Archive
A Winter Solstice Poem: My Life as a Poem (revised)
Revision: As I reviewed this post sorting through my word docs and rereading the poem (reviewing my life!) I realized I had left off the last verse (a cut and paste error)! So I have added that verse back in. How could I forget “love”? The poem (my life) is now complete.
In October I wrote “My Prayer” in the form of a poem. These words have stuck with me; they pop into my mind frequently during the day as I practice life. So I’m not surprised at this reprisal, an echo of that prayer as I wrote this poem on the Solstice and Conjunction.
My Life as a Poem
Waking to my day, a new page,
The threads of a dream drift away
On the winds of another life,
A poem gone now, glimpsed, forgotten.
Today a new dream begins, a new
Story of my own creating,
Speaking to the future, trusting in
The worthiness of these words.
Practice, it all begins and ends there.
Story is practice, a moving toward
Perfection, evolving with a rhythm;
Sometimes involving a rhyme.
With repetition the story evolves
Into a poem: my life as a poem.
For slips and slights I practice
Forgiveness – changing my perception.
Sometimes the words don’t come,
Resisting the page refusing to flow.
For the hesitance, the lurches I practice
Patience – waiting on the muse.
Regretting all that I have lost, resenting
What has been taken or misplaced;
For the destruction and death I practice
Praise – remembering life is ecstatic!
The suffering millions weigh heavily on my heart;
Stafford got it right when he said:
“The darkness around us is deep.” I practice
Compassion – wanting to save with my words.
These words may not be worthy as those of
The Bard of Stratford-upon-Avon. Yet, I read
And weep and rejoice and sing. And I practice
Wisdom – moving toward the light.
For all the grace, the wisdom, the compassion
I reach for words to reflect the deep.
I look up at the moon and practice
Gratitude – knowing they’ll appear complete.
At the end of the day, practice done
I realize I have one more line to
Write, one from my heart; and I practice
Love – the Love Poem of My Life.
©2020 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
A Friday Poem: My Prayer
A few weeks ago I enjoyed several offerings by the Shift Network during their Global Summit. One of the most profound talks was by Andrew Harvey, a “modern mystic” for our times. His talk was an impassioned call to address the five crises humanity faces, and the five responses that are required to bring about a new paradigm for our survival on the planet.
I’ve been working on my responses. One of them is a prayer to bring about the new paradigm, the new way for humans to evolve and thrive on Mother Earth, a New Vision for Humanity. Here is my prayer:
My Prayer
Sitting in the midst of chaos,
Anger bubbling beneath the waves,
I practice: Forgiveness!
Wondering at the edge of time,
Anxiety rising to the surface,
I practice: Patience!
Feeling the loss of all that’s dear,
Grief hanging heavy all around,
I practice: Praise!
Witnessing the suffering everywhere,
Greed holding power in the world,
I practice: Compassion!
Knowing humanity is evolving now, with
Ignorance still shading the light,
I practice: Wisdom!
Realizing there is a greater good at work,
Trust breaking through to ignite souls,
I practice: Gratitude!
Awakening to a New World together,
Love shattering these old patterns,
I practice: Love!
©2020 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
A midi-week poem to celebrate the book launch: “Heavy Lift”
Yesterday (July 7, 2020) I was feeling really wiped out; very low energy, tired, weighed down. Maybe it was the weekend full moon and eclipse; maybe it’s the heat and heavy weather, heavy energy; maybe it’s the ongoing pandemic and the disaster that seems unabated here in the US; maybe it is the collapse of everything we thought to be true and dear as we struggle under the weight of not knowing…
I feel better today. And it feels good to have launched the collaborative book I’m a part of (see yesterday’s post). Maybe that’s one weight lifted from my shoulders. And to celebrate this I did return to my poetry journal to ask some questions about this weighty time:
Heavy Lift
Does the Sun feel the Moon’s weight
As He lifts Her above the horizon
To better see Himself in Her mirror?
