I have been home sick with the flu for the last few days, but I am finally reengaging with the world --- this means catching up on blogs, emails, and news stories. As a proud Barack Obama supporter who readily admits that my theology is often in tension with my politics, I am deeply troubled by the continuation of the Jeremiah Wright controversy.
Now, I defended both Wright and Obama in the wake of the initial “scandal.” I have enough knowledge and experience of the black church tradition and liberation theology to know exactly where Wright was coming from, and I couldn’t stand how the American public was acting as if it had become sacrilegious to even question or critique America’s relationship to 9/11. Most (white) people I talked to didn’t have any clue what Wright really said or the context he was speaking out of. They just bought hook, line, and sinker that he was a racist unpatriotic loud bombastic black preacher.
As I talked with other white people, I heard fears expressed out loud that Obama was a racist and a closet black nationalist who somehow was going to overturn everything in favor of African-Americans as president. I couldn’t believe the outrageous things I was hearing expressed so reasonably by my white educated counterparts.
Intuitively, it makes no sense to me that Obama would be a closet black power nationalist, but that doesn’t matter. White fear is alive and well. Then came Obama’s fantastic and historic speech on race! I couldn’t imagine someone handling that situation with more brilliance, gentleness, and grace. Obama called America towards healing and reconciliation while affirming black and white communities. In an extraordinary act of courage and love, Obama did not reject the person who baptized him and married him, though he defined their differences. At the same time, he did sympathize with the fears and wounds of both black and white America. He spoke with purpose, integrity and insight.
But things kept getting worse…
After watching the new blitz of media coverage on Rev. Wright I feel sad and confused.
1) I think Rev. Wright's defense of the black prophetic faith tradition is justified. I initially felt excited about this opportunity for the general American public to really wrestle with issues of faith and race. When it comes to the body of Wright's message in front of the NAACP and the National Press Club, I totally agree with most of what he says. And I do believe that he deserved a chance to offer the American public a fuller picture of himself.
2) However, I was very disappointed and saddened by his delivery and timing. Even if Wright spoke truth, the way that he delivered it was arrogant, sarcastic, and unfortunately will have turned many people off.
In the long run, this will hurt Obama. This situation is not just particular to Wright. I have seen a lot of pastors gifted with a sharp tongue cross the line when expressing “truth.” As they descend to defensive posturing, arrogance, and sarcasm, there is irreconcilable damage.
I think this whole situation is fascinating in that it’s calling to light the tension between faith and politics and the different standards of accountability each holds. But I am also reminded of Jesus’ admonition to be as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves.
I’m saddened that I do not see more wisdom, humility and gentleness on display by Rev. Wright. I do not doubt for a minute that he is a man of faith who is deeply concerned about justice and reconciliation. But I think that in this instance the shadow of pride looms a little too large.
At the same time, I'm equally saddened by the deeply personal nature of this situation. I can't imagine being in the position where I had to nationally and publically denounce a spiritual mentor. Because Obama is running for political office, this decision is inherently political. Obama doesn't have the luxery of approaching this situation from a faith perspective and as a church member, though I'm sure internally there has been much more turmoil than we might think. I say this becuase of Obama's initial hesitancy to distance himself from Wright was clearly based out of concern, care, and respect for the Reverand. I see why Obama responded the way he did, and I see no other way. Yet, I still mourn the viscous cycle of politics that divides and seperates. Running for public office comes with costs that I could never accept.
Obama's response to Rev. Wright's remarks.
Wright as Prophet --- but which one?
A Long Increasingly Strained Road for Obama and Wright
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
churches fear Zimbabwe 'genocide'
BBC NEWS Africa Churches fear Zimbabwe 'genocide'
This is getting more serious by the day.
Also, if you want a real sense of the violence and torture that is happening on the ground, visit the blog: This is Zimbabwe.
This is getting more serious by the day.
Also, if you want a real sense of the violence and torture that is happening on the ground, visit the blog: This is Zimbabwe.
Monday, April 21, 2008
sexual assault awareness
For those who know me, I think a lot about violence, power and abuse, particularly as it intersects with race and gender. As April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month, I find that I have been wrestling a lot with questions of agency and healing because I have to believe that CHANGE is possible.
