emerging visions: Mindful Design - EV9

20070918

Mindful Design - EV9 - September 2007

The Evolution of Religion

I go forth
via technology
like a cyborg
like an astronaut
studying the far reaches of
metaphysical space.

There is no face to hold me
to expected form.

Back in the far reaches
of humankind
there was no need for the
binding of religion.
Small bands of kin with
common legends
knew what everybody knew.
It was not 'til population grew
beyond the constant face to face
that a binding form
need be evoked
of common ceremony, festivals,
deities, seeped in ritual,
the glue
of worldview.

Fast forward into the future.
Glue dissolves, as, like atoms, we find
invisible network
built on mysterious attraction.
Why die for angry gods
we no longer need?

(c) May 12, 2007 Laurie Corzett

Growing Out of Liminality

Thirteen Wizards Shall Guide You, rotating in 7s,
to be chosen from a wizard test administered at regular intervals
to any who wish to be tested.
Each wizard shall serve at his/her pleasure -- until they decide to move on.
Any wizard may return by retesting and getting the highest score amongst those currently in line at the time of a vacancy, the same as any other candidate.
The test will be devised by a wise pre-council to ascertain qualities of
wisdom, compassion, responsibility, integrity and clarity of communication.
The test may be reviewed and revised at any time that the full council agrees to do so, based on evidence of better evidence to be gained.
The wizards do not make the laws.
Laws are made by direct democracy, after a sufficient period of debate when
an overwhelming majority of consensus seems likely.
Wizards do have veto power.
Wizards do not control the economy. That is the province of the market.
The wizards do oversee the use and conservation of common resources.
They do oversee a social infrastructure that assures everyone a basic secure livelihood. They do oversee disputes to assure that everyone is treated fairly
in the course of commerce, and in the course of community life.
They are not paid an outright salary.
They are given ample living conditions so that their minds may be free
of personal want.

The experience of pain and suffering can be used as a gateway to compassion.
Compassion promotes self-compassion
Self-compassion promotes introspection
promotes self-experimentalization
promotes awareness of the personal operating system
promotes forgiveness of misconceived blame
promotes relaxation of boundaries and restrictions
promotes liminal wisdom
promotes calm acceptance of non-rational realities,
promotes reintegration of self as programmer,
promotes self-reprogramming in alignment with
self-progression to a place of bliss and
dharmic awareness in which
every piece fits magically finds its place
all to all eternally unwinding.

(c) February 26, 2007 Laurie Corzett

"Star" (c) Joel Moore

"Awakening (c) Amanda Sage

"Headbang" (c) Aloas Kino

Hummingbird…

Humming bird wings beat furiously as slender beak dips deeply into blossom…honeysuckle is happy to have such an attentive visitor and the vine opens more flowers so as to hold the intentions of the gathering hummingbird…sweet succulent juices are heard on the wind being sucked into a tiny aperture of love…the noise heard only by the ants as they gather manna and fatten themselves in anticipation of their offering to the queen…somewhere a man is walking thru a field and thinking of a woman while the flowers bring her scent to him on the wind…he is not alone…the sky sees his solitude and sends the most fluffy white clouds to keep him company on his sojourn…somewhere else she is sleeping on a bed of water lilies and a koala bear is her pillow…she tosses and turns and is moist between her legs and the scent of her desire is pungent like the incense in the temples where the monks pray for strength when she passes by…boys and girls make discoveries that their parents fear only to grow old and forget the magic of their childhood…which is tarnished by the passage of time and the harsh solvents of life…the hummingbird never forgets its first taste of nectar…the honeysuckle never forgets it’s first offering of such and the man is still walking thru the field of time and space and wondering if the woman of the lilies is still sleeping and feels his turgid desire when he remembers the smell of the incense of her temple…he reaches the shore of a languid ocean where small waves massage his feet as he crosses the expanse of water…the seagulls herald his approach and the clouds part so that the sun may shine upon her face…the rays have always been her signal to awaken and they play around her face adding to her luminescence…she rises and wraps soft seaweed around her which is thankful to be able to caress her skin…the trumpeting of the gulls tell her of his love and they circle overhead…the Buddha enters the temple and brings peace and fulfillment to the monks…the ants make obeisance to the queen and the honeysuckle blossom caresses the beak of the humming bird…they touch and a thousand whales spout their joy…they ride on a tsunami of torrid passion across the seas of life while the water lilies become pages for the writing of their stories…a thousand years pass in a second and the lingering kiss is as soft as leaves falling to the ground…their blood is one and their union is eternal…he is drunk with her emotions and she is insane with his desire…this they share like a feast of the senses and they appear to all the world as the splitting of atoms…light and heat radiate in every direction for thousands of light years but brings harm to none…the ants raise a tiny shout of joy which is audible only to the roots of plants…meanwhile the hummingbird dips his beak into another honeysuckle blossom and the tiny droplet of nectar which contains their universe is drained from the willing flower…now the bird is sated…wings silent…he sits on a flowering branch observing the world…

Copyright 2007 d.jones

Days Of Trees, Cheetahs And Mountains

In my maiden days

I laugh, sing

dance, play

dream my dreams

live my fantasies

climb trees

scale mountains

run like a cheetah.

In my mother days

I ache with pregnancy

scream in childbirth

feed with love

laugh, cry

plant trees

gaze longingly at mountains

fear cheetahs.

In my crone days

I tell stories

pass on wisdom

laugh, cry

love, live

marvel at cheetahs

hug trees

think like a mountain.

imagery and text © 2007 Maureen Sexton

Male-Female Merging (c) Jerry Wennstrom

Were a woman of design
To find herself in a place
Where fabric falls in rivulets
Of sound against her thighs
Would she know wherefore
And what to?

What would she call the space
Between the pages, the race of beings
That suddenly spring from her like winged
Creatures at dawn?

What would she call the new face
She found in the mirror's eye,
Springing from her skull and staring
Beyond mere daylight from the
Darkest corner of her being?

Would a name suffice to explain
The mythological necessity of the traces
She would claim and someday
Outpace?
Or, what is it in a name
That gives voice to the dream?

Were a woman to design
The newest place to call now home
Would the faeries lend a hand
Or leave her quite alone

Until riding the east wind
On a poppy bloom
She is done?

copyright Kala Snowflower

"Twinkle" (c) 2007 Rosa Seyah
All Existence is...

Give from heartsong tears
away, allow
smiles
soothing what was
ache
Allow
water flowing, cleanse
you, dancing
Allow
Allow
Allow
gifts, this feeling, this
being inside, allow
bliss, allow
I cannot frame the moment
in gauze, mere
tapestries, movement,
allow myself receiving
the present, the sunset,
grave bodies decomposing,
singing past prayer, allowed
to be presently in flow,
allowing discovery:
how the light feeds
thought feeds
inspiration
feeds
rooftop reflections,
Beauty dancing on eyes
sparkling sorrow, love
hungry
they take you
take you
allow you
inside
healing for healing
allow fragments
like cool hands
warm touch
revival rising through
dark water, rising
through dirt, roots
entangling through
hair still growing
receiving manifestly
destiny cosmically
proportionally
in sound, landscapes of
flesh, kisses opening
opening deepest
recesses from
coarse fabric of time to
immortal rooms beaming
bright solitude in crowds,
waves exclaiming, crests
of excitement riding,
speaking, whispering,
screaming out
Destiny, take me!
Love, Open me!
Wider, I'm yours
chaotically, beyond
purpose, light caresses
my hair integrates this
moment, rides the wave
dancing the cycle of perception
without thought, care, notice
only this
understanding--
bright red fruit beckons,
enticing with life
Mother loving Father
Sun and Earth embracing
my heart kisses tiny birds above
with only one true purpose
pure with joy.

copyright Kala Snowflower

Vision Thread Painting 34 X 32 © Robert Forman 2002

"Isle of Ruins" Jude Cowell Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative 2.5

Beneath the House of the Monks.

There is a cave beneath the House of the Monks
and a narrow path that winds steeply down
to the bowels of the Earth
and a deep black pool
where blind fish circle endlessly...

There is a hidden stairway behind the panneling
in the House of Thieves
that leads all the way to the Moon.
Sometimes when a silver-voiced Siren calls to him in his sleep
or a cold white owl hoots in his dreams,
one of the thieves will furtively enter the hidden stairwell
and climb the widing spiral way;
and if, when they gather in the darkness and gloom
of their common-room to discuss their plans and secrets,
his fellows notice that one amongst them is missing,
they say nothing but make a secret sign beneath the table
and keep it to themselves...
"Perhaps he will bring a Moon Diamond back", they are thinking
"an opal or two; a pocketful of sapphires
or a crystalised Rose...
If I keep quiet about it I may be able to persuade him
to share his loot with me.
No need to tell these other fellows!"

