Friday, April 29, 2011

Kairos

Feet planted firm,
wind fills wings;
Tug on the thread
--my heart rings.

Head in the clouds,
dreaming of things;
Time flies a kite
--my soul sings.


© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

This poem has been set to music by Carson P. Cooman,
in his cycle of songs for solo voice entitled Brief Vibrations, Op. 870

Wishing you a great weekend and suggesting...

GO FLY A KITE!

Thursday, April 28, 2011

Referral Spammers, Get A Life!

I always find it interesting that there are people who imagine that someone will click their links to pay for diet tips or training-in-how-to-be-an-annoying-spammer-for-money. These poor, deluded folks are located all over the world.

I could probably start a similar website of my own called "How To Be A Bitch". But I won't--I don't need to, someone else has already done this, I am sure.

But, as it is, this site is a site that is not devoted to making money or losing weight or porn or beauty products or anything remotely as stupifyingly inane as that.

This site is about creativity, and to a certain extent, critical thinking.

What is written up here is copyright protected. I am well aware that I cannot make money by flogging my blogging, and that it is ridiculous to try to do so.

I cannot imagine how all of you trying to sell decorating services in Russia and skin products in Brazil, and I cannot read the Cambodian site, so I don't know what you are trying to sell (could it be bootlegged DVDs of a prurient nature?) are going to find a client in me, but you can, I suppose, keep trying.

Really, I find it rather a sad and even an amusing commentary on humanity that people think they can get ahead in life by being such annoying leeches. Someone should do a sociological and economic study on whether this kind of BS is profitable.

Having commented on the phenomenon may perhaps bring more of such traffic. I am aware of that. But I want all of you who engage in referral spam to know that all it does is make me laugh and hope that the human species evolves sooner, rather than later.

That is all; you make me laugh.

So, by all means, if you feel you need to make me laugh, keep it up.

But, otherwise, may God BLESS you all, and may you find some illuminating light and peace, and a real life that is not so much caught up in sales or money or being annoying.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Public Servants

          Politicians are like diapers;
          they need to be changed often
          and for the same reason.
                      ~ Mark Twain

Weeds grow up

through cracks
formed in the aftermath
of any reign of terror.

Seemingly irreparable damage,
attributed to villains invisible,
is incalculable; somehow,
there is no money for repairs.

Wobbling platitudes
roll off the tongues
of the political class
we were free to vote
into office
to work for us.

If you are, like Flynn,
in the pockets of the powerful,
you need not be free or even real,
but you can afford to paint on a smile
and say g’day and it’ll be all right.

The cracks in the street,
the decay of a republic,
the decline of democracy,
and the absence of common decency
don’t figure into your paycheck.


© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Note: the origins of the phrase “in like Flynn” are unclear,
but in the context of this poem, all could be applicable.



Saturday, April 23, 2011

Dawn

          a song for Easter

          The Holy Spirit is the rising sap, 
          And Christ will be the green leaves that will come
          At Easter from the sealed and guarded tomb.
                       Patrick Kavanagh
                       From the Great Hunger: III, lines 25-27

Steal in,
Steal in softly,
Steal in silently, sweet Other;
Flow thy sweet living steams in,
Flow in vision, flow in being
On the exuberant morning tide!

Illumine from dark to dim to light,
To consciousness and the recognition of it;
In you flowing tide, fill me from outside in,
Until you fill my veins and my visioning with beauty,
Gently birthing me out of your essence.

Steal in,
Steal in softly, Beloved,
Steal in slowly, dear Other;
Flow like the flames of dawn into my senses,
Sing like the lark through my veins,
Extrude me from your consciousness,
Unfold me from the budding of your source
Until I am everything,
And the fleeting thought on the wind,
As the light grows from rose to flame.

Steal in softly, and
Weave our endless song--
Theme and Variations
On our eternally new moment of discovery.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

This poem was written in 2002.
This text has been set to music by composer James Hurd.


