Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Page 65 – Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 32 – 1/17/2022

January 18, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

“Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”
~ Martin Luther King Jr. ~

holy synchronicity! what a meaningful coincidence to have the full moon of transformation in the sign of the great mother fall on the day we celebrate and honor the prophet Martin Luther King who devoted his life to justice for all guided by love…

as we breathe into and draw down the energy of this powerful full moon of liberation, we too, like Martin, are called to be in touch with our most deeply held values and walk our truth talk… YES! sing and leap off the cliff, being wild and free… YES! sing this is what i’ll do with my wild and precious life… YES! sing to coming home, coming home to the heart, true refuge, belonging place… YES sing to the full moon in Cancer – may we all answer her call walking wholeheartedly in love in this moment, every moment…

let’s now join together in the field out beyond in the silence of the still point listening for her song and engage in an ancient practice of tonglen, of giving and receiving, that, like metta, empowers compassion and is a beautiful blessing of balance for the full moon…

breathe in deeply and settle into the present moment simply as it is…

look first into the mirror of yourself with the utmost compassion of your divine self seeing your human self with the tenderest love and see the black smoke coming from the wounded human self and take it into the radiant heart of the open sky dissolving the smoke and send back boundless love and compassion…

next, turn to someone you love who is suffering greatly and take the black ball from their belly and send it to the expansive blue sky of the radiant heart of overflowing love and compassion and send this love to them…

now, turn to someone who has caused you great suffering and see their pain and take it and send it to the radiant heart and shower them with unconditional love…

now, turn to a group that terrifies you and take away all their darkness sending it to the expansive open sky and sending back to them the incandescent love of divine compassion…

may we all feel the blessings of this moon of illumination, this moon of the great mother of divine love which ends all suffering and liberates us all to be for giving…

howlelujah and namaste…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 31 – 1/16/2022

January 17, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

“World peace through nonviolent means is neither absurd nor unattainable. All other methods have failed. Thus we must begin anew. Nonviolence is a good starting point. Those of us who believe in this method can be voices of reason, sanity, and understanding amid the voices of violence, hatred, and emotion. We can very well set a mood of peace out of which a system of peace can be built.”

–Martin Luther King, Jr., December 1964

, i speak again of a peacemaker with a passion for justice who still guides us today on the arc of healing justice, of one who was committed to a world of peace built on justice and guided by love so powerfully developed in his Beyond Vietnam speech, maybe his most important speech…

in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, King said “Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.” What a clear challenge to the punishment paradigm that incarcerates so many, sentencing people to death by incarceration and executing others in our name. King is calling us to evolve, to imagine a different approach to conflict, one that promotes healing and is grounded in love…

Dr. King also reminds us that we must take courageous action in order to realize our visions of a more just world. In 1968 in his final speech, King said“[t]here comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must take it because his conscience tells him it is right.” this statement came from a difficult personal pilgrimage, a dark night of the soul he struggled with that strtched him to the max and brought him into the stillpoint of peace…

what an beautiful synchronicity that this real-eyes-ation spoken in his “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” address was delivered the night before he was assassinated in 1968 and so much of it holds just as true today as it was 54 years ago… regarding his wanting to live a few years in the 2nd half of the 20th century, he says, “Now that’s a strange statement to make because the world is all messed up. The nation is sick, trouble is in the land, confusion all around. That’s a strange statement. But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars. And I see God working in this period of the twentieth century in a way that men in some strange way are responding. Something is happening in our world. The masses of people are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today, whether they are in Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra, Ghana; New York City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi; or Memphis, Tennessee, the cry is always the same: ‘We want to be free.’ And another reason I’m happy to live in this period is that we have been forced to a point where we are going to have to grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple with through history, but the demands didn’t force them to do it. Survival demands that we grapple with them. (Yes) Men for years now have been talking about war and peace. But now no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it’s nonviolence or nonexistence. That is where we are today.”

in his triumphant finale, King proclaims, “Well, I don’t know what will happen now; we’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life—longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over and I’ve seen the Promised Land.I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. And so I’m happy tonight; I’m not worried about anything; I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”

may we all get to the mountaintop, be the promised land and wage peace and justice and love with our every thought, word, deed and breath, existence still depends on our being/doing just that…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 30 – 1/15/2022

January 16, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

on this ides of January in the moonth of dreaming, let us celebrate the birth of one of our foremost modern day prophets and social gustice changemakers and peacemakers who dreamed of his little children living in a world where they were judged by their character rather than their color, a dream still being dreamed today along with his call of sixty years ago to face the challenge of the new age with the creation of beloved community for only love transforms the fear of the old paradigm into the gladness of a new paradigm by opening our hearts to the miracle frequency of boundless love… “darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that”…

Happy Birthday, Martin! celebrating you today with a great leap of faith in what is and what is coming… may we all journey with you to the mountain top where we tune in and listen to the celestial hum mapping out the path of the freedom road and journey a thousand miles and more without lifting a foot… loving how the circle of co-creators is expanding exponentially, a fractal of imaginal cells of the universe/multiverse we are… loving the flight into freedom we are sharing and so thankful for all of our relations who have paved, are paving and will pave the way…

let us close today with the words of the prophet from his I Have A Dream speech…

“Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred…The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.