That being said, below are two interesting articles of note:
1) Ending Violence Against Women
Written by black man who himself was an abuser, this post is so hopeful because it speaks to the possibility of change and redemption. This article speaks to the reality that violent men can be transformed into powerful advocates as their own cultural mindset is challenged and their hearts are transformed.
2) Rape and Race: We Have To Talk About It
That being said, below are two interesting articles of note:
1) Ending Violence Against Women
Written by black man who himself was an abuser, this post is so hopeful because it speaks to the possibility of change and redemption. This article speaks to the reality that violent men can be transformed into powerful advocates as their own cultural mindset is challenged and their hearts are transformed.
2) Rape and Race: We Have To Talk About It
Sunday, April 20, 2008
our home
A lot of people have wondered what our apartment looks like.
These pictures were taken from our front door.
I am thankful for ANY green.
The Subaru is pretty lonely in Texas! It doesn't see many friends on the road.
Home Sweet Home: SummerTime Villa
(this was taken in Oct. notice our neighbor's door decorations)
\
freedom
I learned this week that I no longer see the world in terms of victims. I have hope for the broken, poor, and lonely because I am certain that God is with and for them: s/he stands on their side against the accuser. God does not speak words of condemnation, but words of life and responsibility. And no one is exempt from the call to love ferociously, bless abundantly, forgive radically, and walk courageously. For we are the light of the world.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
the god gap
April 16, 2008--What's missing in my life--and the human rights movement.
TheRoot.com
I was raised Baptist and spent more time in church than I thought any normal adolescent should. As soon as I left Atlanta and landed in Washington, D.C., I was determined to take full advantage of my new-found freedom. One of the first choices I made as a freshman at Howard University was choosing not to go to church. Although this would not turn out to be a permanent separation, the infrequency of my church attendance made it feel like I was always a visitor and never a member.
After finishing at Howard, I got wrapped up in the heady days of the Free South Africa Movement. There were daily demonstrations and arrests at the South African Embassy, and economic sanctions against the apartheid regime. I worked at both the Washington Office on Africa and the American Committee on Africa. The faith community was absolutely essential to these organizations and their work. I studied James H. Cones' Black Theology and Black Power.
I delivered activist Sunday sermons in pulpits no less renowned than Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Dexter Avenue Memorial Baptist Church in Montgomery, Ala. I snuck into South Africa to attend meetings at the headquarters of the South African Council of Churches and learned invaluable lessons from the likes of Rev. Frank Chikane at his house in Soweto. I was living my life in the midst of a loving ecumenical community that was unwavering in its support for human rights, both at home and abroad.
Now that I have an 8-year-old son and love a man who makes his spiritual practice a priority, I am reassessing my relationship with organized religion. As I move from one who manages to make it to church on at least the Christian high holy days to one who attends church more regularly, I've concluded that my Sunday morning yoga classes aren't enough. While I find immeasurable peace with this weekly ritual, I am at a point where I want to make more explicit the link between the human rights work to which I've committed my life and an institutionalized spiritual practice honed by regular church attendance. Simply put, I need more.
Part of this desire has to do with a gap in the human rights movement of which I am a part. Many of the more visible and vocal people with whom I do human rights work view religion with disdain. The tolerance at the root of human rights principles gives way to absolute intolerance for those who choose to take a moment just to bless their food before they eat. Perhaps this is because many of us are concerned about how religion is often used to justify human rights violations.
Maybe it's because some of us were raised by parents who just weren't into the church thing. Maybe it stems from the mistaken belief that opposition to all things mainstream and institutionalized is inherently radical. Maybe it's a function of the rise of the Religious Right and the erroneous belief that all Christians are conservative. Whatever the reasons might be, it's clear that this attitude marginalizes those of us who are neither agnostics nor atheists, but rather have been drawn to human rights because it jibes with our Christianity – it provides an answer to the question, "What would Jesus do?"