Friday, April 22, 2011

Twilight

          a song for Good Friday

          Before I go may I linger over my last refrain, completing its music, 
          may the lamp be lit to see your face and the wreath 
          woven to crown you.
                       Rabindranath Tagore
                       Fruit-Gathering: LI

Steal in,
Steal in softly,
Steal in silently, sweet thief;
Flow into my vision, my being,
Like the drawing on of dusk.
Soothe away the aches and sorrows,
Smooth away all worries and cares, and
In your ebbing tide, wash me, from inside out,
Until you ebb away all doubt, all guilt, all traces of ugliness,
Until you fill my veins and my visioning with beauty,
Gently restoring me to the pure essence that was born of you.

Steal in,
Steal in softly, Beloved,
Steal in slowly, sweet thief;
Flow like jasmine scented dusk into my senses,
Sing like the nightingale in my veins,
Melt me into your consciousness,
Fold me into your arms
Until I am nothing,
But a memory fading on the horizon,
As the light fades from flame to rose.

Steal in softly, and
Sweetly end our song,
Signaling night to draw a discreet curtain
On our eternal embrace and slumbering.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

This poem was written in 2002, and has a companion piece that is for Easter.
This text has been set to music by composer James Hurd.
Check back on Easter, if you want to see the companion piece.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Wake Up Call

Weeping
and the sound of stone scraping on stone
announced a blinding light.

“Come out,”
called a voice,
distant, yet familiar;
far away, yet close by.

A call from one world
to another,
as yet unrecognized
by an object.

“Friend, come out,”
the voice softer now,
closer, kindly.

Could it be for me?

Rising with effort,
encumbered
and stiff,
the faintest trace,
the faintest memory of I
shuffles toward
a bright world.

Sleep,
it has seven beneficial qualities:
    sleep heals,
    sleep relaxes,
    sleep stores focus,
    sleep sharpens memory,
    sleep checks appetite,
    sleep supports a positive outlook,
    sleep calls forth a morning filled with light.

But the wake up call
goes one better than sleep:
love of the Friend is greater than death.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Return Trip


the forty days and nights
passed like years, she writes:

you choose
    your mood
         make your way
and come again
to the city gate
    at an hour late
for finding lodgings
and food.

it is very like
one never left,
but for the sudden death

emergence was
unexpected,
yet edifying:

one sometimes
    has to make sacrifice
in order to know
    it is not needed;

a misapprehension
on the part of one
who thought to measure
commitment in cubits and
freedom in leagues

the gift of
    this return trip:

learning that
the meaning
and the measure
of life fully lived
is the love
that is greater
than death

learning to give it all up

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Saturday, April 16, 2011

The Meeting Place

Here we stand,
Face to face,
Where wave and particle meet;
At the junction of all and nothing,
We stand here, now,
Caught in one another’s gaze.

We can feel time as a wind blowing through our souls,
Faster and faster, forward and back,
Converging ever now, ever new;
Time asks nothing of us, but gathers up our songs,
Like fallen leaves, and carries them to Elsewhere and Back,
So that we may know ourselves then, now or later,
And so we might be known,
In once and future remembrance,
From the beginning.

We stand, face to face,
The soles of our feet defining the holiness
That rises up from the sacred grounding,
Through our extremities of mind, soul and spirit,
Tuning our singular form to its uttermost frequency.
From within the inner knowing of the outer knowing,
And from without the outer knowing of the inner knowing,
We reach forward with the smile reserved for the beloved.

Kiss all that lies beyond us,
And know that it is good—
For that is all we need to know,
And there is no greater joy.
Blessed be the One who made all other,
For the simple pleasure of conversation,
For the delight of laughter, light and lightness,
For the recognition of all that is beyond self,
And is, therefore, the fairest expression of selfless beauty.

