Without talking about it, Jane and I both find ourselves this morning wanting to write about what surrounds us, the every day. Jane does it in a beautiful poem today and I am unable to write anything at all. I realize that as important as I think it is to read this book on Mao, and it is, I also feel it at a cellular level, and the destruction of people and culture that he demanded, is unsettling, and I am somewhat speechless this morning, except for these words I reach to share. Jane and I also spoke of the closing of Antioch College, so that it can be re-created for the 21st century. We spoke of the cycle of life and death. It may be painful, and it seems it is necessary, or is certainly what happens. I feel humbled this morning, and bow in surrender and acceptance, while praying that I might be one who could undergo torture and retain something of who I am, and maybe that is ego, and so, even more I reach to let go of all that is and may be.
Here is Jane's poem for this morning. This is an unusual day for me. I have no free-flow.
In the corner there is a tiny silver canoe tied to a red ribbon
the stencil of a horse in the wind and
bits of earth in cups and bowls -- stone and leaf and feather.
In a basket on the floor three photographs
the peeling paint on the front door that is no longer there
his mock salute
an insistent kiss.
I would go back there. and revise the way that went.
Around me the words of others in stacks and layers
All those tales of being here, that fall
like light and shadow on the rest of us.
All of it shape shifting at each one’s own pace
into the emptiness of air and time in my second story room.
Jane Flint
