Ode To A Muse...

Words color our perception...

You see scars ~ I see life

You see marks ~ I see experience

You see flaws ~ I see beauty

I see you ~ I see love

Thinking About My Grandfather...

I love these words from the novel The English Patient:

“We die containing a richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. I wish for all this to be marked on my body when I am dead. I believe in such cartography – to be marked by nature, not just to label ourselves on a map like the names of rich men and women on buildings. We are communal histories, communal books. We are not owned or monogamous in our taste or experience. All I desired was to walk upon such an earth that had no maps…. into the desert, where there is the communal book of moonlight. We were among the rumour of wells. In the palace of winds.... where there is the communal book of moonlight. We were among the rumour of wells. In the palace of winds.”

The sentiments in these words are that I want to get at, to understand when it comes to Andy. I think because it is what I want to know about myself or what I want, “…marked on my body when I am dead.” So, I am looking to my Grandfather and particularly in the ambiguity of his story, the missing pieces that I want to colour in with my imagination to help me to understand myself. Some sort of parallel space we both inhabit through a contiguous history of the possible and a shared horizon of the moment.

I remember when I first read Michael Ondaatje’s novel and was so struck by the parts when Count Laszlo de Almásy was in the bombed out Church in Italy with the Canadian nurse, Hana. She was caring for him as he was enduring his last days of life and together they explored his memories.

Then when I saw the movie adaptation those poignant scenes of Laszlo in bed, with his pain only alleviated by morphine and yet his mind and heart floating to what made his life beautiful in spite of the horror of what he knew was also part of it.

While watching these scenes in the theater my first thought was of Grandpa Andy and what went through his mind as he lie dying in a bed in Laurentian hospital? I wanted to capture those thoughts, to know them cinematically, poetically – the images of his youth, life in Poland, the lovers, family, friends, experiences, conversations and journey to Canada. The smells, tastes, emotions, realizations of what it all meant - his human tactile self reverential expressions manifested in his actions – his story.

I believe we are all texts that can be interpreted – a text is like a body, a country, a language. You can know it on the surface, what you see at first, how it is first read. There is the literal text/body (story) that you encounter - yet, to see the literal is not to know it in it itself. It must be explored and journeyed over and the heart must fall in love with the story - the metaphors and symbols becoming intertwined with the imagination. Then there is the punctuation within the story that gives it form - defining the parameters of souls and existence.

What is the text of his body – what did the marks of living represent? I suppose in many ways we are the living expression of those marks, the living text of his footsteps – the embodiment of his imagination and hopes?

Hmmm…so many questions that haunt my imagination...

The Last Place...

This is the space on May 21, 2009 where I last remember experiencing an intense feeling of calm and peace; all was okay in the world. Three days later I was devastated by a cruel and unexpected storm. Debris from it is still washing upon the shores of my being.

Deep Touch...

“Touch comes before sight, before speech. It is the first language and the last, and it always tells the truth.”

~ Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin

Grace is deep touch

 Like…

A silent sound silences a mighty noise

A whimper defeats a shriek

A tear hitting the ground consumes a hurricane

A still small voice quiets a powerful wind

A sigh calms a crash of thunder

A lover heals a broken soul

Grace is truth

Grace is all in all

Grace is beauty

A Ballade Of An Anti-Puritan ~ G.K. Chesterton...

They spoke of Progress spiring round,
Of Light and Mrs. Humphry Ward--
It is not true to say I frowned,
Or ran about the room and roared;
I might have simply sat and snored--

I rose politely in the club
And said, "I feel a little bored;
Will someone take me to a pub?"

The new world's wisest did surround
Me; and it pains me to record
I did not think their views profound,
Or their conclusions well assured;
The simple life I can't afford,
Besides, I do not like the grub--
I wait a mash and sausage, "scored"--
Will someone take me to a pub?

I know where Men can still be found,
Anger and clamorous accord,
And virtues growing from the ground,
And fellowship of beer and board,
And song, that is a sturdy cord.