Standing face to face,
Here, at the Holy of Holies, now and ever,
Accept the love offerings we plant in your fertile soil,
Help us to tend them well and, knowing their potential,
Let us watch them bear us fruit most beautiful and sweet,
And let us join in the harvest together,
And may the harvest go on from this day forth,
In joy and peace, forever and evermore.
Amen.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Friday, April 15, 2011

The Measure of Modern Morality

The world, as seen through the lens of the news media, seems to be playing itself out like a parable written by Nietzsche. War, abuse of power, betrayal of the innocent by wolves cunningly disguised as sheep, whether these wolves are politicians, clergy, bankers, generals… It seems like one bad joke that keeps playing itself into deeper and deeper territory. What was once faintly amusing amusing and treated as cliché (e.g., “death and taxes…”) now is far past its pall, and the thoughtful person reckons that the horrors of division that we see, playing themselves across all boundaries and senses, prove that Shakespeare was all too insightful about human nature when he has his character Hamlet observe that customs are “More honour'd in the breach than the observance.” What we see played out now is mostly breach, and little, if any, observance. Apparently, the breachers rule!

Surely, this is what Nietzsche meant when he emphatically stated “God is dead!” This statement was used as a battering ram against Nietzsche, of course, who was treated as a pariah by the academic establishment and the church.

It is very interesting that people judged Nietzsche based on that single quip, out of its context.

Here is more of the passage from The Gay Science:

"Where has God gone?" he cried. "I shall tell you. We have killed him - you and I. We are his murderers. But how have we done this? How were we able to drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? What did we do when we unchained the earth from its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving now? Away from all suns? Are we not perpetually falling? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there any up or down left? Are we not straying as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is it not more and more night coming on all the time? Must not lanterns be lit in the morning? Do we not hear anything yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we not smell anything yet of God's decomposition? Gods too decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, murderers of all murderers, console ourselves? That which was the holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet possessed has bled to death under our knives. Who will wipe this blood off us? With what water could we purify ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we need to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we not ourselves become gods simply to be worthy of it? There has never been a greater deed; and whosoever shall be born after us - for the sake of this deed he shall be part of a higher history than all history hitherto."

Here the madman fell silent and again regarded his listeners; and they too were silent and stared at him in astonishment.

The passage was spoken by a madman—perhaps this is Nietzsche being tongue in cheek about himself; only a madman could make assertions that turn the world of the worldly upside down by stripping the worldly of their illusions. Nietzsche is the most famous pariah ever, for his polemics against the Christian Church Universal, of which this passage could be thought the crowning statement, if only by those who have not read Nietzsche’s oeuvre in the way Nietzsche himself read all the works that informed him; he called this way of reading lento—Italian for slow. Slow reading for maximum absorption.

Nietzsche was excoriated for reporting the truth of he saw about the way people act. Ironically, the seer actually did go mad, and died before his mature thought could be completely developed.

ÐÑ

The Church Universal is an interesting institution. It claims to ground itself in the teachings of Jesus, but patterned itself as a hierarchy in the image of Roman Empire. And so it is an Empire, one that has, over two thousand years, controlled kings and billions of average people, the very slaves that Nietzsche identified in his writings. Of course, Christianity has splintered itself off into denomination after denomination, sect after sect, starting since well before the Councils of Nicea. Each sect has defined and controlled the masses according to its own version of the truth and moral code that it claims to pattern after the very simple commandment of Jesus. The Roman Church has deemphasized women and marginalized quite a lot of diverse interests and ethnicities and thought by using morality and fear as swords and cudgels. Countless innocents have been given the sword or the fire, or some other ultimate punishment for their declared “sins”. There is no peace on earth because religions and governments are continually at war, in an endless effort to command power.

In the modern era, the moral authority of particularly the Roman church has never faced so many challenges. Two of the biggest have to do with the marginalizing of women and homosexuals. Sex scandals continue to rock the faithful, as well they should. The church has fought on this battleground for generations, by primarily using the tool called denial, and by sweeping all transgressions under the carpet. Women and children have suffered abuse of priests who have all taken oaths to uphold and maintain holiness and sanctity in all interactions; the church denied claims, until they could be denied no more; and has finally tried to sweep it all away by sheltering and shuffling the offenders through the Empire, rather than by handing them over to the law. Now, in the U.S., Ireland and, most recently, Belgium, cases are being settled and priests are being defrocked. But there are some wealthy, conservative Catholics (who can afford to take out full page ads in the New York Times, no less) who continue claim that the victims are the ones to blame, not the clergy offenders or the church. Homosexuality is to blame. Women are to blame. Children are to blame. Abortion is to blame. According to the conservative line, the church should not have to bear responsibility for the sins perpetrated within its hierarchy, and its moral authority must not be questioned.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. wrote in his book “Autocrat of the Breakfast Table:

Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle that fits them all.

