FootprintsintheWind.com

I wish to examine how I do things, the extent to which I am open. Can I hear out others? Can I take their opposing positions and allow them, without needing to counter?

:- Doug.

More valued this conversation
becomes as it moves
from head
to heart
to viscera

:- Doug.

Death is not the enemy
of life
rather a part of it
of me
rather one of my chapters

:- Doug.

Tiny bird, I’ve not seen you before
hopping among the grasses
life interacting with life, conversing
the grasses, living, are in your way
you are looking for a mite or a worm
among them hidden
and yet you could not say
if you had speech
that these grasses are in your way
for they provide habitat for your meal
but maybe you already understood

:- Doug.

Unexpectedly high a butterfly climbs
Through the tree
Through the wind
Quickly finding its way

I could not so easily avoid limbs and leaves
But the butterfly is used to
Her own speed
She calls to me

And even my eyes that fast
Do not go
She is gone

But I have followed
A step or two

:- Doug.

If I am feeling opposed, mostly I oppose myself:
mainly within my head and my worrying
Open flower, hear, allow in the wings buzzing and whispering

:- Doug.

In our society, we do not know how to converse. We must invent it as we go along.

;- Doug.

Nickel in, product out:
G*d is not a vending machine!
More a flower opening
Unbidden, not worked for
Soft scents wafting

:- Doug.

We can have the world we want. We can have the family we want. We all want pretty much the same things: peace, being heard, meeting and loving others, being part, being with ones we love to be with. Only the selfish suppose that if they are to get what they want they have to keep us from getting what we want. So we have to work together, from the bottom up, to have the world we want, the family we want. It is possible. We can start today. We.

:- Doug.

Let us sit in each other’s presence

:- Doug.

You speak to me in myriad ways
& that I cannot still
& yet can I my pen set down
to feel your touch & hear your peoples
& that & that we’ll never still

:- Doug.

Words are how you have been speaking to me, or rather how I (think I) have been hearing you. Of course you can speak other languages: touch, rhythm, story, silence.

Silence, then; silence, Now. You.

:- Doug.

Saddened immensely I am when I hear of someone burning their work: they have kept it from others who might from there take off. Or maybe it would hold back some or all of us. How can we know?

I think we need to reach out and make whole where and when and how we can. Ours is not to question its effectiveness or even wisdom.

:- Doug.

If flowers have not the butterflies and bees to carry their pollen, the winds to carry their seeds, the rains to nourish, their species dies out. Flowers cannot survive without conversation.

:- Doug.

We teach by what we demonstrate. If we demonstrate “Sit there, listen only,” we get nothing. If we demonstrate conversation, we increase our chances of conversation.

:- Doug.

Am I to silence
my lips, my pen?
Keep to myself
my thoughts, my prayers?
I pray sometimes
to people about:
please help, please open
our world, include voices
you had not heard
hear their prayer, our prayer
words I hear
seem no answer
still, open

:- Doug.

It takes a pulse
to live among:
a going out, a coming home
an acting, a stopping to hear
softness, softness

:- Doug.

It’s important to give the quieter ones a chance to engage and share their voices. Otherwise, we just hear the usual voices and lose those who ponder, take their time, do not often speak. We reinforce the old patterns and nothing new happens. Why do we want to have these conversations? Then conversing in smaller groups gives more voices an opportunity to be heard, and speeds the conversation’s spread.

:- Doug.

Shh, can you hear
the light rain coming?
the heartbeat rhythm of the fish you caught?
the first movement of the conscience of an executive of a multinational corporation?
All these are at least of God

:- Doug.

How can I move the world?
Become the still point of its turning.
A fulcrum?
Silence answers out of the silence
Converse; be still to see

:- Doug.

What can carry our ideal?
Must we our errors forever repeat?
Can we grow? What do we dare?
Some words shared around our hearts’ imagination
Mix in some action, quicken our pulses
We can yet be more when we
Hear a story we want to believe

:- Doug.

After the soaking rains
Everything green is smiling

:- Doug.

If you don’t have enough money, you might die. Here’s news: you will die. This is news you can use…to get out of your fear…to get out of your greed: get into love. Love expands you, makes you fuller, more whole, more complete. Love.

:- Doug.