poem

Love, Laughter, and Mourning

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

Even as I celebrate a deeply enriching and inspiring day of conversation and play and good food with my family, I want to also acknowledge that today is a Day of Mourning for Native Nations. The link in the previous sentence will take you to a MCUSA page with brief descriptions of some of the November massacres by US forces against Native communities that took place in the late 1800s, along with some resources for ways to educate ourselves and our communities, and to respond in helpful ways.

I tried coaxing a collaborative poem out of some of my family members gathered around a puzzle this afternoon, but we had trouble keeping focused enough to finish a thought, so my nibling Keri suggested we do an acrostic. The Old Woman of Winter had made an appearance in the first attempt, so I wrote CRONE OF WINTER down the side of the page and asked them to give me words or phrases beginning with the letters. We ended up sticking to words, and this is what happened, and I like it.

Gratitude List:
1. The thoughtful and wise and tender and hilarious conversations around the table and the puzzle and the living room today. It appears that perhaps the members of the family with the strongest executive functioning skills are under the age of 22.
2. Pie. So much pie.
3. The Turkey Trot! I walked a lot more of this one, but came within a minute of my PR last spring at the Race Against Racism.
4. Bald Eagle flying over Codorus Creek
5. The healing properties of laughter
May we walk in Beauty!

“There are no shortcuts to wholeness. The only way to become whole is to put our arms lovingly around everything we’ve shown ourselves to be: self-serving and generous, spiteful and compassionate, cowardly and courageous, treacherous and trustworthy. We must be able to say to ourselves and to the world at large, ‘I am all of the above.’” —Parker Palmer

Solace is your job now.”
—Jan Richardson

“I have noticed when all the lights are on, people tend to talk about what they are doing – their outer lives. Sitting round in candlelight or firelight, people start to talk about how they are feeling ~ their inner lives. They speak subjectively, they argue less, there are longer pauses. To sit alone without electric light is curiously creative. I have my best ideas at dawn or at nightfall, but not if I switch on the lights, then I start thinking about projects, demands, deadlines, and the shadows and shapes of the house become objects, not suggestions, things that need to be done, not a background to thought.” —Jeanette Winterson

Joy Harjo:
“When I woke up from a forty-year sleep, it was by a song. I could hear the drums in the village. I felt the sweat of ancestors in each palm. The singers were singing the world into place, even as it continued to fall apart. They were making songs to turn hatred into love.”

“The history of an oppressed people is hidden in the lies and the agreed myth of its conquerors.”
―Meridel Le Sueur

“I never want to lose the story-loving child within me, or the adolescent, or the young woman, or the middle-aged one, because all together they help me to be fully alive on this journey, and show me that I must be willing to go where it takes me, even through the valley of the shadow.”
―Madeleine L’Engle

“Alas, the webs are torn down, the spinners stomped out. But the forest smiles. Deep in her nooks and crevices she feels the spinners and the harmony of their web. We will dream our way to them …

…Carefully, we feel our way through the folds of darkness. Since our right and left eyes are virtually useless, other senses become our eyes. The roll of a pebble, the breath of dew-cooled pines, a startled flutter in a nearby bush magnify the vast silence of the forest. Wind and stream are the murmering current of time, taking us back to where poetry is sung and danced and lived. … In the distance a fire flickers – not running wild, but contained, like a candle. The spinners.” —Marylou Awiakta, Selu: Seeking the Corn-Mother’s Wisdom

“Do it right, because you only got one time to walk this earth. Make it good, make it a good thing.” —Grandmother Agnes “Taowhywee” (Morning Star) Baker Pilgrim (1924-2019)

“Half the world is composed of people who have something to say and can’t, and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it.” —Robert Frost

“I believe war is a weapon of persons with personal power, that is to say, the power to reason, the power to persuade, from a position of morality and integrity ; and that to go to war with an enemy who is weaker than you is to admit you possess no resources within yourself to bring to bear on your fated.” —Alice Walker

“The fault dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in our selves.” —Cassius, from ‘Julius Caesar’ by William Shakespeare

“Let your love be like the misty rain, coming softly, but flooding the River.” —Proverb

“Perhaps too much sanity may be madness.” —from ‘Don Quixote’ by Cervantes

Heart’s Desire

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 1 Comment

I’ve had a very productive day doing things other than poetry writing! So my poem today is my heart’s desire prayer for the new novena that begins tomorrow with Way of the Rose.

