Dancing in the Fire - Oriah

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living.
I want to know what you ache for, and if you
dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are.  I want 
to know if you risk looking like a fool for love,
for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring 
your moon.  I want to know if you have touched the
center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened
by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed
from fear of further pain.  I want to know if you can sit
with pain, mine or your own without moving to hide
it or fade it or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, 
if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us
to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true.
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true
to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see beauty, even when it's not
pretty every day, and if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and
mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout
to the sliver of the full moon, "Yes!"

 I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to
the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children,
[or your elderly parents, your spouse, or a dying loved one.]

It doesn't matter to me who you know or how you came to
be here.  I want to know if you will stand at the center
of the fire with me and not shrink back.
[can you meet me there...]

[This - is Friendship]

Oriah Mountain Dreamer
Original title - "The Invitation"
from - The Invitation

[brackets mine]

~

Vortex Art - Mystic Meandering
Woman Dancing in the Fire
(as seen from overhead)

~

"No one cares how much you know
until they know how much you care."

attributed to Theodore Roosevelt,
although no one really knows the
true author...

 

Moment to Moment - Etty Hillesum

...every moment gives birth to a new moment...

Life courses through one as a constant current in a great

series of moments, each having its own place in the day.

...whenever suffering thrusts itself upon us we must not
avoid it - but accept it.

Does that mean I am never sad, that I never rebel, always
acquiesce, and love life no matter what the circumstances?

No, far from it.  I believe that I know and share the many
sorrows and sad circumstances that a human being
experiences, but.....they pass through me, like life itself;
as a broad, eternal stream, they become part of that stream,
and life continues...

...ought we not, from time to time, open ourselves up to
cosmic sadness?

Your sorrow must become an integral part of yourself.
You mustn't run away from it, but bear it like an adult.
Do not relieve your feelings through hatred, do not seek
to be avenged on all German mothers, for they, too,
sorrow at this very moment for their slain and murdered
sons.  Give your sorrow all the space and shelter in yourself
that is its due, for if everyone bears his grief honestly and
courageously, the sorrow that now fills the world will abate.
But if you do not clear a decent shelter for your sorrow, and
instead reserve most of the space inside for your hatred and
thoughts of revenge - then sorrow will never cease in this
world and will multiply...

Etty Hillesum
From: Etty Hillesum - Essential Writings
by Annemarie S. Kidder

Etty was Dutch living in Nazi occupied Netherlands
during the Holocaust, and died in Auschwitz at the age
of 28 or 29. Her writings were taken from her journals.

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
"walking in Divine shoes"

~

May all those observing Hanukkah
find peace in their sorrow...

 

 

Rhythm of Sadness...

A deep rhythm of sadness 
arises from my heart...
unexpectedly,
spontaneously...

It rises even though
I "know"
that before thought and feeling
"I" am Eternal Beingness...

The rhythm of sadness
is not assuaged
with the knowledge of
that "I am That"...

It will not be held back, suffocated, 
repressed by sand bags of knowledge of
"the teachings,"
from the caverns of the mind...

It matters not to
"The Eternal"
that sadness and grief
arise in this mechanism called
"me",

like the tides of the ocean
rising and falling
in a darkened harbor;
felt not seen...

It is held in the embrace of "The Eternal"
breathing me...

It just is - sadness,
rising and falling
through me...

I follow the rhythm of sadness
breathing into the Heart
where it meets
The Rhythm
of
"The Eternal"

and slowly
becomes
rivulets
of energy;
just energy,
decreasing in
intensity.

Only to rise again
on the next tide...

Mystic Meandering
Feb 3,2021

~

Sadness is not something you need to fix, cure or
transform.  It need not be "healed", but held.  You need
not shift the sadness into some "higher" state or apply
teachings so that it will yield into something else.  For
it is complete and pure on its own.

With the fire of awareness and the ally of your breath,
touch your heart...
Go on a journey into the core of the feeling, the sensation,
the images, and the raw, shaky life that is longing to be held.
And listen.

It is by way of this journey that sadness will be revealed to be
what it is, a bridge into the universal heart, a messenger
of power, mercy, and fierce compassion...