Those of us who have no problem with God have remained silent for much too long in the face of this intolerance of the faithful. The truth is, if the kind of disregard we face from our activist peers was expressed by those with whom we shared no common secular agenda, we would be out on the streets protesting and boycotting. This religious intolerance is not part of the history of the most successful human rights movements in this country.
From abolition to Black Liberation, the church has played an important role in providing not only a spiritual basis for larger movement agendas and objectives, but also an important site for organizing. Without a similar type of religious mooring, this current iteration of the U.S. human rights movement risks being a movement without foot soldiers drawn from the pews of churches regularly attended by many of the most dispossessed.
Today's movement is one that is increasingly alien to many within black communities. It is a movement disconnected from the grassroots folks the religiously intolerant claim to support as long as their faith remains closeted. It is a movement that is often too arrogant to accept people where they are, without belittling spiritual succor and the concept of church as home.
OK. I can hear it now. Some will contend that I'm blowing things all out of proportion, I've got some axe to grind, or I need to work through my issues by myself and quit making such a big deal out of this. Others might concede my points, but conclude that the price of this religious intolerance is nominal. I, however, beg to differ and think that the costs of allowing our movement to eschew the sacred are much too high. One need only consider how the conservatives and the moderates came for Rev. Jeremiah Wright and accused him of spewing hatred. Those of us within the human rights movement recognized the legitimacy of most of his points. We, however, remained silent as Rev. Wright faced ad hominem attacks from those with ulterior political motives.
The Black Liberation Theology which informs Rev. Wright's relationship with the Holy Trinity and his church's social justice ministry is fundamentally a theology of human rights. It is the same type of theology on which many of the struggles for human rights in Latin America are based. It is the same theology that motivated Dr. Ben Chavis, former head of the United Church of Christ's Commission for Racial Justice, to drive a group of us to Alabama's Black Belt in the 1980s to educate and mobilize black voters.
That summer, we spent a lot of time in old country churches in which the "thump, thump, thump" of feet keeping time on worn wooden floors was the only musical accompaniment to hymns whose page numbers were posted on tablets hung on sanctuary walls. Here, there was no need for either a piano or a bulletin outlining the order of service. We learned that churches, like barber shops and beauty parlors, were where real organizing took place. These churches were in the same part of Alabama originally named for its fertile black soil but eventually marked by its black majority.
The systemic disfranchisement of black voters in the Black Belt was the same condition targeted by the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee in 1965. The Black Belt was the birthplace of the Lowndes County Freedom Organization which is known to most as the Black Panther Party. It was here that human rights and Christianity framed the legal and moral claims of citizenship too long denied to those church-going, God-loving black people.
Just as I am searching to fill a void in my personal spiritual life, the human rights movement must search to determine how deeply it believes in the values on which its work are based. We must break our silence, even at the risk of being dismissed by many we consider to be our allies. As much as I am committed to this movement, I am more committed to finding a way to bring God back into our movement.
While my silence can be forgiven, I am prepared to declare that I do this work because I love God, and I believe we can build a movement that is openly engaged in creating a beloved community based on principles such as equality, dignity, justice and freedom. If my colleagues prove too intolerant to deal with this simple fact, then I'll end up searching not just for a church but another movement, a more spiritually-centered space in which to fight this fight.
Lisa A. Crooms is a professor and the director of the Constitutional Law Center at Howard University School of Law and the Senior Coordinator for the U.S. Human Rights Network's CERD Project.
TheRoot.com
I was raised Baptist and spent more time in church than I thought any normal adolescent should. As soon as I left Atlanta and landed in Washington, D.C., I was determined to take full advantage of my new-found freedom. One of the first choices I made as a freshman at Howard University was choosing not to go to church. Although this would not turn out to be a permanent separation, the infrequency of my church attendance made it feel like I was always a visitor and never a member.
After finishing at Howard, I got wrapped up in the heady days of the Free South Africa Movement. There were daily demonstrations and arrests at the South African Embassy, and economic sanctions against the apartheid regime. I worked at both the Washington Office on Africa and the American Committee on Africa. The faith community was absolutely essential to these organizations and their work. I studied James H. Cones' Black Theology and Black Power.
