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Invitation to Poetry: Entering the Desert’s Fire

Welcome to our 44th Poetry Party! I select an image and suggest a theme/title and invite you to respond with your poems or other reflections. Add your responses in the comments section.  Feel free to take your poem in any direction and then post the image and invitation on your blog (if you have one) and encourage others to come join the party! (permission is granted to reprint the image if a link is provided back to this post) Poetry Party Theme: Entering the Desert’s Fire This week the Christian liturgical season of Lent begins on Ash Wednesday.  For 40 days we are invited

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February 15, 2010

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart) i am never without it (anywhere i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling) i fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true) and you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you here is the deepest secret nobody knows (here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky

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February 11, 2010

Sacred Artist Interview with Jan Richardson

Over at Patheos is a reprint of an interview I did a couple of years ago with the wonderful and amazing Jan Richardson.  It is definitely worth a re-reading (or first reading for my newer friends) for Jan’s insights into art as a sacred practice. Jan’s work has been inspiring me for many years, she is one of the first people I discovered as a kindred spirit in the contemporary connection between monk and artist paths (and her out-of-print Night Visions for the season of Advent is one of my favorite books ever).  I am delighted to consider her a

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February 10, 2010

Ancient Wisdom of the Heart – A Practice for Lent

Listen to the long stillness: New life is stirring New dreams are on the wing New hopes are being readied: Humankind is fashioning a new heart Humankind is forging a new mind God is at work. This is the season of Promise. -Howard Thurman A week from Wednesday the Lenten journey begins. On Ash Wednesday we always hear the words of the prophet Joel: “Return to me with your whole heart.” Lent is an invitation toward whole-heartedness.  The heart is an ancient metaphor for the seat of our whole being – to be whole-hearted means to bring our entire selves

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February 8, 2010

Stirring in the Belly

Monastic practice offers me the gift of paying attention to the seasons of the day and the year.  February 1st is a potent time.  On the Celtic wheel of the year it is Imbolc (meaning “stirring in the belly”) which is one of the cross-quarter days falling between the Solstice and the Equinox.  Imbolc marks the first day of spring, the time when the very beginning of earth’s stirrings and awakenings from winter can be seen.  In Christian tradition it is the Feast of St. Brigid (an Irish Saint who is associated with fire) and on February 2nd is Candlemas

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February 1, 2010

Visual Meditation: Gathering Flock

Creation tells me a story – this is what beauty is for – it whispers, to soothe your wearied spirit, to enliven you, to invite you into dancing once again, to imagine gathering with a whole flock of kindred spirits who journey alongside you in grief and delight, who don’t ask you to be anywhere other than where your pulsing heart carries you right now. Sabbath begins for me this evening, a time when I can surrender into the restoration this time offers, a time to simply be and delight in my flock. Shabbat Shalom to all of the kindred

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January 29, 2010

Lost

** Stop by last Monday’s post to find out more about 50% for Haiti ** © Christine Valters Paintner at Abbey of the Arts: Transformative Living through Contemplative & Expressive Arts

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January 28, 2010

Let it Be Winter Still

I wrote this poem in my journal on Sunday and discovered this morning that a former student died suddenly yesterday. I offer this here in honor of Rob and for all those who are grieving for a multitude of losses: ___________________________________________ *** Let it Be Winter Still Let it be winter a while longer, Let darkness be my closest companion cradling me in her inky velvet shawl. Let the owl cry softly from his place among the long aching branches, under the bone-white face of the moon. Let my heart break for the dead in Haiti, buried under collapsed stone

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January 26, 2010

Pondering

I have been feeling tired this week, unwell, my body feels tender and fatigued and so I am taking extra care of myself.  My spirit is also feeling tender, in part because my body is vulnerable, but also because of the tragic events in Haiti, my mother-in-law’s gradual decline with dementia, and some much smaller personal struggles where I am being called to stand in my own strength in ways that are stretching me. I find myself drawn back again and again to this statue I posted last week (the images below are close-ups).  I am so moved by the

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January 21, 2010