After Yesterday Before Tomorrow

Saturday's Flight 9"x12"

What you already are

Before the picnic

The ground of awakening

In the presence of a tree

Collect no jewels

A time of bewilderment

An inside job

Already free

No lock on the gate

Where hope is born

The idea of a journey

In the present tense

As you really are

Taking Refuge

In your present condition

Below the mind's radar

The truth about yourself

Sudden Radical Insight

No matter what

Some block is gone

A door has opened

Stepping outside

Not a bunch of thoughts

The whole world wants to stop here

A simple thing, Transformation

Lift your face to the sky

The Art of Asking Beautiful Questions

Journey 6"x6" oil, earth pigments, cold wax

"Poetry is the art of asking beautiful questions."  That line, from the workshop I did with David Whyte last Saturday, has rented a small bit of space in my head and keeps popping out for air.  Whyte showed us plenty of Irish hospitality (without the single malt) He read to us, told us stories, steeped us in poetry and asked us beautiful questions: questions like "what star just appeared in your life, that you did not know you were following?"

I think Whyte's poetry has such wide appeal because he invites each of us into the interior of our lives in ways that are both practical and mysterious. He takes us on a pilgrimage to somewhere we didn't know we wanted to go, but when we get there we recognize it as the necessary destination.  On Saturday he took us to the wind swept shores of Gallway Bay  and held us up to peek out the same window that Wordsworth did at Cambridge. He stood with us at Finestre while the moon hovered over our shoulders and we threw away our old boots.  He read from his most recent book "Pilgrim" and reminded us that he'd never walked the Camino but after a few more  sentences (because he's Irish, he said) he would be convinced that he had.

Royal Roads University (David Whyte workshop was here)

But mostly Whyte urged us to "start close in, don't take the second step or the third, take the first step, the one you don't want to take." He saw his job that day as teasing us out of our cocoons and onto the path to be "nourished and disturbed". The day was spent weaving in and out of the highways and side roads where we might have "conversations".  He invited us to have the courageous conversation, the one we don't want to have.  It might be with a friend, a spouse, your child, with yourself.  It's about being brave enough to say the thing that needs to be said. He observed that we are often afraid to initiate these conversations because we're not sure we can handle the response we'll get. There are so many conversations we can have: "with the horizon, with silence, with the unknown."  A good question Whyte suggested, is "what conversation am I not having with my heart and mind?"

He reminded us that the stories we tell ourselves, the ones about how things are, about how we are, are really conversations. He suggested that if we engaged in conversations with others in this same way we talk to ourselves we wouldn't have many friends! I found this framing of "self talk" as conversation helpful in looking at the stories that rattle around in my head.  "No, I guess I really don't need to say that, it's not very helpful. I really could open a different conversation."  News flash!

Too warm for a sweater in Victoria?  With the Camas at Beacon Hill Park

Whyte invites us to cultivate a relationship with the unknown.  We spend most of our time shying away from the unknown, trying to wrap things up and get them into the cage of the known asap.  But the truth is we are always walking into the unknown.  If we could do some sort of measurement we would probably find there is more unknown to us than known.  And  so we have this uncomfortable relationship with a large part of our life. Whyte suggests we could ground ourselves in the unknown.

In his summing up Whyte suggested our first step was to stop having the conversation we're having now. That's the only pathway to change. Most of our conversations arise from habit. If we stop the conversation we're having now then the opportunity exists to begin a new conversation.  And the new conversation can emerge out of the silence. Conversation gives rise to invitations which produce seeds that can then be harvested.

Such a rich opportunity, to consider what is it that I want to say, need to say or conversely what is it that I'm avoiding saying? And why am I avoiding it? An even more interesting question. And now, let the conversations begin.

A Small Bird Built A Nest In My Heart

A small bird

 built

A nest

In my heart

I saw her

carefully tugging

Prayer flag threads

I didn't see her carry

the dry twigs of despair

the brittle lichen of longing

instead she placed them secretly

knowing they would hold

what was

waiting to fly

from my heart

It is the season of earth's great generosity and abundance. The natural world is bursting with voluptuous Spring greenness, a colour so rich and vibrant that it tickles you from the inside. The maples, the lilacs and the green fingered pine trees.  And all the while in the garden, the weeds grow like -- weeds.