I delivered activist Sunday sermons in pulpits no less renowned than Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Dexter Avenue Memorial Baptist Church in Montgomery, Ala. I snuck into South Africa to attend meetings at the headquarters of the South African Council of Churches and learned invaluable lessons from the likes of Rev. Frank Chikane at his house in Soweto. I was living my life in the midst of a loving ecumenical community that was unwavering in its support for human rights, both at home and abroad.
Now that I have an 8-year-old son and love a man who makes his spiritual practice a priority, I am reassessing my relationship with organized religion. As I move from one who manages to make it to church on at least the Christian high holy days to one who attends church more regularly, I've concluded that my Sunday morning yoga classes aren't enough. While I find immeasurable peace with this weekly ritual, I am at a point where I want to make more explicit the link between the human rights work to which I've committed my life and an institutionalized spiritual practice honed by regular church attendance. Simply put, I need more.
Part of this desire has to do with a gap in the human rights movement of which I am a part. Many of the more visible and vocal people with whom I do human rights work view religion with disdain. The tolerance at the root of human rights principles gives way to absolute intolerance for those who choose to take a moment just to bless their food before they eat. Perhaps this is because many of us are concerned about how religion is often used to justify human rights violations.
Maybe it's because some of us were raised by parents who just weren't into the church thing. Maybe it stems from the mistaken belief that opposition to all things mainstream and institutionalized is inherently radical. Maybe it's a function of the rise of the Religious Right and the erroneous belief that all Christians are conservative. Whatever the reasons might be, it's clear that this attitude marginalizes those of us who are neither agnostics nor atheists, but rather have been drawn to human rights because it jibes with our Christianity – it provides an answer to the question, "What would Jesus do?"
Those of us who have no problem with God have remained silent for much too long in the face of this intolerance of the faithful. The truth is, if the kind of disregard we face from our activist peers was expressed by those with whom we shared no common secular agenda, we would be out on the streets protesting and boycotting. This religious intolerance is not part of the history of the most successful human rights movements in this country.
From abolition to Black Liberation, the church has played an important role in providing not only a spiritual basis for larger movement agendas and objectives, but also an important site for organizing. Without a similar type of religious mooring, this current iteration of the U.S. human rights movement risks being a movement without foot soldiers drawn from the pews of churches regularly attended by many of the most dispossessed.
Today's movement is one that is increasingly alien to many within black communities. It is a movement disconnected from the grassroots folks the religiously intolerant claim to support as long as their faith remains closeted. It is a movement that is often too arrogant to accept people where they are, without belittling spiritual succor and the concept of church as home.
OK. I can hear it now. Some will contend that I'm blowing things all out of proportion, I've got some axe to grind, or I need to work through my issues by myself and quit making such a big deal out of this. Others might concede my points, but conclude that the price of this religious intolerance is nominal. I, however, beg to differ and think that the costs of allowing our movement to eschew the sacred are much too high. One need only consider how the conservatives and the moderates came for Rev. Jeremiah Wright and accused him of spewing hatred. Those of us within the human rights movement recognized the legitimacy of most of his points. We, however, remained silent as Rev. Wright faced ad hominem attacks from those with ulterior political motives.
The Black Liberation Theology which informs Rev. Wright's relationship with the Holy Trinity and his church's social justice ministry is fundamentally a theology of human rights. It is the same type of theology on which many of the struggles for human rights in Latin America are based. It is the same theology that motivated Dr. Ben Chavis, former head of the United Church of Christ's Commission for Racial Justice, to drive a group of us to Alabama's Black Belt in the 1980s to educate and mobilize black voters.
That summer, we spent a lot of time in old country churches in which the "thump, thump, thump" of feet keeping time on worn wooden floors was the only musical accompaniment to hymns whose page numbers were posted on tablets hung on sanctuary walls. Here, there was no need for either a piano or a bulletin outlining the order of service. We learned that churches, like barber shops and beauty parlors, were where real organizing took place. These churches were in the same part of Alabama originally named for its fertile black soil but eventually marked by its black majority.
