet

 

A Prayer...

Call my name...  Call my name...

My unborn name...

The name that only You know...

When I danced with the unnamed stars
and unknown galaxies...

Let me hear Your voice again...

Let me sink into Your depths...
Let me feel the warm glow of Your
hidden light...
Let me hear the soft sound of Your
unplayed music -
dancing through the Cosmos -
before You were called
Shakti, Shiva, The Buddha, Allah, The Christ;
or however You reveal Yourself,
in the land of myths and stories...

Let me rest in
Your Primal Energy at the Core of my Being,
That which infuses all life
and lights everything from within.
The Breath of the Eternal Source...

Amen

Mystic Meandering
Nov. 7, 2021

Photo from the Internet

 

May Your Heart Fly - Hafiz

The lily-perfumed wings of love
Will lay dust of all your grief.
Patience my heart, and struggle on.

For when love binds,
It binds you to the tyranny of a racing steed,
And when love scatters,
It flings the soul-like fragments of the stars
Out of the ambergris scented woods.

Love makes of each moment an eternity
And tends the garden of the heart's desire.
When love mocks, ruby tears fall heavy as pomegranates
And when love looks, it sees your deepest mystery.

Love seeks out the tears of hidden hearts
And turns not from the Lovers of the Dawn.
Is there a remedy for the pain of love?

Or is it too unbearable for thought?

One taste of the medicine
And you realize just how sick you have been.
Those who plead in the defense of love
In love's judgement shall find grace
And to the court, Hafiz
May your heart fly...

Hafiz

with thanks to Death Deconstructed

Photo from the internet

 

Mighty Mother - AE (George William Russell)

Unto the deep the deep heart goes,
It lays its sadness nigh the breast:
Only the Mighty Mother knows
The wounds that quiver unconfessed.

It seeks a deeper silence still;
It folds itself around with peace,
Where thoughts alike of good and ill

In quietness unfostered cease.

It feels in the unwounding vast
For comfort for its hopes and fears:
The Mighty Mother bows at last;
She listens to her children's tears.

Where the last anguish deepens - there
The fire of beauty smites through the pain:
A glory moves amid despair,
The Mother takes her child again.

AE (George William Russell)

Irish Poet and Painter

with thanks to Death Deconstructed
and photo too...

 

Perishable - Niall Williams

It's because people are so perishable.  That's the thing.
Because for everyone you meet there is a last moment, there will
be a last moment when you hand slips from theirs, and everything
ripples outwards from that, the last firmness of a hand in yours
that every moment after becomes a little less firm until you look
down at your own hand and try to imagine just what it felt like
before their hand slipped away.  And you cannot.  You cannot feel
them.  And then you cannot quite see them, there's blurry bits,
like you're looking through this watery haze, and you're fighting
to see, you're fighting to hold on, but they are perishing right 
before your eyes, and right before your eyes they are
becoming a bit more ghost.

Niall Williams
From: History of the Rain

with thanks to Whiskey River

~

Nothing is more important than empathy for another human
beings' suffering.  Nothing.  Not career, not wealth, not intelligence,
certainly not status.  We have to feel for another if we are going to
survive with dignity.

Audry Hepburn

with thanks to Whiskey River

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

Floating Fork :)

 

The Golden Scaffolding - Matt Licata

It's an act of mercy and compassion to step back and acknowledge
how much we've been through over these last couple of years.
Just to be alive as a human being on the planet right now carries
with it a certain tone of activation in the body and nervous system.

It's like there's been a continuous drip of a soul-level cortisol or
adrenaline, on the one hand, and a collapse into hopelessness/
helplessness on the other - an alternation between hyper-vigilance
and a numbing shutting down.

Each of these responses and the bodily felt arousal that accompanies
them are coherent and make sense.  In addition to our verbal
narratives and stories, there are the stories of the body and also
those of the nervous system that weave together.

Underneath it all, a deep longing to rest and to feel safe again in our
bodies, to re-tune and enter consciously into the next phase.  
Something has fallen away that we will never be able to return to,
but the exact nature of what's coming next has yet to be given.

This not-knowing where we're headed can generate that deep, even
cosmic sort of restlessness that many are experiencing.  We are in
that period of liminality and transitional space, in between the way
things used to be and the birth that is yet to come.

