Repeat When Necessary 2017 (+ New Homes and New Chapters)

Getting Ready For Christmas Day- Paul Simon

https://youtu.be/5Q_y4IqeQe8

The congregation complained that their pastor was becoming redundant and putting people to sleep every Sunday with the same ole sermon...blah, blah, blah. The pastor then one Sunday commented from the pulpit that he heard their concerns and after listening to their confessions and observing their behavior in the community he said the message in the sermons would continue to be the same until they got it.

"Into this world, this demented inn, where there was absolutely no room for him at all, Christ comes uninvited.”

- Thomas Merton

For Religious fanatics only...

Charlie Brown asked 
Lucy why she was so happy. Lucy explained how it was "Christmas" and
 she explained further that this was the time of year to "spread joy, 
 caring, compassion, giving and love." Charlie Brown wondered to Lucy, 
 "Why do we just do these things at Christmastime and why can't we do 
those 
things all year round?" Lucy yelled at Charlie Brown "What are you
 some type of religious fanatic?"

“Christmastime is a little jolt to stop us and get us back on the right path.”

  - Unknown

“But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,' faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.

Business!' cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The deals of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Cry of a tiny babe – Bruce Cockburn

https://youtu.be/YmZlYiMCvSc

What’s so Funny about Peace, Love and Understanding? - E. Costello

 https://youtu.be/eJ1ZQ99pKbY

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy New Year …

Peace on Earth….

“May God bless us everyone”

***********************************

New Homes and New Chapters

Sometimes a sign of growth and progress can be discovered not just in what type of shelter we live in but also how we live in that shelter and make it a living and vibrant home; a place where we know we belong. Sometimes this shelter is a weigh station as we continue to make passage. New chapters wait to be written. Sometimes this shelter becomes a final resting and launching spot for that third act ... the finisterre.

(For Lindsay, Joe, Caroline, Chase, Leigh, Hal and Quinn as they move on to their new homes that wait to be filled with life and love.)

The House of Belonging

I awoke
this morning
in the gold light
turning this way
and that

thinking for
a moment
it was one
day
like any other.

But
the veil had gone
from my
darkened heart
and
I thought

it must have been the quiet
candlelight
that filled my room,

it must have been
the first
easy rhythm
with which I breathed
myself to sleep,

it must have been
the prayer I said
speaking to the otherness
of the night.

And
I thought
this is the good day
you could
meet your love,

this is the black day
someone close
to you could die.

This is the day
you realize
how easily the thread
is broken
between this world
and the next

and I found myself
sitting up
in the quiet pathway
of light,

the tawny
close grained cedar
burning round
me like fire
and all the angels of this housely
heaven ascending
through the first
roof of light
the sun has made.

This is the bright home
in which I live,
this is where
I ask
my friends
to come,
this is where I want
to love all the things
it has taken me so long
to learn to love.

This is the temple
of my adult aloneness
and I belong
to that aloneness
as I belong to my life.

There is no house
like the house of belonging.

– David Whyte

 Our House - C,S and N

 https://youtu.be/FqIc2GYox5E

amdg

“One day I will find the right words and they will be simple”

        - Jack Kerouac

“The only truth is music”

       - Jack Kerouac

Copyright 2017 JF Sobecki LLC All Righst Reserved

Finisterre Pt 3: The Coffee Table Testament

"Woke up, fell out of bed
Dragged a comb across my head
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup
And looking up I noticed I was late
Found my coat and grabbed my hat
Made the bus in seconds flat
Found my way upstairs and had a smoke
Somebody spoke and I went into a dream" *

As if rising from a Bronte Wuthering Fog a coffee table strewn with a peculiar collection appeared at his knees as he rested on the  oft used couch. "What is this ?" he asked. "Are these the aspects of my life, my identity?" One book on the table screamed, "You can't go home again' and another a plough of mystic explorations with whispered mantras. Whyte and Cohen poetics competed for attention. They are all neighbored by journals, one of virgin pages , a canvas for the river of pilgrim words yet to pour out onto them, while another sat filled with recorded half legible reflections, meditations and prayers. An assorted collection of song lyric cheat sheets to be learned and sung to someone at some point in a yet to be defined future took up more space than attention.Technology present in forms of a computer and what few call a phone housed memories in digitalized post-kodachrome photos of children and grandchildren interspersed with images of fond faces and places. Personal poems and musical recordings rest in perpetual residence. Two novels simmer as if to be completed by some magical force. A digital library tunes wait impatiently to be played to soothe the lonely spirits to dance and sing. Lists of co-pilgrims, some near and some far and some departed who refuse to be deleted all await some connection in some form or another. Tools for healing rested for that ever broken foot and aging back sat side by side with a TV remote who controls what will stimulate and what will be a retreat for spinning heads. Empty cup of coffee and oatmeal bowl , contemporary loaves and fishes, indicate recent nourishment of the pilgrim's hunger.

Waking and rising up from the fog the voice cries out,

"Is this my testament? What does all this tell me about me?"

A voice echoes from the wilderness,

"You're a slob!"

