On Barak Obama

[photo by nymag.com]

I first became aware of what a remarkable man Barak Obama is long before he ran for office, when I read his first book Dreams From My Father. The fact that he titled his next book The Audacity of Hope cinched the deal. Here was a man to believe in!

When he ran for office, my heart took wing. I had not had such hope since the days of Bobby Kennedy, and we know hope went south after he was assassinated. I wrote about this hope, all those fallen heroes, and my faith in Barak Obama in Waking From the Dream: Holding the Vision of Change here:
http://stardreamingwithsherrybluesky.blogspot.com/2010/07/waking-from-dream.html

When he won the election, I wept tears of joy. My heart felt so full with the hope for change in this old world that so badly needs it.

This morning, I heard him speaking, after the results of last night's reshifting of balance in the two political parties. He is such an intelligent and articulate speaker; he carries integrity with him the way others wear a jacket. He was very subdued this morning.

I am discouraged, on many levels. When Barak Obama was elected, he told us change could not happen overnight. That it would take time. I so wish people had the foresight to give him the time it takes to make such big changes. Instead, now the power has shifted to an even more strongly bipartisan government. A bipartisan government cant get things done. And remember, this man inherited a HUGE mess and a collapsing economy when he took office. The eight years preceding him I can describe in the one word that applies to how I felt about that administration: nauseated.

I believe Barak has accomplished a great deal while in office and was well on the way towards accomplishing much more.  Now he will be stalled at every step. And will be blamed for the lack of progress, though he cant make progress with resistance , and the swift undoing of what changes he has made.

Bipartisanship will sink us, in the end. All of us, for we in Canada are hugely impacted by what happens in the States. It makes no sense to take two steps forward, then have the opposition set us five steps back, this game could go on forever and we'll never get anywhere. When it is about gaining power or holding onto power, instead of what is best for the common man, it will be a perpetual business of one party trying to make a change, and the other party undoing it, as the pendelum of confused public opinion swings back and forth according to the mood and perception of the day.

It is time for far-sighted vision, friends. I believe Barak knows that last night's results will badly impact the country, as what he has fought so hard to improve will be undone. He knows his hands are tied. He asked us for enough time to see things through. Eight years might have changed this old world. Now it looks like the Republicans are getting ready to wrest power back over into their court. If that happens, I will truly give up on hope for change, resign myself to politics returning to what it was before Barak: about power, about moneyed interests. NOT about what is best for humans and the planet.

Barak Obama is the leader the times thrust forward when we most needed a leader, a man of integrity, a man of the people. We surely dont need another right-wing rich guy cozying up to the multinational money interests that already have a stranglehold on this planet, or the money and power interests that try to block Barak at every turn while he tries to turn the tide towards a new day, that we so sorely need.

But that might be what we're gonna get in a couple of years. They'll tie Barak's hands in the meantime and then blame him for lack of progress when it is time for re-election.

Frick.

I am pretty discouraged.

On the up side - our provincial rich fat-cat right-wing tax-breaks-and-subsidies-for-the-rich-and -the-big-corporations and let's take away all supports and helps to the poor premier Gordon Campbell just resigned. That is a happy day. He did so because he knows he will resoundingly lose the next election, especially after imposing the hated 12% HST tax on the working poor and even poorer disenfranchised of this province. Better to resign gracefully than slink away in defeat. But it will take years to reinstate and repair all the programs he has destroyed in his years in office. The lives he destroyed no one will ever hear about. Think: no support for parernts of autistic children, clawbacks of help to the mentally ill, withdrawal of finances from transition houses for battered women, a welfare rate that has not increased in twenty years, while rents and food and utilities costs have gone through the roof. Think : cutbacks in education and hospital care while billions - literally-were spent on a great big Olympics party for the rich, who were the only ones who could afford to attend. Think: how come he got an impaired driving charge and it was swept under the rug?

Now if we could just get rid of our right-wing Prime Minister in Ottawa, the bells could surely ring out!

Maybe we could entice Barak Obama to move to Canada. Barak, and Michael Moore. THEN we'd be happenin' !!!!!!!

Your Life and a Dog

Something a little lighter tonight.......I came across this poem that I enjoyed so much:
"The Resemblance Between Your Life and a Dog" by Robert Bly from Eating the Honey of Words (Perennial).

I never intended to have this life, believe me.
It just happened. You know how dogs turn up
At a farm, and they wag, but can't explain.

It's good if you can accept your life - you'll notice
Your face has become deranged trying to adjust
To it. Your face thought your life would look

Like your bedroom mirror when you were ten.
That was a clear river touched by mountain wind.
Even your parents can't believe how much you've
changed.