Gratitude List:

  1. Bringing the kid home from college for the weekend!
  2. How things sometimes fall together instead of apart. I lost the cap to my air stem when I went to top off my leaky tire, so I drove to our garage to but a new one, and they offered to just go ahead and fix the leak, too! Now I don’t have to fuss with an appointment.
  3. Fall leaves
  4. Peppermint brownies. Haven’t eaten then yet. The mix is there waiting in the cupboard for us to make this evening!
  5. A good car book to listen to on a long trip. Weyward by Emilia Hart is the current one.

May we walk in beauty!

“Never laugh at live dragons.” —J.R.R. Tolkien
*****
“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.” —Aristotle
*****
“In a good bookroom you feel in some mysterious way that you are absorbing the wisdom contained in all the books through your skin, without even opening them.” —Mark Twain
*****
“The world rests in the night. Trees, mountains, fields, and faces are released from the prison of shape and the burden of exposure. Each thing creeps back into its own nature within the shelter of the dark. Darkness is the ancient womb. Nighttime is womb- time. Our souls come out to play. The darkness absolves everything; the struggle for identity and impression falls away. We rest in the night.” ―John O’Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom
*****
“Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.” —Aristotle
*****
“The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery.” —Anais Nin
*****
“Changing the big picture takes time.. and the best thing to do is focus on the things that we can make in our lives if we’re doing all that. That becomes the collage of real change.” —Michelle Obama
*****
“Adventure is worthwhile in itself.” —Amelia Earhart
*****
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” —Lucille Ball
*****
“Learn how to take criticism seriously but not personally.” —Hillary Clinton
*****
“Like a great starving beast, my body is quivering, fixed on the scent of light.” —Hafiz
*****
“Identity is a story carried in the body.” —Sophia Samatar
*****
“Once every people in the world believed that trees were divine … and that deer, and ravens and foxes, and wolves and bears, and clouds and pools, almost all things under the sun and moon, and the sun and moon, were not less divine …”
—W.B. Yeats
****
“The heart is your student, for love is the only way we learn.”
—Rumi
*****
Poet Joy Harjo, from 2012:
“Visited with my cousin George Coser, Jr yesterday at the kitchen table. He’s a gift. Always something profound among the stories. The sacred lies at the root of the mundane. And every word is a power element. Each word or sound, whether thought, written or spoken grows our path, the path of our generation, the children, grandchildren, the Earth. . . . We become the ancestors. A sense of play gives a lightness of being. So get out there and play—and be kind while you’re at it. To yourself, too.”
*****
Help me to journey beyond the familiar
and into the unknown.
Give me the faith to leave old ways
and break fresh ground with You.

Christ of the mysteries, I trust You
to be stronger than each storm within me.
I will trust in the darkness and know
that my times, even now, are in Your hand.
Tune my spirit to the music of heaven,
and somehow, make my obedience count for You.
—The Prayer of St. Brendan (attributed to Brendan)
*****
The Wild Geese
by Wendell Berry

Horseback on Sunday morning,
harvest over, we taste persimmon
and wild grape, sharp sweet
of summer’s end. In time’s maze
over fall fields, we name names
that went west from here, names
that rest on graves. We open
a persimmon seed to find the tree
that stands in promise,
pale, in the seed’s marrow.
Geese appear high over us,
pass, and the sky closes. Abandon,
as in love or sleep, holds
them to their way, clear,
in the ancient faith: what we need
is here. And we pray, not
for new earth or heaven, but to be
quiet in heart, and in eye
clear. What we need is here.

Now Is the Time

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

I’ve been feeling like it’s been a good month, poetry-wise, this time around. I am often more consistently disappointed and uninspired by the output of a poem-a-day. I do this not because I think I will end up with thirty excellent poems, but in the hopes that I’ll get one or two that satisfy me. Ray Bradbury suggests that you write a short story every week for a year, because it’s impossible to write 52 bad short stories in a row, and I think it’s impossible to write thirty bad poems in a row. This month has given me more than one that I like so far. Today’s is lacking in energy, but I might revisit the theme again and rewrite it.

