Alive, her Tanned Smile mirrors in your Phone
And you smile back. Such Grin spices your Face,
Browning each side completely whenst alone
Fortifying your Moment in good grace
Haply in penance your Innocence bears
Of Blue-and-White Anthems she held the Gold
Which many Fans sigh deeply in Despair
Knowing, in arrest, her Story is told
It's now up to you. Let your Plum-Charm shine
Yet suave must be your poise during your Date
Me? I am the Earth-Hanuman; In thine
Set this Stone Pillar to secure your Fate.
I told you, Athlete: Only you decide
Which Ticket you had your cause to remind.

For this years Thanksgiving, I have decided to focus on developing a sense of gratitude. The world is full of real bad stuff happening to too many people and its easy to let the darkness of our times cast long shadows of resentment, anger and ill will over our outlook on life. So today as I travel to a relatives home to gather for our national day of thankfulness I choose to leave resentments at home and cultivate a sense of gratitude.

I’m grateful for my eyes. My sight allows me to perceive the million graces The Almighty abundantly confers upon the inhabitants of the good earth each and every day. My eyes help me to discover the pressing needs of others and respond to it. My eyes help me to discern light from darkness, distinguish the forest from the trees and eschew pedestrian views to behold a beautiful vista. My eyes are a pathway to my soul moving me to contemplate the good, forsake the bad and move against evil in service to truth.

I’m grateful for my ears. The grace of hearing permits me to listen. My ears alert me to the cries of my brothers and sisters and enables me to understand our shared human condition. My ears tune my spirit to the chords of exquisite music and the natural symphonies of Mother Earth’s angelic chorus of singing birds, heaving oceans, the majestic pause of silent mountains and the fleeting rush of the swelling wind are all divine voices singing the joyful hymns of life.

I’m thankful for my sense of smell. Graciously my nose breathes in the inviting aroma of a lovingly prepared home cooked meal, the wholesome scent of baking bread wafting from the door of the corner bakery, a briny snort from the boundless sea, the rich compost of the deep woods after a soft summer rain, the bouquet of an infants hair and the perfume of a lovers embrace.

I give thanks for my ability to touch. Hands engaged in productive work and gainful employment is a blessing absent from too many Thanksgiving Day tables this year. We yearn to connect and the sense of touch invites our ability to feel. Feeling is the father of empathy and the mother of compassion. Caring for our animal friends we live in communion with all sentient beings.  As we touch one another and allow others to touch us; the hardest of hearts is softened, the most grievous wounds are healed to liberate the sensual yearnings dwelling in the deepest recesses of ourselves. Feeling allows us to become fully present, fully aware and fully alive in the celebration of what it means to be fully human.

I’m thankful for my sense of taste. As Sinatra croons “from the brim to the dregs” the wine of our lives may not all taste good but it all flows clear and true. Sample, savor and learn. Taste and see the glories of the Lord’s banquet so abundantly placed before us. The bitter herbs, the sweet cakes, the leisure repast, the fortifying meal and unrequited hunger is the daily bread of being human.  Pause to consider those that are lining up for the tenth Thanksgiving Day meal in Afghanistan and Iraq and pray that the awful rations of war fed to our young soldiers be supplanted with the good manna of peace.

Perhaps we loose our sense of gratitude because expectations of ourselves and others always seems to come up short of the mark. Imperfection is our most endearing quality. It informs our ability to forgive transgressions, form bonds of friendship and unconditionally love each other. I remain grateful for the sense of my imperfection as I overlook your imperfections and remain ever hopeful that you  will extend your hand to help me overcome mine.

Happy Thanksgiving.

You Tube Video: Jean Ritchie, Shady Grove

as soon as these blue speckled
socks go, that's it. A new bright black death.A solemn weir on a stark horizon.Give me a reason to wear color. My hueless affidavit
runs me into the Earth, where I sprout up
a pallid keb- brain orf'd, you could drag my etiolated ebon
body through the ovine fold or take me to the theater. When I was just a minor teg, I sheared my mim kip, I fuckinggave it to you outright. In this little
cote my wan mien nigrifying; my calamitous black, quaffed full of congou in demitasse, of souchong & saucers. My atrous wethered body albicantly degenerating in the atrous sun. I'm crusting over with wanness and you, you're fortifying in the cwm where I used to yaff and stray. Your ovivorous hunger,something I never knew, when first you came for my jecoral flesh, just another bot digging through my soft toison. Like Dall's Prometheus being sheared from the flock-you cut me away. In this drab and achromic world, you put the wanness in my flesh, the gid in my heart. Still.
Just these blue socks are left.

