The midnight moonlight was shining in the window, illuminating Cassandra’s nude, voluptuous body. She lounged on her side against woven, textured pillows and the afghan that her grandmother had crocheted for her years ago. Her eyes barely open, she gazed peacefully at the candle burning on the low tea table, just past her feet.
Cassandra wanted to soak in the moonlight, to cool herself on this dreadfully hot evening, with the white light of that full orb. How seldom she allowed herself the animal pleasure of nudity. It wasn’t considered decent. But there was something so satisfying about the feeling of air on all her skin, especially after a day having to wear clothes that covered her from the neck down.
She wondered if she was normal in this. Maybe everyone really liked to be nude, but society taught them to always cover up, even when the temperature made them swoon with heat. If only she lived in one of those primitive lands she’d heard of, where people wore little or no clothes and felt nature touching their every pore.
--Terra Rafael
Monday, December 7, 2009
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Headless
A few nights ago, I dreamed that I didn’t have a head. For some reason or other, the surgeons determined that I had to have it removed. It didn’t bother me much and I was more curious than anything. They did a pretty good job except that on part of the top of my neck was sticking up just a little higher to the right of my spine. This disturbed me but I figured that I could live with it. Ah, vanity!
The funny thing was , I could function perfectly well, think , speak, see, and hear. I was normal in all respects except that I couldn’t eat, but that didn’t concern me. I had no desire to.
The reaction to me of other people was most interesting and I, on a perverse level, took amusement in that. It was funny to see the double takes when I was driving my car. Some people got used to seeing me without a head and with others, it was so totally bizarre that they freaked out.
I was observing that, clearly, mind does not reside in the head, that it is all pervasive. I saw that communication takes place, in detail, without the normal apparatus of speech and hearing. I enjoyed the expansiveness that being headless afforded me.
My meditations have been knocking on this awareness, as I have been entering a wholly different state of quiet and relaxation that allows my mind to stop. The instants are becoming more frequent and consistent and there is a physical sensation that accompanies this that I can only describe as a slight buzzing sensation.
I love teaching dreams. They allow me to enter into what I know to be true in a very real experience, even if it is a dream state.
Prema
The funny thing was , I could function perfectly well, think , speak, see, and hear. I was normal in all respects except that I couldn’t eat, but that didn’t concern me. I had no desire to.
The reaction to me of other people was most interesting and I, on a perverse level, took amusement in that. It was funny to see the double takes when I was driving my car. Some people got used to seeing me without a head and with others, it was so totally bizarre that they freaked out.
I was observing that, clearly, mind does not reside in the head, that it is all pervasive. I saw that communication takes place, in detail, without the normal apparatus of speech and hearing. I enjoyed the expansiveness that being headless afforded me.
My meditations have been knocking on this awareness, as I have been entering a wholly different state of quiet and relaxation that allows my mind to stop. The instants are becoming more frequent and consistent and there is a physical sensation that accompanies this that I can only describe as a slight buzzing sensation.
I love teaching dreams. They allow me to enter into what I know to be true in a very real experience, even if it is a dream state.
Prema
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Being in the World, But Not of It...
It's like going into a long tunnel. When you get to the middle, you have shed a good amount of your fake self/ego trips, and are becoming more of your authentic self.
Then the task is to come back to the world, out of the other end of the tunnel, and be able to deal with it.
The whole process may take many years, especially reintegrating into society.
People watching you at either end of the tunnel, have no clue what you are doing, or why you've changed, or why you don't want the same things anymore. You have to get your world legs under you again, and feel out how you are going to be in the world, and not of it. How are you going to protect that authentic self after the excavation process it took to find it.
Some people may judge you by their own criteria of what it means to be on a spiritual path. How it should look. How you should behave, now that you have emerged. Yet it's so different for each person. Yet it's imperative that you bring your new found principles and sense of self into the world so that others may benefit from your work and your insights.
Jyoti
Then the task is to come back to the world, out of the other end of the tunnel, and be able to deal with it.