Now Is the Time
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

Now is the time for web-building,
nest-making, mycelial connection.

Now is the time for shoring up
our courage, for remembering
who we are, and why we’re here.

Now is the time for listening,
for receiving our names,
for calling in the ancestors
for dreaming ourselves into the dream.

Now the time we were made for,
the time to enter all the tales
we learned in every book we’ve read,
where brave children enter the wood,
and uncertain heroes take up the quest.

Good advice from my friend Barb: “Find and wear your orange hat honey. There are 750,000 deer hunters in the yard today.”

“You have done infinitely more good than you can imagine. You may not be a worker of miracles, but you are a worker of compassion. Your kindness is reflexive. You instinctively want to help others in need. Like a first responder: you have the stamina it takes to help someone and it shows up throughout the story of your life. You have done more good than you know.” —Steven Charleston

This year I do not want
The dark to leave me.
I need its wrap
Of silent stillness,
Its cloak
Of long lasting embrace.
Too much light
Has pulled me away
from the chamber
of gestation.
Let the dawns
Come late,
Let the sunsets
Arrive early,
Let the evenings
Extend themselves
While I lean into
The abyss of my being.
Let me lie in the cave
Of my soul,
For too much light
Blinds me,
Steals the source
Of revelation.
Let me seek solace
In the empty places
Of winter’s passage,
Those vast dark nights
That never fail to shelter me.
-Joyce Rupp

“We have all hurt someone tremendously, whether by intent or accident. We have all loved someone tremendously, whether by intent or accident. it is an intrinsic human trait, and a deep responsibility, I think, to be an organ and a blade. But, learning to forgive ourselves and others because we have not chosen wisely is what makes us most human. We make horrible mistakes. It’s how we learn. We breathe love. It’s how we learn. And it is inevitable.”
—Nayyira Waheed

“Only those who attempt the absurd
will achieve the impossible.”
—M. C. Escher

Blessing for the Visitor
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

May you who wander, who sojourn, who travel,
may you who make your way to our door
find rest for your tired feet and weary heart,
food to fill your bellies and to nourish your minds,
and company to bring you cheer and inspiration.
May you find comfort for your sorrows,
belonging to ease your loneliness,
and laughter to bring you alive.

And when your feet find themselves again upon the road,
may they remember the way back to our door.

“A seed sown in the soil makes us one with the Earth. It makes us realize that we are the Earth. That this body of ours is the panchabhuta—the five elements that make the universe and make our bodies. The simple act of sowing a seed, saving a seed, planting a seed, harvesting a crop for a seed is bringing back this memory-this timeless memory of our oneness with the Earth and the creative universe. There’s nothing that gives me deeper joy than the work of protecting the diversity and the freedom of the seed.” —Vandana Shiva

“I’m fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in.” —George McGovern

Found Poem: Nothing but the Snow

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

I decided to do a strip poem today. Sometimes these feel incredibly inspired, but mostly they end up feeling sort of whimsical or silly, like today’s.

Gratitude List:
1. Water (this is a backward gratitude at the moment because the pump is on the fritz, but there’s nothing like being temporarily unable to use the faucet that makes you appreciate water)
2. Woodpeckers! Downy, hairy, red-bellied, pileated. . .
3. Peppermint
4. Simple suppers: apples and cheese and ciabatta and roasted broccoli
5. Sailing ships–My middle division class is reading Peter and the Starcatchers, and so we’re researching what sailing shops looked like so we can understand the nautical vocabulary, and I am getting a little obsessed with old sailing ships
May we walk in Beauty!

“What if our religion was each other? If our practice was our life? What if the temple was the Earth? If forests were our church? If holy water – the rivers, lakes, and oceans? What if meditation was our relationships? If the Teacher was life? If wisdom was knowledge? If love was the center of our being.” ―Ganga White

“Gratitude creates a sense of abundance, the knowing that you have what you need. In that climate of sufficiency, our hunger for more abates and we take only what we need, in respect for the generosity of the giver.” —Robin Wall Kimmerer

“The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying ‘This is mine’, and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society.