Matt Licata

 

Suffering - Francis Weller

No one escapes suffering in this life.
None of us is exempt from loss, pain, illness and death.
How is it that we have so little understanding of [and empathy for]
these essential experiences?  How is it that we have attempted
to keep grief separated from our lives and only begrudgingly 
acknowledge its presence at the most obvious of time, such as
a funeral.

It is the accumulated losses of a lifetime that slowly weigh us
down - the times of rejection, the moments of isolation when we felt
cut off from the sustaining touch of comfort and love.  It is an ache
that resides in the heart, the faint echo calling us back to the times of
loss.  We are called back, not so much to make things right, but to
acknowledge what happened to us.

Grief asks that we honor the loss and, in doing so, deepen our
capacity for compassion.  When grief remains unexpressed, however,
 it  hardens, becomes as solid as stone.  We, in turn, become rigid and
stop moving in rhythm with the soul.... with the flow of life.  Grief is
part of the dance.

As we begin to pay attention, we notice that grief is never far from
our awareness.  We become aware of the many ways it arrives in
our daily lives. It is the blue mood that greets us upon waking.  It
is the melancholy that shades the day in muted tones.  It is the
recognition of time's passing, the slow emptying of our days.  It
is the searing pain that erupts when someone close to us dies -
It is the confounding grief when our life circumstances are
shattered by the unexpected....  the ground beneath us opens,
shaken by violent rumblings.  Grief enfolds our lives....

It is essential for us to welcome grief, whatever form it takes.
When we do, we open ourselves to our shared experiences in life.
Grief is our common bond.  Opening to our sorrow connects us
with everyone, everywhere.  There is no gesture of kindness that
is wasted, no offering of compassion that is useless.  We can be
generous to every sorrow we see.  It is sacred work.

Francis Weller

from The Wild Edge of Sorrow:
Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief;
The Threshold Between Loss and Revelation
Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation

with thanks to The Beauty We Love

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

For One Who Is Exhausted - John O'Donohue

When the rhythm of the heart becomes hectic,
Time takes on the strain until it breaks;
Then all the unattended stress falls in
On the mind like an endless, increasing weight.

The light in the mind becomes dim.
Things you could take in your stride before
Now become laborsome events of will.

Weariness invades your spirit.
Gravity begins falling inside you,
Dragging down every bone.

The tide you never valued has gone out.
And you are marooned on unsure ground.
Something within you has closed down;
And you cannot push yourself back to life.

You have been forced to enter empty time.
The desire that drove you has relinquished.
There is nothing else to do now but rest
And patiently learn to receive the self
You have forsaken in the race of days.

At first your thinking will darken
And sadness takes over like listless weather.
The flow of unwept tears will frighten you.

You have traveled too fast over false ground;
Now your soul has come to take you back.

Take refuge in your senses, open up
To all the small miracles you rushed through.

Become inclined to watch the way of rain
When it falls slow and free.

Imitate the habit of twilight,
Taking time to open the well of color
That fostered the brightness of day.

Draw alongside the silence of stone
Until its calmness can claim you.

Be excessively gentle with yourself.

Stay clear of those vexed in spirit.
Learn to linger around someone of ease
Who feels they have all the time in the world.

Gradually, you will return to yourself,
Having learned a new respect for your heart
And the joy that dwells far within slow time.

John O'Donohue
From - To Bless The Space Between Us

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

Dancing In The Fire - Jennifer Welwood

There will always be voices that promise you greatness and glory;
They call out from the worldly marketplace;
They call out from the spiritual marketplace;
They call out from the bigger-better-more marketplace.

Do not buy their false promises, or purchase their ephemeral wares;
What fulfills for a moment is not worth the price of your soul.
There are heights that will lift you,
but not when you try to ascend them;
There are powers that will fill you,
but not when you make them your own.
There are treasures, and there are imitations of treasures.
If you have lost your true gold, at least turn away from the glitter.

Want only what is true.
This will lead you to the well of your deepest sorrows.
Follow the passageway, all the way down;
Become the dark emptiness of your core.
Be still.  Don't measure the waiting.
Be still.  Let the fire show you its secret heart;
A strand of clear light running through you.
Gather yourself there, and the luminous universe opens.

In the vast expanse, fathomless, infinite ocean of light,
lose yourself, and find yourself, and become what you already are.

Jennifer Welwood
Original title "Renunciation"

~

We can descend into the fire of direct experience of our feelings.
It is within the very core of this holy fire, in the alchemical crucible
of the body where the naked, groundless somatic territory of
illumination occurs, where healing emerges, and a new pathway
of love, care and compassion unfolds and illuminates within you.

Matt Licata

~

Art - Mystic Meandering
Woman Whirling in the Fire
(looking from overhead)

Craypas Oils
2012

 

Hey God - John Roedel

John: Hey God.

God: Hey John

John: Grief keeps sneaking up on me.

God: That's because grief is like a ninja.

John: When will it leave me alone?

God: Hopefully never.

John: Um. What?!

God: To grieve means that you have loved.
Grieving is one of the truest human experiences
that you will ever participate in.  It often arrives
without warning - like a late day summer storm -
obscuring the sun and drenching you in a downpour.
It is a gift, isn't it?

John: Uh, no.

God: Grab a pen and write the following four things down.

1) Grief can come and go as it pleases.
You gave it a key to your house at the exact moment you
gave your heart to somebody else.

2) Bereavement is the debt you must pay for having loved.
There is no getting over the loss of a beloved who is now
resting in the arms of endless love.  Grief has no expectation
date.  Despite the passing time, the phantom pain of mourning
is always one memory away from returning.

3) Of all the emotions you face, grief is the by-far stickiest.
It gets all over everything.  Like peanut butter, grief sticks
to the roof of your soul.

4) Grief is like an
afternoon thunderstorm
in late July.

It's the storm
that's always waiting
on the edges
of your most sunny
days to roll
across the horizon
and right over you.

The ghosts of your loved
ones who have died
are the clouds.

The webbed lighting

illuminating the
dark canvas sky is
their reminder to you
that life is just a
brilliant temporary flash
of time.

It's a reminder
to live now.
to be bold.
to be electric.

The pounding rain isn't your tears.
It's the hope of eternal life that
falls on you.

It's that downpour of hope that will
help you grow deep roots in love...

The gale winds
of these storms are
the messages from
those you have
lost to death that
are whispering
to you through the pines
the following psalm:

"It's okay, my love.  Eternity is holding  me.
Death isn't an end.  Death is a threshold.
I'm still here.  I never left.  Love doesn't die.
I remain.  There is no afterlife.  There is only life.
I'm here with you.  Love doesn't die."

It's all such an adventure!

John Roedel
from: Hey God, Hey John
a book about John's simple conversations with God...

with thanks to Death Deconstructed

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

Grief is Sacred - Francis Weller

No one escapes suffering in this life.
None of us is exempt from loss, pain, illness and death.
How is it that we have so little understanding of these
essential experiences?  How is it that we have attempted to
keep grief separated from our lives and only begrudgingly
acknowledge its presence at the most obvious times, such
as a funeral?

'If sequestered pain made a sound,' Stephen Levine says,
'the atmosphere would be humming all the time.'

It is the accumulated losses of a lifetime that slowly weigh
us down - the times of rejection, the moments of isolation
when we felt cut off from the sustaining touch of comfort
and love.  It is an ache that resides in the heart, the faint echo
calling us back to the times of loss.  We are called back, not
so much to make things right, but to acknowledge what
happened to us.

Grief asks that we honor the loss and, in doing so, deepen
our capacity for compassion.  When grief remains unexpected,
however, it hardens, becomes as solid as stone.  We, in turn,
become rigid and stop moving in rhythm with the soul...

When our grief stagnates, we become fixed in place, unable
to move and dance with the flow of life.  Grief is part of
the dance.

As we begin to pay attention, we notice that grief is never 
far from our awareness.  We become aware of the many ways
it arrives in our daily lives.  It is the blue mood that greets us
upon waking.  It is the melancholy that shades the day in
muted tones.  It is the recognition of time's passing, the slow
emptying of our days.  It is the searing pain that erupts when
someone close to us dies....  It is the confounding grief when
our life circumstances are shattered by the unexpected.....

