Full Pink Moon
April 20, 6:25 a.m. (EDT)
It is the month of the full pink moon, named after flowers that appear abundantly in the early spring.
It also happens to be the name of one of my favorite songs:
Nick Drake’s Pink Moon
There is much to be learned from a river.
The river has always been a meditative place for me. The flow quiets my mind; I lose track of time watching light play on the surface of the water, how the current works its way over stone, strokes the flanks of the river’s bank, smooths all the edges.
I read Siddhartha many, many years ago and I suspect it is one of those books that has infused itself into my perspective. Even before that, though, I can remember standing by a river as a child and feeling comforted by the way it was both consistent and constantly changing.
What strikes me today is that Siddhartha found himself at the river not because he had found some peace but because he had reached his darkest hour; he did not find himself at the river again because he had discovered his purpose, he found himself there because he was lost.
Siddhartha said, Perhaps…in all that searching, you lose the way to find?
How come? asked his companion.
“When someone is searching,” said Siddhartha, “then it might easily happen that the only thing his eyes still see is that what he searches for, that he is unable to find anything, to let anything enter his mind, because he always thinks of nothing but the object of his search, because he has a goal, because he is obsessed by the goal. Searching means: having a goal. But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal. You, oh venerable one, are perhaps indeed a searcher, because, striving for your goal, there are many things you don’t see, which are directly in front of your eyes.”
And when Siddhartha listened “attentively to this river, this song of a thousand voices, when he neither listened to the suffering nor the laughter, when he did not tie his soul to any particular voice and submerged his self into it…when he heard them all, (he) perceived the whole…”
This posting is a contribution to Sacred Life Sundays, the practice of sharing what lifts our spirits with others on a weekly basis.
I have tried, in my way, to be free
Bird on a wire - Leonard Cohen
Like a bird on a wire,
Like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free…..
k.d. lang sings
If I have been unkind,
I hope you can just let it go by.
If I have been untrue
I hope you know it was never to you….
This posting is a contribution to Sacred Life Sundays, the practice of sharing what lifts our spirits with others on a weekly basis.
Remembering John Lennon
October 9, 1940 - December 8, 1980
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Even though it was 27 years ago, a fact that is nearly inconceivable to me, I still get tears in my eyes when I hear Happy Xmas (War is Over), the song that was played repeatedly that winter and in the years that followed as a kind of memorial. I remember gathering with a group of friends at school, how stunned we were that anyone would want to hurt John Lennon let alone kill him, how we stood there waiting for an unknown sign to clarify the loss. Then, we scattered home to listen to his music and observe a moment of silence.
Today, when I heard the song Imagine, I remembered that day again. I am no longer in touch with most of the friends I knew then, we wandered off on our separate paths, but there is some constancy that music offers, some continuance through time that allows one to reconnect with the spirit of the past that cannot be taken away.
One of the most tragic parallels between his time and ours is the persistence of horrific and unbearably brutal wars. The most powerful tribute to his memory is to continue to speak out against these atrocities and get United for Peace and Justice.
The Sound of my Misspent Youth
Three songs
Dancing Barefoot - Patti Smith
we shut our eyes we stretch out our arms
and whirl on a pane of glass
an afixiation a fix on anything the line of life the limb of a tree
the hands of he and the promise that s/he is blessed among women.
Nico - It was a pleasure then
Dead can Dance - The Host of the Seraphim
I’d like to give a shout out to the inestimable Wanda Rizzuto who inspired this sonic nostalgia.