From how many crimes, wars and murders, from how many horrors and misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up the ditch, and crying to his fellows, “Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody.” —Rousseau

“It is wonderful when you don’t have the fear, and a lot of the time I don’t. . . . I focus on what needs to be done instead.” —Wangari Maathai

“I will take my chances with you, with all of you, from any country or any condition, who believe a brighter day for humanity is possible, who open your hearts and minds to a broader vision of diversity, who serve the cause of kindness and speak the language of healing. I will make my lodge with you. I will be honored to call you my relatives. I will face tomorrow by your side, whatever that day may bring, and together we will make our witness, until the wind chases the sun from the sky and the stars begin to sing.” —Steven Charleston

“Two birds fly past. They are needed somewhere.”
— Robert Bly

“Let my anger be the celebration we were never / supposed to have.” —Jacqui Germain

I don’t have to chase extraordinary moments to find happiness. It’s right in front of me, if I’m paying attention and practicing gratitude.
—Brené Brown

“The eyes of the Future are looking back at us and they are praying for us to see beyond our own time.” —Terry Tempest Williams

“You’ve seen my descent.
Now watch my rising.”
—Rumi

“Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.”—Thomas Merton

“For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry.” —Mary Oliver

“Attention is what matters. What we are living through is a time of grotesque inattention. The very act of taking heed, of paying attention, is a political act.” —Kathleen Jamie

Slippery

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I’ve been sick all week. I took off a day of school–probably should have taken three. And I haven’t been exercising to get ready for this 5K Turkey Trot on Thursday morning. So the choice right now was to spend time really working out a good poem for today or hitting the treadmill, and I am going to have to choose the treadmill. So I took the first metaphor that tracked me down, ran with it, and threw it onto the page. Part of the contract I have with myself for these months of writing a poem a day is that any day’s poem can be garbage. I’m not sure where this poem fits, but it’s definitely a toss-off.

by Beth Weaver-Kreider

Remember the slippery fish of a child,
unwilling participant in adult world,
who could melt out of your arms,
slip onto the floor and be off
and running for the hills
before you could catch your breath?

Some days my brain is that child,
anchored as it is to my body,
it somehow slithers through my grasp
even as I am sitting it down
to do its important work,
and it’s off and dancing in the mist
before I even know it’s gone.

“Walk with the Spirit. Wherever you go, whatever you do, whoever you are with. Walk in the light of what we have learned from our ancestors. Each person is worthy of respect. A better world is possible for us all. Our love will finally overcome our fear. Let that wisdom guide your steps. Let that message be made visible in who you are. The path to peace is laid before your feet. Walk with the Spirit.” —Steven Charleston

“We are in a time of deep transformation. Deep change. We did not ask for this to be the case. We did not even fully anticipate it. But it is our reality. It is our challenge. The Spirit has confidence in us to move history in the direction of hope. We are called to create a future. And we are equal to the task — with the help of heaven and the kinship of all living things.” —Steven Charleston

“You pray for the hungry. Then you feed them.
That is how prayer works.” —Pope Francis

“Allow dark times to season you.” —Hafiz

“I don’t have to respond whenever provoked.
No one does.
Steward your energy well.
We have justice work to do.
And strategy to outline.
And self-care to prioritize.
And love to live.
It’s okay to let provocateurs leave empty-handed.”
—Bernice King

“A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one’s neighbor—such is my idea of happiness.” —Leo Tolstoy

“I don’t have to chase extraordinary moments to find happiness. It’s right in front of me, if I’m paying attention and practicing gratitude.” —Brené Brown

“Oh, to love what is lovely, and will not last!” —Mary Oliver

“I don’t have to figure it all out. I don’t have to be perfect for every moment. I just need to be Present. I just need to show up.” —Beth Weaver-Kreider (My past self is preaching to my present self.)

