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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20210815
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SUMMARY:Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue  8/15/21
DESCRIPTION:photo by Abe Green \n  \n  \nOpen Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue \n  \n August 15\, 2021 \n  \nThe purpose of life is to know yourself\, love yourself\, trust yourself\, and be yourself. \n—tag on a Yogi Tea bag \n* \n  \n7/15/21 \n#222 A Very Naive Idea \n  \n“Many people aspire to go to a place where pain and suffering do not exist\, a place where there is only happiness. This is a rather dangerous idea\, for compassion is not possible without pain and suffering.” (from Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh) \n  \nWe don’t want to invite suffering\, but ideally we learn to welcome suffering when it enters our lives. If we live our lives fearfully avoiding suffering and pain\, we live a very limited existence. Living too carefully\, never risking pain\, failure\, unhappiness or loss cannot result in a full and fulfilling life. It results in a careful life; that is not enough for me. \n  \nSuffering bonds you to others in a deep\, rich\, long-lasting way. My first marriage of thirteen years was frightening\, abusive and dehumanizing\, and that is how I emerged. I still have scars\, but resilience and determination (and the specter of poverty) were more powerful motivators than continuing in a fearful\, cautious life. \n  \nThe gift of suffering was that I deeply\, instinctively care for others\, all others who suffer\, in any way\, not just in situations similar to mine. I have the three gifts that come from suffering: compassion\, understanding\, and love. That is the richness that comes from suffering. My heart is full. \n  \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \n(Ronni Lacroute sent this poem by Mary Oliver:) \n  \nMindful \n  \nEvery day \nI see or hear \nsomething \nthat more or less \n  \nkills me \nwith delight\, \nthat leaves me \nlike a needle \n  \nin the haystack \nof light. \nIt was what I was born for— \nto look\, to listen\, \n  \nto lose myself \ninside this soft world— \nto instruct myself \nover and over \n  \nin joy\, \nand acclamation. \nNor am I talking  \nabout the exceptional\, \n  \nthe fearful\, the dreadful\, \nthe very extravagant— \nbut of the ordinary\, \nthe common\, the very drab\, \n  \nthe daily presentations. \nOh\, good scholar\, \nI say to myself\, \nhow can you help \n  \nbut grow wise \nwith such teachings \nas these— \nthe untrimmable light \n  \nof the world\, \nthe ocean’s shine\, \nthe prayers that are made \nout of grass? \n  \n—Mary Oliver \n* \n  \n(These are some excerpts from Michel’s meditation journal. The numbers refer to Thich Nhat Hanh’s book Your True Home.) \n  \nJuly 4\, 2021  Independence Day \n  \n….Today is a day to celebrate freedom. Yet\, how many of us are truly FREE? I really wonder: Must one be trapped in a concrete cage\, behind locked doors\, shut away from the rest of the world and forgotten to become un-free? No. Freedom can be lost\, taken away\, and given away from and by anyone outside of prison or within the box. In fact\, I’m not thinking of a prison for the body\, but one created within a mind\, and a tyranny not from others\, or perpetuated by “others\,” but of one from a tyrant within… \n  \nMany are prisoners of the mind. Some are as of yet unaware of the plight they face. Some have lost their focus—mistaking a tyranny from within for an external enmity. Each of us has a mind. Do we feed it? Exercise it wisely? Take it out to play? to learn? to exercise\, face challenges as it grows?…. \n  \nJuly 8\, 2021   #159 A Healing Mantra \n  \nIf we share compassion through a positive gesture/action\, to express being fully present (mindful) we can uplift another from his or her pit of despair to find a stable footing from which to move forward. We may also need to say such things to our own self. When I’m down or struggling\, there isn’t always a bodhisattva nearby to offer compassionate words. I can be that supporter of myself simply through positive self-talk…. \n  \nJuly 15\, 2021  #166 A Real Friendship \n  \nMay I offer that in learning to love self and/or other\, the key is to see the line of separation vanish. I’ve heard\, “Love your neighbor as yourself\,” and struggled due to lack (I thought) of ability to love myself. Lately a thought is percolating that if I stop seeing you as separate and apart from me\, but begin to see our inter-connectedness\, or our inter-dependency\, then I can learn to demonstrate love to both (in different ways). \n  \n—Michel Deforge \n* \n  \nHappy early 70th birthday! As my present to you\, I’ve written a poem in your honor: \n  \nAFTER \n  \nAnd you may find that you have nothing \nto say\, and that’s okay. The bird \n  \nyou pictured now because that’s the way \nthe brain works \n  \nand the concentric circles of its song— \nthey are always there. Jung defined \n  \nthe unconscious as everything \nyou have forgotten\, everything \n  \nyou’re not currently thinking about\, \nand everything you do not know. \n  \nThat narrows it down. \nSo the conscious mind is really \n  \nonly very little of what goes on— \nlike a lightbulb compared to the dawn. \n  \n—Alex Tretbar \n* \n  \nAugust 11\, 2021 \n  \nI’m turning 70 next Tuesday\, August 17th. It doesn’t seem possible! How did I get so old? It seems like just last week I was 19. What happened? \n  \nMaybe the reason getting older is bewildering is that our body ages\, but something inside us doesn’t. Whoever it is\, or whatever it is that looks out through my eyes—and even observes my thoughts!—hasn’t aged a bit! \n  \nI’m enjoying my human life on Earth! I didn’t make a plan. I’ve been meandering along like the half-wit third son in the fairy tales who somehow ends up with the princess\, thanks to help he got from a magic toad. (My dad once said to me: “John\, if anyone says you’re a wit\, they’d be half right.”) \n  \nI’ve been (and still am) very fortunate. (On another occasion\, my dad said: “John\, if you fell into a ditch\, you’d come up with the deed to the town.”) I suppose the greatest good fortune was that I got hefty amounts of love and encouragement when I was a little boy.  \n  \nWhen I got a little older\, instead of going to Vietnam to kill people\, I went to India to study meditation and mindfulness from wise yogis. That was lucky. \n  \nIt was my good fortune to come of age in the Hippie Era. Had I been born ten years earlier\, I might have become a beatnik! Hippies were into Peace & Love. That sounded good to me. Still does. Flower power! \n  \nFinding Nancy Scharbach was unexpected. More Good Fortune!  \n  \nAbout the same time we got together\, I wandered into a prison. I met a lot of lovely people there. We had long talks. We put on plays. We had great times together! I still have lots of friends in prison. We write to each other. I have friends who have graduated from prison\, who I can see on the outside. \n  \nI have lots of friends! If you’re reading this\, you are probably one of them. \n  \nI have much much more to be grateful for. Too much to try to describe here. And fresh blessings arrive every day\, without fail. I’m grateful that I feel grateful. I’m happy that I’m happy. I love loving and being loved. \n  \n—Johnny Stallings \n* \n  \n                          Your Walden \n  \nFor some\, only sleep is the hut by moonlight\,  \nsleep the pond pure and still\, sleep the essential  \nrefuge for solitary rumination\, the secret escape \nfrom quiet desperations that each day crowd your breath\,  \ndim your vision\, narrow your hope. Others find a porch \nand sit\, composed\, or a tree to muse in shade\, or a hilltop\,  \nhigher than wires and roads\, to look far\, kindling the power  \nto simplify\, to transcend\, if only for a moment. \n  \nYou learned the hard way your soul is green and withers\,  \nstarving without some touch to wood\, earth\, and silence. You \ntook the crash course in complexity for years and years. So now \nyou find a place separate from screen and machine\, a place  \nbeyond getting and spending\, a space to let the buried eden  \nof the wild self bud and blossom. You take your Walden—call it  \nringer-off\, screen asleep\, brass keys all banished to the drawer— \nso at last you may dawn into yourself\, deliberate\, and awake. \n  \n—Kim Stafford \n* \n  \nI love where I now live (North Central Montana)\, it’s where I grew up. I understand it in ways that elude those not from here\, and though the land and its people can be difficult\, it is also magnificently beautiful and allows me access to a natural world I’ve not found elsewhere. \n  \nWhat is often missing here though is my ability to engage in the kind of conversations that challenge me\, expand me\, and support me as I journey away from a spiritually vacuous “self” toward enlightenment. \n  \nThat’s why “The Open Road” is such a precious gift—I feel I belong to this wonderful community of thinkers and explorers. I continue to have struggles and setbacks\, but with each letter I breathe in a freshness that renews my desire to be a better human\, to care and to really see myself in others and they in me. \n  \nAnd it is getting easier! \n  \nI savor all the writings\, but especially by those I personally know. An excellent example is String Clements “Learning to Smile.” I shared the incentive yard at TRCI with String and many a day we practiced mindfulness as we walked the track. (Remember General Sherman\, Tim?) \n  \nThese days I practice my mindfulness most often out in nature where I’ve come to realize all things carry the same spark I carry in my own heart and each thing I observe becomes “the best part.” There are no saints…or sinners\, no self-righteous…no condemned\, everything is on equal terms. I’ve concluded not only do I belong to the human tribe\, I also belong to the life tribe\, and strive to conduct myself accordingly. I’d like to add that mindfulness can be practiced anywhere (as Mr. Clements and I proved at TRCI). Most difficult for me is just getting my mind to “shut up” and listen. \n  \nHere are a few thoughts: \n  \n* Life will always challenge you. The trick is to polish all  the moments to make them shine. That’s both sides of the coin\, not just the pretty or easy ones. Each moment\, each day is precious and should never be wasted or cast aside. \n—Anne Burke quote from Salt of the Earth by Ethan Hubbard \n  \n* Walk in good direction\, come to good place. \n  \n*Only for a time have we borrowed our life from the sum of things. \n  \n* Let go of expectations and accept whatever shows up for you. \n—Katie Radditz \n  \nI thank all who have touched my life in such a positive\, kind\, and loving way—you now live in me! \n  \nAnd I will not forget you. \n  \nPeace and love \n  \nAbe Green  2021 \n  \n(Abe added this:) \n  \nPaul Enso Hillman spoke these words: \n  \nI say “Namaste” because I like what it means\, not because I’m a Hindu. \n  \nA lot of people think I’m a Christian because they think I talk about Christian values\, but the truth is I’m really talking about Human values. \n  \nI’ve been asked if I’m a Buddhist just because I’ve discovered inner Peace. \n  \nA lot of my friends are Pagans and they think I’m one also because I say that being in nature is my idea of going to church. \n  \nDo you want to know what I really am? \n  \nIt’s very simple\, I don’t need a label to define me. \n  \nI am a piece of the universe\, sentient and manifested and… \n  \nI am awake! \n  \n—Abe Green \n* \n  \nAugust 15\, 2021 \nMeditation and Mindfulness \nHAPPY BIRTHDAY\, JOHNNY!!! \n  \nLast month I sent in a topic on Suffering\, but I forgot to include the attachment in the email to Johnny. He said\, “No worries\, I’ll just put it in the August edition.” But then I thought\, how lame to offer a writing on Suffering for Johnny’s very special birthday edition. It really should be something more in keeping with Johnny’s true raison d’être: LOVE! \n  \nSo # 326 – Equanimity  – fills the bill to perfection. \n  \n“True love does not choose one person. When true love is there\, you shine like a lamp. You don’t just shine on one person in the room. That light you emit is for everyone in the room. If you really have love in you\, everyone around you will benefit—not only humans\, but animals\, plants\, and minerals. Love\, true love\, is that.True love is equanimity.” \n  \nThis is Johnny. This is what Johnny emits. His love just spreads out\, sometimes to the bewilderment (how can he be so patient with that guy???)\, the embarrassment (uh oh\, here come the tears again!)\, the frustration (can’t he see that that guy really doesn’t deserve love?) of others. That is Johnny: He just loves with equanimity and abandon. \n  \nJude Russell \n* \n  \nEvery moment offers a myriad of wonders\, opportunities and insights – it is just a matter of how and what we focus our attention on\, and how we perceive it.  – John Kabat Zinn  \n  \nMy friend Sarah has been feeling disheartened lately – about the state of our Earth’s health\, the continuing pandemic\, and her small role in life. She is a generous and engaged person. Her daughter has moved nearby and Sarah loves being with her new grandchild. Her wishes have been fulfilled. But after such high expectations\, the question of what is her purpose in life set in. She remembers what her mother once told her\, “Remember it’s not the big things that count\, it’s the small things.” There will always be the big issues looming. It is a challenge to be engaged in helping to change the world for the better. Meditation can help by training us to focus on our personal small moments of happiness\, compassion\, and healing.   \n  \nIf we choose to rush or force meditation\, we might not experience much or have many great moments.  \n  \nBut by allowing ourselves to be curious\, inquisitive\, attentive and have an open mind\, we can make those small moments wonderful.  \n  \nI have been reading a classic Sufi book called The Conference of the Birds. It is full of parables about taking a spiritual journey. My friend was listening to a CD of chanting and birds flew to his deck to listen. As soon as the music ended the birds flew off. Another friend had two birds come sit on her balcony when she moved into a new apartment. It helped to ease her loneliness and to help her make a transition. These moments that are particular to us can help move us in a direction of paying attention\, of being engaged inwardly as well as outwardly\, and of loving the beauty of the world. It can make us grateful for being alive.    \n  \nI have been enjoying reading and studying The Conference of the Birds along with my friends who had the birds magically visit them. I have also been paying attention to the gifts of feathers that my neighbors—blue jays\, wild turkeys\, crows\, wrens\, even the chickens—have left in my yard and along the paths that I walk. I find one almost every day and have a collection now in my garden flower bed. These are small moments and small tokens that make me joyous to feel the “interbeing” that Thay instructs us to realize. It makes me happy to be alive here and now\, and to share this with whoever comes my way. Gratitude is a strong mindfulness practice for beginning and ending the day.   \n  \nThis morning Sarah sent me a text saying she is paying attention to the birds too! She wrote\, “I’m enjoying migrations!”  \n  \nWhat can be a small moment for some\, can be the single most important moment in another person’s life.  \n  \nHow about you? Do you sometimes see big things in small moments?  \n  \nMay you be aware and happy in some small moments today.  Thank you for being a part of  our mindfulness group and sharing your own experiences here. Below is a poem by Kim’s dad\, William Stafford.   \n  \nBe well and know peace\,  Katie  \n  \nThings I Learned Last Week \n  \nAnts\, when they meet each other\, \nusually pass on the right. \n  \nSometimes you can open a sticky \ndoor with your elbow. \n  \nA man in Boston has dedicated himself \nto telling about injustice. \nFor three thousand dollars he will \ncome to your town and tell you about it. \n  \nSchopenhauer was a pessimist but \nhe played the flute. \n  \nYeats\, Pound\, and Eliot saw art as \ngrowing from other art. They studied that. \n  \nIf I ever die\, I’d like it to be \nin the evening. That way\, I’ll have \nall the dark to go with me\, and no one \nwill see how I begin to hobble along. \n  \nIn the Pentagon one person’s job is to \ntake pins out of towns\, hills\, and fields\, \nand then save the pins for later. \n  \n—William Stafford \n* \n  \n8-10-21 \n  \nGot your letter today: “The Golden World!” I needed to hear that more than you know\, Johnny. I need to come home and it’s nice to know & remember that I can come home & how good home is. I was so focused on what was lost that I lost track of what I have & what I have is pretty damn good. In fact\, what I lost I loved very much\, but what I have now is very much here & not lost & that right now is life & life must be lived\, now\, loved and grown. Sometimes I wish that you would have been my father\, Johnny\, & in many ways you have been. \n  \nThe Golden World is real. I forgot about it. It should be shared with the world. It will make all the world a better place. I’m done being in misery….I’m on my way home. \n  \n—Rocky Hutchinson
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/meditation-mindfulness-dialogue-8-15-21/
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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20210819
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20210903
DTSTAMP:20260427T144200
CREATED:20210821T175015Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250718T124417Z
UID:2323-1629331200-1630627199@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  8/19/21
DESCRIPTION:  \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \n  \nAugust 19\, 2021 \n  \nThou shalt not kill. \n  \n—God \n* \n  \nIn this world \nHate never yet dispelled hate. \nOnly love dispels hate. \nThis is the law\, \nAncient and inexhaustible. \n  \n—Buddha \n* \n  \nWhy\, of course\, the people don’t want war. Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally\, the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America\, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But\, after all\, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along\, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship….All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country. \n  \n—Hermann Göring \n* \n  \nWar: What is it good for? \nAbsolutely nothin’!…. \nPeace\, love and understanding\, tell me \nIs there no place for them today? \nThey say we must fight to keep our freedom \nBut lord knows there’s got to be a better way. \n  \n—from the song “War\,” written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong \n* \n  \nEvery month\, Michel Deforge sends me between 8 and 16 pages from his meditation journal\, from which I select some excerpts for the monthly Open Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue. For this issue of peace\, love\, happiness & understanding\, I want to reply to his entry for July 6th. In it\, he responds to Kim Stafford’s poem “Old Glory’s New Red\, Black\, and Blue\,” from his book Singer Come from Afar and refers to Charles Busch’s “A Promise to Our Children.” Here’s what Michel wrote: \n  \nJuly 6\, 2021   OLD GLORY’S NEW RED\, BLACK\, AND BLUE—KIM STAFFORD \n  \nYesterday I struggled with lethargy and lost. During a few spare lucid moments\, I pondered my July 4 thoughts\, Kim’s poem\, and the poem Johnny shared in the June edition of THE OPEN ROAD—A PROMISE TO OUR CHILDREN. I’ll pause while you review the poems (or Johnny may re-share). \n  \n[I’ll include Kim’s poem later. For “A Promise to Our Children\,” see the June 24th issue of peace\, love\, happiness & understanding. Kim introduced me to Charles Busch\, from Fields of Peace. In his letter\, he gives the names and ages of 69 Palestinian and Israeli children who had been recently killed. He suggests that people make this promise: \n  \nI will not be a part of the killing \nof any child\, \nno matter how lofty the reason. \nNot my neighbor’s child. \nNot my child. \nNot the enemy’s child. \nNot by bomb. Not by bullet. \nNot by looking the other way. \nI will be the power that is peace. \n  \nAnd now\, back to Michel’s journal…] \n  \nI am definitely not for changing the flag; yet\, there is something there we could get a spinnin’ round about over as we explore the idea. Does the Red\, White and Blue still mean what it did 245 (!!) years ago? Does it still need to\, or can we find new meanings\, new depth\, or do we even care to look? \n  \nI don’t know that my thoughts solidified toward any one direction\, other than to want to get something down before I forget and move on to bigger prizes\, if any exist. I definitely do not want to be party to killing any child\, “no matter how lofty the reason.” At the same time I see myself as impotent to act\, powerless to affect change (even the faintest glimpse of a beginning). That letter [“To the Mothers and Fathers of Palestine and Israel”] said more\, in a more eloquent manner\, than I could hope to muster. All I could do was cry for the loss of all those precious children. And what about the ones who think they’re “all grown up” just because they’ve passed through a myriad of