a day for ghoul's & goblins?

happy hallowe'en!

broken winged birds

I finally figured out a way ...! to get one of my flash movies uploaded to youtube! My flash movies are now uploaded to my youtube site ~ link here. So, yeah, that's what that is ~ my favourite one ... maybe a little macabre. But, as she says dead birds sort of provide a metaphor for the fragility and finitude of life, existence.

phoenix dreams ~ celebrating today

[psst ~ i haven't returned comments to previous posts yet.
i will sometime today ~ thursday.]

today. 10 years ago. today. it happened. its funny, when one resolves to stop trying to forget, it seems less difficult ~ less painful ~ to remember. what's done is done. past. time to move on. no pity. just joy. for what was. and for what is ... now.

when my husband decided to take off for a second time, about a week ago, i reached out to a friend with whom i had no contact for 2 years. a nursing friend. a kindred spirit. to give you some idea: she's a cross between enemy of the republic, mayden, and she/k9 ... yeah all those three rolled into one. she's suffered so, at times in her life. that suffering actually forced me to call her ... when i thought mr. mantissa was not coming home. she knows that feeling. that awful feeling that He will not come home anymore. only, in her case, her man died, and they never, ever found the killer.

can people move on from this sort of devastation? ahhh, yes, but with a great deal of difficult work. talk about your upstream swims! the girl's got nuthin' on those salmon. even when i felt nothing but deep anger for her, i admired her resolve to survive. and she can keep up with me ~ she's a tough, smart cookie. a little krazy, but who isn't? besides, if you ever find yourself in the ER, she's the girl you want lookin' after you.

so ... what's to celebrate?

expand the post to see a lovely little critter.

instead of thinking of my own son,

i will spend today thinking of this child ~

a sparkling joy to celebrate.

ya did good, girl. now ... the fun begins.

pinned? or pining?

A Blackbird Singing
It seems wrong that out of this bird,
Black, bold, a suggestion of dark
Places about it, there yet should come
Such rich music, as though the notes'
Ore were changed to a rare metal
At one touch of that bright bill.

You have heard it often, alone at your desk
In a green April, your mind drawn
Away from its work by sweet disturbance
Of the mild evening outside your room.

A slow singer, but loading each phrase
With history's overtones, love, joy
And grief learned by his dark tribe
In other orchards and passed on
Instinctively as they are now,
But fresh always with new tears.

~RS Thomas ~

spinsters hanging in trees

the artist ~ a spoken word poet
sample some more of her stuff

death has two faces?

two sides of the same coin
Originally uploaded by robbroccoli

ahhh. i cannot take credit for this brilliant image. but, it amused me so, that i felt compelled to share it. and thus, move on from the woe-is-me post below. think of this as an early hallowe'en.

i'm feeling socially militant these days.
expand the post for some links to some sites designed to inform us all.

iraq body count
Amnesty International
create change
empire of debt
muslim refusenik
faith without fear

get your fucking head outta the sand!

yeah, that's right. get with the program and take part in keeping this planet alive. for fuck's sake, this earth has suffered enormously because of the ignorance, egocentrism and brutality of humanity. its suffered because we're complacent, lazy, and addicted to consumption. its suffering because some misguided religious types have told us for centuries that the animals and plants of the earth exist for the use of humanity. BULLSHIT! its time we stopped thinking that absolute crap.

so ... GET YOUR FUCKING HEADS OUTTA THE SAND!
cut the pre-operational crap. look around you.
can you step outside the box, for once?
who knows, you may find the expanded view quite interesting.
enlightening, even.

be part of the problem, not the solution.



yes, this post is harsh. its my planet, too. i've lived in places sensitive to climate change ~ the north and the coastal rain forest. i have lived climate change in my short life time. its alarming. we need to turn the global environmental terror alert up to red. or we'll all end up on some apocalyptic planet, like the one described in Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake. frankly, i'm sick and tired of hearing ignorant bullshit from the likes of individuals who turn a blind eye to the carnage of humanity upon the environment and then cling to 11 inaccuracies as their justification for inertia and inaction. here's a challenge for you ~ put the keys to that gas guzzling, pollution-emitting earth-raping machine of yours away, and take transit. ooops! i almost forgot, you're likely all too good for that, aren't you? how many excuses can all of you come up with to justify why you need that car, truck or suv?

its all a question of priorities, isn't it?

i live but not in myself

this morning i wished to die, because i do not feel alive. i feel a slow, yet vicious death seizing my soul. like the fish, who finds himself removed from the water, wishes for death ... i wished for such relief.