“The ego forgets that it’s supposed to be the little traveler with its bindle bag over its shoulder, following behind [not ahead] the radiant Soul who walks as more wise, more tender, more loving, more peaceful trailblazer throughout our lives.
.
Ego aspires sometimes to wear the garments of the Soul, which are way too big, making the ego trip over the miles of radiant robes it tries to wrap itself in, instead of following the light those robes give off. And tending to the Soul’s needs, the Soul’s directions.
Yet with Soul in the lead, and ego following the lead of the Soul, then we can fulfill the vision of the Holy People…” —Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes

“Driven by the forces of love, the fragments of the world are seeking one another.” —Teilhard de Chardin

“There’s a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.” ―Oscar Levant

“Scriptures, n. The sacred books of our holy religion, as distinguished from the false and profane writings on which all other faiths are based.” —Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914), [The Devil’s Dictionary, 1906]

“There are real world implications to ‘just having opinions’ and those implications almost always involve doing deep harm to marginalized communities.” —Kaitlin Shetler

Re-Member

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Re-Member
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

I remember me
when in the company
of women who sigh
when they hug,
who throw their heads back
and laugh, who pause
in the middle of a story
to look you in the eye
and shake their heads
at the ridiculousness
of it all, at the crazy way
it all falls apart,
and all comes together.

Gratitude List:
1. Making art with others
2. Telling stories with the help of tarot cards
3. Yogurt-covered pretzels
4. Woodpeckers: this morning, downy, hairy, and red-bellied were all at the feeder at the same time
5. Watching the herd of deer in their dark winter coats crossing through the bosque this morning–I’m pretty sure two young ones are the twins I saw throughout the summer
May we walk in Beauty!

“The winds will blow their own freshness into you,
and the storms their energy,
while cares will drop away from you
like the leaves of Autumn.”
—John Muir

“Those who build walls are their own prisoners. I’m going to go fulfil my proper function in the social organism. I’m going to go unbuild walls. ” —Ursula Le Guin

“The mother tongue is language not as mere communication but as relation, relationship. It connects. It goes two ways, many ways, an exchange, a network. Its power is not in dividing but in binding, not in distancing but in uniting.

It is written, but not by scribes and secretaries for posterity: it flies from the mouth on the breath that is our life and is gone, like the outbreath, utterly gone and yet returning, repeated, the breath the same again always, everywhere, and we all know it by heart.” —Ursula K. Le Guin

“Who would I be if I didn’t live in a world that hated women?” —Jessica Valenti

“The heart is right to cry
even when the smallest drop of light, of love, is taken away
Perhaps you may kick, moan, scream—in a dignified silence,
but you are right to do so in any fashion…until God returns to you.”
―Hafiz (Ladinsky)

“All water is holy water.”
―Rajiv Joseph

“The mullahs of the Islamic world and the mullahs of the Hindu world and the mullahs of the Christian world are all on the same side. And we are against them all.”
―Arundhati Roy

“Remember there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness.
Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.”
―Scott Adams

“You know what breaks me, when someone is visibly excited about a feeling or an idea or a hope or a risk taken, and they tell you about it but preface it with: “Sorry, this is dumb but—.” Don’t do that. I don’t know who came here before me, or who conditioned you to think you had to apologize or feel obtuse. But not here. Dream so big it’s silly. Laugh so hard it’s obnoxious. Love so much it’s impossible. And don’t you ever feel unintelligent. And don’t you ever apologize. And don’t you ever shrink so you can squeeze yourself into small places and small minds. Grow. It’s a big world. You fit. I promise.”
―Owen Lindley

“The bond of our common humanity is stronger than our fears and prejudices.” ―Jimmy Carter

“The reality is we have more in common with the people we’re bombing than the people we’re bombing them for.” ―Russell Brand

“Colorful demonstrations and weekend marches are vital but alone are not powerful enough to stop wars. Wars will be stopped only when soldiers refuse to fight, when workers refuse to load weapons onto ships and aircraft, when people boycott the economic outposts of Empire that are strung across the globe. ”
―Arundhati Roy, Public Power in the Age of Empire

Two Kinds of People

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Two Kinds of People
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

There are two kinds of people:
the ones who cannot sleep at night
because of the blood on their Instagram feed
and the ones who go on,
eating their pizza—
so sad, they say.

The ones who cannot pull their heads
out from under the covers
when the con man wins
and the ones who shrug,
and walk the dog,
and get on with it.

The ones who cannot stop crying
and the ones who get on the bus
to go shopping downtown
and grab a coffee with a friend,
who say, If I can’t control it
I might as well roll with it.

I
am
two kinds of people.