Autumn Poem

  -  Mary Oliver

In the last jovial, clear-sky days of autumn
the mockingbird
in his monk-gray coat
and his arrowy wings

flies
from the hedge to the top of the pine
and begins to sing — but it's neither loose, nor lilting, nor lovely —

it's more like whistles and truck brakes and dry hinges.
All birds are birds of heaven
but this one, especially, adores the earth so well
he would imitate, for half the day and on into the
evening,

its ticks and wheezings,
and so I have to wait a long time
for the soft, true voice
of his own glossy life

to come through,
and of course I do.
I don't know what it is that makes him, finally, look
inward

to the sweet spring of himself, that mirror of heaven,
but when it happens —
when he lifts his head
and the feathers of his throat tremble,

and he begins, like Saint Francis,
little flutterings and leapings from the pine's forelock,
resettling his strong feet each time among the branches,
I am recalled,

from so many wrong paths I can't count them,
simply to stand, and listen.
All my life I have lived in a kind of haste and darkness
of desire, ambition, accomplishment.

Now the bird is singing, but not anymore of this world.
And something inside myself is fluttering and leaping, is
trying

to type it down, in lumped-up language,
in outcry, in patience, in music, in a snow-white book.

Everything is Waiting For You

 - David Whyte

Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings.

Surely, even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.

Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.

Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into
the conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.

Everything is Waiting for you – D. Whyte

https://youtu.be/MgQf5tx1hi4

Child of the Wind – B. Cockburn

 

https://youtu.be/60Hy3y9KON0

Sail on Sailor – Beach Boys

https://youtu.be/m2f3zZ6sUCY

End of the Line – Travelling Wilburys

https://youtu.be/UMVjToYOjbM

Watching The Wheels - J. Lennon

https://youtu.be/Da69-pu_pqc

*A Day in the Life – The Beatles

https://youtu.be/usNsCeOV4GM

“One day I will find the right words and they will be simple”

        - Jack Kerouac

“The only truth is music”

       - Jack Kerouac

amdg

Copyright 2017 All rights Reserve JF Sobecki LLC

Finisterre Part 2: The Third Act Ramble

"The mystics keep our union with God( The Divine) and all creation through music, art, and poetry, and reflections on nature."
 - R. Rohr OSB

"Instructions for living a life.
Pat Attention.
Be Astonished.
Tell about it."
- Mary Oliver

__________________________________________________________

Sometimes

Sometimes our narrow perspective taints
What we really see
Sometimes the ego surfaces and gets in the way
Of our continuing down the right path
Sometimes the reconnecting with spirits from the past
Affirm the grace of the original initial connection
Sometimes science is used to rationalize
That which needs to be left unexplainable
Sometimes we think we know God
We need to stop thinking and let go
Sometimes streams lead to rivers and rivers flow to the sea
We should join the leaves on the water and let ourselves drift and flow with the rivers
Sometimes some are blessed to realize that it is not too late
As our third act to the great play can help us make sense of all that went before
Sometimes completing that impossible climb up the mountain
The victory was not just for those we name but for our very own soul.
Sometimes it takes the grace of pure smiling innocence of an infant
to sanctify the universe's eternal spark within our own authentic spirit
Sometimes our own lack of wisdom is evidenced by insufficient words
And we need a poem, a song or a moment in nature to understand

_______________________________________________________

"When it's over, I want to say:all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it is over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world."
 - Mary Oliver

The Journey

One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice --

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voice behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do --

determined to save

the only life that you could save.

- Mary Oliver

Some Eternal Spark – Glossary

https://youtu.be/HNC48nWREXg

On the Road to Find out – Cat Stevens/Yusuf

 

https://youtu.be/5vN3Fqglnkg

Sensitive Man – Nick Lowe

https://youtu.be/0_aWdumsnJ8

 amdg

“One day I will find the right words and they will be simple”

        - Jack Kerouac

“The only truth is music”

       - Jack Kerouac

 

 Copyright 2017 J Sobecki LLC All Rights Reserved

Finisterre Part One: The Conversational Nature of Reality

Finisterre : The Place Where Your Present Turns Into the Future

(Written and inspired by the "Farm" in Upper Marlboro, MD and the works of David Whyte)

“ Think about how many times I have fallin

Spirits are using me

Larger Voices are Callin’ ”

              - Stephen Stills

"The Logic of worldly success rests on the fallacy: The strange error that our perfection depends on the thoughts and opinions and applause of other men! A weird life it is, indeed, to be  living always in somebody else's imagination, as if that were the only place in which one could at least be real"
 - Seven Storey Mountain, T. Merton

"This is another great difference between your civilization and ours. You admire the man who pushes his way to the top in any walk of life, while we admire the man who abandons his ego"
  - Seven Years in Tibet, H. Harrier