RELAX. my life does not belong to me ~ and thus, is not mine for the taking. wishing for an escape, does not mean one will escape, does it? NO. but, there you have it, dear reader ~ my honesty, brutal and ugly though it may seem. the poem below is by St. John of the Cross.




I live, but not in myself,
and I have such hope
that I die because I do not die.

1. I no longer live within myself
and I cannot live without God,
for having neither him nor myself
what will life be?
It will be a thousand deaths,
longing for my true life
and dying because I do not die.

2. This life that I live
is no life at all,
and so I die continually
until I live with you;
hear me, my God:
I do not desire this life,
I am dying because I do not die.

3. When I am away from you
what life can I have
except to endure
the bitterest death known?
I pity myself,
for I go on and on living,
dying because I do not die.

4. A fish that leaves the water
has this relief:
the dying it endures
ends at last in death.
What death can equal my pitiable life?
For the longer I live, the more drawn out is my dying.

5. When I try to find relief
seeing you in the Sacrament,
I find this greater sorrow:
I cannot enjoy you wholly.
All things are affliction
since I do not see you as I desire,
and I die because I do not die.

6. And if I rejoice, Lord,
in the hope of seeing you,
yet seeing I can lose you
doubles my sorrow.
Living in such fear
and hoping as I hope,
I die because I do not die.

7. Lift me from this death,
my God, and give me life;
do not hold me bound
with these bonds so strong;
see how I long to see you;
my wretchedness is so complete
that I die because I do not die.

8. I will cry out for death
and mourn my living
while I am held here
for my sins.
O my God, when will it be
that I can truly say:
now I live because I do not die?

~ St. John of the Cross

he will not come anymore

NB (take note) ~ please, regarding comments ... no pity ... no sorries ... that's not why i posted this. i'm not into pity parties, they're pointless and way too messy for my liking. and please, don't ask me what happened. telling that story out loud serves no useful purpose. the story tells itself in my heart everyday. and that is enough.



will the sun ever break thru?
possibly, quite possibly.
yet ... its difficult to imagine,
when one feels
the cruel and stoney chill
of a dark night.
the darkest of nights ~
one which rears his head every year
in October ~
the month of my youngest son's birth
and also, ironically,
the month of his very painful and permanent
departure from me.
ten days from now he would turn 18 years old.
a tall shadows looms
as i contemplate the could haves ~
how might that flower have unfurled ...
what fruit could it have borne?

expand the post to read the poem, Pieta by RS Thomas


Always the same hills
Crowd the horizon,
Remote witnesses
Of the still scene.

And in the foreground
The tall Cross,
Sombre, untenanted,
Aches for the Body
That is back in the cradle
Of a maid’s arms.

RS Thomas

the kindness of bigotry

i'd finally had it. i could tolerate it no longer. does that make me weaker thann the rest, or stronger? i called someone a bigot. i figured, if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck ... then its definitely NOT a swan ... its a duck and i should call it that. and i should stop expecting this duck to display the grand elegance and poise of a swan ... for a duck is not a swan. a duck is a duck. and so i called it like i saw it.

and now i wonder if i'm supposed to feel bad for calling it like i saw it. because i don't. i feel bad for witnessing the behaviour that made me speak out. i feel bad for remaining silent for so long. i feel bad for the reality that many around me continue to remain silent. and the cycle of hatred continues. and, i find myself wondering ... what is kindness? is it just whitewashing everything? is it truth? compassion? when is compassion appropriate? all the time? is compassion necessarily niceness? is truth?