ÐÑ

In Daybreak, Nietzsche speaks Moral Authority in the following manner:

Thus commands the authority of morality: an obscure fear and awe are at once to direct mankind in the case of precisely those actions the aims and means of which are least immediately obvious! This authority of morality paralyses thinking in the case of things about which it might be dangerous to think falsely—: this is how it is accustomed to justify itself before its accusers. Falsely: here that means ‘dangerously’—but dangerously for whom? Usually it is not really the danger to the performer of the action which wielders of authoritative morality have in view, but the danger to themselves, the possibility that their power and influence may be diminished if the right to act arbitrarily and foolishly according to the light, bright or dim, of one’s own reason is accorded to everybody: they themselves, of course, unhesitatingly exercise the right to arbitrariness and folly—they issue commands even where the questions of ‘how am I to act’ to what end am I to act’ are hardly possible or at least extremely difficult to answer. — And if the reason of mankind is of such extraordinarily slow growth that it has often been denied that it has grown at all during the whole course of mankind’s existence, what is more to blame than this solemn presence, indeed omnipresence, of moral commands which absolutely prohibit the utterance of individual questions as to How? And To what end? Have we not been brought up to feel pathetically and to flee into the dark precisely when reason ought to be taking as clear and cold a view as possible! That is to say, in the case of all our higher and weightier affairs.

Rather a frighteningly accurate description of the state of moral authority, as it was in the 1880s and even to the present day.

So we have this doctrinal hot potatoes constantly tossed at us—free-will and sin are juxtaposed to one another. We are offered the assurance of permanent lodgings of our eternal soul in Hell if we do not bow as slaves to the will an institution that is ancient, not modern.

Lost in all of this is the central teaching: Christ died for all.  Here is what Paul said in the first letter to the Corinthians (15:1-3):

Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures…

What Paul tells us is that we have all been saved, and that we are free. Then we are sent on to preach this release from the bondage of sin by proclaiming the gospel, loving God and cherishing our neighbors as we cherish ourselves.

But ever since the day that the Church patterned itself on Empire, we have been told that we have not been saved, but continue in sin, and further that we can only be saved if we follow the arbitrary doctrines of people who live in the world but are not of the world, and don’t feel bound to adhere to civil law or even their own arbitrary doctrines!  Many of which doctrines are not at all in keeping with the teachings of Jesus during his ministry!

Mark 2:27:

(Jesus) said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.

The Roman Church, and not this branch of the Church Universal alone, and not even just the Christian Church, has been acting as if this were the other way round, for far too long.

ÐÑ

Luke 4:18-19:

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

Let us recall that in Baptism we enter the new life. The prisoners are free, the blind see, the oppressed are released from the bondage of authoritarian rule. This, and every year, is the year of the Lord’s favor.

Let us pray that all may be reacquainted with and reminded of this simple and humbling truth, that we may live lives of goodness and compassion because we have been freed to do so, in unity with our neighbors, eschewing the lies of power and arbitrary authority.

Amen.


Holmes, Sr., Oliver Wendell. The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table. H. M. Caldwell Co., 1900, p. 129.

Nietzsche, Friedrich; Hollingdale, R.J., translator; Clark, MaudeMarie and Leiter, Brian; . Daybreak, Cambridge University Press, 1997. p. 62: 107. Our right to our folly.

Holy Bible, New International Version, Biblica Inc., 1973; various passages.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Hearing the Universe Speak

The universe opens itself to
questions and answers.

Listen,
Listen, so that you can hear:
the answers to your questions
are carried on the air;
you need only gather
the many strands,
like flowers,
into a nosegay
your mind will blossom.

The universe speaks,
singing the answers
to all our questions;
a musical coherence.

Who are the listeners?