The systemic disfranchisement of black voters in the Black Belt was the same condition targeted by the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee in 1965. The Black Belt was the birthplace of the Lowndes County Freedom Organization which is known to most as the Black Panther Party. It was here that human rights and Christianity framed the legal and moral claims of citizenship too long denied to those church-going, God-loving black people.
Just as I am searching to fill a void in my personal spiritual life, the human rights movement must search to determine how deeply it believes in the values on which its work are based. We must break our silence, even at the risk of being dismissed by many we consider to be our allies. As much as I am committed to this movement, I am more committed to finding a way to bring God back into our movement.
While my silence can be forgiven, I am prepared to declare that I do this work because I love God, and I believe we can build a movement that is openly engaged in creating a beloved community based on principles such as equality, dignity, justice and freedom. If my colleagues prove too intolerant to deal with this simple fact, then I'll end up searching not just for a church but another movement, a more spiritually-centered space in which to fight this fight.
Lisa A. Crooms is a professor and the director of the Constitutional Law Center at Howard University School of Law and the Senior Coordinator for the U.S. Human Rights Network's CERD Project.
being white
I discovered this site yesterday THINGS WHITE PEOPLE LIKE. I’m not sure what I think about it – it is sort of a tongue in cheek critique of white (affluent) culture. And as much as I try to run from it, their list reminded me that – yep, I’m white.
I read some critiques of the site. The essential problem that people seem to have with it is that is passes off as critique but really it is a backhand affirmation of the superiority of white culture. My own opinion is that its swipes are too easy --- at the same time though, I was really bothered by some of the entries especially the one on graduate school. I think it is because it plays on my worst fears/guilt on being a privileged white person.
Considering the fact that I am interested in applying to graduate programs in the humanities (and comparative lit. to boot!) and already spend countless hours wrestling with how my privilege and a career in academia connects with real world issues of justice and oppression, I all of a sudden feel really guilty. I don’t necessarily believe this critique entirely, but I do know that it plays into my deeply lodged deposit of white guilt.
All this to say, it stings a bit.
I read some critiques of the site. The essential problem that people seem to have with it is that is passes off as critique but really it is a backhand affirmation of the superiority of white culture. My own opinion is that its swipes are too easy --- at the same time though, I was really bothered by some of the entries especially the one on graduate school. I think it is because it plays on my worst fears/guilt on being a privileged white person.
Considering the fact that I am interested in applying to graduate programs in the humanities (and comparative lit. to boot!) and already spend countless hours wrestling with how my privilege and a career in academia connects with real world issues of justice and oppression, I all of a sudden feel really guilty. I don’t necessarily believe this critique entirely, but I do know that it plays into my deeply lodged deposit of white guilt.
All this to say, it stings a bit.
Monday, April 14, 2008
why Africa's elections are becoming irrelevant
Thought Leader » Bhekinkosi Moyo » Why Africa's elections are becoming irrelevant
It is time for some good news. Anyone?
It is time for some good news. Anyone?
Friday, April 11, 2008
living well
The last few months I have been thinking a lot about simple living/ethical living as it relates to food. Anyone who knows me knows that I LOVE food. I care a lot about quality so I want to buy the best food possible in all dimensions. At the same time, living on a budget forces us to have to make daily choices about our food.
I am trying to find the balance between enjoyment and intentionality so that any system of eating doesn’t descend into legalism. What has developed is consideration of a few factors when buying and making food:
- budget vs. quality
- organic vs. non-organic
- vegetarian based protein sources
- unprocessed food
- minimized ingredients
- reduced/no meat consumption
- consideration of the source and sustainability of food source
- awareness of what I am eating and why
- enjoyment, celebration, and gratitude for every meal
- mindfulness of the rest of the world
As a result, I find myself so much more aware and thankful of God’s provision in our daily lives --- the provision of daily bread --- and at the same time aware that so many around the world are also dependent on this provision. Living on a budget where every food decision needs to be considered has made me less judgmental and legalistic and also prone to living in a spirit of gratitude, awe, and simplicity. It is also forced tough questions about American’s love for a “deal” and who really pays the cost? I think it is worth spending more quality, ethical, nutritious food, but I also think that this means reducing, streamlining, and minimizing to balance things out. It also takes compromise and flexability.
