A Dream of Death and the Light Beyond Light: Remembering Ñacuñán by Laura Shannon

In my final year of college, my B.A. in Intercultural Studies required me to take a daily accelerated Spanish class. Thus I met Ñacuñán Sáez, the dazzlingly urbane young professor from Argentina who had recently come via Italy and Oxford to our tiny liberal arts college in western Massachusetts. Ñacuñan spoke four languages, adored Maria Callas, and showed up at his first faculty dinner party amongst the snowshoes, mufflers and plaid lumberjack coats of the Berkshire Mountains sporting a white dinner jacket and carrying a bottle of Campari.

Ñacuñán Sáez

Ñacuñán taught with theatricality and flair, keeping us students awake and interested, even at the ungodly hour of 8.30 am each day. The sample sentences he concocted as grammar exercises were gems of Latin American magical realism, provoking laughter as well as thoughtful discussion about different beliefs, realities and worlds.

Continue reading “A Dream of Death and the Light Beyond Light: Remembering Ñacuñán by Laura Shannon”

Don’t Think About That – a poem of motherhood in this wounded world by Trelawney Grenfell-Muir

Get the kids out the door to swim
Sunscreen, lots of sunscreen
Summer’s worse every damned year
Deadly heat waves are killing people as our civilization begins to crumble

Don’t think about that, gotta remember to fill water bottles
Pack a snack
Settle the dogs in their crates
Cages like those refugee children who keep dying in concentration camps

Don’t think about that, gotta get everyone herded into the car

Continue reading “Don’t Think About That – a poem of motherhood in this wounded world by Trelawney Grenfell-Muir”

 Fish Tails: A Grandmother’s Legacy by Sara Wright

When the two year old pulled the silvery gold fish out of the pond to the cheers of her five and seven year old siblings, parents, and grandmother, I shuddered involuntarily.

The young perch impaled by sharp hook was gasping for oxygen as the adults allowed the fish to hang helplessly while pictures were taken. Afterwards the group watched the fish flounder, still gasping, on the bottom of the boat. The toddler was applauded for her catch, while the terrified fish flipped over and over attempting to escape back into the water. It takes a while for a beached fish to die a death of asphyxiation. Continue reading ” Fish Tails: A Grandmother’s Legacy by Sara Wright”

Art That Lifts the Soul by Judith Shaw

judith shaw photoArt that seeks the essence. Such art comes in many forms and styles.

Some art is political, some is decorative. Some art is conceptual, some is commercial. But the art that draws me in, that makes me feel deeply, and that compels me to truly be with it, is art that expresses the mysterious essence of life, the unfathomable depths of infinity, the indescribable nature of existence.

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Gentle Moments in a Violent World by Marcia Mount Shoop

mms headshot 2015“Be gentle with yourself.”

It may be some of the most redemptive guidance I have ever received.  And I share that invitation daily with people in painful situations.

“Be gentle with yourself.”

In a world seemingly hell bent on self-destruction, being gentle even for a moment is a radical act of resistance. A moment of tenderness. A moment of trust. A moment of attentiveness to need.

But really, what good does gentleness do in a world as brutal as ours can be?  How does being gentle provide any kind of answer to the assault of being commodified or objectified or betrayed or assaulted or oppressed or erased or abused or discarded or exploited? Continue reading “Gentle Moments in a Violent World by Marcia Mount Shoop”

Plant Trees, Trees, and More Trees by Carol P. Christ

I dream that all of us who are suffering burn-out because of national and world politics come together to plant and nurture trees. Scientists say that planting ONE TRILLION TREES would neutralize two-thirds of carbon emissions and reverse climate change. Yes, we need to march, to organize, and to vote. But it is also important to embody our commitment to life and the living. Putting our hands in the soil, tenderly teasing the roots of the trees we plant as we nestle them into the earth, we move from our heads to our bodies, re-membering the interdependence of life.