“Are you waiting for the next shoe to drop? Are you anticipating the worry even before it happens? If so, you may be wearing yourself out. Rather than worry about what might happen, why not help make something different happen: an alternative, a positive change, a softer impact. Many of us are working on that right now. So when you get tired of waiting for the shoe to drop — come catch it in midair.” —Steven Charleston

“The ability to sit with mystery and explore the dark but fertile realms of infinite possibility is crucial to the work of inhabiting a meaningful life. We have to learn to stay rooted in the midst of chaotic obscurity, in the shadow-haunted wild places of the psyche. We need these rootings more than ever during the bone-deep metamorphosis that is menopause.” —Sharon Blackie

“To see where you are going, look behind you. The clues are there. Mistakes you have made, patterns you have followed, breakthroughs you have had, ideas that did not turn out as planned: your experience is your guide. It tells you what you may expect on the road ahead. The key is in how much you have learned from the past and how those learnings shape your decisions for the future. Look before you leap: look back to see what may come.” —Steven Charleston

“Revolution means reinventing culture.” —Grace Lee Boggs

“May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.”
—Nelson Mandela

For a day, just for one day,
Talk about that which disturbs no one
And bring some peace into your beautiful eyes.
—Hafiz

“Open your mouth only if what you are going to say is more beautiful than silence.” —proverb

“All religions, all this singing, one song. The differences are just illusion and vanity. The sun’s light looks a little different on this wall than it does on that wall, and a lot different on this other one, but it’s still one light.” —Rumi

The magic of autumn has seized the countryside;
now that the sun isn’t ripening anything
it shines for the sake of the golden age;
for the sake of Eden;
to please the moon for all I know.
—Elizabeth Coatsworth

“Revolution means reinventing culture.” –Grace Lee Boggs

At the Gallows

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

I was back at school today after a day off for this bad cold. My head still feels like it’s full of rocks. So the poem today was slightly lower effort. In a little break today, I went through the first few chapters of The Scarlet Letter and pulled out words and phrases that seemed to go together in order to create a found poem.

I think I’m going to have to come back to this again and see what possibilities arise. I’m actually more pleased with these results than I expected to be.

At the Gallows
a poem found in The Scarlet Letter
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

I.
a throng of bearded men
heavily timbered
founders of a new Utopia
on one side of the portal
kept alive in history
under the footsteps
of our narrative

II.
on a certain summer morning
in that early severity
that witch was to die upon the gallows

on the summer morning the women
appeared to take a peculiar interest
they were her countrywomen

III.
make way, good people, make way
open a passage
iniquity is dragged out into the sunshine
the spectacle of guilt and shame
woman, transgress not
beyond the limits of heaven’s mercy
on this wild outskirt of earth
art thou not afraid

IV.
her sin the roots
which she had struck into the soil
the chain that bound her here
could never be broken
her shame that all nature knew

V.
a torch kindles a name
destiny had drawn a circle about her
witchcraft gathered about her
the sound of a witch’s anathemas
in some unknown tongue

VI.
the fallen woman had been
on her pedestal of shame
possessing the lock and key
of her silence

“May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.”
—Nelson Mandela
*****
For a day, just for one day,
Talk about that which disturbs no one
And bring some peace into your beautiful eyes.
—Hafiz
*****
“Whatever you’re meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible.” —Doris Lessing
*****
“Open your mouth only if what you are going to say is more beautiful than silence.” —proverb
*****
“All religions, all this singing, one song. The differences are just illusion and vanity. The sun’s light looks a little different on this wall than it does on that wall, and a lot different on this other one, but it’s still one light.” —Rumi
*****
The magic of autumn has seized the countryside;
now that the sun isn’t ripening anything
it shines for the sake of the golden age;
for the sake of Eden;
to please the moon for all I know.
—Elizabeth Coatsworth
*****
“. . .fairies’ gold, they say, is like love or knowledge—or a good story. It’s most valuable when it’s shared.” —Heather Forest, The Woman Who Flummoxed the Fairies
*****
“Sacred is another word for energy. Some physical spaces are sacred because they vibrate with the energy of the Spirit. Some rituals are sacred because they connect infinite energy with finite creation. Some memories are sacred because they transmit the energy of those who are now our ancestors.  Some visions are sacred because they are the energy of hope, transforming our lives, right before our eyes.” —Steven Charleston