Than and I still sometimes get into fights at the grocery store since we usually go shopping together, but mostly I find that it is an exercise in compromise and dialogue as we negotiate our values at the most basic level: sustenance.
I bring all this up because I am aware of the growing global food crisis in the world --- especially rising rice and bread costs. As an American, I know that my consumption patterns and a whole other host of factors affect this crisis (including US production of ehthanol). Does anyone have any thoughts about how we can practically stand in solidarity with those around the globe in this time?
I am trying to find the balance between enjoyment and intentionality so that any system of eating doesn’t descend into legalism. What has developed is consideration of a few factors when buying and making food:
- budget vs. quality
- organic vs. non-organic
- vegetarian based protein sources
- unprocessed food
- minimized ingredients
- reduced/no meat consumption
- consideration of the source and sustainability of food source
- awareness of what I am eating and why
- enjoyment, celebration, and gratitude for every meal
- mindfulness of the rest of the world
As a result, I find myself so much more aware and thankful of God’s provision in our daily lives --- the provision of daily bread --- and at the same time aware that so many around the world are also dependent on this provision. Living on a budget where every food decision needs to be considered has made me less judgmental and legalistic and also prone to living in a spirit of gratitude, awe, and simplicity. It is also forced tough questions about American’s love for a “deal” and who really pays the cost? I think it is worth spending more quality, ethical, nutritious food, but I also think that this means reducing, streamlining, and minimizing to balance things out. It also takes compromise and flexability.
Than and I still sometimes get into fights at the grocery store since we usually go shopping together, but mostly I find that it is an exercise in compromise and dialogue as we negotiate our values at the most basic level: sustenance.
I bring all this up because I am aware of the growing global food crisis in the world --- especially rising rice and bread costs. As an American, I know that my consumption patterns and a whole other host of factors affect this crisis (including US production of ehthanol). Does anyone have any thoughts about how we can practically stand in solidarity with those around the globe in this time?
Thursday, April 10, 2008
I am 25 today. I am listening to Wild Sweet Orange.
I don’t know why I don’t have their album yet. The song Ten Dead Dogs pretty much got me through last year.
In the last year, I got reengaged. I got married. I moved. I started a new job. I took the GRE. I began taking Zoloft.
I’m not sure what to make of all that. Right now, I feel strangely empty but satisfied too.
I don’t know why I don’t have their album yet. The song Ten Dead Dogs pretty much got me through last year.
In the last year, I got reengaged. I got married. I moved. I started a new job. I took the GRE. I began taking Zoloft.
I’m not sure what to make of all that. Right now, I feel strangely empty but satisfied too.
three poems
I didn’t realize until last night that I totally ripped the first line of the last poem off from Hafiz. Can you tell what I have been reading lately?
Wandering
you are both deep and wide
and my heart weeps into the night
because at the end of the day
i must abandon everything
to love
turn your back on grief
turn your back on fear
turn your back on guilt
because love’s flame calls
mingled with my tears
i try to grasp words, but find myself weary.
Wandering Still
i wake up to thunder
as lightening pierces morning light
the world is wet
i imagine you somewhere in the Nevada sun
the desert providing some strange solace
to the desert in your heart.
Waking
Say goodbye to reason
It can’t quiet the stirrings of your heart
And it will only make you hate yourself
Bitterness destroys you
Stop asking why
Instead ask what
Say hello to dreaming.
Wandering
you are both deep and wide
and my heart weeps into the night
because at the end of the day
i must abandon everything
to love
turn your back on grief
turn your back on fear
turn your back on guilt
because love’s flame calls
mingled with my tears
i try to grasp words, but find myself weary.
Wandering Still
i wake up to thunder
as lightening pierces morning light
the world is wet
i imagine you somewhere in the Nevada sun
the desert providing some strange solace
to the desert in your heart.