The temptation is to get out of the in-between and into the rebirth as
quickly as possible.  But if we bypass the reorganization prematurely,
we will not be able to receive the gold that is found only within the
core of that which is falling apart.  This is the invitation into the
rich, alchemical yellowing.

This is a difficult realm to navigate as it is not held as valid and
honorable in our conventional world.  But it is one of potential
and creativity, a doorway to experience that is not always available
in times of certainty and flow.

In the very center of the paradox and contradictory energies is the
water of life.  It is a courageous journey into that territory and one
that will surprise us.

It may grind us into dust, but it is the particles that survive that
initiation that form the golden neural and soul-scaffolding of a
new world.

Matt Licata

~

Photo from the Internet

 

Rain Talk - Thomas Merton

What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone,
in the forest, at night, cherished by this
wonderful, unintelligible,
perfectly innocent speech,
the most comforting speech in the world.
the talk that rain makes by itself all over the ridges,
and the talk of the watercourses everywhere in the hollows!
nobody started it, nobody is going to stop it.
It will talk as long as it wants, this rain.
As long as it talks I am going to listen.

Thomas Merton

with thanks to The Beauty We Love
and photo too...

~

As I recall we haven't had rain in months - I miss the sound,
the smell, the comfort...  And we have yet to see our first
snowfall this season.  Very late...  Very dry...  No rain talk...

 

The Edge You Carry With You - David Whyte

You know
so very well
the edge
of darkness
you have
always
carried with you.
You know
so very well,
your childhood legacy:
that particular,
inherited

sense of hurt,
given to you
so freely
by the world
you entered.
And you know
too well
by now
the body's
hesitation
at the invitation
to undo
everything
others seemed
to want to
make you learn.
But your edge
of darkness
has always
made
its own definition
secretly
as an edge of light
and the door
you closed
might,
by its very nature
be
one just waiting
to be leant against
and opened.

And happiness
might just
be a single step away,
on the other side
of that next
unhelpful
and undeserving
thought.
Your way home,
understood now,
not as an achievement,
but as a giving up,
a blessed undoing,
an arrival
in the body
and a full rest
in the give
and take
of the breath.
This living
breathing body
always waiting
to greet you
at the door,
always prepared 
to give you
the rest you need,
always,
no matter
the long
years away,
still
wanting you,
to come home.

David Whyte
From: "The Edge You Carry With You"
in 'Still Possible"

with thanks to No Mind's Land

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

Emptying - Mark Strand

I empty myself of the names of others.  I empty my pockets.
I empty my shoes and leave them beside the road.
At night I turn back the clocks;
I open the family album and look at myself as a boy.

What good does it do?  The hours have done their job.
I say my own name.  I say goodbye.
The words follow each other downwind.
I love my wife but send her away.

My parents rise out of their thrones
into the milky rooms of clouds.  How can I sing?
Time tells me what I am.  I change and I am the same.

I empty myself of my life and my life remains.

Mark Strand
(1934-2014)

with thanks to Death Deconstructed

~

Our life force, like our flesh, never seems to issue away 
from us all at once.  Anyone who has been half dead can
attest to this.  What we call our soul can die in small quantities,
just as our bodies can be worn, amputated, and poisoned away,
bit by bit.  The lost parts of our souls are no more replaceable
than the lost parts of our bodies, life incrementally lifting
from life, just like that.

Anne Boyer

~

Photo - Painting by Nancy Proucher

 

This Meandering That I do...

This meandering that I do, in the Great Inner Wilderness,
is not a mistake.  I am not lost.  I am unconfined by
tribe or herd, undefined by one religion or spiritual philosophy...
It is not floundering or aimlessness,
but a deep exploring of "The Mystery."

I am not renouncing anything, nor seeking anything, but
only allowing myself to feel the deeper Rhythm of the 
rich Inner Life...  And to rest there...

This is not an escape from the world, yet there is a need
to recede from that rhythm; leaving behind the surface
consciousness of the world that so often drives me/us
through life experience, and keeps me/us from deepening
into the Inner Rhythm - until I am able to intuitively and
instinctively feel that Internal Rhythm flowing in and through
 myself - naturally...

The Inner Wilderness is a space of remedial Silence for me
that soothes the Heart and Spirit.  It allows me to be
"anonymous" - without identity, role, or function - just resting -
allowing myself to be absorbed by the Silence of Being -
leaving everything else behind until I am fully immersed...

