Fred LaMotte: Ancestry

WOW!! We are truly and profoundly all related. Deepest bow for this wisdom, this beautiful illumination of our interbeing with all of life and all that is. — Molly

Ancestry 

 

My DNA results came in.

Just as I suspected,

my great great grandfather

was a monarch butterfly.

Much of who I am is still

wriggling under a stone.

I am part larva, but

part hummingbird too.

There is dinosaur tar in

my bone marrow.

My golden hair sprang out

of a meadow in Palestine.

Genghis Khan is my fourth cousin,

but I didn't get his dimples.

My loins are loaded with

banyan seeds from Sri Lanka,

but I descended from Ravanna,

not Ram.

My uncle is a mastodon.

There are traces of white people

in my saliva.

3.7 billion years ago I swirled

in hydrogen dust,

dreaming of a planet overgrown

with lingams and yonis.

More recently, say 60,000 B.C.

I walked on hairy paws

across a land bridge

joining Sweden to Botswana.

I am the bastard of the sun and moon.

I can no longer hide my heritage of

raindrops and cougar scat.

My mud was molded with your grandmother's tears.

I was the brother

who marched you to the sea

and sold you.

I was the merchant from Savannah

and the cargo of blackness.

I was the chain.

Admit it, you have wings,

vast and crystal,

like mine, like mine.

You have sweat, dark and salty,

like mine, like mine.

You have secrets silently

singing in your blood,

like mine, like mine.

Don't pretend that earth

is not one family.

Don't pretend we never hung

from the same branch.

Don't pretend we do not ripen

on each other's breath.

Don't pretend we didn't

come here to forgive.

— Fred LaMotte

Painting by Lobsang Melendez Ahuanari

https://www.lobsangsecretart.com/gallery

___________

 

"Ancestry" has been published in The Tiferet Journal, the anthology "Inspiring Forgiveness," and Fred’s own book "Fire of Darkness."

 

William Hornyak: A Bedtime Story

 My husband and I love this one by our friend Will! 

Brilliant and beautiful! — Molly

A Bedtime Story 

 

And so it was

Children

That the

“Space Age”

Finally

Came to

An end.

All the men

At NASA

Just couldn’t

Get it up

Anymore

And we

Discovered

That

Space travel

Is done best

Without

Rockets

Blast-offs

Noise, smoke

And space junk.

Everyone

Came back

Down

To Earth.

NASA

Became GAIA

Run by

A council of

Indigenous grandmothers.

Our own

Planet

Became

“The Final Frontier”

And

The mysteries

Of the

Universe

Unfolded

As a

Shimmering

Garden

Before our

Eyes.

The longing

To escape the

“Surly bonds of earth”

Became

A longing

To know

The spirit

Within

The Earth

And all the

Seeds of

Genius and

Passion

Bound

For outer space

Were scattered

Far and wide

In our

Own

Backyards

And

Villages grew

From

Homeless camps

Poets emerged

From

Prison cells

Grain sprouted

From

Battlefields

And

Jeff Bezos

And

All others

Who couldn’t

Learn

To share

Went to Mars

Where

They live

Like ants

In little colonies

Beneath

The cold ground

To this day. 

 

— Will Hornyak, August 2022

 

John O'Donohue: For Belonging

Photo by Molly

For Belonging

 May you listen to your longing to be free.

May the frames of your belonging be 

generous enough for your dreams. 

May you arise each day with a voice of blessing 

whispering in your heart. 

May you find a harmony between 

your soul and your life.

May the sanctuary of your soul 

never be haunted.

May you know the eternal longing 

that lives at the heart of time.

May there be kindness in your gaze 

when you look within.

May you never place walls between 

the light and yourself.

May you allow the wild beauty of the invisible 

world to gather you, mind you, and 

embrace you in belonging.

 

— John O’Donohue 

From To Bless the Space Between Us:

A Book of Blessings

 

John O’Donohue: For a New Beginning

For a New Beginning

 In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life's desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

— John O’Donohue