Waking
Say goodbye to reason
It can’t quiet the stirrings of your heart
And it will only make you hate yourself
Bitterness destroys you
Stop asking why
Instead ask what
Say hello to dreaming.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
sky
This isn't from Hafiz, but this poet reminds me of Hafiz. I bought the book of poems Inward Moon Outward Sun on my first trip to South Africa, and I have returned to them over and over whenever I am in need of light, comfort, hope, and love. The poet Shabbir Banoobhai is a Muslim Indian South African born in Durban. lives in Cape Town. For more poems, click here.
Are You The River Or Am I
are you the river or am i
do i flow into the sea or do you flow into me
why is it when i try to slake my thirst you disappear
when you try, i appear
you have never stopped calling me
i have never stopped answering you
whose longing elicited this longing in me
whose love buried me in sorrow
i, even i, even as i am
know the loneliness of separation
as sails of clouds, like memories
flee across the windswept sky
you are all that i love, all that i can love
yet how do i love you, know you, know that i love you
when all that you are remains unknown to me
and all that i am is known only to you
i carry within me the grief of all loving
would you be different if i knew you
would i be different - can a flower know
what it means to be a flower
all the silt of my journeying
all the salt of my yearning flows into you
and all longing, every love, all knowing, every loss
everything you are comes to rest in me
Are You The River Or Am I
are you the river or am i
do i flow into the sea or do you flow into me
why is it when i try to slake my thirst you disappear
when you try, i appear
you have never stopped calling me
i have never stopped answering you
whose longing elicited this longing in me
whose love buried me in sorrow
i, even i, even as i am
know the loneliness of separation
as sails of clouds, like memories
flee across the windswept sky
you are all that i love, all that i can love
yet how do i love you, know you, know that i love you
when all that you are remains unknown to me
and all that i am is known only to you
i carry within me the grief of all loving
would you be different if i knew you
would i be different - can a flower know
what it means to be a flower
all the silt of my journeying
all the salt of my yearning flows into you
and all longing, every love, all knowing, every loss
everything you are comes to rest in me
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Monday, April 7, 2008
the gift
In honor of my good friend Sarah, I will be sharing poems from the great Sufi poet Hafiz this month. My heart has been heavy recently, and my spirit broken. Yet, these poems of healing and humanity have brought hope and comfort to my bones.
Love is a Funeral Pyre
Love is
The funeral pyre
Where I have laid my living body.
All the false notions of myself
That once causes fear, pain,
Have turned to ash,
As I neared God.
What has risen
From the tangled web of thought and sinew
Now shines with jubilation
Through the eyes of angels
And screams from the guts of
Infinite Existence
Herself.
Love is the funeral pyre
Where the heart must lay
Its body.
Love is a Funeral Pyre
Love is
The funeral pyre
Where I have laid my living body.
All the false notions of myself
That once causes fear, pain,
Have turned to ash,
As I neared God.
What has risen
From the tangled web of thought and sinew
Now shines with jubilation
Through the eyes of angels
And screams from the guts of
Infinite Existence
Herself.
Love is the funeral pyre
Where the heart must lay
Its body.
rachel goes camping
This weekend I went camping. My wish for water and greenery was partially satisfied. Though the “lake” was surrounded by dead fish, it was still nice to see to be near water. Sadly, our stay was cut short by the party that kicked into high gear around midnight next to our campsite. I woke up to the announcement that we were packing up and heading home.
The painful side of the weekend is my sunburn. Falling asleep on your stomach in the Texas sun is not a good idea. The entire backs of my legs got sunburned, and I'm in a lot of pain. Right now, I’m hobbling around and trying not to put pressure around any part of my legs. Next time, I’m wearing sunscreen!
The painful side of the weekend is my sunburn. Falling asleep on your stomach in the Texas sun is not a good idea. The entire backs of my legs got sunburned, and I'm in a lot of pain. Right now, I’m hobbling around and trying not to put pressure around any part of my legs. Next time, I’m wearing sunscreen!
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
From a Beirut Cell, an Iraqi Watches as the U.S. Finally Takes His Advice
From a Beirut Cell, an Iraqi Watches as the U.S. Finally Takes His Advice - New York Times
This is an incredibly sad and interesting story.
This is an incredibly sad and interesting story.
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
i am going to make it
This song was playing on the radio on my way home for lunch! This song gives me HOPE and makes me smile.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)