Trans Day of Remembrance

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Trans Day of Remembrance
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

Hold a lit flame in the palm of your hand
Quanesha, Strawberry, Honee
Kassim, Redd, Vanity
Tai’Vion, Dylan, Monique, Pauly
listen as the silence gathers wings around you
Kenji, Shannon, River Neveah
Liara, Jazlynn, Yella, Africa
Michelle, Tayy Dior, Reyna
their faces like wisps of smoke and mist
looking over our shoulders
Kita, Andrea Doria, Kitty
Sasha, Starr, Meraxes, Chevy
Diamond, Alex, Tee
These are just the names we know of those
who lost their lives this year to violence.

Hold your flames high and give them light,
let light shine into their memories,
let light pour through the scrim of their stories
that we may hear again their voices.
We have a right to be here.
We have a right to exist as ourselves.

Hold your flames higher still,
for their number is greater than thirty.
Hosts of beloved ones join our circle,
lives lost not at the hands of another,
but at the hands of society,
at the bitter end of despair,
caught in the crosshairs
of some preacher’s sanctimonious condemnation,
some politician’s pandering to the puritans,
some school board member’s unctuous dissembling.

Rise up like smoke, they tell us, their voices
like ashes caught in the arms of autumn wind,
spilling into our circles. Stand up,
step forward, speak out, so that the ones
who come after us may live.

Gratitude List:
1. Pileated woodpecker, towhee, shadow of vulture
2. The white breast of the yellow-throat catching the afternoon sun among the red leaves of the Japanese maple
3. Beginning to feel good again after feeling rotten
4. Cinnamon tea
5. How hearts reach out. Can you feel it?
May we walk in Beauty!

“Here is what the elders call a starting point. If we seek to welcome people into community, then mutual respect must be our foundational practice. We commit ourselves to respect the dignity of every human being. It does not mean agree, authorize or approve. It does mean treat others as we would have them treat us. Respect is the gate we open to all those looking for a place to belong.” —Steven Charleston

“If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they’ll kill you.” -Oscar Wilde

“Every minute can be a holy, sacred minute. Where do you seek the spiritual? You seek the spiritual in every ordinary thing that you do every day. Sweeping the floor, watering the vegetables, and washing the dishes become holy and sacred if mindfulness is there. With mindfulness and concentration, everything becomes spiritual.” ― Thích Nhất Hạnh

“…when women speak truly they speak subversively–they can’t help it: if you’re underneath, if you’re kept down, you break out, you subvert.
We are volcanoes. When we women offer our experience as our truth, as human truth, all the maps change. There are new mountains.
That’s what I want–to hear you erupting. You young Mount St. Helenses who don’t know the power in you–I want to hear you.” —Ursula Le Guin

“What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life? The world would split open.” —Muriel Rukeyser

“Oh to meet, however briefly, the greatness that lives under our surface. To summon enough bravery to be without armour and strategy, for the chance at meeting that irreducible power. Oh to make of our terrified hearts a prayer of surrender to the God of Love; that we remain safe in our quivering ache to be near that Otherness, even for a moment. To touch that ancient life who will never relinquish its wilderness, who lets instinct make its choices, whose knowing lives in bones and whose song is a wayfinder.” ―Dreamwork with Toko-pa

“The deeper our faith, the more doubt we must endure; the deeper our hope, the more prone we are to despair; the deeper our love, the more pain its loss will bring: these are a few of the paradoxes we must hold as human beings. If we refuse to hold them in the hopes of living without doubt, despair, and pain, we also find ourselves living without faith, hope, and love.”
―Parker J. Palmer

“November always seemed to me the Norway of the year.”
―Emily Dickinson

“One of my favourite teachings by Martín Prechtel is that ‘violence is an inability with grief.’ In other words, it takes skillfulness to grieve well, to grieve wholeheartedly. It requires us to bravely, nakedly come to face all that is lost, keeping our hearts open to loving just as fully again.
“When we make war, lashing out in rage and revenge, it is because we are unwilling to make this full encounter with grief. It is easy to enact the same violence which has taken so much from us―including towards ourselves―but the greater work is to let that which is missing enlarge your life; to make beauty from your brokenness.
“Whatever you hold in the cauldron of your intention is your offering to the divine. The quality of assistance you can generate and receive from the Holy is governed by the quality of your inner offering. When you indulge in fear and doubt, you are flooding the arena where love is attempting to work.” ―Dreamwork with Toko-pa