They are the ones who
need never ask a question;
they listen to the wind,
the ground, the ocean;
they hear the answers,
and then respond
with appropriate gratitude: 
the silence of knowing.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Relevance


This holds that,
plus this and that,
better than the old glass dish
you gave away last year;
trouble is,
this is toxic,
while that was not.

This allows you to talk,
to walk and talk,
to drive a car and talk,
and even to take pictures
and do research while
talking, walking and driving;
trouble is, you have to pay a fee,
charge it with expensive power,
and have a sense that when you are using it,
it is for something worthwhile,
because if you are doing all those things
with it while driving, you could get a ticket.

This is inside your head,
and holds far more than the toxic dish,
and does far more than the electronic device,
believe it or not;
this is built to last a lifetime:
is not toxic,
does not need batteries,
cannot be given away,
and doesn’t need to be regulated,
though it must be fed and nurtured.

This last item, used correctly,
renewing itself, as it does,
with the changing tides of concerns mundane and noetic,
has the potential to maintain its value and relevance.

The other items will no doubt end up in the dustbin;
it is only a matter of time.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Monday, April 11, 2011

Wishing Well


Shafts of light reach into the placid depths of the pool.

So, too, my gaze and my breath reach,
inward, downward through the mossy depths,
finding source and swing,
peace and wing.

The sharp relief of day's cast is softened,
and stillness imbues thought's idle current,
discoloring emotion to the point of peace
and back in reflection.

May the stroke of my gaze
and may the breath of my soul
be tokens that,
floating ever deeper into the still quiet depths,
find both their question and their answer,
find their expression from inward ever outward,
and their expansion onward, upward—beyond.

Well wishing to and from a wishing well,
for this moment and for all the episodes that follow.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Friday, April 8, 2011

within silence

withdraw, withdraw from the noise!
withdraw into the stillness of creation,
like burrowing into the folds of a warm cloak.

stillness invites silence
to the center of self and every living thing,
and to the interiority beyond,
which is the beauty of creation.

when silence speaks,
receive the message,
and be its instrument.

let silence play through your soul
like the breath of a song
on the beat of the sacred drum.

like the flower,
unfolding from the bud
to make a bed for the bumble bee,

silence will call blessed rest,
will speak beauty to your dreaming,
and greet you warmly in the truth of dawn.


withdraw, withdraw from the noise!
withdraw into the stillness of creation,
like burrowing into the folds of a warm cloak.

stillness invites silence
to the center of self and every living thing,
and to the interiority beyond,
which is the beauty of creation.

when silence speaks,
receive the message,
and be its instrument.

let silence play through your soul
like the breath of a song
on the beat of the sacred drum.

like the flower,
unfolding from the bud
to make a bed for the bumble bee,

silence will bring the blessing of rest,
will speak beauty to your dreaming,
and greet you at the dawn of day.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen


Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Trignosis 3.

3. visions


from the garden,
echoes of a faded music
round the corner of forgetting

the tapestry of being
unfurls before me,
as if it could be mine
and of my making

and so I sing,
I sing to the beauties of being
and the words tumble out
like colored threads
to dazzle
and then
to darn themselves
into the warp and woof
of continuity

do I truly see,
or is it that I flow
as a thread among
the seas and seams?

from the garden,
echoes of a fading song
round of the corner of forgetting

perhaps I should enter there,
and follow

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Monday, April 4, 2011

Trignosis 2.

2. mandala


the bud opens,
spiraling from her soft center,
reaching to the eight directions
and out toward the welcoming arms of infinity

it has been this way since before the dawn,
and thus it shall ever be,
song without end,
amen

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Trignosis 1.

1. illuminations

walking in the light,
a blinding experience;
there is no softness to truth,
and neither are there shadows
within which to linger on this journey

and it does continue,
the soul journey

blindness is
a necessary hazard
while traveling the interior

they brush up against me,
their wings barely touching me,
but I can hear them rustle;
they lead me on right paths
when I put my faith in silence
and release the hand of thought

in the desert places,
bushes burn,
and silence opens
toward the flames;
angel wings guide
no-thought
forward
to be quickened
and to be quenched

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen