Enough!

The Museum of Science and Industry 

We the people wanted power for industrial creation,

So we harnessed a river to move some gears to grind the flour.

Harmless.

In some places, it was donkeys or horses, gravity, or steam.

Power, energy, fire. 
Harmless.

Life was so hard...cleaning clothes, cooking and preserving food,

Heating homes in cold places. So, "lesser" humans did the work.

Hard work, horrible, hard work and hurt, for free, ...no place for me,

No place for me up there.

Set her free and help her babies, more than three…babies, babies, harmless, like me. Make more power. More babies, more food, more houses, more clothing, more time...got to keep it all going.

Harmless.

Not just light to light the darkness, now there are waves repeating, repeating all day long. Refrigerator, stove, cable cars, plug me in!! Harmless.

Hospitals, fire department, telephones, help us, help us, help us.

More survive, more for longer, healthier lives, harmless, harmless, harmless.

Where fire smoke choked the air, now smog, heat, and acid rain,

beautiful sunsets, airplane rides, exotic foods, and Internet brides.

If we could choose, we'd do it again, and again.

See more, feel more, live more, know more.

More for me, and those like me. Chemical madness.

More drugs, less bugs, less hugs.

Harmless.

Demand progress, supply and demand, and curiosity.   

Magnets, static, angry wind.

All God's power, made by men.

Marie Curie, her night light rocks

So long before a cancer cure, fission fusion essence of life,

A cell divides, divided cells, bombing pieces, into peace,

You are she, and they, and it. Life is here and now it's gone.

Gone gone, gone beyond, beyond the beyond,

in the refuge of the Walrus.  All of us together,

Splitting, and splicing new life to save a life.

Save so many lives. More lives saved.

More.

Harmless.

Whale oil, Moby Dick, matching might, for light. More light.

Perfume, a story about smelling good. Your smell, we stole your smell! Your oil, your fat for that. Only for that. Oil, precious oil, miracle of oil, Divine holy oil. Holy war, blood for oil.

Her blood's not blood, but rotting life deep below. 

Carbon carbon everywhere,

Breathing out this breath of life, and in and out,

Through this damn respirator, close to death,

Plugged in to life support.

Even brain death cannot bring me closer to heaven.

Kerosene oil, coal from the depths, alchemical joules.    

My blue ridge mountains take me home to light the sacrificial flame

of our resistance.  

In the wilderness, we are tempted to return again and again to shop and carry, swagger and sparkle, just to make a buck. Walk on the wild side, walk on by, my curious heart lookin' for love in all the wrong places.

Big city delight, up all night, a life on stage, on the screens,

and glossy pages. Got a job, money, a friend, a flat, even an exotic cat.

Anything money can buy, anything, everything, my heart's desire. Harmless. Harmless desire.

Make enough to meet demand. We supply, we demand.

So much light, it fills the sky, where pop stars live on Mars,

Making food from synthetic dreams that feed on fear, trail of tears.

Oceans of tears. Twenty years of tears,

A holy war beckons end of times, a revelation born in the desert

Under starry starry night.

So beautiful. So calm and bright.

Silent silence on the right and silence on the left.

Somewhere in the middle is a place where heaven and Earth collide at the speed of light. Stop time, stop in time, step in time with Shiva's dance, across the universe, and on and on. I love you.

I love you so much, my beautiful child. My beautiful harmless child.  

This is a poem I "downloaded" all at once from divine inspiration while I followed my 7 and 9 year old children through the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry.  It was, in part, an answer to questions that arose over a period of time following growing awareness around the causes of earthquakes in Kansas and Oklahoma in the United States.  My mother lives in Harper County, Kansas, just over the southern border from Oklahoma.  The folks who live in the county, on the whole, have not experienced the extreme consequences of the economic depression of the last 10 years due to the discovery and use of modern oil and natural gas fracturing methods, including new disposal methods for the high saline water produced when deep oil areas like the Mississippian Play are drilled.

This is a meter at Folsom Dam that told the engineer when
to turn on the next generator to produce the right kind of power
to run refrigerators and motors rather than just lights.   

The rest of my family lives in Northern California, the state capitol of Sacramento and the home of one of the first hydro electric dam projects in the country.  In its antiquated form, it has been kept as a historical site.

As I attempted to explain the concept of energy to my children, we couldn't miss the opportunity to explore the origins of power.  

Seeing as how power seems to be the heart of our American culture in so many ways, this was a tangible explanation of our present condition.  How can we explain to our children the choices we have made over time to increase our dependence on oil and electricity as a symbol of prosperity.  

My eventual response was to sit quietly with all that I know and feel about power and to ask the question, "How will we live now?".

Learn more:  Hydro Power and Power: An Indigenous Rights Perspective 
                      Solar Energy for Kids (In India!)  (Youtube Film) 

The Gathering

Dr. Nekima Levy Pounds, a civil rights attorney, community organizer, and law professor, spoke to Friends gathered in the wake of yet another killing of a man of color by police in Minneapolis. She spoke to us as the holders of privilege and authority. Here is a poem that arose out of this event. 

