Rotation No.25,550

Great men want the four seas. I’ve only
wanted old age to come unnoticed like

This . My family together in one place,
kids and grandkids looking after each

other still, I linger out mornings over
koto and wine, the wine-jar never dry.

My clothes a shambles, exhausting every
joy, I sleep late now, and nod off early.

Why live like all those fine men, hearts
stuffed with fire and ice to the end,

their hundred-year return to the grave
nothing but an empty path of ambition?

- The Selected Poems of T’ao Ch’ien, translated by David Hinton © 1993.

Old – P. Simon

https://youtu.be/tKsjty-yT6U

The Human race walked the earth for 2.7 million
We estimate the universe to be 13-14 billion
When all those numbers tumble into your imagination
Consider that the lord has been here before creation
God is old
We're not old
God is old
He made the mold
Take your clothes off
Adama and Eve
  - Old, P. Simon

"As a white candle in a sacred place, so is the beauty of an aged face." 

      - Joseph Campbell

_______________________________________________________

Rotation 25,550

That day that was once only realized in dreams

Of poet musings and in the songs of sojourning desperadoes

Had provided evidence of finally being born.

Three score and ten years in the making

That recent almost never-ending cold dark night

Slowly faded into yesterday.

Bright red bead burning sanctified glow

Calmly and deliberately peaked

Over the endless sea’s horizon.

The third rock’s rotation prevailing again.

Picaresque hero shaded that unknown glow from blinding his eyes.

Seeing in the light would need to be relearned.

His voice too yearned to be recovered and heard.

They say that some winters are longer than others.

Some say that wandering forty years in the desert

Before accidentally discovering paradise

Is really no big deal.

Many lost pilgrims never get to reach the River Jordan.

Words of the quiet one repeated

Like the song of a wind chime breaking the silence

By the breath of God.

“The only real purpose is to discover God…

The answer is really how to find peace of mind.

That’s what we are really here for. “

Aging weathered worn wayfaring vessel

From the arduous constant journey slows the pace of passage.

Yet the spirit that set sail in the first place had slowly

Come to Ulysses’ realization.

The chartered mission never had the intention to be known

For battles won or by the size and number of beasts conquered

Or by the bounty of worldly treasure owned.

The fortune of the adventure to date

Was that the desire for possessions

Never completely possessed him.

“So far so good”

    - JF Sobecki

_________________________________________________________________

My Back Pages – B. Dylan

 

https://youtu.be/OZwncQfvaKk

Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth,"rip down all hate,"I screamed
Lies that life is black and white spoke from my skull, I dreamed
Romantic facts of musketeers foundation deep, somehow
Ah, I was so much older than I'm younger than that now.
 - My Back Pages, B. Dylan

Old Friends/Bookends

https://youtu.be/snVOxz6fjbA

Can you imagine us

Years from today

Sharing a park bench quietly?

How terribly strange

To be seventy

- Old Friends/Bookends  , P. Simon

EVERYTHING IS WAITING FOR YOU

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.

  -- David Whyte
  ©2003 Many Rivers Press

I Worried

I worried a lot.  Will the garden grow, will the rivers

flow in the right direction, will the earth turn

as it was taught, and if not how shall

I correct it?

Was I right, was I wrong, will I be forgiven,

can I do better?

Will I ever be able to sing, even the sparrows

can do it and I am, well,

hopeless.

Is my eyesight fading or am I just imagining it,

am I going to get rheumatism,

lockjaw, dementia?

Finally I saw that worrying had come to nothing.

And gave it up.  And took my old body

and went out into the morning,

and sang.

   - Mary Oliver

Oftentimes there are those who can articulate through poems and songs precisely what has been rumbling on within ( Please watch all four parts)

George Harrison’s Last Interview p 1

 

https://youtu.be/50LfH0I879g

George Harrison’s Last Interview p 2

 

https://youtu.be/cZYozQfn8a0

George Harrison’s Last Interview p 3

https://youtu.be/dxmG0R9S2Qg

George Harrison’s Last Interview p 4

https://youtu.be/fdSb4zddOzo

amdg

Copyright 2018 All Rights Reserved JF Sobecki LLC

Resolver

                          

“You have no right to tie yourself in knots because you want to know the outcome of what you are doing. Don’t, no, no. Let it go. Let it go into history. Let it go into Christ. Let it go into generations. Let it go into the children. Play it and pray it well…. as (Dorothy) Day taught we may never see the good outcome of the good we do - that we must do it anyway".
 - D. Berrigan SJ

Sitting on the starting line of another year

There were a couple of basic questions yet unresolved.

Journal and pen in hand the questions flowed to fill the virgin spaces between the lines.

Do we really believe that B.F. Skinner is the primary

student of the divine who disclosed

the secret to serenity and the purpose of life itself?

Is the intention of faith, religious practice and good works

All part of some insurance policy concerning the afterlife?

Do we believe that serving the poor refugee, the poorest of the poor and the sick are part of some social experiment that if we get it right we win two tickets to paradise?

Are we to love another and our children only if they love us in return or do we wait until they love us first before we return the love?

Is making ourselves great really a result of isolation and self-centeredness?

If the divine insisted on consistency and subscription to only one path to grace then why is all existence in the universe so diverse?

The questions suddenly ceased. Then silence  …. A long pause and the words on the pages evaporated. The mystic voices of Berrigan, Day and the poets whispered sweetly as he let it all go.

Simple isn’t it?

Keep it Simple - V. Morrison

https://youtu.be/nXXFKhyrq7w

Tomorrow Never Knows – Beatles

 

https://youtu.be/nNQIpUmTdXE

Soul of a Man – B. Cockburn

https://youtu.be/xUqFP3kGMZg

                                                

                                  Practical Reasons to Welcome Poetry into our lives

                                                                  ( Click link)

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/the-practical-reasons-to-welcome-poetry-into-our-lives

Where Many Rivers Meet

All the water below me came from above
All the clouds living in the mountains
gave it to the rivers
who gave it to the sea, which was their dying.

And so I float on cloud become water,
central sea surrounded by white mountains,
the water salt, once fresh,
cloud fall and stream rush, tree root and tide bank
leading to the rivers' mouths
and the mouths of the rivers sing into the sea,
the stories buried in the mountains
give out into the sea
and the sea remembers
and sings back
from the depths
where nothing is forgotten.

David Whyte 2004

The Buddha’s Last Instruction

“Make of yourself a light”
said the Buddha,
before he died.
I think of this every morning
as the east begins
to tear off its many clouds
of darkness, to send up the first
signal—a white fan
streaked with pink and violet,
even green.
An old man, he lay down
between two sala trees,
and he might have said anything,
knowing it was his final hour.
The light burns upward,
it thickens and settles over the fields.
Around him, the villagers gathered
and stretched forward to listen.
Even before the sun itself
hangs, disattached, in the blue air,
I am touched everywhere
by its ocean of yellow waves.
No doubt he thought of everything
that had happened in his difficult life.
And then I feel the sun itself
as it blazes over the hills,
like a million flowers on fire—
clearly I’m not needed,
yet I feel myself turning
into something of inexplicable value.
Slowly, beneath the branches,
he raised his head.
He looked into the faces of that frightened crowd.

    - Mary Oliver

Wild geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting-
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

       - Mary Oliver

amdg

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

        - Jack Kerouac

“The only truth is music”

       - Jack Kerouac

Copyright 2018 All Rights Reserved JF Sobecki LLC

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