how does one show kindness to a bigot? by ignoring the bigotry? by whitewashing it? by pretending we don't see it? is that kindness ... to refrain from expressing our true visceral reactions, for fear we may cause waves? is this kindness ... doctoring the truth based on some notion we have of the perceptions of others? i have a problem with that ... isn't that lying? to refrain from speaking the truth? when there's an elephant pouncing on my chest ... do i just tell everyone i feel okay because that's the answer they want to receive? that seems FUCKED UP to me.

this is eating me up. i want to think that truth is always in order ... even when its ugly. but so many around me seem to execute their existence based on the notion that truth is only in order when its pretty. and no one wants to weigh in on this issue. so ... i am left wondering. and ... well, i suppose that's just another thing that scalds and scorches my frail, brittle and breaking heart.

Western Jahiliyyah

Don't know what that word means?
Educate yourself and look it up.
Do we, in the West, really believe ourselves superior?
If so, we need to pull our heads out of our fucking asses.



expand the post to read an excerpt from Karen Armstrong's book Muhammad, A Prophet for our Time

We have a long history of Islamophobia in Western Culture that dates back to the time of the Crusades. In the twelfth century, Christiam monks in Europe insisted that Islam was a violent religion of the sword, and that Muhammad was a charlatan who imposed his religion on a reluctant world by force of arms; they called him a lecher and a sexual pervert. This distorted version of the Prophet's life became one of the received ideas of the West, and Western people have always found it difficult to see Muhammad in a more objective light. Since the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, members of the Christian Right and the United States and some sectors of the Western media have continued this tradition of hostility, claiming that Muhammad was irredeemably addicted to war. Some have gone so far as to claim that he was a terrorist and a pedophile.

We can no longer afford to indulge in this type of bigotry, because it is a gift to extremists who can use such statements to "prove" that the Western world is indeed engaged on a new crusade against the Islamic world. Muhammad was not a man of violence. We must approach his life in a balanced way, in order to appreciate his considerable achievements. To cultivate an inaccurate prejudice damages the tolerance, liberality and compassion that are supposed to characterize Western culture.

~ Karen Armstrong

I have spoken out recently. In disagreement. I have tried to understand, but its impossible to dialogue with someone who makes little effort to understand you, isn't it? Frankly, I'm sick and tired of the lies perpetuated by small-minded bigotry which takes historical events out of context for pure ideological hubris. And I have as much as said so, choosing against doing what everyone else does: tip toe around the shit pile, or pretend not to smell it. If this has made me unpopular, then ... oh well. Too fucking bad. Your loss ... I rather like being unpopular ... its what I've always been, and its quite freeing, actually.

EDIT: a great description of the Bush Administration by Stephen Lewis ~ "... they have not a moment of remorse [for the situation in Iraq]... they're military predators!" ... HOW BRILLIANT!

cold turkey ~ withdrawal sucks

if i never eat again, or smell the horrid scent of cooking food, it would feel far too soon. even just contemplating food, stirs those sick feelings in my gut. *sigh* ~ the sun is shining, and i have a whole new day to live out. hope lies ever on the horizon, even when we cannot see it there, for the thick clouds that obscure our sight.

can we love hatred?

"... you got no regard for things you don't understand ... that's why you will not survive."
~Spoon, Underdog

how do we love? do we love, at all? or is it all lies and illusion?

i feel quite unable to insulate myself from the insensitive, arrogant intolerance of the blogosphere. it hurts my heart a great deal. i find myself very saddened that, in the 21st century, we seem unable to dialogue about sensitive issues without sneering, jeering, snide insinuations, without kicking sand in each other's eyes.

i feel at a real loss ... as to how to insulate myself from bruises that intolerance stamps upon my spirit. once again i ask ... how can one tolerate the intolerant, the intolerable? is there a way? is that way ... simply to retreat? when the intolerant masses appear only to want to hear themselves yell and scream their vulgar thoughts ... then what? part of me wants to listen ... but each word cuts. the message holds importance, because its what another human thinks and feels ... and i want to know why. but ... the longer i hold my eyes open, the more they hurt from the sand which gets kicked into them.