The whole process may take many years, especially reintegrating into society.
People watching you at either end of the tunnel, have no clue what you are doing, or why you've changed, or why you don't want the same things anymore. You have to get your world legs under you again, and feel out how you are going to be in the world, and not of it. How are you going to protect that authentic self after the excavation process it took to find it.
Some people may judge you by their own criteria of what it means to be on a spiritual path. How it should look. How you should behave, now that you have emerged. Yet it's so different for each person. Yet it's imperative that you bring your new found principles and sense of self into the world so that others may benefit from your work and your insights.
Jyoti
Friday, December 4, 2009
A Winter's Night
I awoke to the sound of the snow
Drumming against the windowpane
The moon called out my name
Dreaming while pulling on boots and wrapper
I opened the door to the magical night
And walked into frozen white
Trees creaking from winter’s art
Sang songs of midnight
Into my open heart
Jesse
Drumming against the windowpane
The moon called out my name
Dreaming while pulling on boots and wrapper
I opened the door to the magical night
And walked into frozen white
Trees creaking from winter’s art
Sang songs of midnight
Into my open heart
Jesse
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Over the River and Through the Woods
.... another Thanksgiving memory
People make fun of Kansas and how flat and boring it is; I know, I was one of them. In the last 36 years I have driven thousands of miles between my birth state of Missouri and my adopted Colorado, most of them on Interstate 70 ~ usually just as fast as I could get across. It is kind of scary, but in the past few years, I have begun to enjoy the drive. Kansas has a subtle beauty that I dismissed for years. And especially driving east, the closer one gets to the Missouri border the more rolling and forested the terrain becomes.
But the trip I am thinking about now is when my new husband and I were heading east for Thanksgiving Day dinner with my family at my sister’s house in Springfield, MO. The year was 1992 and the weather conditions were deteriorating by the hour. My son, about nine years old, was asleep in the back seat and my husband was snoring in the seat next to me. I was driving my Honda station wagon, concentrating on the road and listening quietly to the radio. The wind was ferocious, blowing snow across the road and I wondered how thick the ice on the road really was. It is during these times of snow packed roads that a driver begins to realize how “Not Flat” Kansas really is.
It was early afternoon and I was traveling in the right hand lane keeping ample distance between us and the car ahead. Up ahead I started to see brake lights and began to slow down. A semi-truck blew by me on the left and I was wondering what in the heck the driver was thinking. His speed was way beyond what the road conditions dictated. I quickly surveyed my situation. To my right the shoulder of asphalt dropped away, wouldn’t you know it, and in the blizzard conditions I had no idea how steep the drop off was. Where in the heck was the boring flat terrain that I always made fun of?
The semi up ahead of me suddenly slammed on his brakes. I watched his trailer begin to jack-knife across the entire road. For one second I was paralyzed with fear. Gently pumping my brakes I had a nano-second to consider my options. The other cars on the road were well spaced so I was not threatened from the rear. I could steer the Honda over the edge on the right and hope to drive it strait down the embankment, thusly avoiding rolling the car. Or I could aim for his rear tire which was now sliding away from me but appeared to be getting larger by the second. I chose the tire. It was so huge I hoped that I could bounce back off of it. I don’t know if I was swearing, definitely a possibility in this situation, or if my husband just felt the car slowing down, but he came too quickly and yelled out something. Miraculously the semi started drifting to left and into the medium. Still gently pumping the brakes I thought we might have a chance. Like a jockey in the Derby, I gently steered the Honda toward the space that was slowly opening up in front of me on the right hand side of the road. All of a sudden my windshield was covered with pink diesel fuel; as the semi went down into the medium, his gas line had ruptured. Excess energy shot out my fingertips ~ it only happens when I am scared to death. Furiously flipping on the wiper blades I tried to hold the car on what I hoped was “on-track”, but I had absolutely no vision out the slime streaked windshield.