Goodbye enemies
talking and stalking
I never knew you
while you spoke
rearranging truth
snide comments
rude ideas
toxic seeds
in infertile soil
planted deep
without water
dried
without roots

Goodbye enemies
branches without leaves
leaves without life
rotting designs
molding fruits
twisting reality
wildest roots
lifting up houses
poisoning
mine

Goodbye enemies
smirk and stare
I don't care
I never knew you
and you never knew me
trauma bonding
at my expense
a primitive mindset
but no drums
or pretty colors
or life-fortifying culture
dried and dead

Goodbye enemies

Anxiety is getting quieter, but it's not gone. I feel it in my periphery, knocking and scratching. My walls are a little stronger today, and a little stronger everyday. But there's always that unwelcome guest tapping on my door. I hear it whispering through the boards, little lies I don't quite believe but I can't quite ignore. Each day is a fight.

Depression is a little louder today. Not quite loud enough to leak but it falls like rain on my roof. My roof is a little stronger today, and a little stronger everyday. But the rain still falls heavy and cold. When I find a leak, I patch it. Trusting the patches hold longer than I do. The rain makes me feel heavy and cold. Each day is a fight.

My pain is like a dripping faucet
abused and mistreated
My overall condition, worsening drip by drip by drip.
Filling up the sink of life and drowning slowly,
agonizingly.

Choices made with haste and without true understanding of the possible result of the bitterness and pain I was causing.
The loss of the only child you carried in your womb, protected and loved by you, tenderly and with intent.
Mistakes so numerous, an exact moment of loss not known.
Immature woman given young child to raise in this world
of temptation, sin and emotional turbulence.......

-SIN OF THE FLESH CHOSEN OVER A GODLY LIFE-

My beautiful boy with a heart full of hope and abundance
damaged with a change of plans in my travels, unfairly and unjust.
Causing his vehicle to careen down an empty highway of bitterness and isolation.
Fortifying walls around his heart full of abundance of trust and love
Now cold and distant from the mother that shielded him from pain with strain and exertion.

My voice beckons him from across the canyon
To PLEASE allow me to make things ok again between us.
But, alas, only the echo of my own voice is rocketing in the distance
Emptiness and hopelessness, I strain to hear anything at all, no emotion allowed to return to me.  Not even an angry voice.
Beating myself with a metal chain, ****** and in complete desperation, standing on piercing nails with ripped off limbs.....

-OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER-  
FOR EVER??  
NO MORE CHANCES.  
FORGOTTEN, WATCHING IN DESPAIR AS HIS LIFE GOES ON WITHOUT ME
SO EASILY, HE MAKES IT APPEAR.

Regret is like an ancient building ruining the value of its neighbors
decrepit and broken down,
Depraved, isolated and abandoned with recklessness.
So ugly on the outside, no one dares try to re-enter the condemnation of the door.
No one believes it can ever be restored to its original beauty and inspiration.

Hopeful and optimistic for a reunion of remembrance and forgiveness.
Determined with purpose, willing to risk looking shamed and unlovable.
No more self-respect because of hasty, decisions and instant gratification.
Still holding my breath.  Could this be the time I call and he finally comes around?
Grasping to clutch, once again, the blessed unconditional love and trust of my only son.

Negligent and selfish, unintentional life choices of a mother
Difficult to completely accept responsibility for injuries sustained by my misjudgment.
Finally, after years of scripture and study,
Understanding the agony and misery
God must have felt to watch Jesus' beaten and prodded,

GOD SACRIFICED HIS ONLY SON
............THE ONLY WAY TO SHIELD US FROM THE UNIMAGINABLE PAIN AND MISERY
OF AN  ETERNITY  IN HELL ALONE AND UNWANTED
FINALLY RENEWED WITH FORGIVENESS!!!
AFTER WE HAD SINNED AGAINST HIM SINCE THE GARDEN OF EDEN FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS.

Almost insane from the self-inflicted abuse,
Survival instincts start to make me want to give up and continue my bad choices to numb the memory of him.
Yet, still begging to have him love me again, even if it was for a single minute.
Dreaming of a loving hug from son to mother in earnest and heartfelt.  Willing to settle ANY emotion at all reciprocated.
Hoping he never makes a mistake that causes such irreparable intensity, empty and unwanted.