And as a human living in this divine explosion of energy I make some attempt, in my foolishness, to tame a small part of this world that grows up around my door. I pull weeds.  I use the weedeater and the lawn mower. I plant seeds in a garden whose clay soil is a better host to hardy, practiced weeds than to tender veggie seeds. In my grumbling and digging I realize my need to amend the soil. Tiny lights are lit from the candle of despair.

And so the list of tasks that rattle around in my head is also made abundant by this lush season. I am humbled by my role of lion tamer to the natural world. Each morning the overnight surges and spurts of growth greet me and ask me "who do you think you are?"

The deer browse hungrily, eyeing the trellis rose just out of reach, scratching the itch of their velvety antlers. Quail take a dust bath in hollows they have etched with their round bodies and crazy scratching. We watch them argue over whose turn it is in the prime spot under the bird feeder. Seven tiny ducklings swim under the willow that hangs into the pond. Their is always new snacks for the eyes.

I watch the feelings of delight at the sights of nature untamed and then am swamped by the sense of overwhelm that rises in an instant, feeding on my desire to manicure a small square of earth for the part of me that savours order and tidiness. It is a constant movement like the breeze that comes over the hill. My work is to delight in the coexistence of these two senses like a parent of children that like to argue a bit.

And how is it in your part of this lovely planet as it springs to life?

A Break For Freedom

It looks like we're going on a little poetry road trip.  Summer is a good time for road trips, don't you think? Someone mentioned David Whyte in yesterday's comments, another one of those lovely poets that aims straight for the heart and seldom misses. "Poetry," says Whyte on his website comments "is a break for freedom."   Now that's my kind of road trip.

Loaves and Fishes

This is not

the age of information.

This is not

the age of information.

Forget the news,

and the radio,

and the blurred screen.

This is the time

of loaves 

and fishes.

People are hungry

and one good word is bread

for a thousand.

  -- David Whyte

The Begging Bowl

The poem on this textured mixed media piece is from  the Japanese Zen poet and monk, Ryokan.  It reads: 

On the first day of the eighth month I go into town to beg

At dawn, the doors of a thousand homes are flung open

The smoke of myriad hearths slants through the air

Last night's rain has washed the road clean

And An autumn wind rustles the rings of my staff

I take my time begging

The universe is vast without end

 There is so much teaching in this short poem.

I love how Ryokan conveys his sense of presence, of being right there expressed in the clear seeing of things as they are, the wonderful details of the simple scene.  Ryokan is reminding us to be here for our lives, in their fullness, in their simplicity.... to be here in the wet and the wind and the smoke.  

And not only does he see the rain washed street and the smoke and  hear the wind , you can feel his appreciation of those simple details, a savouring of them.  He is showing us how there is pleasure in participating fully in what is, in sensing the texture and flavour of the day.  He is not saying man it's dark and cold and wet and there's smoke everywhere, it's windy.  This really sucks. I wish I was on a sunny beach somewhere.  He is not rejecting what is or imagining it as the source of some suffering.  He is not adding on to what is.  He is "taking his time" knowing that this precious moment is the only one we really have, wherever we are.  There is a wistfulness too, a bittersweet quality to this savouring, a lonely heart tugging quality  expressed in these few words, which can often be present in life.

And of course there is the humility of the monk with his begging bowl.  How comfortable would I be holding out a bowl to strangers, asking for something, anything....   just being open to what they offer or don't choose to offer.... open to rejection, to receiving something I don't want, or to going unnoticed.  Do we willingly put ourselves in this position?  And how much courage does it take to do this?  It's all about the "little self" as my Zen teacher calls it, the ego.  Always shoring itself up, protecting and defending it's poor little vulnerable self.  How much energy do we waste on that process?    How subtle is the mischief of pride?  How attached are we to our opinions and points of view? And there in lies a lot of our spiritual work, it seems, loosening the grip of the ego.

And finally Ryokan reminds us that there is so much that is beyond our human understanding that really it is probably good to just give our thinking minds a rest and be present.  How can we understand the ultimate mystery of it all, that ...."the universe is vast and without end" ....