WE SHALL FILL INNOCENCE WITH THE STRENGTH WE HAVE SO LONG BEEN LACKING
Follow the path of the radiant life force
as she flashes upward like lightning
through your body.
Attend simultaneously
to the perineum, that bright place between the legs,
to the crown of the skull,
and to that shining star-place above the head.
Notice how this living electricity becomes ever more subtle
as she rises, radiant as the morning sun
until she streams outward from
the top of the head into all-embracing gratitude.
Thus become intimate with the life of all beings.
I don’t think of myself as making art. I do what I do because I want to, because painting is the best way I’ve found to get along with myself.
“It is neither Art for Art, nor Art against Art. I am for Art, but for Art that has nothing to do with Art. Art has everything to do with life, but it has nothing to do with Art,”
In any quiet moment when you are breathing,
the breath may flow out and pause of itself,
or flow in and pause of itself.
There experience opens into an exquisite vastness
with no beginning and no end.
Embrace that infinity without reservation.
Dive into it, drink deeply of it and emerge renewed.
|
a language known only to ourselves
made of snarls and syllables and sudden wild appeals
Enter these turning points
In the play of respiration and expiration,
Where the rhythms of life transform
Into each other.
Breath flows in, then surrenders to flow out again.
In this moment, drink eternity.
Breath flows out, emptying, emptying,
Offering itself to infinity.
Cherishing these moments,
Mind dissolves into heart,
Heart dissolves into space,
Body becomes a shimmering field
Pulsating between emptiness and fullness..
“All the feelings that fly around in me like bats come together,hang upside down by their toes, fold up their wings and stop flapping and there’s just music.
What sort of diary should I like mine to be? Something loose knit, & yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will embrace any thing, solemn, slight or beautiful that comes into my mind. I should like it to resemble some deep old desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through. I should like to come back, after a year or two, & find that the collection had sorted itself & refined itself & coalesced, as such deposits so mysteriously do, into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life, & yet steady, tranquil composed with the aloofness of a work of art.
Let us gather in a flourishing way
with sunluz grains abriendo los cantos
que cargamos cada día
en el young pasto nuestro cuerpo
para regalar y dar feliz perlas pearls
of corn flowing árboles de vida en las cuatro esquinas
let us gather in a flourishing way
contentos llenos de fuerza to vida
giving nacimientos to fragrant ríos
dulces frescos verdes turquoise strong
carne de nuestros hijos rainbows
let us gather in a flourishing way
en la luz y en la carne of our heart to toil
tranquilos in fields of blossoms
juntos to stretch los brazos
tranquilos with the rain en la mañana
temprana estrella on our forehead
cielo de calor and wisdom to meet us
where we toil siempre
in the garden of our struggle and joy
let us offer our hearts a saludar our águila rising
freedom
a celebrar woven brazos branches ramas
piedras nopales plumas piercing bursting
figs and aguacates
ripe mariposa fields and mares claros
of our face
to breathe todos en el camino blessing
seeds to give to grow maiztlán
en las manos de nuestro amor
-Juan Felipe Herrera
Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days!
Come near me, while I sing the ancient ways:
Cuchulain battling with the bitter tide;
The Druid, grey, wood-nurtured, quiet-eyed,
Who cast round Fergus dreams, and ruin untold;
And thine own sadness, whereof stars, grown old
In dancing silver-sandalled on the sea,
Sing in their high and lonely melody.
Come near, that no more blinded by man’s fate,
I find under the boughs of love and hate,
In all poor foolish things that live a day,
Eternal beauty wandering on her way.
Come near, come near, come near—Ah, leave me still
A little space for the rose-breath to fill!
Lest I no more hear common things that crave;
The weak worm hiding down in its small cave,
The field-mouse running by me in the grass,
And heavy mortal hopes that toil and pass;
But seek alone to hear the strange things said
By God to the bright hearts of those long dead,
And learn to chaunt a tongue men do not know.
Come near; I would, before my time to go,
Sing of old Eire and the ancient ways:
Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days.
-Yeats
How do I live with the romance of the world?
How do I live with the romance: the lure of scenery?
How do I live with the romance of comfort and closed eyes?
How do I live with the romance?
and admit that this might be the world
where I belong.
How?
I’ll sing my song in a parking lot.
