Thursday, February 26, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
early morning muse: Where do these things come from…
Where do these things come from…
Growing older, must be like moving into a state of Vipassana
A deeper form of meditation where everything you have filed elsewhere comes up…
Maybe that is where the stories of wisdom telling come from throughout the creation's history.
I don't know I just feel it, like the deep rumblings of the tummy soon after the meal you could have skipped…
I remember...
It was after 8:30 in the morning, there was commotion in the outer office,
I walked out in the room filled with emotion, the radio was on, my staff was crying,
A plane had hit the towers in NYC,
My step son, Marcy's kids were in Manhattan, are they safe we asked without speaking?
We felt as a nation, a world, what we all feel at the death of a child, a baby, a loved one…
A emptiness in the bottom of our lives…
Where did this come from, a mid winter, sunny and warmer than usual day in 2009?
It's there my sister, it's there my brother, it's there…
Always reminding us of our journey,
Of our compassion,
Of our hope…
Maybe the question is not, where does this stuff come from?
But, what else is there, where ever it is?
We are all "dhamma brothers (&Sisters)" *
Life as it continues will surprise us, not just memories, but who we are,
Thank you, whoever I am thanking…can I rest from this stuff for a while? No!
""I am the spirit of where it came from, and I have something to tell you now…""
A sudden something, the morning of February 10, 2009 by ko shin, listen!
*Dhamma Brothers, is a Documentary recently released on Donaldson Prison in Alabama, where they
used the Vipassana Program, a ten day silent retreat with 20 some inmates and the program now continues there and in other prisons. Worth seeing. I have a copy. Check out www.dhammabrothers.com Peace!
Sunday, February 8, 2009
The Big Sit 90 Day Zen Meditation Challenge
This is one way to gain some understanding of Zen Meditation. If you go to this web site, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review it has a wonderful group of essays for your enlightenment, I am joining this journey starting in a week or so. If you have any question please let me know and if I can not help I will pass it on to others who would be able to help with the question and answer. I have learned in the realm of spiritual practice, the question is the center of the conversation. I will also be offering this to the men in my Sangha's at Fox Lake, Red Granite and New Lisbon Correctional Institutions. Peace, ko shin
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
The world looks in a ll directions…by Gregory Orr
That Is the Body of the Beloved, published by Copper Canyon Press,
a nonprofit publisher that believes poetry is vital to language and living.
The world looks in all directions…
The world looks
In all directions
Like that vase
Of chrysanthemums
On the table.
But the beloved
Looks only at you.
How easy to choose.
Yes, the flowers
Are beautiful,
But the beloved’s gaze
Makes you beautiful, too.
– Gregory Orr,
COPPE R CANYON PR E S S
http://www.coppercanyonpress.org/VDayBroadside/
Check this out, solid stuff...
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Reflection - Posted Daily by John Cock Sleep tight tonight & always
Friday, February 06, 2009
To Find God
If nothing that can be seen ... [is] God ... then to find God we must pass beyond everything that can be seen and enter into darkness. Since nothing that can be heard is God, to find Him we must enter into silence. ~Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 131
Let me enjoy darkness and silence at least every night before sleep ... and bask in the ever-present mystery that is verily not I ... and that sustains me in being. ~jpc
From and to ... and in between. Namaste.
You and your whole race. by Langston Hughes, Black History Month
You and your whole race.
by Langston Hughes
You and your whole race.
Look down upon the town in which you live
And be ashamed.
Look down upon white folks
And upon yourselves
And be ashamed
That such supine poverty exists there,
That such stupid ignorance breeds children there
Behind such humble shelters of despair—
That you yourselves have not the sense to care
Nor the manhood to stand up and say
I dare you to come one step nearer, evil world,
With your hands of greed seeking to touch my throat,
I dare you to come one step nearer me:
When you can say that
you will be free!
Source: Poetry (January 2009).
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Poetry Month April, 2009
2009 Poster
Design: Paul Sahre
Sponsors: The New York Times, National Endowment for the Arts, Random House, Inc., Merriam-Webster, and The Poetry Foundation
The 2009 poster features the lines "Do I dare / Disturb the universe?" from T. S. Eliot's poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock."
Sit, relax, be quiet - Listen - tranform the world
So many say, they are too busy,
yet, take some time, say 15 minutes, find a quiet place,
sit with both feet on the ground, take three deep breath's,
then focus on your breathing, one, breath in, two, breath out...
some say, count to ten and start again,
my mind fills up, monkey mind,
the issue is not empty mind, but letting go...
not planning the day, solving an issue, but letting go...
being quiet is about letting go.