Strangely enough, in the deep black pool
beneath the House of the Monks,
the reflection of the beautiful silver Moon
can sometimes be discerned quite clearly
- despite the thick layers of intervening rock
and when it shines thus, deep in the
cold mysterious mirror of the deep Black Pool,
it illuminates many diamonds, opals and sapphires
embedded in the solid basin of the stone that holds it,
twinkling like so many submerged stars.
"Perhaps these blind fish that circle endlessly
are in fact inhabited by the souls of thieves",
an imaginative monk might speculate
" - circling forever around mystical treasure
they can neither see or hope to touch
but haunted by its invisible presence..."

But, of course, if he has any sense he will dismiss
any such idle speculation the moment it arises,
returning his errant attention to his meditation
and the gentle breath of the Universe...

copyright Willowdown

"Healing" (c) Nisvan

"contemplating the future" (c) Gregory Lent

With great valor on his side, the warrior monk posed at the crossroads of multiple elevens, great intersections of fiery jolts of life, the novitiate, the adept, the master, all stand in file at the beckon of the philosophers stone, while Mars holds court over the lion, both in stately regalia.

The new found knowledge of stability as a perception versus a concept, the nine cups overflowing, ripe in their outpour, delighted in the song of waterfalls cascading and filling full vessels, while Jupiter and the fish dance eternal, a mischievous sparkle in the multiple I's and in their varied lives.

He faced up square shouldered to the task at hand, the duty of transformation via a process of rams and lambs, of shields and staffs. On the road to this redemption the righteous man of faith and the god of war stand together surveying the metaphysical battlefield upon which life and love's conquests take shape and are determined.

It's a shame and 'tis a pity, but indeed we say goodnight to the Dionysian queen, the fire mother herself, holy leopard and pine cone setting in the west, where dreams and ancestors find a home in the ether. Goodnight sweet lady, the world doth eternal spin.

And behold to the east, for there rises the very same seed of the once known mother, the birth of fire, bold and new arising Ra, the landscape of a singular shine perpetual and life giving, redeeming and renewing, dispelling and discerning, reborn once more…

(c) Javier Yoacham

"Athena" (c) Stevon Lucero

Two Rams

(c) David Harrington

Come: Look and see the wonderful sights through the eyes of the visionary.

I was driven by the Spirit to a high plateau near a river of rushing waters. And overlooking the sea wall where the waters cascade into the sea, stood two, like rams, clothed in long flowing robes all decked in gold.
And in their hands I saw them juggling open books as would a pair of charlatans. And out of the mouth of one I saw fabulous tongues of fire stretch forth over the congregation. And in the eyes of the other welled up great pools of water that whenever he opened his mouth to speak, an endless flood of tears would pour down upon the congregation: In order to extinguish the flames that the first ram had spit forth from out of his mouth.
Above the crashing of the waves I could hear the rams speaking great things concerning the Living God before the assembly, who had come to witness the powers of their healing word. But when they spoke their words clashed and went against one another, not too far between.
Nevertheless, the rams stood fearlessly in the midst of the congregation, facing each other in bitter opposition, kicking and snorting as they prepared to do battle. And bowing their heads in prayer, they charged at full throttle.
And when the rams locked horns, I heard a loud crack of thunder. And all about the arena the mountain rattled. And it was high tide and the waves were battering ferociously against the sea wall. And the boulders were loosened from their places, and the great slabs of marble, granite and slate of their temples broke loose from their foundation and washed out to sea.
And their faith faltered and gave out from under them by way of their pride and shame. And their ministries fell hard against the rocks and broke apart. And their lavish kingdoms were thrown down hard with mighty vengeance against the sea wall and crumbled to pieces.
And the congregation disputed one with the other over the great things which the rams had spoken in their midst: For one spoke vehemently and with great authority, and the other mildly. And the assembly was torn in two and divided by way of the great things which the rams had spoken. And departing from the midst, went their separate ways.

And as I stood wondering what these things might mean, I heard the angel answer and say,
"Marvel not: For I shall show you the cause of the rams' great downfall, with whom they have committed adultery."
And as the angel was yet speaking, behold, up from out of the midst of the congregation arose a she-goat despoiled with the filth of the earth. And she ascended to the crest of the mountain and opened her mouth to speak great things against the rams.
And the she-goat had a small following that went up after her with hammers and chisels that they might carve in stone every glorious word that proceeded out of her mouth. And she lashed out fearlessly against the rams, accusing them of debauchery and treachery. And the congregation was appalled at the rams and cast them into prison because of the glorious words which the she-goat had spoken.

290 Days

Come and see the terrible sights through the eyes of the visionary.