solar-year cycles? (Johnny still sees the child in each of us! How could we imagine these little boys and girls going to play at war being any different? They’re still mommy’s and daddy’s little bundle of joy; they’re still mourned when shot or killed or bombed or stabbed.) \n  \nAnd then my mind drifts to all the little boys and little girls playing at being grown-ups. Having babies of their own as babies themselves. Or\, heaven forbid\, falling victim to the drug dealing predators—(who\, by the way\, are still somebody’s little boys or girls)—or the lure of sex and/or alcohol. Each one a precious being. Sometimes killed by bullets of war and hate\, sometimes for other “lofty reasons.” Sometimes by their simple naïveté. \n  \nWhat can any of us do more than we do already? More laws won’t help. Look at the “War on Drugs\,” or “against gang violence”? No victories there. \n  \nI saw an advert for a show coming up where the brewery hired Bloods and Crips to work at the same factory and participate in the same “program”. I think it was a success\, for some; thus\, the show. Is it a cause for hope? Do we (I) have grounds to look for hope in prison\, as well as for life post-prison? May it be so\, a thousandfold! \n  \nAnd so I part\, once again\, with more pain reviewed and few answers to eschew\, having just re-read Kim’s OLD GLORY’S NEW RED\, BLACK\, AND BLUE. (It leads to rhyming.) As I go\, I still can’t help but wonder: What can I do\, where do I fit in? Am I fodder for the cannons of the nightly news\, or some other “frontline” war on humanity’s failings and weaknesses? I don’t rightly know. \n  \nWhat about you? Where do you fit in? To my world or my life—better yet\, to our world and our lives—each one of them does MATTER! It’s not something to frame a political slogan or program around. How do we pursue an end of killing children for any reason—lofty or not? \n  \n—Michel Deforge \n* \n  \nI’d like to say a few words to Michel\, and to whoever else is reading this\, about pacifism. I became a pacifist while I was in high school. It was simple: I didn’t want to kill anyone. (And I didn’t want to hire other people to kill for me\, or on my behalf.) It seemed wrong to me that I was required by law to join an organization whose purpose was to kill people.  \n  \nI think most people are already “almost pacifists.” They know that in war lots of people are killed and that is somehow “bad.” But\, many people would add\, “Sometimes it’s necessary.” In order to avoid some arguments\, I say that I am not for or against any past wars. They are over. It’s absurd to protest against something that has already happened. I am against all present and future wars. Anyone got a problem with that? \n  \n(Here is an interesting statistic from the Fields of Peace website\, fieldsofpeace.org: During World War I\, the ratio of soldier to civilian deaths was 9 to 1. In World War II\, it was 1 to 1. In today’s wars\, for every soldier killed\, nine civilians are killed. Most of them are children. Watch the two-minute video on the Home Page.)   \n  \n(Strictly speaking\, a pacifist is not necessarily opposed to all acts of violence\, just organized\, large-scale killing: war.) \n  \nMichel\, I think that if you weren’t already a pacifist\, you became one in the act of pondering and writing your journal entry. You say: \n  \nI definitely do not want to be party to killing any child\, “no matter how lofty the reason.” \n  \nThat’s all it takes. You’re in the club. Welcome. \n  \nIt’s a fun club to be in. Kim and I are in it. Kim’s dad William is in it. Their friend and neighbor Hideo Hashimoto is in it. The Dalai Lama is in it. So is Jesus. And Martin Luther King and Coretta Scott King and Mahatma Gandhi and Leo Tolstoy and Helen Keller and Dorothy Day and Albert Einstein and Bertrand Russell and Sigmund Freud and Helen Caldicott and Alice Walker and Howard Thoresen and Alan Benditt and Thich Nhat Hanh… It’s quite a long list. Made up mostly of people whose names we don’t know. \n  \nIn his poem\, Kim refers to the problem of war and violence\, but the primary focus is on questions raised by the Black Lives Matter movement of injustice and systemic racism. His poem is both playful and serious. It is the job of wise people to encourage us to perform thought experiments\, to challenge