Cycles – Bartels' Universe

February 4, 2024

Acadian Musing.

Missing the mark. Being off the mark… Over and over… and…. weeping. Weeping and then deep laughter. A tune… the silent hanging instruments. Sudden sound… the intimacy of a song. The intimacy of a symphony. The intimacy of … an event. To experience a gathering… in house, in hall… on a street corner… dancing on the bow of a sailboat… dancing in the rain… dancing between puddles. Missing the mark… Off the mark… to see that care in connection.

Passings. Feeling the absence of neighbor. Feeling the absence of a long ago woven moment. Feeling the absence of a voice that is long silent… yet, so present in moment… moment memory. Passings, making room for emergent tendril weaving… a symphony of tapestry. A tendril symphony… woven… a tapestry… across the all and all of creation.

It is raining. thick drops of rain. The storm upon…

Thinking of long departed friends. The various choruses of … all gathered in song. The gathered ensemble. Sudden in raised song… woven tendril… sudden in raised song.

A friend has taken a leave. Another sudden gone in passing. Another sudden passing… and another… just passing… the gentle laying down.

Missing the mark… starting from off the mark. Music speaking in tendril weave. The guitars hanging… and now singing. The recorder… long in drawer… out and singing. Long silent… now singing.

Loving notes… tendril weave. Some sung… some touched… some – to make new living. All of creation. Just down on the farm… here and there… rain… now falling in sheets. Rain… now tendril weaving in tapestry sheets… thin and thick…

There it is… a song on the dancing storm. A song… on the dancing storm.

Long silent strings… singing… long silent muse now dancing… long silent … long gone… now gathered all around and in chorus… across the weave of time… all singing. In harmony … all singing. Just so… there in moment. A new suit of strings… bent to guitar… bent to dobro… bent to bouzouki… bent to requinto… singing… singing with voices of chorus… with solo song… with duet… with trio, with quartet… all in dancing song.

A lone cowboy… teaching to sing the middle french… and now, in canyon… the walk… that song of the walking of the lonesome valley… with chorus all around. there…

I think of Charlie… recovering from a stroke… brilliant and with care.

I think of bands… long ago… and bands now…

I think of a chord… sung with many voices… in this sheets of rain moment… they are all singing. Every one… even those who cannot be in same room the more…

Missing the mark… off the mark. Connected in tendril weaving. Hearing a song … from a different voice… yet, in tendril weave…

A song of voyage home… a song of love passing… a song of new birth… Yes… in each… the tendril weaving of … the all of creation.

So… in this moment… giving thanks. Those here… those passed… those moments of tendril weaving… a magic… just so… a magic… or … a sacred… the turning from missing the mark to being with the moment mark… a turning from being off the mark… to being in moment anchor… anchor and dance… To Roy… to Cam… to Roger… to Lyle… to Paul… to Leo… to Barb… to Pam, and Pam… To John… to Vance… to David… to Ellen… to Myrt… to all the voices… to Amy… to Spud… sudden to acadian … a place that … held silent… yet, so foundational… all on the tendril weaving… a gift. Just so… a gift.

January 7, 2024

Of Moment

… of the moment.

In each renewal, there is a death of passing on… the breaking apart of vessel on the rocks… the burning of ships on the shore… the emergence of the surviving moment… the renewal of the covenants of community… the pivot and delight of new living… the grief in comrades riven or separate roads taken… sadness of the wisdom which is passed on, and passing on… the curiosity of the all… A sunrise.

The setting of the day and the new sunrise… the liminal night… into the new sunrise.

Perineal in cycle. Day – Night – another Day… A breath, an exhale… another breathing breath. The moment of last breathing. The moment of first breathing.

The ‘breathe on oh breath of life’ – a song of rising.

All in pulse of cycle. The tides. The day into night into day… the phases of moon and passing of moment into minute… into hour, into day… in to week into month, into year… into years and decades… the long march of time…

Portal of moment. Always at the mouth of the long march of time… spilling into the sea. Rivers running down mountains… spilling into sea…

The bright sun, in invitation. Drops in air, leaping to sky… to fill the clouds with the tears of rain… to dance upon the winds… all over the earth. And sudden to cry down in falling waters… tears of joy, of rage, of long sadness… as a birth… that dying into new…

And on the porch… a putter sit. The instrument in hand… the playing of a new song… of an old verse… new in this moment. The rising of the wind… as song. The rising of the drops as invocation to weeping of the clouds… A harmony on the porch. Just so… a harmony on the porch. A gift…

In thanksgiving. This set of moment. This curiosity in layered rhythm… three with two… with six… with 13 and 17… all in one symphony. At the downbeat. In the rising through the movements… and the harmony of each instrument’s voice.

