Category Archives: prayer

poem: for the Ukrainian women in the black parka and scarf (I am signaling you through the flames)

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poem: for the Ukrainian women
in the black parka and scarf
(I am signaling you through
the flames) 

her blue eyes squint
from the sting of the smoke
flaxen hair covered with
a large white bandage
her high cheekbones
smeared with blood
lips searching for words
which do not come
hands extended, palms up,
crying out for justice

her weary visage
hangs in the ether
of eons haunting us
for the hundreds of million
war casualties from stones,
arrows, bullets, bombs,
humans cruelty and incarnate evil
fueled by human desires for
power and control always
resulting in violence 

may her suffering
ignite in us
the awareness that
the line of peace and violence
runs through every human heart
asking our self: what is the mirror
of life holding up to us, what are
we creating and how is it creating us,
and what is it we intend to create
here upon this earth home 

thus may the compassionate heart
of the enlightened mind overcome
the sovereignty of death culture,
such that in her suffering we lament,
embodying the life force and peace
in every breath, manifesting
peace is every step, our lips
perpetually chanting peace,
shalom, shanti, salaam, and our poetry
defeating the conqueror with word 

in our third eye the bloodied woman
with her haunting blue eyes and flaxen
hair and high cheekbones transforms us all 

Herb Stone
here&now working poetry
February 26, 2022

photo Wolfgang Schwan/Anadolu Images

Author’s note: It is with great respect I
credit quotes from my poem from other
master writers and master teachers.
The subtitle of my poem is a line from
the poem ‘Poetry as An Insurgent Art’
by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Stanza three,
lines six through eight are by the writer
Mark Nepo and line nine and ten are by
the writer Gary Zukov. In stanza four
‘the compassionate heart of the enlightened
mind’ is a Buddhist teaching taught by many
including Sogyal Rinpoche, and ‘peace is
every step’ is a book title and teaching from
Thich Nhat Hanh. All of these writers and teachers
are masters of their art and should be read and
studied for their wisdom especially in the area of
peace and life viz-a-viz violence and death.

May be an image of 1 person and standing

Advent Reflections: The Most Revolutionary Advent Hymn Ever Sung

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Advent reflections: When Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, meet during their pregnancies, they rejoice in the ending of Empire and its oppression of the lowly under which they live at that time with the Roman occupation of Judea

Mary sings a revolutionary song to Elizabeth, known as the Magnificat:

The Magnificat: Luke 1:46-55 NRSV lyrics:

“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.

His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.

He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”

German Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer called Mary’s song “the most passionate, the wildest, one might say the most revolutionary Advent hymn ever sung.” Bonhoeffer, who would be hung 12 years later for resisting Nazism, added: “This is not the gentle, tender, dreamy Mary … This song has none of the sweet, nostalgic, or even playful tones of … Christmas carols. It is instead a hard, strong, inexorable song about collapsing thrones and humbled lords of this world … ”

Sister Elizabeth Johnson says “The Magnificat is a revolutionary song of salvation whose political, economic, and social dimensions cannot be blunted. People in need in every society hear a blessing in this canticle. The battered woman, the single parent without resources, those without food on the table or without even a table, the homeless family, the young abandoned to their own devices, the old who are discarded: all are encompassed in the hope Mary proclaims.”

image by Ben Wildflower
click on image for better view

poem: 9/11: this day of national mourning and rebirth 

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poem: 9/11: this day of national mourning and rebirth

silently witnessing this day of national mourning,

through tears remembering the tragic images burned into our minds,

grieving for all who perished, were wounded, and traumatized,

humbly opening to the way of love, healing, peaceableness, and community,

let us be bearers of comfort, healing, and reconciliation,

and harbingers of the eternal way of radical love and radical grace in the neighborly community truth and authentic belonging,

God of the Universe, by whatever name,  hear our cries and laments for hope, creative imagination, and a better world for all beings

Yes! Amen.

Herb Stone
here&now working poetry
September 11, 2021

art by Abel Pann (1883-1963)
‘and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares’

 

 

Reflection: Aftermath of the flooding

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Reflection: Aftermath of the flooding
Walking at Radnor Lake Natural Area yesterday, witnessing the aftermath and power of the flood waters these last few days after heavy rain over the weekend (and it rained heavy again last night).
The waterways are running swift and deep, carving new branches here and there.
Herons and turtles survive on a log, a large salamander meanders by, and a fish and crawdad perished by the way.
Wildflowers and trees are all abloom. The smell of wet loamy earth fills the air. The warm sun helps us forget the raging storms we have just experienced.
I mumble a little prayer for those who suffered injuries, damage, and death from the storms with a word of gratitude for the sunny calm this day

Reflection: Spiritually transforming practice

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Reflection: Spiritually transforming practice
We must practice to transform our being personally and collectively Spiritual practice, undertaken according to principles of spirituality, and mindfully followed with purpose and intent, is capable of powerful personal, relational, social, and cultural transformation.
Some of these spiritual principles are:
– cultivate a loving heart for all beings
– develop an altruistic, sustaining spirit and share what you have with others
– be a good ally of the earth and its resources
– identify with your own suffering and that of others and be a healer
– measure progress and growth according to non-materialistic and non-economic factors such as sustainability and peace
– support democratic forms of government and the liberties they guarantee for all peoples
– speak out against, non-violently resist, and work to change social injustice and evil in the world
– develop unitive consciousness that envelopes paradox and
creative tension
-value diversity in creation and community
Creator God awaken in us a dedication to spiritually transforming practice that we may be collaborators and co-creators in your kin-dom of the alternative neighborly community for the good of all humankind and all creation.

photo by Cathey Stone
‘meditating in the estuary at Draper Lake’
Gulfview Heights Beach, Santa Rosa Beach, Florida

Reflection: Richard Rohr on our apocalyptic times and our need for a stabilizing spiritual practice over the next four months (and always)

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Reflection: Richard Rohr on our apocalyptic times and our need for a stabilizing spiritual practice over the next four months (and always)

(with thanks and respect to my patron saint, Gertrud Nelson for sharing Richard’s words with me)

“We are without doubt in an apocalyptic time (the Latin word apocalypsis refers to an urgent unveiling of an ultimate state of affairs). Yeats’ oft-quoted poem “The Second Coming” then feels like a direct prophecy. See if you do not agree:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

……..

Stand as a sentry at the door of your senses for these coming months, so “the blood-dimmed tide” cannot make its way into your soul.

If you allow it for too long, it will become who you are, and you will no longer have natural access to the “really deep well” that Etty Hillesum (Dutch author of the Nazi persecution of Jews in Amsterdam and who was killed in Auschwitz) returned to so often and that held so much vitality and freedom for her.

If you will allow, I recommend for your spiritual practice for the next four months that you impose a moratorium on exactly how much news you are subject to—hopefully not more than an hour a day of television, social media, internet news, magazine and newspaper commentary, and/or political discussions. It will only tear you apart and pull you into the dualistic world of opinion and counter-opinion, not Divine Truth, which is always found in a bigger place.

Instead, I suggest that you use this time for some form of public service, volunteerism, mystical reading from the masters, prayer—or, preferably, all of the above.

You have much to gain now and nothing to lose. Nothing at all.
And the world—with you as a stable center—has nothing to lose.”

photos: Gertrud Nelson, my patron saint
Richard Rohr (who I read widely) with my dear, late friend and spiritual teacher Jeff Blake

Thank you God for friends and teachers like these💓