“Our true home is in the present moment.
To live in the present moment is a miracle.
The miracle is not to walk on water.
The miracle is to walk on the green Earth
in the present moment.”
―Thich Nhat Hanh

“An awake heart
is like a sky that pours light.” ―Hafiz (Ladinsky)

“There’s a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.” ―Oscar Levant

Rules

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

This one is inspired by Martín Espada’s “Rules for Captain Ahab’s Provincetown Poetry Workshop”

Rules for Aunt Elizabeth’s School for Young Witches
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

  1. No dogmas allowed in the house. 
  2. Keep your karma tuned up at all times.
  3. No reading of others’ auras without consent.
  4. For that matter, do no magic on anyone without consent. This particularly applies to love potions. Go ahead and make yourself lovely and loveable, but refrain from compelling others to love you.
  5. Remember to empty your pockets of crystals and twigs and butterfly wings and feathers and toads and marbles and nails and broken glass before you put your robes in the wash.
  6. Your wands are extensions of your fingers, and it isn’t polite to point fingers, so do not point your wands at others.
  7. Keep your cauldrons clean. Residual spellwork in an unclean cauldron may cause unintended reactions in future potion-making.
  8. Tend to your ongoing spells. Expired spells may increase in potency, resulting in dangerous side effects.
  9. Keep that nose out of the air. No task is too humble for a witch. Sometimes the strongest spells are created in the completion of the humblest of tasks.
  10. Listen when the trees are talking to you. Do not ignore the questions that the rocks put forth. Do not interrupt the speeches of the rivers.
  11. Greet all beings politely, whether human, animal, mineral, plant, or magical.

We are doing 30 Days of Gratitude at school right now, so some of my gratitudes are responding to those specific prompts.

Gratitude List:
1. That pink sky this morning, and the pastel greens of the fields below
2. Three small things: gemstones, kittens, little succulent plants
3. Something in the room: my students
4. A person: Leymah Gbowee ( and her continuing work for justice and human rights)
5. First Trimester Grades are done and submitted
May we walk in Beauty!

“I want to live the rest of my life, however long or short, with as much sweetness as I can decently manage, loving all the people I love.” —Audre Lorde

“We need another… perhaps a more mystical concept of animals… In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear.” —Henry Beston

“One must say Yes to life, and embrace it wherever it is found – and it is found in terrible places. … For nothing is fixed, forever and forever, it is not fixed; the earth is always shifting, the light is always changing, the sea does not cease to grind down rock. Generations do not cease to be born, and we are responsible to them because we are the only witnesses they have. The sea rises, the light fails, lovers cling to each other and children cling to us. The moment we cease to hold each other, the moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.” —James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time, 1963

“Walk fearlessly into the house of mourning, for grief is just love squaring up to its oldest enemy.” —Kate Braestrup

“Honesty matters. Vulnerability matters. Being open about who you were at a moment in time when you were in a difficult or an impossible place matters more than anything.” —Neil Gaiman

“Yesterday we obeyed kings and bent our necks before emperors, but today we kneel only to truth, follow only beauty, and obey only love.” —Kahlil Gibran

“To write is to ask questions. It doesn’t matter if the answers are true or puro cuento. After all and everything only the story is remembered, and the truth fades away like the pale blue ink on a cheap embroidery pattern.” —Sandra Cisneros, Caramelo

“With guns, you can kill terrorists.
With education, you can kill terrorism.” —Malala Yousufsai

“The wo/man who moves a mountain
begins by carrying away small stones.”
—Confucius, The Analects

“We learn from our gardens to deal with the most urgent question of the time: How much is enough?” —Wendell Berry

“She’s a lean vixen: I can see
the ribs, the sly
trickster’s eyes, filled with longing
and desperation, the skinny
feet, adept at lies.

Why encourage the notion
of virtuous poverty?
It’s only an excuse
for zero charity.
Hunger corrupts, and absolute hunger
corrupts absolutely,”
― Margaret Atwood, Morning in the Burned House