Just for today
I will not worry
Just for today
I will not be angry
Just for today
I will give thanks for my many blessings
Just for today
I will do my work honestly
Just for today
I will be kind to every living thing.
-Usui
I have my hopes of how I would be after living in exile
after closing your eyes to me
I even wrote scenes where I re-emerged boldly, bearded alive
with eskimo eyes
new baby on my back
but I didn’t count the fact that I have ghosts in my mind, stored away
great ghosts of my life
great ghosts of old wives
and their howling
so I spend my wilderness time, rolling on the ground
pulling my hair and wrestling them of
yelling at none, punching snow
I gathered ghosts and gave them my lecture, bid them away, I pleaded and cried
there’s no room in my life for you or your howling
let my undo these ropes and go on living without you
not just change where I live
go on get, I said
I had my hopes of how I would be after sending them of
after getting set free
but there’s no such thing as living without their prowling
as you can see, having descended the hill
I still look like me, I still wallow as Phil
and forever will
I’m teaming with ghosts and I still whining for wives, unkniting my brow
but now I’ve surrendered
In fact I’ve joined in
You can hear us howling
The Polisher
As everything changes overnight,
I praise the breaking of promises.
Whatever love wants, it gets,
not next year, now.
I swear by the one who never says tomorrow,
as the circle of the moon never agrees
to sell installments of light.
It gives all it has.
How do stories end?
Who shall explain them?
Every story is us. That is who we … are,
from the beginning to no-matter-how-it-comes-out.
Those who know the taste of a meal
are those who sit at the table and eat.
Lover and friend are one being,
and separate beings too,
as the polisher melts in the mirror’s face.
I think what Elephant 6 meant for us is very simple: there’s something pure and infinite in you, that wants to come out of you, and can come out of no other person on the planet. That’s what you’ve got to share, and that’s as real and important as the fact that you’re alive. We were able, at a really young age, to somehow protect each other so we could feel that. The world at large, careerism, money, magazines, your parents, the people at the rock club in your town, other kids, nothing is going to give you that message, necessarily. In fact, most things are going to lead you away from it, sadly. Because humanity is really confused at the moment. But you wouldn’t exist if the universe didn’t need you. And any time I encounter something beautiful that came out of a human somewhere, that’s them, that’s their own soul. That’s just pure, whatever its physicality is, if the person can play piano, if they can’t play piano, if they’re tone deaf, whatever it is, if it’s pure, it hits you like a sledgehammer. It fills up your own soul, it makes you want to cry, it makes you glad you’re alive, it lets you come out of you. And that’s what we need: we desperately need you.
Radiant one,
The life essence carries on its play
through the pulsing rhythm
of outward and inward movement.
This is the ceaseless throb, the rhythm of life –
terrifying in its eternity, exquisite in its constancy.
The inhalation, the return movement of breath,
sustains life.
The outgoing breath
purifies life.
We breathe out the old air, the old thoughts, the old feelings.
These are the two poles
between which respiration goes on unceasingly.
Between them is every quality you could ever desire.
As the breath turns from in to out,
and again as the breath
curves from out to in –
through both these turns, absorb intensity.
From the Bottom Up:
1. I like to wiggle my toes when I’m waiting for something – like in the
waiting room of my dentist. It makes me less nervous.
2. I like to be barefoot as much as possible. Places I’m definitely
barefoot are: a) at home b) in bed c) in the shower. What’s wrong?
You guessed that much? Well, you never know, do you!
3. In fact I love to put my feet up at the end of the day, and
watch them looking kinda good. I say in my mind to them: “Thank you
for taking me around for so many years to so many places and still
doing so – with happy steps. You’re the best!”
4. I have rather short legs to match my short height. I love that.
The fact that they’re short makes them easier to go around with. Can
you imagine if I had long legs? They might go in different directions
from each other, or something. Then what would I do? Short legs work
very well for me.
5. Okay, I must confess. I love wearing high heel shoes. I love wearing
silk stockings. I love wearing hot pants. When I arm myself with those
three, I feel like a tough girl from the 1930’s. If I didn’t look at
myself in the mirror, I might just mistake myself for Rita Heyworth, or
Marlene Dietrich. How great is that?!
6. Oh, I forgot to tell you about my ankles, calves and thighs. Well, later.
7. I must go back and tell you about my flats. When I wore flats at
my college campus in the 50’s, I had these great flats which made one
of my toes stick out. I thought that it was so creative. Wherever I
went, the girls at campus looked at the toe, looked at me, and
expressed disapproval with their eyes. I loved it. But they were nowhere
as special as high heeled shoes. They did not make my heart beat fast.