My Camino

There was that time while on his
Self selected Camino
The Pilgrim awakened
To the reality his conversation
To the journey that brought him to this moment
What he had desired had already happened
Each step along the way of his sojourn
Was the result of one invitation leading to another
The great Marathon is both voyage to where he thought
He should be in the end
An the expedition of the Seven Stories of the interior.
At one mystical moment the colors glorify the mountains
In September in the rain just before the leaves come falling down.
Purpose,intention complete the trees as they rest in wait
For the promise of their redemptive rebirth.
Weary Pilgrim on that road less travelled.
Scallop shells indicate
it is how he got to this place that really matters.
The reflections of his journaled confessions repeated
Beginnings and Endings,
Endings and Beginnings,
Interactions and coincidental encounters.
The Obe Wan had once counseled " Courage"
His Jedi companion said "The Frontier
Where reality lives is where the true self, the myths of the world
And the future reside.
Hearts break when we care about that which really matters."
His Santiago another safe harbor
On that perpetual voyage.
Illuminations and transformation arrive
When spirits let go.
Paradise is ...now
A river can't be pushed,
It flows, flows and flows...
This place on the shore of the great sea and this time is
Where the pilgrim stands in revelation reflecting
On that which was, is and receives another invitation.
He walks on.

Maybe This is Heaven - Field of Dreams

https://youtu.be/lXjz-M_6eN8

Finesterre
- David Whyte

The road in the end taking the path the sun had taken,
into the western sea, and the moon rising behind you
as you stood where ground turned to ocean: no way
to your future now but the way your shadow could take,
walking before you across water, going where shadows go,
no way to make sense of a world that wouldn't let you pass
except to call an end to the way you had come,
to take out each frayed letter you brought
and light their illumined corners, and to read
them as they drifted through the western light;
to empty your bags; to sort this and to leave that;
to promise what you needed to promise all along,
and to abandon the shoes that had brought you here
right at the water's edge, not because you had given up
but because now, you would find a different way to tread,
and because, through it all, part of you could still walk on,
no matter how, over the waves.”

Camino
 - David Whyte
The way forward, the way between things,
the way already walked before you,
the path disappearing and re-appearing even
as the ground gave way beneath you,
the grief apparent only in the moment
of forgetting, then the river, the mountain,
the lifting song of the Sky Lark inviting
you over the rain filled pass when your legs
had given up, and after,
it would be dusk and the half-lit villages
in the evening light; other people's homes
glimpsed through lighted windows
and inside,othe people's lives; your own home
you had left crowing your memory
as you looked up to see a child playing
or a mother moving from one side of
a room to another, your eyes wet
with the keen cold wind of Navarre.
          
But your loss brought you here to walk
under one name and one name only,
and to find the guise under which all loss can live;
along the wa, remember you were greeted as such,
and you needed no other name, other people
seemed to know you even before you gave up
being a shadow on the road and came into the light,
even before you sat down with them,
broke bread and drank wine,
wiped the wind-tears from your eyes;
pilgrim they called you again. Pilgrim.

Santiago

     - David Whyte

The road seen, then not seen, the hillside

hiding then revealing the way you should take,

the road dropping away from you as if leaving you

to walk on thin air, then catching you, holding you up,

when you thought you would fall,

and the way forward always in the end

the way that you followed, the way that carried you

into your future, that brought you to this place,

no matter that it sometimes took your promise from you,

no matter that it had to break your heart along the way:

the sense of having walked from far inside yourself

out into the revelation, to have risked yourself

for something that seemed to stand both inside you

and far beyond you, that called you back

to the only road in the end you could follow, walking

as you did, in your rags of love and speaking in the voice

that by night became a prayer for safe arrival,

so that one day you realized that what you wanted

had already happened long ago and in the dwelling place

you had lived in before you began,

and that every step along the way, you had carried

the heart and the mind and the promise

that first set you off and drew you on and that you were

more marvelous in your simple wish to find a way

than the gilded roofs of any destination you could reach:

as if, all along, you had thought the end point might be a city

with golden towers, and cheering crowds,

and turning the corner at what you thought was the end

of the road, you found just a simple reflection,

and a clear revelation beneath the face looking back

and beneath it another invitation, all in one glimpse:

like a person and a place you had sought forever,

like a broad field of freedom that beckoned you beyond;

like another life, and the road still stretching on.

Transformation – Van Morrison

https://youtu.be/PuXJsEXJu7A

When the Leaves come Fallin Down – Van Morrison

https://youtu.be/85sUVuoetW4

Wasted Along The Way – Crosby Still and Nash

 

https://youtu.be/Kg-Qdrr3XSk

Southern Cross – Crosby Stills and Nash

 

https://youtu.be/Eplyswd8ZRU

The Ballad of Easy Rider – R. McGuin

https://youtu.be/BWoMz6C7INQ

A Lyrical Bridge between the past, present and future- David Whyte (TEDTalk)

Click on Link

https://www.ted.com/talks/david_whyte_a_lyrical_bridge_between_past_present_and_future?utm_campaign=tedspread-a&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare

The Way * (Fictional Movie about The Camino de Santiago and Life Journeys)

https://youtu.be/o5VZKWcgw6c

amdg

“One day I will find the right words and they will be simple”

        - Jack Kerouac

“The only truth is music”

       - Jack Kerouac

Copyright JF Sobecki LLC 2017 – All Rights Reserved