Is it a heavy lift?
Does God feel Man’s weight
As She lifts Him out of darkness
To better reflect Her image?
Is it a heavy lift?
Evolution is hard work for the gods
Raising Consciousness up a rung
To better realize creation’s Light.
It is a heavy lift!
Ascension is a steep and lonely climb;
It is an inside job for the strong of heart;
Energy runs high in this rarified Love.
It is a heavy lift!
©2020 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
A new poem for Friday: Dinosaurs
Long time, no write! It’s time to change this! I recently attended Christine Kloser’s “Breakthrough” event for Transformational Authors. The three days of emersion in what it means to write, to be an author, to be transformed and transforming has motivated me to get back to it!
And I have been writing; I just haven’t been publishing anything here. I’ve been “waiting” rather than taking action. But I wrote this yesterday and decided to take action with it.
Last Christmas I found and read a book, The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs: A New History of a Lost World by Steve Brusatte. It is a wonderful read; I also bought it for my son to share with our grandson, Tristan. My geologist son has my copy now. Since that book I think a lot about dinosaurs; now when I watch the birds I think they are the evolutionary gift of the dinosaurs. And I wonder, were the dinosaur songs as beautiful as our bird songs today?
The end of the dinosaurs is marked as the “fifth great extinction” that the earth has hosted. And most scientists agree we are now in the sixth as we witness the loss of so much of our biodiversity. Of course the time-scale of these musings is immense, millions of years. It is hard to imagine what humans, if there are any around, will be like in a million years from now! But I do muse about these things. Hence the following:
Dinosaurs
There is a lesson to be learned
From the lives and times of dinosaurs.
Some of them grew large, very
Large; they ate and ate, a lot!
Life was good for a time. Earth was
Warm, abundant with greens and meat.
There was plenty for all. Greed
Was only manifest in voracious appetites.
How long could Earth sustain this
Greed, the appetites of the monsters?
We cannot know how this could have
Ended. The Heavens intervened.
The screams were likely deafening as
An asteroid sized meteor ripped the air
With fury; a million bombs exploding, killing.
Killing almost all: the Great Extinction.
This was the fifth such catastrophe,
Ending, nearly wiping out life. But
Earth has a way with these things; a
Long, long way to renew herself.
It is not over, friends. It is never
Over. Earth has her way of healing,
Rebuilding from even the meanest blows.
Life goes on—with us or without us.
©2019, Richard W. Bredeson, all rights reserved.
PS: I am about to be a “published poet”! On November 10, a collaborative book compiled by Linda Roebuck will be released: Circular Leadership – Together We Rise. Check it out on the website: CircularLeadership.global.
A Poem to Celebrate the coming: “Winter Solstice”
While many say “Jesus is the reason for the season” it was a season long before Jesus hit the scene. As with all of the Church holy days they are mapped onto ancient observations that may go back 100 thousand years or more.
I love the Winter Solstice for many reasons, but mostly for the return of the Sun (or Son if you will). After the three days around Solstice the Sun will rise again and begin the long climb to Summer Solstice.
Rosemary and I celebrate the Solstice as part of our Holidays. Happy Holidays to all, whatever and however you celebrate.
Winter Solstice
They say we are on a spiral journey;
We spin on the Mother,
Spinning around the Father,
Spinning at the edge of the Milky Way,
Wheeling through the fringe of the Verse.
The effects of this swirling seem small:
Summer Solstice spins through Fall
And on to deepening Winter as
Light recedes in lowering sky
And Spirit draws nigh offering Love.
The cycle is grounded in Mother’s core,
Energy following graceful traces of
Magnetic forces, lifting consciousness
Along soft grooves of innocence,
Natural paths for expanding vision.
Spiraling consciousness follows
These graceful lines of attracting energy,
Mapping courses for the transformations
Forever carrying us higher,
But never far away.
Earth bound and sky happy we rise
Ever seeking, always believing
There is more, we are more.