Sparrows in winter, if you've ever held one,
all feathers,
Burst out of your hand with a fiery glee.
You see them later in hedges. Teachers praise you.

But you can't quite get back to the winter sparrow.
Your life is a dog. He's been hungry for miles,
Doesn't particularly like you, but gives up,
and comes in.

To End All Wars

[image from crystalchild.net]

War is the final destination of hatred.

This is a quote from the dvd To End All Wars. I look at this sunny hopeful radiant face above, one of the Indigo children,  and think of children all over the world, trusting adults to create a safe world for them to live in.

As I watched the end of the documentary Trinity and Beyond last night, they touched on the issue of radiation causing cancer. In the government-speak of the day, they filmed a man explaining to the public, "There may be a 'few' people who develop cancer as a result of exposure to radioactivity from these detonations. Radioactivity affects the plant life and water on earth, and is carried into plant-eating animals which humans consume."

[He failed to mention we all also breathe.]

He went on, "These 'few' may be considered unknown soldiers, in a war that hasn't been declared, a war that our development of these weapons has prevented."

O.M.G.

Pardon me while I have a hissy fit!

I reflect upon the rise in cancers all across North America in recent decades.

There are more than a few "unknown soldiers" in a war they never signed up for.

They finally stopped testing in 1963. Then other countries began.

Argh.

And now for something completely different.......

[image from vancouverisawesome.com - Vancouver is my big-city neighbour!]

............and utterly NON-peaceful. I am watching a documentary called Trinity and Beyond: the Atom Bomb Movie, which depicts the dropping of bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the subsequent  testing of atomic and hydrogen bombs by the USA through the 1950's. It is simply appalling to watch the absolute insanity, filmed as they  exploded these massive bombs on the deserts and in the oceans of the planet, unleashing whatever at-that-time-unknown cataclysmic repercussions, and unloading huge quantities of radioactive material into the air to settle over humans and all other life everywhere.

They showed some green rock still highly radioactive fifty years later. They did not know what they were dealing with - the footage shows men standing within sight of the blast, watching the detonation. And "testing the viability of boats to nuclear blasts" by positioning ships full of men within the blast zone, some of which sank to the bottom of the sea.

Why was there not a huge public outcry?

I remember nuclear war seemed a very real threat when I was a youngster in school. I grew up with that fear. The adults all believed (or were led to believe by the careful news releases of the governments of the day) that it was a very real possibility. There were drills at school. Some people dug bomb shelters in their back yards. I remember being terrified when Russian ships were heading towards the Bay of Pigs and Kennedy did not back down.

I was a young mom when Chernobyl happened, and I was rivetted to the tv, afraid that it might set off a domino effect, igniting other reactors across the world, and that my children would suffer - the world's children would suffer. I imagine many of the children of Chernobyl are still suffering the effects of that "accident".

This is a power that humans are foolish to mess with. And there isn't even a safe way to contain the material,  if we tried to eliminate them.

I have peace on my mind, as November 4th approaches and the huge and accelerating Blogblast for Peace project gets underway. People from all over the world will be taking part and it does give one hope that the vast majority of us simply want to live in a world at peace. There are enough challenges in life without people having to try to survive in war zones.

I will finish watching this........thing........as one needs to know, I suppose, just how foolish governments can be. The only "safe" nuclear weapon is a non-existent one. And any hugely destructive force,  at risk of being left in the hands of humans, who can be reactive, angry, unwell or downright psychotic, or even just distracted, sleepy or careless, is a recipe for certain disaster which, fortunately until now, we have avoided, don't ask me how.

To finish on an upbeat note: judging from the people in countries all over the world pledging to join this movement for peace on the 4th, peace is an idea whose time has come. It is trying to happen. Imagine, if it does.............

[image from peaceabbey.org]

A Celtic Blessing of Peace

[image from the Global Peace Project website at bhagavandharma.org]

Deep Peace, I breathe into you,
O weariness, here.
O ache, here!
Deep peace, a soft white dove to you,
Deep peace, a quiet rain to you,
Deep peace, an ebbing wave to you!
Deep peace, red wind of the east from you,
Deep peace, gray wind of the west to you,
Deep peace, dark wind of the north from you,
Deep peace, blue wind of the south to you!
Deep peace, pure red of the flame to you,
Deep peace, pure white of the moon to you,
Deep peace, pure green of the grass to you,
Deep peace, pure brown of the earth to you,
Deep peace, pure gray of the dew to you,
Deep peace, pure blue of the sky to you!
Deep peace of the running wave to you,
Deep peace of the flowing air to you,
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you,
Deep peace of the sleeping stones to you,
Deep peace of the Yellow Shepherd to you,
Deep peace of the Wandering Shepherdess to you,
Deep peace of the Flock of Stars to you,
Deep peace of the Son of Peace to you,
Deep peace from the heart of Mary to you,
And from Bridget of the Mantle,
Deep peace, deep peace!