8. So now we go to gloves. I love gloves. I have leather ones,
lace ones, satin ones. Long, medium, short. All great looking. But I
hate wearing them. It’s too bad. Because I could wear them and look
really sharp. But I don’t like them on – my hands cannot breathe
properly. My hands love to feel the air, the breeze, the wind, the sun.
So I put on really great ones that match my outfit, go out, and take
them off right away. It’s really too bad. My hands are knobbly and tiny.
Not a good combo. So I would love it if I could show off the gloves
instead of my hands. But…that’s life.
9. I love rings. But for some reason, just like the gloves, I like
to take them off right away, as soon as I am alone. I go to an
opening wearing a nice ring. I come out of it, get in the car, and the
first thing I do is to take off the ring and put it in my purse. I
don’t like that feeling of something restricting my finger.
10. Speaking of stuff that bothers me: I hate putting things on my face.
They say it’s better to put some cream on your face if you don’t want to
shrivel up like an old potato one day. So I got all the latest cream I
read in the ads. But once I had put one of them on, it made me feel so
sticky that I had to immediately wipe it off with a very hot towel. I
couldn’t help it. My whole face rebelled against the stickiness.
Speaking of sticky: Once I put on some green mud on my face and got
pimples for a week. That was not good.
11. Now hats! I think everybody has a vague idea that maybe I love hats,
since I am always wearing one. In case you might think that maybe I’m
trying to hide a bald spot or something, I occasionally take it off to
expose my bushy hair. But soon enough, I put it on again. The reason is
so complex that I’d have to go to a shrink for a year, and probably
still wouldn’t find out what’s making me do this. I don’t go to any
shrink, so I will probably never know. Maybe I just like hats. Or maybe
I think I will look taller if I wore one. Or maybe I think people’s
focus will go to my hat and not my face. Of course, I’m not saying
there’s anything wrong with my face, honey. A girl does not have to hide
under a hat, ever. If there were a few wrinkles and shades, they just
make you look more interesting…. So they say.
12. All my life my mother told me that I had strong jaws like a guy. It
was not womanly. Well, I got them from my father, I think. So yes, I
won’t say I am particularly feminine. So what? I used to hide my jaws
with my long hair. John used to say “Show me your face!” and took my
hair out of my face. “Look, you’re beautiful. I don’t know why you are
hiding with your hair.” I kept myself hidden.
13. I also kept my hands in my pockets as much as possible. My
mother didn’t have to point out to me that my hands were stringy.
But they were.
14. My head was unusually large for my small bod. So John called me
a “Martian”.
15. I look at the sky and feel like my home is somewhere far away – so I
thought I might really be a Martian – a result of
cross-breeding thousands of years ago.
16. I used to love wandering aimlessly. I used to walk about 7 miles in
the city aimlessly, but with the speed of the wind! I can’t do that now.
If I did it now it would be unfair to the security guard.
17. But I’ve got tons of great things to do at home. Most people
think ”what?” Because they want a name for what I do. What is the name
for it? I just like pottering around my flat, fixing the crooked
frames, looking over the park and day dreaming.
18. It’s so nice to see the sky through a small opening of an
old fashioned window from my apartment!
19. I think of the days we were gods and goddesses, playing ball
with planets. We were larger than dinosaurs. But now we sit like good
girls and boys and watch the small tennis ball going left and
right, forgetting the days when we use to play with bigger balls.
What happens when we shrink even further, and become the size
of cockroaches? Will we be still playing with something that echoes
the time when we were larger?
20. When the war started, I thought it would be more economical to drop
10 thousand dollar bags from the sky to the people of the country. It’s
cheaper, and what they need. But now we don’t even have enough money to
do that.
21. When I daydream, I go all the way to the end of the Earth, and come
back. It’s a nice exercise.
22. Well actually, not always. Sometimes I just go to the city I
love. Once I was flying low in Geneva, and I saw a friend of mine
walking. The interesting thing was that friend was somebody who died
over ten years ago. He did not have any strong reason to be in Geneva. I
just wanted to share this with you because it seems that we just
wander where we like, and when we want. Not for any reason.
I loved that.