That one day down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today.”

with this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to stand up for freedom together – if America is to be a great nation, this must become true...

so mote it be, blessed be and so it is…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 29 – 1/14/2022

January 15, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

today’s pilgrimage calls for an exceptional january jewel seed image, a special image as today’s a special day, one of my favorites… joan of arc, a lifelong shero of mine was born on this day and today is also the birthday of my beautiful daughter, my crown jules, another revered shero…

it is so fitting to mark this day, this wild and precious moment of eternity with divine feminine energy rising to join with sacred masculine energy at the start of a new year and an almost new decade of destiny when the stars whisper of a great turning manifesting with an adamant call to trust inner wisdom and to proceed courageously trusting unwaveringly in the knowing that love always finds the way…

with deep bows and enormous gratitude, today’s pilgrimage is dedicated to juliette, a surefooted capricorn child of the earth and to all children of the earth, our natural teachers of lovingkindness and compassion… on the occasion of the anniversary of your birth, i am seeing such an amazing turn around the sun for you, for us all…

yes! this is the year to take flight

to be dreamweavers of translucent, rainbow light

our cosmic heart soaring to an unimaginable height

yes! this is the year to take flight

what a joy to travel the way of the heart with you… invisible, infolding pathway of presence, trust, surrender, devotion hypnotically calling us home to our true refuge, our one cosmic heart… this moment, this beautiful moment of boundless love, of taking flight on the wings of love’s angelic waves…

may we be true in this moment of eternity, in every moment of eternal return to the beloved embodied, ensouled within inspiriting us with every sacred breath…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 28 – 1/13/2022

January 15, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

well come, welcome to this moment of eternity where we are luxuriating in the radiation of the new sun of the new year calling us to commit to our sacred mission of living in harmony and to listen, listen, listen to the soulsong singing our one body to come home to the heart, to the present moment, the only moment…

so many shoulders supporting us, such a boundless circle, a communion, a common union, our one body, yes, we are so created for these times… what follows is one of the thousand thousand fold expressions of this living truth, this cosmic wisdom known to us since the beginning of beginningless time…

“You have been telling people that this is the Eleventh Hour, now you must go back and tell the people that this is the Hour. And there are things to be considered…

Where are you living?
What are you doing?
What are your relationships?
Are you in right relation?
Where is your water?

Know your garden.
It is time to speak your truth.
Create your community.
Be good to each other.
And do not look outside yourself for your leader.

Then he clasped his hands together, smiled, and said, “This could be a good time! There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore. They will feel they are being torn apart and will suffer greatly. Know the river has its destination. The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our eyes open, and our heads above the water.

And I say, see who is in there with you and celebrate. At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally, least of all ourselves. For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey come to a halt.

The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves! Banish the word ’struggle’ from your attitude and your vocabulary. All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.

We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”

~ Hopi Elders’ Prophecy, June 8, 2000 ~

may this day be blessed with gifts, lessons, understanding and friends… may our energy be a gift to all we meet… let us be centered, healing and open facing the day with courage, kindness, insight and compassion… may we honor this day, this new sun and year in thought, word and deed re-membering, embodying the truth that all our relatives are sacred…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 27 – 1/12/2022

January 14, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

“When there is no more separation between ‘this’ and ‘that,’ it is called the still-point of the Tao. At the still point in the center of the circle one can see the infinite in all things.” ~ Chuang Tzu ~

every day is one of dreaming, every day is one of awakening… in this special first moonth of the new turn around the sun, we are perfumed in the essence of dreamtime carried by the energy of great mother bear through the dark tunnel into the sacred space of the dream lodge, the cave of the heart, the place beyond words, the primordial womb of great silence, of pure consciousness, true emptiness before the world begins… here we rest in the gap with silence breathing us in and out… as we hibernate in this deep cave of imagination, a new world is forming in this watery womb, this ocean of being…

breathing in and breathing out, we return to our great mother in still silence to receive essential nourishment as she breathes us into life through the placenta of the void, the organ of great mystery…

may we all be gentle with ourselves and each other as we journey along the path of blessed darkness and deepen into a spaciousness of silence, a consciousness of generosity and of the wisdom of the heart giving us the strength to awaken the dreamer within and be the ones we have been waiting for… all our relations one unbroken circle of radiant love illuminating the dark sky, revealing wonder…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 26 – 1/11/2022

January 13, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

today i move out into the rain before coming back to sit still with the spirit of gaia while watching the river flow, a perfect day for wu wei traveling with no fixed plans or concerns about arriving, nothing to do, simply be in the moment as dormant seed rooting deeply in earth… being one with the mother, communing with cosmos, organically feeling what it’s like to be a tree and part of a spacious star family, floating in rain clouds warmed by the sun, now, bursting free as a bow of beauty, our one cosmic heart’s song of harmony… sung at a frequency heard by all, beloved’s eternal call to return, to come back, come back, come home to me, dancing always with great mystery in the sacred space of real-eye-sing our true natur as rainbows with the innate ability to see and reveal the beauty hidden tn the clouds…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 25 – 1/10/2022