After 12 years of comforting and soothing and protection,
Everything lost, no more memory at all of mother needed...
No thought of how important he made me feel at one time.
Only father standing proud in picture next to child
                Lovingly smiling at him with adoration.

He respects him and loves him as much as he condemns and disregards me.
               He only speaks or thinks of me with disdain and total detachment
And.. Only when absolutely unavoidable and by force, it appears.
What kind of hell on earth is this?  
           My own tears drown my hope and regret now defines me with each effort of possible reconciliation that is tossed away like an unwanted thing.  

Drip, drip, drip.
My heart is ripped into a million pieces, by my own hand.  
Never to be needed again
If forgiveness will never be possible, tell me now.
                 Please have mercy, while I grieve the loss of my only son.  Yet he lives.

I'd shatter the mirror,
if I knew it would release your gaze.
The lock keeps your brain racing relentless
as your eyes hold the whip
and mascara, like an addict
Fortifying the belief that the real you
Isn't beautiful enough

I do believe
Tonight, more than all others
The distance pierces my soul
A deeper depth
For each mile apart
A thousand punctures through
Still, after the red gums black
What is left
To course through my emptied veins
Is nought but you
The very life within me
The very beat of my heart
Your sweet breath
My only air
'Tis love that bridges the distance
But pain flows in rapids beneath
With you souls soar with angels
Anticipation of your return
Leads each day
As my smile is painted
With the memory of your own
Traversing the bridge
A tricky feat on stormy nights
The rain sparkles like diamonds
The moonlight never more beautiful
As in their reflection
Feeding the river
Yet, somehow, fortifying the bridge
Love is rooted deeply
Bound in eternal light
To a world tinged in darkness
A beacon within
Home is always in sight
If just out of reach
With eyes closed in slumber
United in bliss
Wrapped in the last time
Living for the next time
As much as it can be called living
Being stabbed by each
Of a thousand miles

This year I have decided to focus on developing a sense of gratitude. The world is full of real bad stuff happening to too many people and its easy to let the darkness of our times cast long shadows of resentment, anger and ill will over our outlook on life. So today as I travel to a relatives home to gather for our national day of thankfulness I choose to leave resentments at home and cultivate a sense of gratitude.

I'm grateful for my eyes. My sight allows me to perceive the million graces The Almighty abundantly confers upon the inhabitants of the good earth each and every day. My eyes help me to discover the pressing needs of others and respond to it. My eyes help me to discern light from darkness, distinguish the forest from the trees and eschew pedestrian views to behold a beautiful vista. My eyes are a pathway to my soul moving me to contemplate the good, forsake the bad and move against evil in service to truth.

I'm grateful for my ears. The grace of hearing permits me to listen. My ears alert me to the cries of my brothers and sisters and enables me to understand our shared human condition. My ears tune my spirit to the chords of exquisite music and the natural symphonies of Mother Earth's angelic chorus of singing birds, heaving oceans, the majestic pause of silent mountains and the fleeting rush of the swelling wind are all divine voices singing the joyful hymns of life.

I'm thankful for my sense of smell. Graciously my nose breathes in the inviting aroma of a lovingly prepared home cooked meal, the wholesome scent of baking bread wafting from the door of the corner bakery, a briny snort from the boundless sea, the rich compost of the deep woods after a soft summer rain, the bouquet of an infants hair and the perfume of a lovers embrace.

I give thanks for my ability to touch. Hands engaged in productive work and gainful employment is a blessing absent from too many Thanksgiving Day tables this year. We yearn to connect and the sense of touch invites our ability to feel. Feeling is the father of empathy and the mother of compassion. Caring for our animal friends we live in communion with all sentient beings. As we touch one another and allow others to touch us; the hardest of hearts is softened, the most grievous wounds are healed to liberate the sensual yearnings dwelling in the deepest recesses of ourselves. Feeling allows us to become fully present, fully aware and fully alive in the celebration of what it means to be fully human.