things we take for granted\, to imagine in new ways. Here’s the poem: \n  \nOld Glory’s New Red\, Black\, and Blue \n  \nCue the anthem\, slide down the flag \nthat flew through World Wars I and II\, \nthen assailed Korea\, Vietnam\, Afghanistan\, Iraq\, \nand now a hundred nameless places where drones \nlook down on weddings to seek out villains known \nor guessed—old wars and new\, the flag flown high \nto woo our crew to action for our banner blue\, our \ndevotion true—until money tattered it as inequality \ngrew\, and drew us\, first a few\, then more\, to view \nin new light the plain hue of white one clue \na change was due—so beat the drum’s \ntattoo and raise anew our flag \nof red\, black\, and blue. \n  \nSunset red\, shadows blue and black\, indigo \nand scarlet deja vu when dew falls heavy \nin the grass to strew starlight in diamonds \nthrough the dusk. No stew of sorrow at our \nrendezvous. No one to misconstrue this change \nas anything but patriotic on the avenue of many colors \nhitherto passed over when some hullabaloo\, some retinue \nof old privilege and this fresh generation’s overview \nbegan to see a world askew and must eschew \nold privations and renew our love of freedom \nto pursue our happiness and make taboo how \ncertain citizens because of color were subdued\, \nso bring forth now the red\, black\, and blue. \n  \nBrew a bold libation\, fire up the barbecue\, \nand offer feasting cordon bleu to celebrate \nwhat no judicial revue\, no internal revenue\, no \nvoodoo Waterloo from here to Timbuktu can make \nuntrue\, what no zoo of caged freedoms can deny \nsome citizens have been held second class in lieu \nof rights by law but yet false in fact. We say \nadieu to that. We’re all in one canoe\, our ship \nof state that flies the banner red\, black\, and blue. \n  \nNow we must interview each other\, give our leaders \none stern talking-to\, root out each residue of prejudice\, \noutdo old talk with questions and with follow-through\, \nhew the righteous line and find in black all colors joined\, \nall ethnicities of shade and blend and flavor\, so may good \naccrue. For we were gathered from one Genesis when God \nthrew galaxies together spinning with diversity beaucoup. \nIn keeping with that old creation\, we must now imbue \nour politics (that have been one big bugaboo) with kindness \nto us all at last\, undo each miscue that slew our honor \nso may ensue a tart fondue of plenty. We stir \nthe roux of flavors in our bold debut: Old Glory \ndressed up now in red\, black\, and blue. \n  \nBlue and black—this the color of a bruise: no news \nto those who made the Blues\, and something no-one could \nconfuse with anything but hurt. So set the Statue of Liberty \nat Standing Rock to face down opposition to democracy\, \nwealth flowing corrosive through pipes of steel to spew \ninto the river collateral trouble for the Water Keepers \nwho knew Pilgrims were first refugees\, seeking freedom \nfor faith first welcome to these shores. Does our dream \narc toward justice still? Can we call that effort true\, \nsupreme\, or is our legacy sunk to pay-per-view? \nWe must fly the red\, the black\, and blue. \n  \nThis mighty woman\, mother of exiles with a torch \nwho lifts her lamp beside the golden door shall dress \nher copper in these colors now to call this century’s \nhuddled masses in. Her beacon-hand reveals that \nat our best we are the watershed where myriad \nstreams are harvested\, rivulets gathered into one: \nAsian\, Eurasian\, African\, Bedouin\, Islander\, Blue- \nBlood Black\, and every lovely shade of brown\, \nfrom dark dusk to sand\, and every hue of Wanderer \nor Fugitive from darkness seeking light\, every Indian \nto this ground restored by right\, for this we fight\, \nfor this democracy our aspiration’s light\, for this \nto be true\, we will pledge allegiance now \nto the red\, the black\, the blue. \n  \n—Kim Stafford \n* \n  \nHere’s a link to Edwin Starr’s 1969 version of “War”: \n  \nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01-2pNCZiNk \n  \nAnd in 1985\, The Boss: \n  \nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn91L9goKfQ \n  \n  \nPeace\, love and understanding \n  \n—Johnny
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-8-19-21/
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