Opening of the day, closing of the night, and the awakening of the light within me….early morning at the ferry terminal in Anacortes, Washington, USA, with the sun behind Mount Baker. Photo by Ian Byington.
your slightest look easily will unclose me though i have closed myself as fingers, you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens (touching skilfully, mysteriously)her first rose
or if your wish be to close me, i and my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly, as when the heart of this flower imagines the snow carefully everywhere descending;
(i do not know what it is about you that closes and opens; only something in me understands the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses) nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands
It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch
a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway
into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak….
It was 1989, and time to come up with a name for my just-born son. In an move I’ve never regretted, we named him Seamus (Shay for short), and though we agreed we weren’t naming him after anyone specific, it was cool that his name echoed this fellow from Ireland, who passed away in 2016.
During that period 32 years ago, folks asked us, baldly, how can you bring a kid into this world? It’s all so dark, so hopeless, so unforgiving, they said. I think this poem by Heaney answers the question far better than I did at that time. As I look at the tracks my sons both are leaving, as well as the ones they trace out as they make their paths, I believe in miracles, and the chance for hope & history to rhyme.
from “The Cure at Troy ” by Seamus Heaney
Human beings suffer,
they torture one another,
they get hurt and get hard.
No poem or play or song
can fully right a wrong
inflicted or endured.
The innocent in gaols
beat on their bars together.
A hunger-striker’s father
stands in the graveyard dumb.
The police widow in veils
faints at the funeral home.
History says, Don’t hope
on this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
the longed for tidal wave
of justice can rise up,
and hope and history rhyme.
So hope for a great sea-change
on the far side of revenge.
Believe that a further shore
is reachable from here.
Believe in miracles
and cures and healing wells.
Call the miracle self-healing:
The utter self-revealing
double-take of feeling.
If there’s fire on the mountain
Or lightning and storm
And a god speaks from the sky
That means someone is hearing
the outcry and the birth-cry
of new life at its term.
It means once in a lifetime
That justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.
Canadian folk group The Good Lovelies are on a roll….if you haven’t heard them before, this is a good chance to hear them in a sweet version of the famous Cohen song:
This little prayer (known to monks, worldwide) is attributed by many to St. Francis, and is notable in that it doesn’t “ask for something;” instead it simply asks that we be allowed to channel peace to the people around us.
I’ve always thought it was a pretty robust expression of that little bit in the Lord’s Prayer that says, “Thy will be done.”
Which means we get out of the way & let it flow…and I love the job Sarah McLachlan does with her musical version of it, below.
Let it wash over you….
Prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy.
Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
You & I learned this song ages ago, it seems, and it’s still a good one to start the day, to end kundalini yoga class, to wish on some good friend who’s leaving, or to sing with the kids before it’s time to dream.
Written by Mike Heron and shared with yoga students all over the world, it’s a little reminder that, as Ram Dass says, we’re all walking each other home.
I’m honoured to get this chance to sing it & play it for you.
May all love surround you, my friend.
Blessings – Brother Ian
From the album, “108 Sacred Names of Mother Divine”, produced, arranged and engineered by Craig Pruess for Heaven on Earth Music, UK. Sanskrit vocals by Ananda.
What do you do when your kid say, “Let’s go play in the rain?” Click on the picture above to see the little video…
When I was kid, I used to take my shoes off when I had to walk to the bus stop when it was raining, so my socks & shoes wouldn’t be wet all day at school. I found that I really liked walking in the rain, sloshing in the mud with the inter-toe mud & squishiness of it all, and the feeling of freedom it gave me. Of course, I never told my parents, even now.
So the picture of me, walking under my little umbrella (yes, in grade four I had an umbrella!), with my shoes tied by the laces & hanging from my shoulder, taking twice as long to get there, because it was fun…it’s a picture I have in my scrapbook of a head.
That’s why I like the little video above. Especially the English accents (when I was a kid, I was bi-dialectic – I spoke with a Southern gentleman-in-training’s drawl, and my thoughts were in a British accent)…I sure like it. See what you think.
Just another way to take a shower…
The video below reminds me of university – I was at the University of Alabama, walking home from work at the dining hall, when the rains came, warm & hard & wet, with home too far away to even walk fast or run. It was wonderful, walking in the Alabama rain.
Years later, I went on a hike with my sister’s pal Hilda in an thunderstorm in north Alabama, where we walked up the side of a hill to near the top, where the lightning was, and it was a week after I had first heard the song below. Summertime rain washes you clean, so I wanted to share that with you today!
Thanks for listening, and singing along, my friend.
My heart has been broken by the violence, polarization and xenophobia that have been escalating so much in recent weeks. If things had been like this in 1933 when my father’s family came to the US to escape the Nazis, I simply would have never been born.
I’ve felt deepening anger, despair, sadness and frustration as these messages of hate and division increase in their frequency and intensity.
I must respond.
So here is my response, inspired in no small part by the kind and gentle percussionist Mike Wofchuck, who stayed with us in our home recently. Mike shared with me that, since he became the father of an infant, he’s been able to see people he encounters as infants, and he can instantly connect to a place of loving them. This song invites each of us into that place and, I hope, into living the lessons of the great Indian saint Neem Karoli Baba:
Love people. Serve people. Feed people. Always remember God.
The opportunity to make a real difference in the lives of those in need is a gift beyond measure; I was given such a gift over 20 years ago when I was called to help dozens of Bosnian (and yes, Muslim) refugees here in Portland. It remains one of the true peak experiences of my life.
A walk last autumn, on the west side of San Juan Island in Washington State, USA….photo by Ian Byington
The Peace of Wild Things by Wendell Berry
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Thought for the day…
"Breathing in, I calm body and mind. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment I know this is the only moment." -- Thich Nhat Hanh
About Brother Ian
Over the centuries, Brother Ian has been collecting stories & information & discourses for the purpose of elevating the human condition as needed, dissecting it when necessary, and building the case for hope.
In the spirit of noting that organized crime, organized baseball, organized labour, and organized religion tend to engender controversy & occasional discord, I promise to be neither organized or critical of those who are.
Over the centuries, Brother Ian has been collecting stories & information & discourses for the purpose of elevating the human condition as needed, dissecting it when necessary, and building the case for hope.