Showing posts with label ellen bass. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ellen bass. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Yes, a light touch... that sears


David Whyte, whose poetry I much love, posted this poem on his Facebook page today, and I have kindly received permission to paste it in here. I have the book and have only begun to plumb all its wonders.
THE LIGHTEST TOUCH

Good poetry begins with
the lightest touch,
a breeze arriving from nowhere,
a whispered healing arrival,

Thursday, August 28, 2014

We need new stories...

Last night I was sitting on the cushion at my sangha meditating there for the first time since the beginning of August. In the past few weeks, life put in front of me a rich platter overfull with travels to the East, with insights, experiences, input, output (i.e., work) relationships (some new, some decades old), reunions, homecomings, and the raw vulnerability of accompanying a family member intensely dear to me through a profound medical challenge.

In the background was Gaza, and ISIS, and the Ukraine, and Ebola, and climate change tipping points, and Ferguson, and visceral racism, and on and on. When I came home, it was back into this nasty political culture that is my poor State of Wisconsin in an election year with huge stakes and money corrupting the whole process.

Whew! And I think I appreciate more than ever that the work of culture