Day 3 - response

Inside a tsunami raged

The crowd simply watched as I over flew into life

No one else

chose for me to continue

even when wounded and overwhelmed

No one else

made me a martyr

No one else

caused the envy of others lives

and choices to rage unchecked

My care must start with me.

Day 2 - Haiku for a friend

No one sees inner

journey of another

compassion needed

We used to wear black for a year after someone close died. 

Black as a reminder to ourselves and to all around us - the life here has died - life here is struggling to breath. 

We who grieve may look out onto the world but we can not see anything but grey tears and shards of regret.

I was so tired, so alone, so unsure - when I felt betrayed by another I over reacted - I wish I had had the wisdom to simply stay home and not try to act as if nothing was wrong. Let me wear black - let them wear black - let them wear their hearts for at least a year ... it would have been easier than the fear people showed when they could not be bothered to remember they walked with someone whose inner landscape was as brittle as the moon.

Day 1 - What is left when a hole is made

Forgiveness - Reconciliation - Confession
The empty hole is where it starts.
A path
A word
A forgotten ...
I can see the deep need only through the puzzle of what is missing
How to address a need that screams from its absence
                                     Shouts long low howls
                                     Nails on a chalk board
Seen only out of the corner of my eye
                                     late at night when fear alight

50 Days - 2014: Forgiveness

For the last three years in the spring, during a season called Eastertide, I have reflected through art on different theological issues. In 2011—Where do you find heaven? In 2012—Where do you see G-d* in the world? In 2013—What is a call to ministry? I wrestled with these traditional theological premises: afterlife, G-d, ministry, but with a twist. Instead of looking for answers in a far-away perfect, unattainable place, I asked myself, and often people around me, to engage these religious questions from an earthly perspective.

You see, Eastertide is a little known celebration in the Christian calendar, commemorating Jesus’s walking the earth for fifty days after his death. As I thought about this celebration, I wondered what Jesus, as a bodhisattva (an enlightened being of compassion), might give the world. Or, what indeed, each of us gives one another when called to expression of love.

The question I will pose for myself this year—What of forgiveness? From Easter to June 8, I will grapple, through art, with this question. I have already spent some time reflecting on the times I have missed, or simply not taken, opportunities to act out of love. I am going to wrestle with what it means to be forgiven for these and here is the human twist—I will, when possible by whatever means, ask for forgiveness from another and I will ask for forgiveness from myself. I will practice asking for compassion in part by learning to be compassionate. . . I am reminded of the beautiful Rumi poem, “out somewhere is a field beyond right doing and wrong doing, I will meet you there…”

I wonder if you might join me. If, on one or more of these days, you might engage this question for yourself in a creative way. If you might stop for a moment to reflect on forgiveness and self compassion. If you would like to share your holy wisdom as expressed in the arts, please let me know. I would gladly post your work as well. As always, peace.

Karen
(*I spell G-d with a dash to signify I cannot know the full meaning of that word.)

To a veteran

Hmm - skip to the end to read the thanks and then come back to read about freedom, but only if you want to.

I am utterly grateful to live in a country where unless I am a complete idiot (well even if I am a complete idiot) I can speak my mind and friends will generally laugh at my jokes, offer support if I am weary or listen if I get on a soap box about a myriad of injustices meted out to people I often do not even know. It is such an amazing gift this freedom to be human and humane that I do not even think about it much of the time. I have come to understand this freedom as part of my rights. Not rights protected by anything but as part of my rights as a person. This is actually an amazing statement. 

I do not think about my rights to the freedom of speech, of conscience, of choice, of compassion because I have had them most of my life. I have thought of my limits only as the limits imposed by my self - my lack of knowledge, will power, courage, social panache, candor, ... I have mistaken personal requirement for personal freedom. I have had the freedom to make that mistake because for many years we have spent the good will and energy of our youth on ensuring this freedom for many. 

Today I pause to say thanks. Thanks Rolf Hellman

War is terrible and its burden is the huge human cost it extracts for this freedom to be humane. Even while it is the measure of any society that it will fight for the hope that might spring forth from what is possible in freedom we must always be mindful, grateful, thankful to those who gave of their personal store of humanity to ensure this freedom for others.

Thank you Rolf Hellman and all of your cadre of friends and comrades. 

Thank you to your family who bore and even greater cost. 

Thank you to those you love who bare witness with you to this great treasure of freedom that we live within.

I can only imagine what my beloved Michaeline would write to you about thanks and pride but know that those intentions are added here to my own.

The edge of justice that you have sheltered still grows because of your service and your care.

Thank you now go and have a good time darn it

Karen Mooney 

(Meta & Susan's friend)