This has already begun to happen in India—a country where what Vandana Shiva named “maldevelopment” has produced massive deforestation. At the Paris climate change conference India pledged to “make India green again” by reforesting 235 million acres of land. The government allotted 6.2 billion dollars to support the plan. What was not expected was the overwhelming enthusiasm of those who volunteered to plant trees. Continue reading “Plant Trees, Trees, and More Trees by Carol P. Christ”

The World Cup was won by Lesbians, Activists, Mothers, Youngsters, Over 30’s, and all around Remarkable Ladies by Anjeanette LeBoeuf

AnjeanetteAs a follow up of my June FAR post, I am writing about soccer and the Women’s World Cup. The final aired on Sunday July 7th and saw the USA women beat the Netherlands 2-0. This historical win was the fourth time the USA women have won the World Cup since its inception. It was also the highest watched sporting event of the year.

Continue reading “The World Cup was won by Lesbians, Activists, Mothers, Youngsters, Over 30’s, and all around Remarkable Ladies by Anjeanette LeBoeuf”

What to Do About Bullies by Deanne Quarrie

I could probably go on and on about this topic, so in the interest of education I offer the following information gathered in my own recovery. Why would I write about bullying at all?  Are we not Goddess lovers, one and all?  How would such behavior ever come into a spiritual path that believes all life is sacred?

Well, we all come to this path with all our old baggage. That baggage may include jealousy, fear, and a desire for the wrong kind of power, that which attempts to control others.

Bullying is not merely, as many believe, an occasional stinging comment made by a significant other at the breakfast table, a bad day with the boss, or children wrestling on the playground.

Bullying is cruelty deliberately aimed at others with the intent of gaining power by inflicting psychological and/or physical pain.

Bullying behaviors are varied: name calling, humiliation, spreading rumors, gossiping, public ridicule, scape-goating or blaming, isolating, assigning poor work conditions and job assignments, or denying holiday and vacation time in the workplace, or more obvious punching, hitting, kicking, taunting, ostracizing, sexualizing, or making ethnic or gender slurs, etc.

Continue reading “What to Do About Bullies by Deanne Quarrie”

Poem:  “How to Survive a Four Letter Word” by Marie Cartier

What is taken from a woman?

When someone breaks her open and fills her with nothing of herself,

and then leaves?

She has to find all the pieces of herself.

That’s why they call it—recovery.

 

 

You have to recover.

It doesn’t always happen. You’re not put back together

exactly the same. The pieces were broken.

Still are, just glued back together.

It’s a four letter word:  rape.

Continue reading “Poem:  “How to Survive a Four Letter Word” by Marie Cartier”

Happy Birthday Isis: Isis Isis…Ra! Ra! Ra! by Karen Tate

I wanted to pull myself away from the ugliness out there and take time to honor the Egyptian Goddess, Isis, as Her birthday is recognized to be in the latter part of July.  My husband, Roy, and I formed the Isis Ancient Cultures Society and the Iseum of Isis Navigatum, in Los Angeles, sometime ago and for more than a decade, in Her name, we sponsored Moon Circles to promote diversity, Salons to teach, and we put out a quarterly newsletter when you still had to fold and mail them – remember that?  But the premier events every  year were the Isis Birthday Tea and the Isis Navigatum or Festival of Isis, every March.    Our aim was to reconstruct Isis rituals in a modern context and make them relevant  for today.

We put on the Isis Tea in prestigious locations like aboard the Queen Mary and the Isis Navigatum in various public locations including The Japanese Gardens, in the San Fernando Valley, and on the beach on Point Dume, in Malibu, California.  So detailed were our events, sometimes the public joined us thinking we were a movie crew and our organization was written about by a anthropologist/folklorist citing the detail and depth of the material culture of contemporary Isian devotees.

Continue reading “Happy Birthday Isis: Isis Isis…Ra! Ra! Ra! by Karen Tate”