January 13, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

as rains gently fall,

poets journey as pilgrims

dreaming beautyway…

on this tenth day of journeying january, the moonth of dreaming, what is awakening in you, what beauty is taking flight, what does your soul want you to know?

this is the year for us to take flight

being dreamweavers of translucent, rainbow light

hearts soaring as one to unimaginable height

this is the year for us to take flight…

may we all dream and awaken to our medicine, our power, of weaving our light beingness into a seamless tapestry of lucid luminosity alive with love, liberation, compassion, wisdom, joy and the deep peace of the running wave… and,may we all awaken to our child heart, our seedbed of creativity, in each moment listening, listening, listening for the cosmic heart song… may the song reach us in our wildest and deepest places inspiring our howling with the wolves and the whales – all is well, all is well and all shall be well…

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 24 – 1/9/2022

January 13, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

another day, another moment of eternity to share and pay tribute to another being of astonishing light who died on the day after Christmas, the first day of Kwanza when Umoja or unity is celebrated and that seems so appropriate for this being who was known as the father of the rainbow nation….what follows will be a stream of consciousness beginning with my first and only encounter with this astonishing being of light…

some four decades ago, i injoyed the extreme pleasure of spending time “Arch” in the vestibule of the National Cathedral… such twinkling eyes and such merry energy that radiated off of him and then he danced down the aisle of this august and solemn sanctuary, i smile just re-membering the effulgent dancing tutu sauntering along… this Nobel Peace Laureate describes himself growing up in South Africa as an urchin with a penchant for fun and joy, a penchant that remained a constant throughout his ninety turns around the sun no matter what was going on in the world he served as a bodhisattva…

years later, as chair of his country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Tutu listened to accounts of political hatred and physical brutality that might shake anyone’s faith in humanity but Tutu said, “we were constantly being bowled over by the extent to which people were ready and willing to forgive. But we had, obviously, the spectacular example of Nelson Mandela, who could come out of 27 years’ incarceration, so eager to be able to forgive.”

“Let we who believe in freedom and justice be his legacy always,” said Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II of this iconic advocate and guardian of human rights…

in a letter of condolence His Holiness sent to the family of his long time friend, he wrote, “As you know, over the years, your father and I enjoyed an enduring friendship. I remember the many occasions we spent time together, including the week here at Dharamsala in 2015 when we were able to share our thoughts on how to increase peace and joy in the world. The friendship and the spiritual bond between us was something we cherished. Archbishop Desmond Tutu was entirely dedicated to serving his brothers and sisters for the greater common good. He was a true humanitarian and a committed advocate of human rights. His work for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was an inspiration for others around the world. With his passing away, we have lost a great man, who lived a truly meaningful life. He was devoted to the service of others, especially those who are least fortunate. I am convinced the best tribute we can pay him and keep his spirit alive is to do as he did and constantly look to see how we too can be of help to others.”

thanks be for this speaker of truth and towering figure who played a pivotal role in ending apartheid in South Africa, this man who embodied a fierce, love-based liberation theology guided by a moral compass that was unflinching…

i’ll close this peace with a reminder from the dancing Tutu, “You and I are made for goodness. You and I are creatures who were made for transcendence, were made for love, were made for caring, were made for embracing one another… And that is what is going to prevail.”

and so it is… blessed be…

“Those who have been hurt must be the ones who have the right to propose what it is that will begin to assuage the anguish, or you’ll just be repeating the same cycle of the perpetrator, who is a top dog, prescribing.” ~ Desmond Tutu ~

Poetic Peace Pilgrimage – Year 9 – Day 23 – 1/8/2022

January 12, 2022 Jo BeallLeave a Comment

for almost a month now, i have been writing, inside of myself, a tribute to bell hooks along with so many others but today on this day of the planet of love beginning a new phase as evening star and a new cycle, it seems a good day for honoring bell who was always writing of love…

i shared with bell an enormous respect for MLK, a teacher who led her to another being, Thich Nhat Hanh, who also servrd as a powerful teacher for her… in a conversation with him, bell said, “I think that we best realize love in community. This is something I have had to work with myself, because the intellectual tradition of the West is very individualistic. It’s not community-based. The intellectual is often thought of as a person who is alone and cut off from the world. So I have had to practice being willing to leave the space of my study to be in community, to work in community, and to be changed by community.” Thay answered her saying, “Right, and then we learn to operate as a community and not as individuals. In Plum Village, that is exactly what we try to do. We are brothers and sisters living together. We try to operate like cells in one body.” i wholeheartedly agree with Bell’s pronouncement that this is the love that we seek in the new millennium, which is the love experienced in community, beyond self and with Thay;s plea that live that truth and disseminate that truth…

may we all devote ourselves to building and being a community of love bringing our one body into an ecosystem of harmony…