I'm thankful for my sense of taste. As Sinatra croons "from the brim to the dregs" the wine of our lives may not all taste good but it all flows clear and true. Sample, savor and learn. Taste and see the glories of the Lord's banquet so abundantly placed before us. The bitter herbs, the sweet cakes, the leisure repast, the fortifying meal and unrequited hunger is the daily bread of being human. Pause to consider those that are lining up for the tenth Thanksgiving Day meal in Afghanistan and Iraq and pray that the awful rations of war fed to our young soldiers be supplanted with the good manna of peace.

Perhaps we loose our sense of gratitude because expectations of ourselves and others always seems to come up short of the mark. Imperfection is our most endearing quality. It informs our ability to forgive transgressions, form bonds of friendship and unconditionally love each other. I remain grateful for the sense of my imperfection as I overlook your imperfections and remain ever hopeful that you will learn to love me for mine.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Music Selection: Jean Ritchie, Shady Grove

Oakland
11/25/10
jbm

Fear fabricates factious fragments,
futile for fulfilling faded fantasy's forlorn figures.
Few find faith from forecful feelings..
farewell forces fugitive faces-
forging faulty formality,
finesse fights failure for fame,
fortifying forgotten promises.

Go the distance

Lord you know we lost one of our own today a young mother with four babies under seven reminiscent of robin out home had five
Jesus this is what everyone living faces I need to speak I don’t neglect them I never look at them with shallow looks my interest are
Their eternal souls this is occurrence calls for self examination taking spiritual inventory but lord my soul is dry only dust lies where rich
Waters should be standing then though I clean out the debris it comes blown in daily by the world that is fallen its power its influence
Fanned by our enemy the devil welcomed by our fallen nature I stood in the shower and wept bitter tears standing against a natural
Wall but it makes me know I am at the wall of my soul I was going to consult metaphysical books to address soulful areas I have
Lincoln and Jefferson books here they lived lives of great difficulty from this uttered words of reason that still burn and scorch time
And places where mundane edifices needed clearing and replaced with structures that held magnificence as there enduring building
Material please let me see and hear the spiritual waters flowing into my soul that it fills then over flows out to the needy the hopeless
And the helpless they have to go the distance all else is fearful and treacherous ground live a lifetime and then to late discover it only
Led to ruin take off the blinders put on spiritual glasses read the word realize the showers of blessings that are promised we have to go
Back to childhood no adult would think about standing in the rain but what trills and fun we used to know the banging thunder we used
To say angels dropped a vegetable in heaven off of a wagon then wet freezing run up on the porch warm up physically but also on the
Inside talking to one another how wonderful we go to church feel your spirit know and feel such sweetness outwardly all the way
Down in our souls no experience on earth compares whats the problem all of our loved ones from school and life are at home
Watching some drivel being spoon fed some harmful leads they create desires that will finally place you in insurmountable
Circumstances the no way out death trap while our blessing is sweet all consuming instructive peaceful like dreams of high lovely
Nature yes we get attacked in quick order but those blessings were fortifying it put armor about your life and concerns are quickly
Dissolved in holy prayer and meditations someone setting on the couch or worse a bar stool misses these protective modes that
Create survival and success only problem he still has to go the distance provide and guide his family but with inferior ineffective
Means of support he is soon over whelmed and leads to more drinking and instability and eventually dire straits and then complete
Collapse we need reinforcement in a true sense spread the word of God before you walk then your steps will be sure and it will be a
Lamp unto your feet we are in a darkened troubled world caution steadied hands held by divine messengers will win the day and then
The next day at the end it adds up to a life your proud of an the exit unto eternity won’t be terrifying it will be like for Tamara
Electrifying walk from love coming at intervals to the flood your swimming in it and the peace I had this experience my sister died back
Here we spent Christmas at Disneyland was going to stay longer then decided to go on home but just stop in Paso to break up the trip
I believe she died when I was out in the San Sequin valley a storm came up while driving on interstate five all kinds of debris flew up in
Front of the car I had a very eerie feeling I felt something sinister as I went back over the time and it difference to Illinois time it was
When she died we checked in to the the Adelaide inn the room filled with a peace other worldly it was so strong I was actually trying to
See the heavenly visitor who had to be responsible it was so great we stayed extra days we couldn’t leave the song comes to mind
He looked beyond my fault and saw my need I didn’t know but God knew he took care of me without me understanding why that’s’
What I want for all of you that are out of the arc of safety hell was made for the devil but man made it part of his reality by the fall
Jesus is calling no one ever spoke your name like he does please cry to him its eternal rewards hanging in the balance.