As I braked to a crawl I slowly began to see what was happening. The state patrol had closed the road in front of us at the WaKeeney exit. I joined the slow moving line of vehicles headed to the off ramp. The energy inside our car was explosive. I wanted out of the car; I wanted my feet on the ground! We headed into one of the truck stop restaurants that were available.
A few minutes later we sat in a booth and my heart rate returned to normal. My son started crying quietly, saying he just wanted to see Grandma and Grandpa for Thanksgiving. Personally, I was just thankful to be alive. Bob got up and went over to talk to some truck drivers sitting at another booth. I held my little boy and thanked God for the opportunity to breath in the intoxicating smell of coffee and hamburgers. Bob returned and said he had found out how to travel east for a few miles and get back on the interstate farther down the road. I would have voted “No” but Walker was very excited about the prospect and so we decided to top off the tank and continue our trip.
It was comforting to think that most of our fellow travelers (the smart ones?) were holing up till the interstate opened again so there were would be fewer drivers to compete with. And the really good news is that we drove the rest of the trip with no problems. With Bob behind the wheel now, we headed east, slow but sure.
Over the asphalt and through the storm,
to grandmother’s arms we start.
The Honda is ready, our nerves are now steady,
With gratitude filling our hearts.
* annette.
People make fun of Kansas and how flat and boring it is; I know, I was one of them. In the last 36 years I have driven thousands of miles between my birth state of Missouri and my adopted Colorado, most of them on Interstate 70 ~ usually just as fast as I could get across. It is kind of scary, but in the past few years, I have begun to enjoy the drive. Kansas has a subtle beauty that I dismissed for years. And especially driving east, the closer one gets to the Missouri border the more rolling and forested the terrain becomes.
But the trip I am thinking about now is when my new husband and I were heading east for Thanksgiving Day dinner with my family at my sister’s house in Springfield, MO. The year was 1992 and the weather conditions were deteriorating by the hour. My son, about nine years old, was asleep in the back seat and my husband was snoring in the seat next to me. I was driving my Honda station wagon, concentrating on the road and listening quietly to the radio. The wind was ferocious, blowing snow across the road and I wondered how thick the ice on the road really was. It is during these times of snow packed roads that a driver begins to realize how “Not Flat” Kansas really is.
It was early afternoon and I was traveling in the right hand lane keeping ample distance between us and the car ahead. Up ahead I started to see brake lights and began to slow down. A semi-truck blew by me on the left and I was wondering what in the heck the driver was thinking. His speed was way beyond what the road conditions dictated. I quickly surveyed my situation. To my right the shoulder of asphalt dropped away, wouldn’t you know it, and in the blizzard conditions I had no idea how steep the drop off was. Where in the heck was the boring flat terrain that I always made fun of?
The semi up ahead of me suddenly slammed on his brakes. I watched his trailer begin to jack-knife across the entire road. For one second I was paralyzed with fear. Gently pumping my brakes I had a nano-second to consider my options. The other cars on the road were well spaced so I was not threatened from the rear. I could steer the Honda over the edge on the right and hope to drive it strait down the embankment, thusly avoiding rolling the car. Or I could aim for his rear tire which was now sliding away from me but appeared to be getting larger by the second. I chose the tire. It was so huge I hoped that I could bounce back off of it. I don’t know if I was swearing, definitely a possibility in this situation, or if my husband just felt the car slowing down, but he came too quickly and yelled out something. Miraculously the semi started drifting to left and into the medium. Still gently pumping the brakes I thought we might have a chance. Like a jockey in the Derby, I gently steered the Honda toward the space that was slowly opening up in front of me on the right hand side of the road. All of a sudden my windshield was covered with pink diesel fuel; as the semi went down into the medium, his gas line had ruptured. Excess energy shot out my fingertips ~ it only happens when I am scared to death. Furiously flipping on the wiper blades I tried to hold the car on what I hoped was “on-track”, but I had absolutely no vision out the slime streaked windshield.