i must close my eyes now ... to that part of the blogosphere that seems rife with contempt and vengence for that which remains misunderstood. and that saddens me, because i know that my weakness makes it so ... i want so much to understand and to be understood. i fear this revulsion that fills my chest each time i read words such as ...islam, the evil ... muhammad, the warlord ... we need war to achieve peace. HOW DO I ACCEPT WHAT MY HEART AND SOUL FEEL UNABLE TO ACCEPT? HOW DO I LOVE HATRED? AND NOT BECOME THAT HATRED? IS THERE A WAY?

... expand the post if you dare ...



will humanity ever learn?

i fear not. as long as we think killing those unlike us will solve all of our problems. as long as we fail to put down our fists, and our hateful, vengeful words. as long as we hold the rage of revenge closest to our hearts. as long as we obliterate all of the divine light that lives inside of us with our conceit, our ego-driven hubris, and the blind faith of intolerant superiority. as long as we strive to dominate. as long as we react before we reflect. as long as we regard our belief systems as golden, ideological nuggets which we must bolster above all else, at any and all cost.

we all come from the same divine dust. and return to said dust, we all will.

the world exists today, as it does, because of all of the yesterdays that have passed. the warring spirits that infect this world have only grown, not diminished ... and they continue to grow so rapidly. we did not put them there ... our forefathers did. but ... we have failed to learn ... about love ... about unity ... about understanding.

Surely, those who believe, those who are Jewish, the Christians, and the converts; anyone who believes in GOD, and believes in the Last Day, and leads a righteous life, will receive their recompense from their Lord. They have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve.

qu'ran 2:62

far too beautiful

he is far too beautiful to give up. besides, i tried that already, not for me. my ego does not make decisions about my relationships anymore ~ i do. there's a difference ... i am not my ego. i am my soul ... my essence ... my spirit. and that divine portion of me tells me to stay and work it out. i am responsible, too ... for that devastation. and we are fixing ourselves ... together.

breaking the narrative

He did not come home last night. He did not call. I have not seen him in 24 hours. I have called the hospitals. And now, filed a missing person's report. Whatever happens, I think for me, this marriage has now ended. I have nothing, except myself. And my son. Its really true ... one is really only ever alone. There's no such thing as union. Its a lie ... an illusion. I am secretly devastated. Yet, hopeful.

I wrote those words Sunday morning, before my husband returned home from his 24 hour absence. I wonder, when do we know the time has come to break the narrative ~ to rewrite the story we have spent so much time telling ourselves? Why do we stay? Why do we go? Do we stay, because our narrative tells us to stay? Do we go be because our ego deludes us into thinking that's the panacea? Do we go because that's what we do ~ go? Because when something looks or feels broken, we throw it away, like rubbish?

When do we break the narrative? How do we know its time? How do we forgive? I believe everything forgiveable. Its the ego that tells us otherwise. And our viscious hunger for the carnage of revenge. Maybe ... maybe we break the narrative through forgiveness? Maybe ... we break the narrative by taking the time to find out why ... the devastation occurred, as opposed to chastising its deliverer? Perhaps that's love?

the woodshed ~ where i'm at

My husband stayed out all night, Saturday night. I called the police, yet again, to look for him. This is the 3rd time in 6 or 8 weeks I have had to call the police to look for him or keep him safe ... frankly i think he should be a man about it and manage himself with more maturity and consideration. I really have little use for such manipulations, and piggish, inconsiderate behaviour. I'm not fucking kidding, either. He failed to call, or send any signs of life during his 24 hour absence. I have discovered what my deal breaker is ~ THIS. I have no desire ... for anything. For anyone. I have only myself. And my son. And my intellect. Any notion I had of a life partner ... of a marriage skin ~ its all a delusion ... an illusion. One is truly alone in this world and life. No one really gives a flying shit, when it really counts, do they? Well, this is my lot and I have to deal with it ... somehow. For now ... I feel like retreating.