In meditation the world is transformed...
try it? Do it!
Peace, ko shin (boundless heart) Bob Hanson
Anika, the beautiful Poet
The Fifth Grade Poetry Reading
from La Escuela Fratney, Milwaukee WI
The reading was at Woodland Pattern Book Center, Milwaukee, WI
Anika Otero Ingvoldstad is our grand-daughter and we are very proud of her.
020709 Anika's Poetry
I AM
I am the sea turtle drifting through the sea.
I am the waves encountering different lands.
I am the leaves whispering in the wind.
I am the earth rotating around the sun.
I am the butterfly flying to each flower.
I am flexible like monkey swinging from vines.
I am the thunder rumbling in the sky.
I am the rain kissing our earth.
I am the breaking dawn rising from below.
I am the new moon rising into the night.
I am the twilight slowly sinking in the meadow.
I am the snow that falls like a blanket on our earth.
I am what I am I do what I do and live my life as a bumpy
road with twists and curves.
Read by Anika Otero Ingvoldstad at the 5th Grade Poetry
Reading at Woodland Pattern Book Center, Milwaukee, WI
Feb. 1, 2009
Where I am From
I am from Lacy my stuffed animal that I sleep with. My dog Bear who I picked out from a barn, 2 tea sets and a dinner set of Peter the Rabbit and my mom's earrings from when she was a little girl.
I am from a small slide that I played with at my grandpas, from the garden with sunflowers and daisies, the tire swing that I swing on, the mud and hammock that I get dirty in and from the small stove we cook on in the summer.
I am from the park across the street where I play forts in the winter with my cousins, the park Wickfield were I play kickball and tennis, and from Hawthorn Glen where I sled.
I am from my great, great grandma Ing who serves the best grapefruit, from my grandma Kurth who would take care of me and say I was her favorite, from my grandma Karen who makes me pop-overs and chocolate torte royal, from my godparents Jeff and Mary-Lynn who take me to Cedardberg and from my Abuelo y Abuela who would cook me rice and eggs.
I am from my dad who always tells me when I am tired at the Zoo, "If you walk any slower you will stop" from my mom who when I would ask her what's for supper she says food, and I ask her what kind of food? She says, "the kind you eat."
I am from the scar I got falling down a dresser and from the blood I spilled crashing into a tree.
I am from my gray and blue plastic bin with my name on it with sharpie full of memories, and my Indian and whinnie and pooh diaries.
I am form all that and more!
Written by Anika Otero Ingvoldstad as part of her poetry project for her fifth grade class at
La Escuela Fratney, Milwaukee WI
Luna Sol
Soy la luna salgo
Soy el sol salgo
Duranye el dia.
Veo a los murcielagos.
veo a los pajaros.
Oigo a los grillos.
Oigo a los ninos.
Alrededor de mi
Hay estrellas.
Alrededor de mi
Hay nubes
Soy un satelite.
Soy una estrella.
Brillo enla noche
Doy calor a los
Planetas
Soy la luma.
Soy el sol.
Haiku's by Anika
Arbustgo
De
Frambuesas
Verde con hojas
roja y deliciosas son
me gusta comer.
Osos polares
Son del Artico
blanco con amarillo
no tienen frio.
Chocolate
Marron y dulce
se derrite en mi boca
me gusta comer.
Written by Anika Otero Ingvoldstad as part of her poetry project for her fifth grade class at
La Escuela Fratney, Milwaukee WI
Monday, February 2, 2009
The root of War is fear...Thomas Merton
At the root of all war is fear: not so much the fear men have of
one another as the fear they have of everything. It is not
merely that they do not trust one another; they do not even
trust themselves. If they are not sure when someone else
may turn around and kill them, they are still less sure
when they may turn around and kill themselves. They
cannot trust anything, because they have ceased to believe in God.
It is not only our hatred of others that is dangerous
but also and above all our hatred of ourselves: particularly
that hatred of ourselves which is too deep and too powerful
to be consciously faced. For it is this which makes us
see our own evil in others and unable to see it in ourselves.
Thomas Merton. New Seeds of Contemplation
(New York: New Directions Press, 1961): 112.
Thought for the Day
[W]e never see the one truth that would help us begin to solve
our ethical and political problems: that we are all more or less
wrong, that we are all at fault, all limited and obstructed
by our mixed motives, our self-deception,
our greed, our self-righteousness
and our tendency to aggressively and hypocrisy.
New Seeds of Contemplation: 115-116.