And hope, that is a hardy shrub,
And goodness, that is God's last word--
Will someone take me to a pub?

ENVOI

Prince, Bayard would have smashed his sword
To see the sort of knights you dub--Is
that the last of them--O Lord!
Will someone take me to a pub?

1992...

I dreamt about you last night

Before I woke

You kissed me

Really kissed me

Like you wanted to

Like you use to

A long time ago

In the Texas night

Now I am afraid

That it was never true

Never real

All a dream

"Is a dream a lie if it don't come true or is something worse..."

Afraid to go home

To make anywhere my home again

Afraid to close my eyes

To dream

To live

I didn’t know what else to do

I was scared

I thought I did okay

I am sorry

It was the best

That I had

In January of 1992

My Words...

I hope my words; all I have written will someday be a testimony to my life. For my children to understand who I am, was, and how much I love and have loved them even during difficult times in my life. For them to know how much they are and have always been on my mind.

Daughter - Brooke At 18...

Daughter

Green grey chameleon eyes

Sparks of light

Invitation to love

Glistening in your smile

I blink

And I am there

Yesterday morning when you were born

So distant now

Compiled and complicated years since then

But still so close the memories

Of your first simple sounds in the world

My eyes open

I see you

A woman now

Bright and beautiful

The world that heard your first sounds awaits you

Full of possibilities for you to explore

To journey over and discover who you are

A secret for you to know as you embark into this life

This world…

Is a blessing and a curse

There will be both beauty and horror

You will know both

And that is okay...

To know both and all that is in-between is to be alive

Grace will dance with you through your life

So walk…

Walk through life

Hold dear all that you love

All that you touch becomes sacred

Experience all of life that you can

Inhale it all and savor the aroma of the sublime

I love you…and always will…

What Did I Ever Come Here For?

“It wasn't too long before

I showed up at your door

I'd been gone a thousand miles

I didn't know how much more I could stand

If I could stand at all

You said I looked like I'd been through World War II

And my soul was worn right through

I thought you would read my mind

I thought you'd ask me to stay

You'd never turn me away like before

But you closed your door anyway

What did I ever come here for?”

~ Brandi Carlile

Four Questions...

How do two souls meet?

How is discord turned to harmony?

How music is heard when eyes are closed?

How are you born again after you have died inside?

A Summer Night...

A summer night

Bottle of red wine

Words and memories

Empty pages

Empty glasses

Hollow eyes

Time etched in stone

Turned to salt

Pillars of tears

More wine

Memories become a game

Of hide and seek

The night turns cool

The moon turns red

A naked

Lost

Soul

Screams at the darkness

Lines Of Reality...

To seep between the lines of reality

To fall into the crevice of time

To bleed translucent imagination

Cutting creativity to its core and eviscerating knowledge

Until it disintegrates and its edifice crumbles into the sea of being

The interpretation of Babel

Strewn in hermeneutical squalor

Muted string of maligned words

Meaning languishing in mumbled syllables

To know Babel is to know the infinite ineffable silence

In which, “…all things are permissible…”

Nothing not known by humanity, “…nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.”

So now

Forever tumbling in the architect’s maze of epistemological black holes

And it is here we die

In the search

On the journey

For truth on the cartography of our consciousness and unconsciousness

Uncharted collective uncertainty

Pacem In Terris Reflections ~ The Beauty and The Horror...

This was my fourth visit to Pacem In Terris. 

When you come to Pacem you don't pick the hermitage but rather the staff prays about it and it is interesting to see where you end up.

The last three times I visited here I stayed in the hermitage of St. Anthony and this time I am staying in St. Dominic.

I understand this as no longer being in the intense spiritual battles I was once enduring in the desert but now free to walk the earth as God’s beloved child.

Upon entering the hermitage I read what was written in a pamphlet about St. Dominic and a line in it gave me chills, “…the Dominicans traveled on foot and without money, preaching the gospel wherever there was an audience.” Also, of interest was that Dominic was born in Spain (1170) – because the country of Spain has been on my mind for some time as has been a peripatetic ecclesiology and walking the El Camino. Walking and encountering humanity.

I spent a lot of time sleeping in the hermitage with many vivid dreams but no particulars remembered.

Did some reading and some writing – went for a walk and took pictures. The weather was superb, just perfect.

For the first time in a long while I felt content and at peace – the silence is beautiful.

These words from Frederick Buechner came to mind “…but places are full of mystery as times are, and almost from the start I knew that, of all places, it was the one that was right for me.”   

 Go and journey, walk, discover spaces to connect within with other travelers. Walking encounters,   peripatetic kingdom participation.

An embodied, sensual theology – walking on the earth – grounded experience in conversation, meals and relationships.

The church of the journey…

I abandoned my phone, left it in the glove box of my car turned off. I dreamed today that it was buzzing, beckoning me to again enter into the connected world. Thankfully, it was only a dream but a dream perhaps revealing something of my need of connection to connection.

What thoughts have I had since being here at Pacem for the first twenty four hours?

Not many – have read and been in the moment, in the now, present – remarkably for much of the time.

The El Camino has come to mind often. No thoughts about Canada or work or relationships. Sleep, El Camino and walking – ha ha – of course three (3) main thoughts percolating through my consciousness.

   Walking

   El Camino (pilgrimage)

   Sleeping

My purpose, my what to do next is not, has not been revealed in the static moments of time but any revelations, insights, intuitions come in the dynamic moments while on the journey…keep walking…

The thoughts of suicide have gone since arriving here. Before arriving at Pacem the thoughts of death were ubiquitous, each time I closed my eyes I saw my death, me dead. Now those images are gone – the grace of God sweeping in again to my life to liberate me.

Lilith

I feel Shalom

At Pacem today, June 3 I do not feel like leaving. There is no anxiousness in being here, I want to remain. If not remain then carry with me what it is being here is, or has been, or will yet be.

 Green grey chameleon eyes

Sparks of light

Glistening in your smile

John 10:10: an abundant life is just that – abundant – full – complete in all of its range of possibilities. From the beauty to the horror and the entire spectrum in-between because it seems to me that Jesus invites us into a life of encounter and experience.  An invitation to be and become alive – to be alive is to no longer be afraid to feel, to doubt or question and to know in the wrestling with life God is wrestling and is in the midst of each storm and joy filled moment. The blessings come from her in our participating of living life.

“Let go of everything Chris and know me.” ~ Jesus

An abundant life has the possibility of both horror and beauty and it is the awakening to this does one become alive. One does not or no longer plots to escape either the horror or beauty but lives through both and all that is between the two with grace. There is no longer a bifurcation in living life, a dualism of desire between two poles of want but rather a coalescence of patience and presence of the divine walking along side in the horror and the beauty of life.

The one whose betrayal hurts the deepest frees the most.

Out of betrayal comes unknown freedom.

David and Saul’s armor – it did not fit David and David would fight Goliath on his own terms, in his own way.

Seminary is not the path on which God wants me to walk – she has other paths for me. Paths I do not know, paths that must be walked in order to be known.

“Living the mystery – undoing fear.” ~ Ben Johnson

“All will be okay, walk and trust me.” ~ Jesus

Walk…

Chris, you do not have to be like anyone else. You can walk your own path and encounter those you will along the way so touch them with your life and be touched by their lives. Be connected and entwined with the divine and with humanity, the glory and beauty and the horror of life. Be and become the image bearer of God by inviting the other image bearers you encounter along the way into your life.

“All real life is encounter.” ~ Martin Buber

Life is an empty page so write your story...

Morning Sun...

“Dawn in her yellow robe rose in the east out of the flowing ocean, bearing light for deathless gods and mortal men.”

~ Homer, The Iliad