The season reminds the reason
We spiral on, lifting gradually.
We stretch our plastic minds,
Resisting brittle breakage
On our destined way.
Each turn reveals more, creates new
Perspectives, bigger dreams, exposing
Even so, the next turn.
Solstice deep to Solstice high
We spiral from choice to choice
Knowing the journey, seeing
Transformations from new heights
Learning more with every turn.
©2018, Richard W. Bredeson, all rights reserved.
A May Day Poem: Commitment & Surrender
I am privileged to part of an amazing group of people who meet a couple of Mondays a month to discuss deep thoughts and experiences. I am the guy among four incredible Goddesses. Over the last few months we have used the “The Keys of Enoch” by J.J. Hurtak as our springboard for our discussion. It has been an ever awakening journey beyond the “normal” 3-D elements of life. Our next springboard is “The Cosmic Hologram: In-formation at the Center of Creation” by Jude Currivan. We are interested in penetrating the depths, and heights, of reality in our multi-dimensional Universe so we can be better co-creators of our reality.
This week our discussion concluded with two words that seem almost opposites; their juxtaposition struck me as an excellent jump-point for thought and maybe even a poem. Here’s the result:
Commitment & Surrender
Is this a dance, a rhythm, an ebb
And flow through the music of time?
Do they push and pull one another
Leading, following to the pulse and notes?
Commitment leads, pushes across the floor,
Pulls away from a cluster, creating
Space and steps, new twists and turns
As the ballet evolves in the flow.
Surrender yields to the wishes of the maestro.
The choreographer dictates the journey,
Narrates the story in perfect harmony
As the notes unfold from the conductor’s baton.
Commitment is the drive, the force
Compelling action, progress, evolution.
Surrender is the acceptance of the propulsion
Ever reaching higher, farther, beyond.
Surrender is the prayer that holds the course.
Commitment is to pray to support the cause.
Commitment is the knowing the cause is just.
Surrender is the trust that the course is God.
©2018 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
PS: If you wish please substitute “Dao” for “God” in the last
line. I debated between the two and decided the poem has a
more western feel.
My “New” Manifesto
A week or so ago Rosemary brought several of her long-term clients together for a group VIP day. I was fortunate enough to be included and to do the work with this select group. And we did some excellent work.
Rosemary led us to create our “manifestos” for ourselves. We did some deep work exploring our purpose, our big “Why?” We answered questions like:
“What do you stand for?”
“How does your heart, your soul and your personality come together in this life?
“What is your declaration about this life, independent of any ‘shoulds’?”
We also answered the five questions that Matthew Goldfarb asks in his book, “Corporate Renegade.”
“What are you pissed off about?”
“If you could change one thing about business or the world what would it be?”
“Why do you want to start a business in the first place?”
“Why are you willing to go broke to make this business work?”
“Why are you willing to go for broke to make this business work?”
And then we went to work. Some of us got out paper and scissors, colored pens and fancy tapes, decorating their manifestos with frills and flourishes. I’m a word guy and not overly skilled at the crafty work so answered questions, took note of my priorities and wrote out my manifesto. Here is the result:
Alternative Facts?
We must remain vigilant and test everything and anything coming out of the White House. Don’t be deceived. Stay awake. Shine your light. And as William Stafford wrote in his poem: “A Ritual to Read to Each Other” —
“For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.”
Let’s keep the signals very clear!
Here’s my response to #alternativefacts:
Alternative Facts
Do facts alternate?
Are they sometimes true, sometimes false?
Are they bits in a computer,
Sometimes zero, sometimes one?
Facts can evolve.
Humans are learning creatures;
This makes facts always relative,
Ever changing as we grow.
And sometimes facts can flip,
Like from zero to one.
Science is like this:
Old theory disproved, new theory proposed.
But it is rare for facts to flip, flop, flip.
They are not bits in a computer to turn off and on.
Alternative facts are devolutionary;
They take us back to old “facts” disproved.