It is essential for us to welcome our grief, whatever form it
takes. When we do, we open ourselves to our shared
experiences in life. Opening to our sorrow connects us with
everyone, everywhere.  There is no gesture of kindness that is
wasted, no offering of compassion that is useless. 
We can be generous to every sorrow we see.
It is sacred work.

Francis Weller
from - The Wild Edge of Sorrow

with thanks to The Beauty We Love

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

The Rhythm of Sadness...

 A deep rhythm of sadness
arises from my heart...
unexpectedly,
spontaneously...

It rises even though
I "know"
that before thought and feeling
"I" am Eternal Beingness.

The rhythm of sadness
is not assuaged
with the knowledge
that "I am That"...

It will not be held back, suffocated
by the sand bags of knowledge of
"the teachings,"
from the caverns of the mind...

It matters not to
"The Eternal"
that sadness and grief
arise in this mechanism called
"me",
like the tides of the ocean,
rising and falling
in a darkened harbor;
felt not seen...

It is held in the embrace of "The Eternal"
breathing me...

It just is - sadness,
rising and falling
through
me

I follow the rhythm of sadness
breathing into the Heart
where it meets
The Rhythm

of
"The Eternal"
and slowly
becomes

rivulets
of energy;
just energy,
decreasing in
intensity.

Only to rise again,
on the next tide...

Mystic Meandering
updated version 2/3/2021

~

Sadness is not something you need to fix,
cure, or transform.  It need not be healed, but held.
You need not shift sadness into some "higher" state, or
apply teachings so that it will yield into something else.
For it is complete and pure on its own.

With the fire of awareness and the ally of your breath,
touch your heart...

Go on a journey into the core of the feeling, the sensation,
the images, and the raw, shaky life that is longing to be held.

And listen.

It is by way of this journey that sadness will be revealed to 
be what it is, a bridge into the universal heart, a messenger
of power, mercy, and fierce compassion...

Matt Licata

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

The Wildest Comfort - Kathleen Dean Moore

 I don't know what despair is, if it's something or nothing, a kind
of filling up or an emptying out.  I don't know what sorrow does
to the world, what it adds or takes away.  What I think I do
know now is that sorrow is part of the Earth's great cycles,
flowing into the night like cool air sinking down a river course.
To feel sorrow is to float on the pulse of the Earth, the surge from
living to dying, from coming into being to ceasing to exist.
Maybe this is why the Earth has the power over time to wash
sorrow into a deeper pool....  And maybe this is why, even though
 sorrow never disappears, it can make a deeper connection to the
 currents of life and so connect, somehow, to sources of
wonder and solace...

...I don't know what gladness is or where it comes from,
this splitting open of the self.  It takes me by surprise.
Not an answer of beauty and mystery, but beauty and
mystery themselves, flooding into a mind suddenly
without boundaries.  Can this be gladness, to be lifted
by that flood?

...The Earth holds every possibility inside it, and the mystery
of transformation, one thing into another.

This is the wildest comfort.

Kathleen Dean Moore
Excerpts from - Wild Comfort - The Solace of Nature

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

Melancholy - Fred LaMotte

 Even on the most radiant days, there is a sorrow at the heart
of life.  When we deny it, the day becomes a desperate quest
for happiness, and the night is long.  But when we absorb the
trough into our rhythm, like the shadow of the breath, that
benign negation infuses all things with spaciousness, tinges
creation with golden poignancy, like Autumn itself.
What is heavy is not sadness, but the denial of sadness.

Fred LaMotte
Uradiance
original title - "Autumn"

~

For all those tasting the sadness of these
unimaginable strange times that we are living through -
not only the losses from COVID, but
from the devastating fires on the West Coast, and the
hurricanes on the Gulf Coast affecting so many lives,
as well as the racial unrest, and the political upheaval
across this country.
May we all find the deep Quiet within..

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
Sunset Heart Leaves

Loss after Loss - Mark Nepo

...Somehow we go on
loss after loss, like seeds
drowning in their possibilities
under all that snow.