A flower leaps into bloom. The bloom opens in the bright sun… the drying wind comes to ease the petals away… all on the wind and tide of creation’s songs.

So, in moment… a quiet song on the porch. A quiet song on a walk next to the rippling and dancing stream… a quiet song out on the desert… bright sun… cool snow… the whole of the wonder of …

All in moment. Held and lifted… holding and lifting. In healing balm… In loss… in healing balm. All and all… The joyful dance of the puer… in the face of slaughter… even in that moment… the joyful dance. What … in every time there is a purpose… is this moment?

Invited or not… present. A gift. And the breathing breath. A gift.

July 27, 2019

Lesson in presence.

What my father taught me, as he lay dying. When he would suddenly feel like he was falling, he would reach up a hand… and all he needed was to have the hand grasped. Nothing more. Perhaps a word… gotcha. That is all.

Sometimes… a schizophrenic asks for 5 minutes in a warm room to drink a cup of coffee… Disheveled … and five minutes. Permission is given. A timer is set. A cup of coffee is drunk. Then, raincoat on, umbrella up… with great appreciation, that seen, connected mind… in gratitude, can be in the rain, with a community connected smile.

Five minutes and a cup of coffee. A hand and gotcha… Then, in a safe place of connection… getting back to the work of … negotiating with the staff in my mind… laying down to die…

Is our connection that of being in charge of both sides of a conversation? Is our connection to connect with the moment of common? Or, is our connection to begin, within, to see and choose, with understanding,

What language? We, us? They, them? We, us with a management of both sides of the connection? We, us with connection and deep listening? They, them… are we and us when we ‘choose’ …

The challenge of this moment is that subtle and ‘all the power of the universe’; seeing.

Dancing in the tension of the gap… in that dancing, there is something else. It is the gratitude of a moment when the connection carries across the gap. The circle of all of ‘us.’

March 30, 2019March 30, 2019

Riffing on the wind

03-30-19 Riffing on the wind.

Or… whoever is from creation, hears the words of creation…

Easy to fall into argument. That wonderful moment when two are standing and looking out on a vista… look, it is raining. Look it is snowing… and it is doing both. As we hear with our seeing, it is doing both. How to resolve? Is it to resolve, for in creation, it is doing both. In the filter of my hearing in seeing… it does one thing… and in the filter of the beloved standing next to me … it does another.

The wind, dancing, knocks over an umbrella… “I hate the wind…” The wind dancing… in the same moment, moves the boat to the front of the race… “I love the wind…” It is the same wind and the same creation. All in the same moment… how can this be?

The deeper dive… the longer riff… it is both and. In darkness, so much presence. In light the presence still.

Thinking of the St. Helens explosion. A grand celebration of power in creation. Wonder, fear, death and living past death. Making street lights come on in a far away place. To be a sudden change … even though, in other parts of creation, the event was a triumph of prediction. Now, years later, the mountain… stands as relic? No, stands as monument and dancing living creation… No, should… No, could…

This riffing on the wind. Celebration. A friend is given a short time to live. The voice that passes this information to me, that friend, is celebrating not his ending but the amazing moment of his living. He just wanted me to know. For, having heard from another of his ‘plight’, he wanted to cast his own perspective to the long life he has had and the wonder of this next segment of journey. Riffing on the wind.

Riffing on the wind, a house renewed. Sacred and failed systems… now renewed. The wonder of reaching for a spigot and … behold… water comes forth. Behold, the drain, drains. Riffing on the wind.

The crop is harvested. The most recent oranges hang … ready to pick. The grasses, released from long hibernation by the long winter rains… all riffing on the wind. This wind that is change. Daily, moment by moment; riffing on the dancing of the wind.

From all creation we each come. In the wonder of a lenten meditation… riffing on the wind. There is now, this moment, a shift, a change… for the wind is singing… even in the speaking of … the singing of … to riffing in…

Dancing on and with all creation. For, in that dance, there is the work of being in creation. In gratitude… in all creation. Seeing in and hearing and breathing in… all creation.

March 8, 2019March 8, 2019

Lenten Musing and… All Creation

Cleaning up the stables…

Sometimes the flowery words of scripture are like the duff on the stable floor. So overlaid with blather that the beautiful invitation to relationship and conversation are covered over in layer after layer of rococo …

What do you wish in your life? What are you looking for? What are you seeking?

Where are you going? Who is going with you?

The teaching of Augustine: … our hearts are restless until they rest in God…”

What do you wish in your life? What are you looking for? What are you seeking?

Where are you going? Who is going with you?

The teaching of Augustine: “… our hearts are restless until they rest in God…”

It is now a moment… where am I going? Who is going with me… resting in the heart of creation. In my world, the heart of God. The heart of all creation.

All from cleaning the stables. A gift.