Wednesday, January 30, 2013

go home

“Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.”  ~ Khalil Gibran




When adversity strikes, I have a tendency to become cynical... some might even say bitter. That's my initial reaction, taken with a bit of humor.

But bitter is not a good place to land; it's more of a trap than a solution. At some point, I eventually acknowledge the reality of where I am and determine what I need to learn or know or change to make things feel better.


When I find myself in this place, I need to take my own 
advice:
Take inspired action toward the life you want. Patience and positivity will help. Remove negative influences from your life. Surround yourself with that which helps you focus on the positive: take a hike, meditate, read a book, have coffee with an inspiring friend.
Our thoughts are powerful. Don't let them lead you into a trap. Take inspired action.

change your thoughts --> change your feelings --> change your actions

Monday, January 21, 2013

57th Inauguration



One Today


One sun rose on us today, kindled over our shores, peeking over the Smokies, greeting the faces of the Great Lakes, spreading a simple truth across the Great Plains, then charging across the Rockies. 

One light, waking up rooftops, under each one, a story told by our silent gestures moving behind windows.

My face, your face, millions of faces in morning’s mirrors, each one yawning to life, crescendoing into our day: pencil-yellow school buses, the rhythm of traffic lights, fruit stands: apples, limes, and oranges arrayed like rainbows begging our praise. 

Silver trucks heavy with oil or paper— bricks or milk, teeming over highways alongside us, on our way to clean tables, read ledgers, or save lives— to teach geometry, or ring-up groceries as my mother did for twenty years, so I could write this poem.

All of us as vital as the one light we move through, the same light on blackboards with lessons for the day: equations to solve, history to question, or atoms imagined, the “I have a dream” we keep dreaming, or the impossible vocabulary of sorrow that won’t explain the empty desks of twenty children marked absent today, and forever. 

Many prayers, but one light breathing color into stained glass windows, life into the faces of bronze statues, warmth onto the steps of our museums and park benches as mothers watch children slide into the day.

One ground. 

Our ground, rooting us to every stalk of corn, every head of wheat sown by sweat and hands, hands gleaning coal or planting windmills in deserts and hilltops that keep us warm, hands digging trenches, routing pipes and cables, hands as worn as my father’s cutting sugarcane so my brother and I could have books and shoes.

The dust of farms and deserts, cities and plains mingled by one wind—our breath.

Breathe.

Hear it through the day’s gorgeous din of honking cabs, buses launching down avenues, the symphony of footsteps, guitars, and screeching subways, the unexpected song bird on your clothes line.

Hear: squeaky playground swings, trains whistling, or whispers across café tables, Hear: the doors we open for each other all day, saying: hello - shalom - buon giorno - howdy - namaste - or buenos días in the language my mother taught me—in every language spoken into one wind carrying our lives without prejudice, as these words break from my lips.

One sky: since the Appalachians and Sierras claimed their majesty, and the Mississippi and Colorado worked their way to the sea. 

Thank the work of our hands: weaving steel into bridges, finishing one more report for the boss on time, stitching another wound or uniform, the first brush stroke on a portrait, or the last floor on the Freedom Tower jutting into a sky that yields to our resilience.

One sky, toward which we sometimes lift our eyes tired from work: some days guessing at the weather of our lives, some days giving thanks for a love that loves you back, sometimes praising a mother who knew how to give, or forgiving a father who couldn’t give what you wanted.

We head home: through the gloss of rain or weight of snow, or the plum blush of dusk, but always—home, always under one sky, our sky. 

And always one moon like a silent drum tapping on every rooftop and every window, of one country—all of us—facing the stars hope—a new constellation waiting for us to map it, waiting for us to name it—together 

Saturday, January 19, 2013

Friday, January 18, 2013

educating the heart

From The Dalai Lama Center for Peace Education... 
Educate the Heart.



Dalai Lama Centre // Educate the Heart from Giant Ant on Vimeo.

If developing compassion is something we can teach ourselves, then the Dalai Lama's message is essentially "educating the heart" -- an education that is not merely about developing the mind and getting good grades. Rather, it is about fostering an environment where we can learn empathy.

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

mighty times

As you prepare for MLK Day, be sure to watch Mighty Times.


Mighty Times: The Children's March-D Day from SPK ENT on Vimeo.

What rights do you have?
Does everyone get to share those rights with you?

Friday, January 11, 2013

Monday, January 7, 2013

greater good


Dear Universe...
Please help me take what I already have
and use it for the greater good.


the Centre Pompidou


Tuesday, January 1, 2013

from the threshold of the year to come



Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering 'it will be happier.' - Alfred Lord Tennyson