©2017 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
What happens next?
A couple of days ago, Rosemary posted on her Facebook page an article by an archeologist and historian about cycles of human history and how we may be entering one now. It is a provocative article! As I wrote my pages today (one of my practices is to follow the Julia Cameron “Artist’s Way” and write out three pages every day) This article was foremost in mind. Here is the link to the article: https://medium.com/@theonlytoby/history-tells-us-what-will-happen-next-with-brexit-trump-a3fefd154714#.e4rkcn9ib
And here are my three-pages I wrote today; my call to action was to “shed more light”! Here are my thoughts:
“The day before Equinox and the days are getting shorter. And finally the days may be cooling as well. We will see low 60s by Sunday. We are moving into my time of the year when things begin to slow and rest. It is a lovely time of respite. A good time to breathe.
Will we breathe after the election in November? What will happen between now and then? There is an ugly mood in the country, even the world, and it seems to grow uglier every day. Police killings, riots, violence, bomb plots by the crazies on all sides. The election seems to be attracting all the crazies – drawing them out from their holes, somehow giving them permission to raise their crazed cries of fringe creeds and beliefs to the point of drowning out saner voices of reason, logic, thoughtful discourse. Has it always been like this? Or has Trump set a new standard of low? It is a throw-back time, back to Jim Crow, racism, violence, hate, separation, distrust and deep-seated fear. What is to be gained by this?
Is it a cycle of history we are doomed to repeat, another mass kill-off of humanity, like the plague, world wars, famine? Do we need a purge, a cleansing of the human population to somehow restart evolution? Could it get this bad?
Or is there enough lifting of human consciousness now in the world to somehow counteract this pending cycle? Have we brought enough light into the world to defend against the darkness, to shed light into the shadowy corners and prevail? I don’t know. The world as it is currently configured hangs in the balance of my not-knowing. There is a pause now, of sorts, across the next seven weeks while we all consider. News will continue to flow and more of Trump’s antics and tactics will be revealed. The debates may come off to reveal the clown vs. the Stateswoman. But no one will laugh. And we will learn little. Then there will be a flurry, a fury of last-minute campaigning, and we will go to the polls.
It is hard to believe that the buffoon is close to a possible win. It reveals much about the country we live in. And maybe it doesn’t really matter who wins, because this is the country and will continue to be the country after the election. The population won’t change. The hearts and minds of our neighbors will remain the same. The hate and fear that created Trump, the candidate, will remain. There will be violence against the black community and there will be the attacks on the Muslim community. Clinton won’t stop this. And our government will continue to be hamstrung by the same forces that currently prevent real progress. Perhaps a tenuous balance will be found and we will continue to teeter on the edge. But the forces have been unleashed. Trumpism is here now, with a mean voice and no forgiveness. It may not even matter who “wins” in November as we may lose any sense of stability in the world
As I write these words I can too easily see a world war on the horizon. That is a scary thought but too real to deny. It would be irresponsible to deny this possibility!
So, then, what is the responsible thing to do? What is my role in all of this? What am I to do?
Be the light. Shed light on this real possibility. Talk about it, not in terms of fear but in terms of responsibility and action. Do I blog about this? Do I write a poem? Do I publish this “essay” in some form for people to consider? What is there, really, to be done to “prevent” the cycling of history we seem about to repeat? If we hold the light up to it and examine it most carefully perhaps there is a way to dull its edge. Perhaps it won’t bite quite as deeply. Maybe this is the best we can hope for, like the 2008 recession that, thanks to Obama, didn’t descend into a full- blown depression.
We all know a shift is coming. There can be no forward progress without change. We can “pray” the progress will not be in reverse. We can take action to shed light on the possibilities and rally all the forces to support our prayer!”
And we can build bridges, rainbow bridges of light, as the author of History tells us what may happen next with Brexit & Trump, Tobias Stone, concludes!
Please enjoy!
Men and The Goddess 