From a distance, stars
are pins of light
pushing back the dark. 

But inside, each
is a world of light.

And the Spirit we carry -
that carries us - flares like a
star, everywhere we go pushing
back the pain and loss.

Still, a star can't be seen
without its covering of night,
nor a soul without its
human skin.

I don't know why -
It has nothing to do with
optimism or pessimism
or with triumph and defeat.

More, the impressible reach
of a beam of light entering the
darkest place it can find,
because that is how it
fulfills itself.

Mark Nepo
Excerpt from "Still"
From: Inside the Miracle

~

...[when the heart] is ripped apart
nothing makes sense while
in this re-arranging pain.
Nothing.
No matter what others say,
nothing is of comfort while
the heart is reforged in
the furnace no one asks for.

...Against our will, our heart
is remade by the angel of grief
who grips the center of our life,
shaking everything dead within us
from our branches, until
the heart condenses into a diamond.

Hard as this is to endure,
this too is a miracle.

Mark Nepo

Excerpts from: "After Mira"

From: Inside the Miracle.

~

Photo: Mystic Meandering

For Grief - John O'Donohue

When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you gets fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence
Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.

Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid and undone.

There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.

Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.

It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.

Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And, when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From the gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
in your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return...

John O'Donohue

from: To Bless the Space Between Us

~

Photo - from Keukenhof Tulip Garden in Holland
by Ellen Ratmeyer

~

The world still grieves its losses...
And the hatred and tragedies that keep occurring...

Kindness and Sorrow - Naomi Shihab Nye

[.....]

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.

You must speak it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters
and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crown of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

Naomi Shihab Nye

from: Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

[this is only an excerpt from one of the poems
in that collection].

Photo from the Internet

Moment to Moment - Etty Hillesum

...every moment gives birth to a new moment...

Life courses through one as a constant current in a great
series of moments, each having its own place in the day.

...whenever suffering thrusts itself upon us we must not
avoid it - but accept it.
Does that mean I am never sad, that I never rebel, always
acquiesce, and love life no matter what the circumstances?
No, far from it.  I believe that I know and share the many
sorrows and sad circumstances that a human being
experiences, but.....they pass through me, like life itself;
as a broad, eternal stream, they become part of that stream,
and life continues...

...ought we not, from time to time, open ourselves up to
cosmic sadness?

Your sorrow must become an integral part of yourself.
You mustn't run away from it, but bear it like an adult.
Do not relieve your feelings through hatred, do not seek
to be avenged on all German mothers, for they, too,
sorrow at this very moment for their slain and murdered
sons.  Give your sorrow all the space and shelter in yourself
that is its due, for if everyone bears his grief honestly and
courageously, the sorrow that now fills the world will abate.
But if you do not clear a decent shelter for your sorrow,
and instead reserve most of the space inside you for hatred
and thoughts of revenge - then sorrow will never cease in
this world and will multiply...

Etty Hillesum

From: Etty Hillesum - Essential Writings

by Annemarie S. Kidder

Etty was living in Nazi occupied Netherlands during
the Holocaust, and died in Aushwitz at the age of
28 or 29.  Her writings were taken from her journals.

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
"walking in another's shoes"

Beyond Death - Eckhart Tolle

The natural way of being after death of a loved one is suffering
at first, then there is a deepening.  In that deepening, you go to
a place where there is no death.  And the fact that you felt that
means you went deep enough, to the place where there is no
death.  Conditioned as your mind is by society, the contemporary
world that you live in, which knows nothing about that dimension
- your mind then tells you that there is something wrong with this.
Your mind says "I should not be feeling peace."

But that's a conditioned thought by the culture that you  live in.
So instead we can recognize when this happens, when that
thought comes - recognize it as a conditioned thought
that is not true.

It doesn't mean that the waves of sadness don't come back
from time to time.  But in between the waves of sadness, you
sense there is peace.

When you go deep enough to the formless, the dreadful is no
longer dreadful, it's sacred.

When somebody dies who is close to you, it [feels] dreadful
on the level of form.  It's sacred on the deeper level.
Death can enable you to find that dimension in yourself - the
sacred dimension of life, where life is indestructible.