As I braked to a crawl I slowly began to see what was happening. The state patrol had closed the road in front of us at the WaKeeney exit. I joined the slow moving line of vehicles headed to the off ramp. The energy inside our car was explosive. I wanted out of the car; I wanted my feet on the ground! We headed into one of the truck stop restaurants that were available.
A few minutes later we sat in a booth and my heart rate returned to normal. My son started crying quietly, saying he just wanted to see Grandma and Grandpa for Thanksgiving. Personally, I was just thankful to be alive. Bob got up and went over to talk to some truck drivers sitting at another booth. I held my little boy and thanked God for the opportunity to breath in the intoxicating smell of coffee and hamburgers. Bob returned and said he had found out how to travel east for a few miles and get back on the interstate farther down the road. I would have voted “No” but Walker was very excited about the prospect and so we decided to top off the tank and continue our trip.
It was comforting to think that most of our fellow travelers (the smart ones?) were holing up till the interstate opened again so there were would be fewer drivers to compete with. And the really good news is that we drove the rest of the trip with no problems. With Bob behind the wheel now, we headed east, slow but sure.
Over the asphalt and through the storm,
to grandmother’s arms we start.
The Honda is ready, our nerves are now steady,
With gratitude filling our hearts.
* annette.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
War
War
War. More War. Big Business
War.
and who will fight these wars
sons and daughters
who will die or be maimed or
maybe just
have post traumatic stress
disorder
War is always ugly.
always
I can't figure out how it is
possible that we create all
the beautiful things
see nature roar
watch children grow
and believe war fits in this
picture
Is it so hard to imagine another
way to resolve
conflict and make money
Sometimes I think I must be on
the wrong
planet
when did we get it so wrong and
decide to
let the military dictate
a mess
but don't worry because we
don't
have to see it
It is hidden, not for public
viewing
but we pay,
we all pay.
It's a sad day.
Mary
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Prose - A Simple Thanksgiving
It started out with me needing a change of scene. The last few months I have been healing from a cancer diagnosis. A change of scene would be delightful. I wasn’t aware of how much I needed it. My daughters suggested this would be great for me. And where else do I enjoy going than New Mexico. Central to western New Mexico holds a lot of magic and healing energy for me. A friend has a lovely home in the desert, far from most anything, except the square topped peak of the Pedernal.
Another friend agreed to drive down with me, or more appropriately, I with her. It was time to break away from the usual tradition. Leaving on Thanksgiving Day, there was very little traffic. None of us were interested in turkey. None-the-less, we had a great Thanksgiving dinner. Two of our favorites was a mushroom, nuts and short grain brown rice casserole, for melting in the mouth, along with a squash pie with a cranberry glaze. And the treat of a pumpkin pie, for those not too full to partake.
Much resting was enjoyed, a perfect retreat. A little hiking, on my part, plus a fabulous massage.
It was a small and loving Thanksgiving. Just what I needed during this time. Much gratefulness to all who brought me into such a healing space
Thanksgiving Day doesn’t have to be the same, year after year, but whatever our beings need at the moment. What we are most grateful for. I felt so blest.
Patricia
11/30/09
Another friend agreed to drive down with me, or more appropriately, I with her. It was time to break away from the usual tradition. Leaving on Thanksgiving Day, there was very little traffic. None of us were interested in turkey. None-the-less, we had a great Thanksgiving dinner. Two of our favorites was a mushroom, nuts and short grain brown rice casserole, for melting in the mouth, along with a squash pie with a cranberry glaze. And the treat of a pumpkin pie, for those not too full to partake.
Much resting was enjoyed, a perfect retreat. A little hiking, on my part, plus a fabulous massage.
It was a small and loving Thanksgiving. Just what I needed during this time. Much gratefulness to all who brought me into such a healing space
Thanksgiving Day doesn’t have to be the same, year after year, but whatever our beings need at the moment. What we are most grateful for. I felt so blest.
Patricia
11/30/09
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