VOICES 

Speak to me truly 

this time I tell you 

I will hear my place 

On top is killing 

My place where I am safe 

And you are not

For property returned undone 

Undone of self respect 

We cannot confiscate

Cannot conceal 

Hands are up to silence 

This murmur long and deep 

Hands up, don't shoot 

Hands up for a silent silence 

In a room screaming 

Say you're sorry! 

Give it back! 

It's not yours to take 

Or give 

Or live

All you got is time to listen

Open up your ears to hear

Your eyes to see 

Your whole selfs got to change

You're  a fragile egg shell 

Holding seeds of tiny prisoners 

In your hands

Who, instead of saving, you eat for breakfast next to the pigs and Irish potatoes

Whistling a tune for 

Woe be gone days when me and mine had all there was 

All the power 

All the land

All the rights

All the freedom 

Stolen from the flesh 

Of our own righteousness. 

Away away in Dixieland, there flows a river of blood wide and long, from South to North and West to East out into the desert growing in our hearts. 

And now you know, have always known. And love flows in, and through, for you, my children, for you. For you are now and this is when we stop our hands a wringing and set the system free.

How To Talk To A Flower

The Real McCoy    by Glee 

Pretty pink flower

Torn from your branch

You endure my grasp.

I chose you,

Not so carefully,

To be my alter for today.

Then I saw your

Dark spots

And remembered hidden bugs emerging

From blossoms previously picked.

With fortitude

I sought to change

The outcome this time ‘round.

And turned you upside down

And shook

And shook

And shook.

A petal fell

To stay my violent hand.

Oh, my regret

To find you weren’t as strong

and fresh as I had hoped.

A second passed…

I see I've made you weak

And imperfection glares at me.

Guilt rises like floodwater

As I focus my eyes

On the black remains

Of your life before you blossomed.

Those tiny scars

Embedded in your bright pink flesh

Are not bugs at all

But evidence

Of your growth and change to come.

You are an imperfect vessel of love. 

I judged you hastily.

And injured us both ever after.

Forgive me.

Learn more:  Bole: Willingness To Feel-Opening To Understanding (Youtube: 8 minutes)

                     Doing Business The Quaker Way (An odd reminder to Quakers by Forbes Magazine)

                                           

The Galaxy Song

I see the stars up in the sky

And they become the faces

Of all the humans  

Who didn't die

Who didn't lie

Who couldn't cry

For the one who shone so brightly 

That the heavens gave him back to Earth

How did so many, who were in so much pain, so much sadness, hold back the anger and move forward  into a new paradigm without the sun to light the way?  In the darkness of winter, we cannot forget being burnt by the sun.  

Love.  LOVE. LOVE!!!

See more: The Stars and Galaxy Song (With Lyrics!)

                I Have A Dream Speech (Watch Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Wo-Manifestation

I'd be one of those spiritual types
Who shake and holler in adoration,

Oozing over with a gushing enthusiasm
In celebration of her existence.

For once, I'd feel something
That cannot be contained.

Her love would explode inside of me
And I would lay down forever
In the field of spring grass. .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .

And here I am
Looking out 

Reaching beyond BIG 

Encircling her enormity 
Never-ending. 

Sharing completely in that wordless continuing awe. 

Then I am whole.  

All of my limbs accounted for, 
And stretched wide...

A giggle escapes from my little girl throat
as the world drops out from underneath my feet. 

And there...
Then and there...

Everything is changed.


--Glee  11-17-12

Learn More: The Alphabet Verus The Goddess  by Thomas Shlain 

Love Thy Enemy

The Oppressor.  Pastel on paper, 8/25/11

I'm not so sure this drawing needs a lot of explanation.  By "love thy enemy", I mean that we should make a concerted effort to see the oppressors in our society as a part of a sick system based on power.

The woman in the photo could be any mom.  Obliviously doing what she thinks is best for her child.  She could be a school teacher, making an effort to keep the child out of trouble.  Who does the child grow up to be?  Rush Limbah?  Michael Jackson?  People overcome this experience and grow up to be amazing.  And we are all amazing in some way.  But still, I wonder if our early experiences make us afraid to challenge an unhealthy system when we see that others are being hurt or oppressed.  So often, it is the subtle inequalities in our culture that sneak under our radar of caring.  When are we going to realize that "we the people" are both the oppressors, by not taking a stand, and the oppressed, just by experiencing childhood?  Perhaps we can start to change the future by changing the way we see children in our culture.

I wonder if it is possible to find some small light of compassion for our human condition and feed the flame of humanity with love until we find forgiveness.

I started by forgiving my mother for being a less than perfect mother.  I forgave my teachers for being less than perfect teachers.  Then I forgave myself for being a less than perfect mother.  And forgiveness fell like rain.  Forgiveness became the world all around.  It soaked into the hard earth and began to grow whole gardens of non-judgement, where rows of flowers, vegetables and weeds grew in nature's imperfect way.  And it is beautiful.  I fell in love with humanity all over again.  I fell in love with the oppressor inside myself.  Now, can we lay down our arms?  Can we stop "fighting" the people in charge and come at things from a whole new direction?  

"Somewhere in the archives of crudest instinct is recorded the truth that it is better to be endangered and free than captive and comfortable." -Tom Robbins