FootprintsintheWind.com

The task each undertakes in conversation is to fit with her other. Neither can do well at this without the similar—not same—efforts of the other. Each and both are required. Finding fitting. Jagged pieces. Never quite.

:- Doug.

Stories drag metaphors, images, and even thinking through the stubbly field known as experience—our own, not the one in the story.

:- Doug.

Conversation offers us many chances
Meeting would as well
If we but run away less often

:- Doug.

Ritual extracts devotion.

:- Doug.

Why do we seek ritual? What purpose might we pursue?

:- Doug.

It takes both
of you to say
what you mean

:- Doug.

Ritual intimately opens us to community—life, nature, compassion, grief, companion, reflection, love, beauty, trueness.

:- Doug.

What is the rainbow of sound? The continuum from loud to silent? The stretch from rhythm to sweet to umami to oily? The arm-spread from converse to withholding? The spectrum of olfactory senses?

:- Doug.

Conversation is a secret discipline
A practice for hollowing out
Slowly, slowly, bowing to receive

:- Doug.

As you speak, I watch the shadows and glistenings from the leaves on that tree, as they dance across your face.

:- Doug.

Risk is in reach. Your heart-core will be ground up, laughed at, trod underfoot. If. A hand reaches back. It’s the little you desired. But surprise: you are propelled!

:- Doug.

Every book on the library shelf can call out what was covered over: things we can grasp about the conversations of life.

:- Doug.

In conversation we might just have an exchange of rainbow lights and sounds and tastes, etc.

:- Doug.

The work of conversation
poke through the grey cloth:
holes for eyes, ears, and hearts

:- Doug.

Think of a yo-yo
For instance, Yo-Yo Ma

:- Doug.

That grey cloth
Touch and know
How it armors you

:- Doug.

Touch the web between
Uncover how it keeps you
From touching one another

:- Doug.

In what all ways has life gotten better for young people in the last century or two?

:- Doug.

Conversing we are
Poking holes in
Fine grey cloth
As it’s turning us into
Lumpkins

:- Doug.

Even miracles end. Lazarus died again. The miracle that is life may end, and the miracle that is human life will probably end. They may not be tragedies for the universe. What is our task in the face of those things?

:- Doug.

Let us join together in the Lost Conversors Club.

:- Doug.

The object is to always take in more of the worlds. The worlds others carry. To you.

:- Doug.

Do you feel empty?
What then is that
Echo?

:- Doug.