When in this space of deep Silence, I experience seamless
fluidity, that nothing can interrupt - not thought, thinking, the
external distractions of life, nor the deeply ingrained
emotional and mental patterns that still arise in the
every-day-ness of life...

I experience this meandering as the normal "play" of the
Formless in Form.  The Formless dances within us, in such
intimacy with us that at times I feel as if "The Beloved" is
as much in my shoes as I am in "The Beloved's."

The Beloved falls in love with ItSelf...
Inhabits ItSelf...
and loves the Form of ItSelf...
which is us...

Mystic Meandering
2021

istockphoto

 

Treading The Gate - Cate Kerr

Approach the gate as a pilgrim, a seeker,
wear sturdy boots for the craggy trail beyond.
Go cloaked and hooded against the wind,
blackthorn staff and lantern in your hand,
an abundance of candles in your pack
for the dusky nightfall hours ahead.

Bring the gifts and votive offerings for those who
dwell beyond the ancient threshold, bundles of sage,
clear water, kindling, earth and seaborn salt.
Bring flasks of tea, incense and bread,
tales and laughter to share around the fire
with those you meet along the way.

Travel light and make your journey by the moon,
taking the owls, true kindred, as your fierce
and tender companions.  Feel their soft breath
along your own wings, share in their dark
and watchful wisdom as you go.

Let the songs you sing as you are questing
be your own sweet music, and the stories
you spin by the fire in the nights ahead be the
narratives of your own wild and shining life,
this journey into an unknown land.

Listen to the night and be content, for you are not alone -
around you is a vast and singing throng.
The very stars are singing with you as you go.

Catherine Kerr
Beyond the Fields We Know

With thanks to Cate for her photo as well!

 

The Cosmic Game...

You learn to play the game by
resting and waiting for
the inner movement to come...

Waiting for everything to be revealed
naturally, without efforting or trying...

Not letting the game dominate your
mind, but waiting for the movement of
the Sweet Beloved within...

Awake to the game while in 
the game...

Mystic Meandering
May 9, 2021

~

Phtoto - Mystic Meandering

~

Ancient rishis called it Gyan-ganu, "solidified knowledge."
Every particle contains all the information in the cosmos.
And empty space is really not empty, but filled with bliss
and knowledge.  Knowing this, we simply relax and get
connected.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

with thanks to Uradiance

 

The Yawn of Infinity - Caitlin Johnstone

...you and everything you've ever known is nothing but an
infinitely small blip in the middle of a yawning expanse of
infinity...

The very thing you think of as you is no more substantial
than a wisp of sea foam.  You're nothing but a loosely
associated cloud of cells swirling around for a short time
in the inseparable interplay with the ecosystem which 
birthed on a tiny planet in the outer periphery of a galaxy
which in the grand scheme of things is scarcely older than
you are.  You're a little eddie twirling in the middle of the
ocean for a single instant, and you presume yourself so wise
and authoritative that you can pass out decrees on the
meaninglessness of life...?

From every Big Bang in every universe there emerge
movements of every possible form.  These movements
may and can include pain.  And cancer.  [And COVID].
They can also include serial killers, ecocide, oligarchs, and
warmongers.  These things are all part of the swirling ongoing
explosion of this universe, which achieves peaks of dazzling
beauty, the likes of which your primate mind cannot even
imagine, then it grows old and collapses in on itself once again.
They're all little curlicues in the movement of its energy, just
like the sea foam on the waves.  And they are fully, entirely
beloved, just as they are.  No part of the cosmic dance is
rejected.  Every part is embrace.  And when it all goes, that
going is embraced as well, and so is the pain of loss.

Love doesn't seek to dominate and control what is happening.

Real love loves everything just as it is, however it shows up.
Real love doesn't reject what is; it's a deep and unconditional
yes.  And of course that yes can include saying yes to surgery,
and chemotherapy [or death].  The yes is always there, if you
can get past all the head noise and notice it.

You're every molecule is perfectly beloved no matter what
you do...
You can learn what is is to love life if you want...

Caitlin Johnstone
From an article entitled:
The Boy and the Starfish and the Yawning Chasm of Infinity

with thanks to No Mind's Land

~

FunQi Art - Mystic Meandering
2012