A Celtic blessing of peace for all hearts tonight.......I havent been able to find a source, other than it being adapted from some Celtic runes long ago..........

In The Infinitely Possible Universe.....

Taking time out of time,
I can,
this morning,
without leaving home,
lift my heart out of life's
gobbling dailyness,
setting it free
amongst
the infinitely
possible
universe.........

I am sitting in an upper row
at the Imax,
and on the big screen
in front of me
spreads the Kalahari,
lions stretching and yawning
in the amber glow
of the African veld,
herds of wildebeeste
flowing across
the brown and endless land,
a wave of life
surging to a
common shore.

Now I'm siting
in a stone hut
in the Himalayas,
drinking butter tea.
In the glow of the fire,
warm brown faces
smile at me
with kind eyes,
their expressions radiant
with the peace
of their hearts'
simplicity.

Walk with me
along
the Great Wall of China,
then let's nip over to
see the rounded shapes
of the Mystic Mountains.

Or travel the Camino,
five hundred miles
a pilgrim,
sleeping on stone benches,
the trail one long thirst.

In Dharamsala,
I sit with red-robed monks,
in a silence so vast
the veil parts,
I am half in
and halfway out,
co-existing
between two worlds.

There are
no limits
here.

So now we travel space,
a vast blackness,
stars scudding past,
exploding and imploding,
the glow
of comet-dust
upon our seeing eyes.

Time to come home,
and I'm most happy to -
home to my tiny trailer,
with its barking dogs,
its clean, green
sweep of yard
full of marmalade-colored leaves,
cheerful with Tibetan prayer flags,
bamboo wind chimes,
waiting porch swing.

When I first wrote these words
my nearest neighbor
was a tender newborn foal,
small as a medium-sized dog,
who clung to life
with a sweet tenacity
and spooky pale-blue
and inquiring
eyes.

He left this world
fourteen months later,
was buried with his
favorite ball
in a green spot
where now an apple tree
blooms each spring.

There is a bench
there,
for sitting,
and remembering
Baby Leo,
his spirit
now running free
in some other
parallel
reality
in this
infinitely
possible
universe.

A Soliloquy on the Night

[I got thinking about how night time evolves during the course of a human life, and how it holds different degrees of emotion, depending on the time in one's life it corresponds to.]

Night.
When a small child falls asleep to the sound of the Big People drinking in the living room, waking later to empty silence, creeping out of bed and down the hall to wander through the empty rooms, finding herself alone, except for the monsters waiting for her under the bed.

Night.
When the twelve year old lies shaking with fear in bed, listening to the yells and curses, blows and crashes. Only now the fear is worse; now she knows who the monsters are. Now, when silence falls, she worries that one of her parents might be dead, and that the wrong one might be left alive.

Night.
When the young wife stares into the lonely dark, realizing her marriage is nothing like the marriage of her dreams, that she is, in fact, more alone now than she ever was.

Night.
When the baby wakes, and the young mother takes it to her breast, watching out the window, waiting for daybreak, cocooned in a warm, sweet world of two, her heart full with finally, finally having someone to really love.

Night.
When the husband furiously harrangues, night after night, into the early hours: her lacks, her faults, his needs not being met, what-is-it-that-you-want, what's wrong with you?

Night.
When he finally leaves,  she regains her freedom, and nights are silent once more.

Night.
When she discovers what love between a man and woman can be. Night of ecstasy.

Night.
When he leaves too, because she has children and he has to be free, and besides, he has two new girlfriends now. But thanks, and here's one tear, for remembering.

Night.
Of despair. Of despair. The long night of the heart, when it is frozen, asleep, refusing to be roused.

Night.
That one keeps waking from, because one must. And because, over time, the rosy sunrise keeps on winning, until she awakens to a new day of hope.

Many, many nights.
Till the heart comes home to a place of fullness where there is no pain. Aware that the world is full of weeping, hungry, frightened and abused children, angry, drunken adults, heartbreak, and danger in the night. But believes more in the way the world wakes fresh and brand new every morning, with the chance to do things better, and builds a life on that.

One of the kindest things that age does is take the night, once a time of fear and pain, loneliness and yearning, and turn it into a kind friend, who pulls the covers up over our shoulders and bids us rest.