There is always the window into the formless.  It's not through
an explanation that says, well, he or she will move on or
reincarnate, or go to some place of rest.  That can be comforting,
but you can go to a deeper place than that, where you don't need
any explanations, because what opens up when the form
dissolves is life beyond form.  That is the sacred dimension.

Eckhart Tolle

via The Beauty We Love

~

Photo taken by my husband
at the Butterfly Pavilion

Personal Note:  While I understand and have experienced what Eckhart says here, I have also experienced that grief is a very organic process and sometimes we just have to sit with the feelings of sadness and sorrow, embrace them while we go through the grief, and not try to "spiritualize it, but allow the feelings to be what they are...

When Dark Clouds - Jamie K. Reaser

When the dark clouds lay thick
before you and the wind has
lifted your hair and taken it
someplace wild, do nothing.
Be no one known.
What has happened is moving
on to new horizons.  What remains
are the desires withstood and
all the unfinishedness that will
see you through to the next day.

copyright/ Jamie K. Reaser
From "Truth and Beauty"

~

The hurt you embrace becomes joy...

Rumi

The Unbroken - Rashani Rea

There is a brokenness
out of which comes the unbroken,
a shatteredness
out of which blooms the unshatterable.
There is a sorrow
beyond all grief which leads to joy
and a fragility
out of whose depths emerges strength.

There is a hollow space
too vast for words
through which we pass with each loss,
out of whose darkness
we are sanctioned into being.

There is a cry deeper than all sound
whose serrated edges cut the heart
as we break open to the place inside
which is unbreakable and whole,
while learning to sing.

Rashani Rea

Rhythm of Sadness...

A deep rhythm of sadness
arises from within...
unexpectedly,
spontaneously,
inexplicably.

It rises even though
I "know"
that before thought and feeling
"I" am Eternal Beingness.

The rhythm of sadness
is not assuaged
with the knowledge
that "I am" That...

It will not be held back
by the sand bags of knowledge,
from the caverns of the mind...

It matters not to
"The Eternal"
that sadness and grief
arise in the mechanism called
"me",
like the tides of the ocean,
rising and falling
in a darkened harbor;
felt not seen...

It is all just held in Its Awareness...

Sadness
is of no consequence
to "The Eternal..."
It just is - sadness
rising and falling,
breathing
through

me

I follow the rhythm of sadness

as it rises through the gut
into the Heart
where it meets
The Rhythm
of

"The Eternal"
and
dissolves
~
~
~

into
rivulets
of energy;
just energy,
decreasing in
intensity.

Only to rise again
another day, or
on the next tide...

Mystic Meandering
Sept. 20, 2015

~

Sadness is not something you need to fix,
cure, or transform.  It need not be healed but held.
You need not shift sadness into some "higher" state or
apply teachings so that it will yield into something else.
For it is complete and pure on its own.

With the fire of awareness and the ally of your breath,
touch your heart...
Go on a journey into the core of the feeling, the sensation,
images and the raw, shaky life that is longing to be held.
And listen.

It is by way of this journey that sadness will be revealed to
be what it is, a bridge into the the universal heart, a messenger
of power, mercy, and fierce compassion...

Matt Licata

The Blessing of The Deer - Jane Hirshfield

As the house of a person
in age sometimes grows cluttered
with what is
too loved or too heavy to part with,
the heart may grow cluttered.

And still the house will be emptied,
and still the heart.

As the thoughts of a person
in age sometimes grow sparer,
like a great cleanness come into a room,
the soul may grow sparer;
one sparrow song carves it completely.
And still the room is full,
and still the heart.

Empty and filled,
like the curling half-light of morning,
in which everything is still possible...

Filled and empty,
like the curling half-light of evening,
in which everything now is finished...

Beloved, what can be, what was,
will be taken away from us.

I have disappointed.
I am sorry.  I knew no better.

[.....]

This morning, out the window,
the deer stood like a blessing, then vanished.

Jane Hirshfield
Original title: "Standing Deer"
from The Lives of the Heart

Thanks to - The Beauty We Love