Reteach the spirit

It's funny how for a non-religious person I have been so drawn to readings on faith and spirituality of late. Today, I read a book called The Passion of Reverend Nash by Rachel Basch. I enjoyed the oversized Reverend immensely. Her imperfections made her so human.

I wanted to share a short poem from the book, written by Galway Kinnell, St. Francis and the Sow.

The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don't flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
of the flower
and retell it in words and in touch
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;
as Saint Francis put his hand on the creased forehead
of the sow, and told her in words and in touch
blessings of earth on the sow, and the sow
began remembering all down her thick length,
from the earthen snout all the way
through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the tail,
from the hard spininess spiked out fro the spine
down through the great broken heart
to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and shuddering
from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking and blowing beneath them:
the long, perfect loveliness of the sow.


Doesn't that strike a chord? To reteach a thing its loveliness?

I think there are times when we need to remember who we are and just how lovely our being is.

That's what I wish for you today, that you remember your inner truth and take delight in your being.

Colleen

God Grew Tired of Us

Although this has nothing to do with writing, I wanted to let you know about a post on my other site, Ideas Change the World All the Time (http://ideaschangetheworldallthetime.blogspot.com/) about the Lost Boys of Sudan.

Please help.

Colleen

Martyr Street: or when religion is totally not cool

Just got back from another day of films. Saw White Planet which, despite the name, isn't about white supremacists, but about the Great White North. Great soundtrack, very Inuit sounding; great visuals (Have you ever seen a walrus nursing her young? She hangs in suspended animation under the surface of the water and junior latches on upside down with mom's hind flippers cradling its head. Or narwhals... I thought they were extinct!) There was also footage of glaciers breaking away which was pretty scary.

Movie #2 was Martyr Street which was shot on the only place in Hebron where Jewish settlers live in the heart of a Palestinian neighbourhood. Hebron is a flash point because it was the home of Abraham, the father to both Muslims and Jews. It juxtaposes bits from the bible about Abraham and his two sons, Isaac and Ishmael with interviews with two young women -- one Jewish, one Muslim. These girls are filmed as they grow up across the street from each other without ever speaking or meeting.

When filming began four years ago, there were 400 settlers there and 400 military personnel to protect them. The story that is told in this documentary is one that it claims is hidden from the international media -- it is one of intense hatred and inhumanity toward the Palestinians by the settlers.

Although Jewish military personnel aren't allowed to speak with the media, a soldier who is no longer in the army did speak out as did other Israelis who want Jews out of Hebron.

I will say that I don't know which side should get to be there and, frankly, I don't care. This is an instance where religion is the source of evil. It has spawned generations of hatred resulting in too many deaths to count. An area that was once famous for vineyards is now a wasteland.

And yet, the settlers are happy with this. Staying there is worth everything and anything. It is worth adopting terrorists tactics. It is worth raising children on a battlefield and teaching them to hate blindly. It is worth burying their babies who die from bullet wounds.

This can't be what Abraham had in mind.

Colleen

Working through the chatter

Well, I opted out of movie viewing yesterday and, instead, spent a few hours at Starbucks editing. Amid the chatter around me I managed to edit a whole chapter. I think I made some needed changes. We'll see what my view is once I have a chance to look it over.

Have a great writing day!

Colleen

P.S. Have you tried their Toblerone cookies? Sin was never so affordable. mmmmmm

War Dance

As blogged yesterday, I attended the launch of Viewfinder's International Film Festival for Youth last night. The movie selected to kick off the festival was War Dance. What a choice. It made an impact.

From the program:

"War Dance is a profoundly moving documentary film demonstrating the power and triumph of the human spirit over hardship and personal tragedy. For the last 20 years, northern Uganda has been at war with a rebel force, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). In this war zone, children are not only the victims of the rebels--they are the rebels. The LRA employs a horrifically effective process to fill its ranks--abducting children. War Dance follows the historic journey of three of these children--Dominic, Rose, and Nancy--and their school in the Patongo refugee camp: the first school from the northern war zone to make it to the finals of Uganda’s national music and dance competition. Amidst unimaginable violence and grief, these children sing and dance; they sing without fear; they sing in protest and in celebration. They dance and stomp
to the rhythms of their ancestors. Devastated by the horrors of war, they carry the hopes and dreams of their entire village with them. Breathtaking cinematography almost makes it impossible to imagine such violence and devastation could exist among such natural beauty.

"Winner of the Directing Award at this year’s prestigious Sundance Film Festival, War Dance will leave you affected, changed, and inspired to help create a peaceful world for all of us."

What this description can't convey are the quiet moments in the film that portray the dignity and sadness of the children. Moments like when one young abductee, Dominic, questions a rebel leader about the fate of his brother and is told that he is probably dead. When Dominic then asks the man why children are abducted and made to kill, the man explains that many children are needed to give leaders status, it is heartbreaking. Or when Rose, a 14-year old orphan who cares for her younger siblings practices singing for the competition, exhausted after a long day of cooking, laundry, child care and cleaning.

To see these same kids then smile and laugh when they practice and perform is both heartbreaking and inspiring.

These kids are unbelievably stoic, unbearably brave and prove that those who have nothing give everything.

I wish we could say the same about us -- those who have everything.

Colleen

'Cause we don't want to be too prolix...

This is a good one for us writer types to keep in mind...

prolix \pro-LIKS; PRO-liks\, adjective:1. Extending to a great length; unnecessarily long; wordy.2. Tending to speak or write at excessive length.

It was a cumbersome book, widely criticized for being prolix in style and maddeningly circular in argument.-- Simon Winchester, "Word Imperfect", The Atlantic, May 2001

Montaigne is a little too prolix in his determination to tell us almost everything that happens as he fishes his way across the country, and he gives us a few too many accounts of the people he meets and of their repetitiously gloomy opinions.-- Adam Hochschild, "Deep Wigglers of the Volga", New York Times, June 28, 1998

Greenspan, on the other hand, is given to prolix comments whose sentences are hung like Christmas trees with dependent clauses.-- John M. Berry, "Greenspan: A Man Aware of Feasibility", Washington Post, June 14, 1987

Comment about Estonia

I would like to point out that my comment about the Estonian film industry is 1) my weird sense of humour and 2) due to my ignorance about Estonia. Really, I wanted to see Ruudi. It looks like a wonderful family flick. Sorry if I caused anyone from Estonia any offence. C