23. Now that you know so much about me, I should not go all the way
to 25, or should I? For number 23, Let’s say, I am a person who needs
a lot of time to myself. If I don’t have the time, I will be making
it, anyway. My mother use to wave her hand in front of me and say
“Yoko are you there?” Well, if I were always there, I would not be me,
would I?
24. John and I felt that we were like people in an H.G. Wells story.
Two people who are walking so fast that nobody else can see them.
Well, that creates a problem, too. Sometimes you want to have a good
chat with friends.
25. In a day, sometimes I feel so much love for the world, I think
my heart is bursting. Sometimes, I feel so scared, I want to
shrink myself even further. I think that’s what happened to us gods
and goddesses. Like the dinosaurs, we realized that it’s too dangerous
to be so large. So we kept shrinking ourselves to what we are now.
We might get even smaller. I see the sign in the engineers making
smaller gadgets, smaller and smaller. Pretty soon, our fingers will be
too large to operate them. So what are we doing? I trust in the
human wisdom. We are incredibly intelligent beings. So we might
know something without thinking that we know…. Well, even my best
friend didn’t know until now that I was thinking of crazy things like this.
Have a good day!
yoko ono
New York City
Feb. 2009
You have played,
(I think)
And broke the toys you were fondest of,
And are a little tired now;
Tired of things that break, and—
Just tired.
So am I.
Life is only half a game.
Molecules are always at the verge of half disappearing and half emerging.
Somebody said I should also put half-a-person in the show.
But we are halves already.
It’s sad that the air is the only thing we share.
No matter how close we get to each other,
there is always air between us.
It’s also nice that we share the air.
No matter how far apart we are,
the air links us.
Gather all your favorite fruits of the season.
Make a fruit soup out of them.
Freeze it in the freezer for the night, until it becomes icecubes.
Cut the ice cubes and serve it with maple syrup and cinnamon.
Make sure to chant an affirmation that this sweet desert will bring peace and love to the lives of all who eat it.
My love is with you, too.
yoko
I forgot to post this before the full moon. but anyways here is is…
Taurus Full Moon in Scorpio
Wesak – the Sun in Taurus – Scorpio Full Moon – is the most powerful Full Moon of the year. The Sun’s transit through Taurus exalts the Moon and Taurus is ruled by Venus, the spiritual ruler of Earth. Venus is identified with Mary, the World Mother. May, the month of Taurus, is the month of Mary. Venus appears in the west as the feathered serpent god Quetzalcoatl who brought enlightenment to the Mayans; in the east she is Maya, mother of the Buddha.
The lunar cycle is a wave of creation that comes to fruition when the Moon is full. Each Full Moon brings revelation and possibility for healing body, mind, and soul. The Moon is the Mother whence comes reflected Light of the spiritual Sun to nurture, support, protect, and bring to flower the seeds of creation.
The Full Moon is like a pitcher pouring out a healing elixir. The celestial dispensation continues for three days following the day of the Full Moon. Calm and balance, deep breathing, meditation, yoga, rhythmic music and dancing help for receiving the blessings of heaven.
Locally the Full Moon has strong effect in the hour following Sunset when the Moon is rising and at local Midnight when the Moon is directly overhead. This Sun in Taurus Full Moon is called Wesak (WE-sock). Mystics say that the Buddha returns now to help regenerate the Earth.
According to tradition, the Buddha was born, attained enlightenment, and left Earthly incarnation under the Full Moon of Taurus. And the Buddha returns at this time each year to bring new light to the world. Spiritual leaders gather in Wesak Valley, a mythic place high in the Himalayas. Here initiates led by the Christ arrange themselves into a great pentagram (the Venusian emblem of world soul) while the Buddha hovers over those gathered radiating light. This cosmic alignment occurs during the eight minutes centered on the moment of the Wesak full moon.
The One Who is Intimate to All Beings said,
Beloved, your questions require the answers that come
through direct living experience.
The way of experience begins with a breath
such as the breath you are breathing now.
Awakening into the luminous reality
may dawn in the momentary throb
between any two breaths.
The breath flows in and just before it turns
to flow out,
there is a flash of pure joy –
life is renewed.
Awaken into that.
As the breath is released and flows out,
there is a pulse as it turns to flow in.
In that turn, you are empty.
Enter that emptiness as the source of all life.
Emma
Katyslany
Salastia 