Picture 20 people sitting in the mud, a rope tangled limply around ankle and elbow, shoulder, neck and foot. What accounts for their earlier struggle and their current high spirits and banter is the rope that still holds them together, connects them.
:- Doug.
If I am to die well
I need you to place
my story in yours
If I am to die well
I need you to love me
:- Doug.
If our memory goes?
what do we know of G*d?
Do we yet turn, turn, turn?
Is our compass set,
or do we turn, turn, turn?
“No longer will they say
‘Remember the Lord,’”
For the Lord will
be their heart
:- Doug.
Don’t hold G*d in your fist
Nor press G*d like a leaf
Between pages of your book
Freedom suits G*d more
Play!
:- Doug.
Everything is in conversation
Everything is conversation
We don’t need to invite participation
In a world awash in participation
We are challenged to be conscious
& on purpose about it
& not to shrink from our challenge
The sacred essence of
the world is conversation
:- Doug.
It is true that our story reaches out and touches others, touches the stories of our ancestors and descendants, touches and mingles with the story of our family and tribe for years, maybe eons.
:- Doug.
We are ever given the ability to renew our futures.
:- Doug.
How do we die in our times? Would we die heroically, meaningfully, or as many of us do, with a whimper?
:- Doug.
Here is a tale true to life: A boy sets out on a road. Life offers not end, so this story has no end. Sometimes there is opposition, sometimes not. Life is open. A life might end, but life goes on. We are all always setting out on a road.
:- Doug.
If you see a goal
I’ll offer a goal beyond
If you see an ending
I’ll point to a seed sprouting
If you see a vista
I’ll invite you to horizons
Rolling out before us
:- Doug.
Since I see some things in longer view than others, it is my obligation to share this longer horizon. You see other things larger than I, so you expand me. Please. Coming toward us are these permutations. The more we see, the greater our choices. The more our choices, the more we can live.
:- Doug.
There are many parts to the human. Let’s take for instance head, hand and heart. All tire at different rates. The longer our view, the more that is possible to us. The more we see, the more we see. Our hand is dying, our head sleeping, yet our soul might be flying. This opens possibilities to us: things we can do, places we can go, wisdom we can impart, love we can give, essences we can be, new things we can meet, even in our last days.
:- Doug.
We are in this family and in this setting together. Only together do we move on. Even if some of us pull away and stop participating, the whole of us must adjust and find a way forward. We might be hobbling along on three limbs. It is better whole, but we need always to recognize the freedom of each. It is, after all, dance. Dance is infinite.
:- Doug.
Footprints in the Windsm # 1238
The redbuds and the pears
The cherries and the apples
Start the spring with shouts
In the shape of flowers
Riotous flowers
The maples put forth
Seeds on the wing
The pin oaks get right
Down to business
New leaves pushing off old
Tulip trees bloom later
And Mulberries give
Sweet fruits to the birds
There are so many ways to live!
To write first chapters and last!
And no chapter is ever last
And everything cycles
And everything is moving
And everything is moving
Please pass it on.
© c 2012, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/291-0022, or by e-mail to mailto:Doug AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com
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If you cannot find anyone you trust, find someone to mentor and create in them someone you will trust.
:- Doug.
If doctors have no desire for conversation, then we can take on having the conversation for them.
:- Doug.
Life is a continual conversation of life with life and all it touches.
:- Doug.
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