Poetic Revelations: Unknown Desert
Listening for Heart Song
“Instead of looking to the world for answers we have now become the answer.” ~ Tao Te Ching, translated by William Martin
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Because Human-ing is harder than Adulting. This is a weekly publication for heart-centered warriors, swimming through this thing called Life.
Selected Readings and Sounds:
Let America Be America Again, Langston Hughes
A Small Moment, Cornelius Eady
Six Desert Poems, by David Hinton
The Desert Whispers What You Can’t Explain, Toby Moore (reading)
Dear Embodied Hearts and Dancing Souls,
Deep breath peeps. Deep breaths. We are being taking on a rough ride. Once a former CEO placed me on a hurricane of his making. I knew the project was doomed to fail but I found a way to dance, motivated in my desires, anyway.
Two weeks I wrote as I always do, letting my fingers spill forth a greater reveal. I did not know it would strike such a chord. I am grateful for the feedback I received.
Today I manage some disparate musings. I feel somber. This mask photo comforts me.
On the Outer. My husband surprised me the Friday night before the rally. We decided to put what we were against (Hands Off) on one side, and at least one thing that we wanted to see on the other side. For the back of his sign, my husband chose a quote by Langston Hughes (see below). It rung a faint bell. It’s from a poem (see above) that is a perfect coda to my last post. I felt a quiet moment of appreciation watching him complete his task. The rally was fun and peaceful by the way.
The times, they are a bruisin’. Creepily, the Supreme Court seems hell bent on capitulating to F47’s demands with minimum adherence to the Constitution. Like you, it’s challenging to stay on this tightrope of staying informed and finding my focus without losing my mind. Real strategies from any leaders have yet to emerge. It is daunting and downright scary. One of my questions: If the federal government is no longer going to fund important shit, how can we get those capital flows to adapt?
All I know for now. The last 5 years I have practiced listening, really listening, to my life. When I stopped ascribing notions of “good” and “bad” to what was happening, I found life was always showing me that I could trust myself fully. When a random teen smashed into my brand-new car in front of my house at 3 am, I felt as crushed as the dark blue Mazda parked outside. The thing was…I hadn’t really “loved” that car. I second guessed my choices during the test drive all the way to bringing it home. With the insurance check, I got a second chance to get honest about what I really wanted. Getting clear on my trade-offs led me to a slightly used car I absolutely love. Every time I drive it, I feel lucky that it’s mine. Week after week, as I showed up to play with life, I began sensing and trusting just how much life is happening for me.
It’s like this old Chinese parable about a farmer and his horses. When we don’t judge, it’s hard to know what is good or bad. I know—it’s not easy in our current climate. I find it easier to do with capital flows than with humans being cruelly used as pawns.
Heart Voice. Still, I have to believe that this basic truth of life happening for me doesn’t change. As long as you are breathing, there is more to you than you can imagine. There is purpose in your cells.
It’s not our job to give in to fear or powerlessness. It’s not our job to suddenly be the opposite either (this is the tricky bit where we “watch” ourselves go through the emotions). Clearly there are forces at work bigger than me or you right now. It’s all too easy to give away our power, focus and purpose to the various external momentums. But tuning into your unique siren song is still your real job. This song lives in your body, in your heart and in your voice.
Here is an excerpt from the Langston Hughes poem. Let is seep in lest you forget how the America of 1935 is still the America of 2025.
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
Noticing 1: Perhaps it’s best we don’t go back to how it was. Even the old system didn’t serve all of us. Now, this will be true for more of us.
Noticing 2: I’m appreciating anew how Toomer, Gaines, Baldwin, Hurston found their true song amidst oppressive tyranny. And Sojourner Truth, the OG of heart voice!
In a world where outer authority is dissolving, it seems like we are all being pushed to find the way we become part of the answer, as noted in the quote above from William Martin’s translation of the Tao te Ching. This is the process we are going through.
Trust in the Small. You can continue to use this time as a gift (like the pandemic) to learn who you are, what lights you up, what or where you want to be and what you want to do. Your Life (and your Body!) wants to nudge you back to the truth of you —your Being— every moment. This may not sound revolutionary, but your authentic expression is bold and grand no matter how small and ordinary. I learned this through a physical, improvisational system called InterPlay. When I let my body move or sound, even a hand gesture or tone becomes a way to have space to express my true self. When you get accustomed to emitting your true frequency in your space, you take up more space being the real you. This truth of you is invincible, always. Whatever is happening externally, it may catalyze the power of your own unique expression.
Poems give us this constantly. Here is a public arts project in St. Paul, MN that has succeeded in making 17% of city land in walking distance of a poem using sidewalks.
Midnight in the Burger King parking lot:
We could drop a dime, see it sparkle
fifty feet away. We would always
have the moon we said.
-Pamela Schmid
A tiny moment with large ripple effects. Continue to trust (what feels like) your smallness as the big unfolds.
Dry Desert. Still. My life’s normal flow has come to a standstill for weeks now. It is driving me crazy. As a person attuned to frequencies, I rely on life’s “movement” to choose my direction, like a dolphin uses sonar. Fear, despair started taking hold; the 40 days and 40 nights story came to mind. Life does feel an arid desert. I did feel forsaken.
Again poems come to my rescue. This by David Hinton in Six Desert Poems:
All day
long, wind and desert
light, I
followed that river’s
distances, shedding
histories,
histories, until I was
nothing but
river.
I am reminded, like poems, deserts distill us all down to our essence. As we shed, we lose what's not true. It's a different way of unlearning. Toby Moore clarifies further:
“The desert doesn’t explain itself. It’s just a mirror reflecting back at you, and if you’re quiet enough, it might show you what you need to see.” ~ Toby Moore
Deserts are strangely quiet. Listening for wisdom in the discomfort of the not-yet feels brutal. Self-love, right now, looks like honoring myself while listening to vast emptiness.
I have to end this here but there is more to explore from this place of long shadows. Stare into the loving compassion I see in that mask. May you find tiny oasis-moments—poems on sidewalks, moonlight in parking lots, a deeper breath than you expected.
To your exquisite unfolding. Stay #heartwoke and trust that beautiful heart of yours!
Monisha
When we belong to ourselves, we move freely. ~ Monisha Mittal
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