i have taken the ring off

He did not come home last night. He did not call. I have not seen him in 24 hours. I have called the hospitals. And now, filed a missing person's report. Whatever happens, I think for me, this marriage has now ended. I have nothing, except myself. And my son. Its really true ... one is really only ever alone. There's no such thing as union. Its a lie ... an illusion. I am secretly devastated. Yet, hopeful.


where are you? why do you make me worry, so? why did you forsake me? you do not love me. and that's so very sad.

a woman, a man, love & war

"We are flying into a black hole where we have already been, one in which we condemned dissidents only because they thought differently from the majority. And it is no exaggeration to say that we are 'flying' there: the time has already arrived when the persecution of human rights defenders has become common once again, and when human rights committees in the country are de facto being liquidated."

~ anna politkovskaya



"Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events."

~ winston churchill

... expand the post to read my words ...

Do you know the woman? She was killed for speaking out against Vladimir Putin, the leader of her country. They found her body in the lift of the building where she lived, a year ago. Is this the world we want to call our own? A world that indicts people for harbouring beliefs and thoughts that differ from the rulers? Or, for looking different ... for looking like our vision of that which we call "the enemy" ...? It seems to me, we should take a close look at this case ... and cases like it ... anywhere in the world. North America seems far less free than we think. If we're so free and liberated, then why does GITMO exist?

Do you remember the man? And what he said and did? He lived an amazing life ~ born 10 years after the end of the American Civil War, and died around the time of Malcolm X's assassination. He fought in the Boar War, was a POW, led the British Navy in early WWI, rode in the last cavalry charge of WWI, and was the only leader in those early thirties that saw right through Hitler and Nazism. He wrote about the failings of trying to reorganzation the fallen Ottoman Empire, and apparently George Bush cannot read or thinks himself too big to learn from history. Churchill's perhaps laughing his ass off at Dubya's Gunsmoke Gang! Either that, or he's terribly saddened. Or maybe a bit of both. Or ... maybe he's musing in that sardonic British way of his. Like we all do, sometimes, about Dubya.

Do you want to be Anna? Neither do I. Do you want to be Churchill, who saw the writing on the wall, when no one else would listen? Do you want to be Dubya, who allowed vengence and intolerance to blind him to the wisdom of reality? Perhaps you are Dubya, and do think Iraqis, Iranians and Palestinians must "pay" for the carnage of 9/11. Then ... why do you find it so incredulous that many Iraqis, Iranians, and Palestinians view us with similar sentiment?

Do you want to be MLK, whom, I feel, knew his destiny involved dying so his people could LIVE? So, what do we do about it? We'd best decide, coz none of us is free as long as some of us are oppressing others. And as long as we allow hatred and intolerance to colour the lenses thru which we view the world. Do you think your enemies should receive entitlement to human rights? Or are rights only for those with whom we agree? Do we dissolve all disagreement thru oppressive and violent means?

Why don't we produce great world leaders like Churchill anymore? Why don't our current leaders understand humanity ... suffering ... the human condition ... the way those of our past did? Why don't we elevate noble people like Politkovskaya, instead of the ego-driven and substance-less Paris Hilton's of the world? Does happiness really occupy such importance as to become an end to which we all strive ... at all cost? Is there nothing more, beyond hedonism and ego, for which we should reach? Why did anyone think that a FUCKING WAR would serve as the answer to global disagreements? Are these the same people that think you just go around beating dissenters, and all those who follow said dissenters? why?

Here's something for your listening pleasure ~ listen to tracks 2 ... America needs to hear that message about the cup of bitterness, once more. Then, listen to track 5 ~ do you remember? Do you ... love your enemy? Did MLK die for nothing ...? Did Politkovskaya?


Have we forgotten? Do we want to forget? Let us remember ... not just speak of remembering, but live it ~ feel it ~ DO IT!

