. . . the times, they are a-changin'
Apropos for Odin's day, this is Bob Dylan's 82nd birthday. The singer, song-writer, poet was born Robert Zimmerman in 1941 Duluth, Minnesota. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in 2016. The official home page.
Enough is apparently not enough for Der TrumpenFührer.
There is no such thing as one-sided liberation. – Elizabeth Gilbert
The culture of separation and divisiveness we have created for ourselves manifests in that feeling of “stuckness” you may be experiencing. It can be hard to engage in a transformation into something other than what we are inside of – like the fish in water becoming aware of water – opening up to the something we can't imagine. Yet.
Another aspect of this conditioning is the sense of not having enough time to deal with the busyness of everything and there's so many “things.” Our energies get depleted as we scatter it. Even our immune system becomes vulnerable. Our relationships become fragmented and disconnected. We lose that sense of belonging, contradicting and growing at odds with the fact of interconnectedness. Cheating and affairs in all its forms become temptations if not realities. We create our distractions to keep from looking at the water which is ALWAYS moving. Perhaps we need to take a breath and tend however briefly to what might be beyond the “human-centric,” fear rhetoric focus pushed at us, particularly by conservative politicians and the “two sided prism” of most media. There are birds singing in the rain outside my window as I write this.
Come gather 'round people, wherever you roam
and admit that the waters around you have grown,
and accept it that soon you'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you is worth saving
then you better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone
for the times, they are a-changin' — Bob Dylan
When the Buddha disappears . . .
In Tew's day's mail box this morning:
Today is the 1947 birth date of poet Jane Kenyon.
When buddhas don’t appear
And their followers are gone,
The wisdom of awakening
Bursts forth by itself. – Nagarjuna
Ponderments from Rilke
What are nights like for
people who can't sleep?
Even churches look like prisons.
Ever again the wave sweeps
through all things. Only an ocean
where islands appear
now and again.
This past Saturday night (20 May 12) Taylor Swift and her loyal fans danced through a one-inch deluge of rain during her a three and a half hour, 45 song set at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts. She performed previous rain-drenched concert at the same venue in 2011. FYI, Ms. Swift is 33 years of age.
Happiness
There’s just no accounting for happiness . . .
It even comes to the boulder
in the perpetual shade of pine barrens,
to rain falling on the open sea,
to the wineglass, weary of holding wine.
– Jane Kenyon, “Happiness” from Otherwise: New and Selected Poems. Graywolf Press, St. Paul, Minnesota © 2005 by the Estate of Jane Kenyon.
In honor of the copywrite I've provided a sharply edited portion of this amazing work. Go here to read the whole poem. You'll be glad for it.
Livin' in ¾ time . . .
Named after the moon, it's Monday morning in Okieland. In the mailbox:
One of the greatest English-speaking actors of the 20th century, Laurence Olivier, was born in Dorking, Surrey, on this date in 1907. He was also a director, and he founded the National Theatre of Britain.
They used to say we're living on borrowed time...
who loaned it to us? ...say it is an unknown benefactor
who gave us birds and Mozart, the mystery of trees and water.
It's sometimes days, years,
before I realize them – the gifts
brought by the Watercourse.
Another Country
I love these raw moist dawns with
a thousand birds you hear but can’t
quite see in the mist.
My old alien body is a foreigner
struggling to get into another country.
The loon call makes me shiver.
Back at the cabin I see a book
and am not quite sure what that is.
– Jim Harrison