It was Fall Equinox and I was headed for lower ground when looking up, I saw a great gull circling above. And leading me down the face of the mountain, I was drawn like a magnet to the sea. And being about the second hour of the day, I could hear the surf pounding gently against the rocks as I stood by the water's edge with my feet planted firmly in the sand.
Clutched tightly in the gull's beak I saw a long rope with both its ends dangling in space. And a full moon rose in the Eastern sky above the ocean. And I watched in fascination as an angel took up one end of the rope and looped it around the moon like a noose. And with the other end of the rope still grasped snugly in her bill, the gull soared across the horizon. And flew straight into the sun with the moon towing behind her.
And I watched as the sun was swallowed up by the moon. And the earth was plummeted into total darkness seven minutes. And the stars and planets appeared aligned in a bizarre configuration.
And up from out of the waves came millions of giant salamanders. One by one they crawled until the beach was covered in slime.
And looking up, I again saw the sea gull fly across the horizon tugging the moon behind her. And as the veil of darkness lifted and daylight returned to the earth, I saw the giant amphibians that were caught by the mighty undertow and dragged back out to sea.

Time was virtually swept away as the days, months and years were shortened. There were no more seasons and Dusk and Dawn could not be found. And those grand monuments and towering pillars of stone that the ancient astrologers built came crashing to the ground, one great column upon another. And I saw those who stood by with their sundials fall backward on their heels and flee.
And those that navigate the high seas with compasses and chart their destiny by the stars were blown off course and vanished along with their ships. And all about the face of the deep magnetic storms raged and many more were lost at sea and perished.
And the rotation of the earth was quickened. And the windmills and water wheels of the world were hurled into orbit like spinning tops. And the tides roared furiously as the lunar cycles grew more frequent and the gravitational pull of the moon increased in strength. And I saw those mammoths of the deep that were driven ashore by the hundreds and crushed themselves to death.
Falling flat on my face in the sand, I prayed to God that in His mercy He might spare His servant from harm. And I heard the angel answer and say, "Fear not: For one cycle has passed and a new one is begun! From here on in each year shall consist of two hundred and ninety days. Each month twenty-four days, and each day twenty-one hours. Night and day shall be equally divided in that there will be ten and a half hours of darkness and ten and a half hours of daylight."
And when I had picked myself up, I peered into heaven as would one looking through a seven-dimensional kaleidoscope, and lo and behold, above the wind and weathering there appeared a dazzling phenomena in space: A blazing disk of fire spiraling toward the earth like an enormous dial.
And I saw seven spectacular points of light like the colors of the rainbow shooting forth from out of the wheel like flaming arrows. And upon each of these mysterious crowns were written in glory the seven virtues of faith which come down freely from God to a troubled world.

(c) David Harrington

"Saturn" (c) Aloas Kino

"Indian Arcade Mystery"

On a distant highway in the Western U.S., there was a Native-American roadside exhibit; the kind where billboards announce it miles ahead with mysterious teasers, like "The Thing" and "? Ahead." After I explored the dusty little museum next to a Brand X gas station, I wanted to see the real mystery of the Navajo or the Apache. The guide said it could be arranged for a little more money. Behind the amusements out back, they showed me to a gravel and sand pit. I fell in and was drawn into a magnificent mineral whirlpool. I wanted to be pulled in, but resisted nonetheless. The Indians dashed around screeching out primal incantations. Behind me, I saw an Indian filming me. I was a specimen of the white tribeless ones; those who conquered the wilderness and left a little of its splendor – in a highway amusement arcade.

image & text copyright Carl Linkhart

"Circuitree (c) Stevon Lucero

Sonnet--Hunger Awhile

You've forgotten what you are,
where, why.
You've traded liberty for far, far less--
A thing of paltry grasping...

Hunger awhile...

Yes; find a wild place,
far from noise, from stress,
From senseless orders and obedients
And mystic pretense (bureaucratic 'gods'
prating unreason)...

There your stupored sense
can rouse to breezes, scents,
a world entirely apart
From vivid nightmares taking the form of days...

Reconnect. Touch your hand
to rough bark. Scent. Taste the wind. Feel..

Walk down a woods' trail;
know some prairie's tremendous space
Its flat unbarrier'd leagues and planes;
know real
the floating weight of cloud and miles and
skies.

You are of this, the creatures, the sounds, the
deaths,
Growths, dangers, scope--
this: the soul's fierce quietness...!

Robert David Michael (Cerello)

"Drinking Eyes" (c) Brandon Smith

// 02:39

<< Home

emerging visions

20070918

Mindful Design - EV9 - September 2007

Links

ARCHIVES