Logos

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

(John1:1,14)

The cone nebula struck me ~ in it I imagined the image of Christ ... I imagined looking at the back of his head, watching him, from behind, as he hung his head in utter pain and despair, as he suffered so. When I saw the image of Christ ~ the art piece ... I somehow felt it belonged with the nebula. The redness of the nebula gives the image a gory hue. It also casts an ethereal, divine light on the face of Christ. Described as a star-forming pillar of gas and dust, it makes me think of the formation of Christ, as opposed to his destruction. The image ~ my composite, collage image ~ provokes thoughts of creation ... and what it must look like, if one could picture it, in God's realm.

I want to write more about this image ... about the feelings it provokes in me ... about wisdom I could glean, for my own Self. I will return ... to write about that tragic, yet passionate, rubric and divine solitude which embraces Christ, in this image. About the loneliness, the yearning of a droplet for its source. About happiness getting in the way, deterring us from our true goal ... the peace of truth.

Does all time occur at once? Do we consider the fact that the universe moves ... think of the night sky as a snapshot in time, as opposed to a map of stars, which we would no longer find in those spots we now see them? Do we consider that the light of each of those stars in the sky took thousands of light years to travel to our very retinas? And ... yet, all time could possibly occur at once?

Some food for thought. And feeling. And living. And breathing. I'll return.

history ~ upon the shoulders

I have recently discovered this man. He rocks and rolls, people. If you're into history conversation, the type you'd find among history nerds at the water cooler, then check out his podcasts. If you don't have an iPod, you can still get iTunes ~ its free ~ and download the casts and listen to them on iTunes. Anyway, here's what his words have stirred up in me so far. Expand the post to read more.

We, existing fully and consciously in the now, stand upon the shoulders of those who have gone before us ~ of those actors who have played out our history. Human nature binds us all into this matrix, in which we find ourselves. Do the winners write history? If so, then, how can we really know history? For, what of those who lost ... what of the worthy, yet much obscured, lost cause? What of men such as Tecumseh? And Vercingetorix? Did their outcomes - loss - render their cause, their vision worthy of knowing?

Are the winners, in history, necessarily correct? Don't we need to see both sides, before really learning the lessons that history begs to teach us? Why do we revere Alexander the Great, and Constantine, yet despise Hitler? Does the same distance which provides objectivity, also remove the passionate context from these figures? In 2500 years, will humans view Hitler in the same light that we, today, view Alexander the Great and Constantine? What's real? I remember learning about Constantine in Catholic school as a great man, not a brute who had his wife and son, among others, killed. How do we, who find ourselves here, and not there, know? Can we ever achieve accomplish the production of an accurate historical record? How do we utilize the stories of history ... to move forward?

Does it matter so much how the Cold War transacted itself over four decades? Or does it matter more that certain key moments and individuals in history provided the hinge upon which the Cold War swung? Can we really analyze historical events without considering their context, and the context of the major players? Do we need to consider that each person, each decision-maker, represents an entire vision, an entire culmination of life experiences and moments? Does this make a difference ... in what we grasp from history? And how it shapes us in the here and now?

I find myself drawn to dialectical process of analysing events that occur in society ~ past and present. I find history most fascinating when I pick at it ... bits and pieces that seem to fit together, despite existing in different time realms. Such as these . We forget, in our haste to react, that this has happened before to humanity ... at some point. Why do we harbour such conceit and arrogance about our superiority? So much has gone before us ... and yet, in some ways we remain blinded to the real lessons of humanity. Intriguing. How we understand so much of the universe, yet fail to understand the most important element ~ humanity. I wonder what would happen if we stopped destroying each other long enough realize that our individual self-awareness exists, only due to the existence of other humans, different or alike.

a heart glows in the misty darkness

thanx to the dearest k9 i know, i find myself listening to 12 byzantine rulers. très interessant! really. i've downloaded the full series of podcasts via itunes, but the computer i'm using now does not have itunes ... so there's an alternate link site. i'll stop being delinquent and return previous comments and write emails. for now ... expand the post to see what's on my mind today.

HINT: its visual ....

CLICK THE IMAGE TO VIEW THE ORIGINAL, MAXIMIZED VERSION

For all the time we are apart
I'll light a candle
In my heart