Navigating the territory

Getting lost is admirable. Feeling lost is uncomfortable. Banging into and up against unknown forces can be painful. I pick myself up shaken and bruised and retreat to care for myself and my words. 'What happened there?', I ask myself. 'Who knows and yet stay true and follow your own star home, not someone else's.'

Navigating the tracks requires diligence, discipline and dedication.

The cycle between violence and beauty, happiness and suffering, between grief and praise is going strong. The call for another story is ringing loud in my ears. Tears, many tears are being shed. Blood is flowing. Explosions, bombs, violence continues to rain. Unintended consequences are being felt and reverberating through the ether. Is this the way it will be ... Que Sera Sera? When misplaced nationalism soars will our stadiums, schools and churches resound to the words of William Blake, 'I will not cease from mental fight, nor shall my sword sleep'.

I feel fog descending around me
Clouding the scene
I'm lost
No longer knowing anything
Am I alone?
Is anyone out there?

A good friend tells me this is a neptune moment.
Enter the transcendent 'bird' third.

I feel the potential of a fresh breeze sweep through me offering a break in the fog and an opening to follow. I stand at the meeting point. The place where paradox dwells. The tension of holding opposites can be unbearable and yet if I hold the polarities long enough can there be a breakthrough? The bird third that transcends us from the tension towards something new.

The planet neptune was discovered in 1846. Let's be clear here, Neptune has always been there. The difference to those shaped by modernity is that something does not appear and exist until it is seen and named. So it was for Neptune in 1846. And now our astrologers incorporating this planet into our consciousness say Neptune, my gift du jour, represents 'dreams, illusion, abstract thought and the mysterious. Spirituality is important to this planet, and how we harness that energy for our personal betterment. Neptune invites us to let its energy wash over us and to use a meditative state to gain insights and heightened awareness. Poetry, music and dance are among the trance-like activities which this planet favours.'

As I am bounced and battered by events and forces Neptune visits me inn the guise of a William Stafford poem and the healing balm of a peace Mantra - Sarvesham Svastir Bhavatu.

I am grateful to Robert Bly for bringing the words of William Stafford to my door. I feel the energy and presence of raven; the darkness around us is deep my friend.

If you don't know the kind of person I am
and I don't know the kind of person you are
a pattern that others made may prevail in the world
and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,
a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break
sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood
storming out to play through the broken dyke.

And as elephants parade holding each elephant's tail,
but if one wanders the circus won't find the park,
I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty
to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,
a remote important region in all who talk:
though we could fool each other, we should consider--
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.

For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give--yes or no, or maybe--
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.

 William Staffords poem it titled 'A Ritual To Read To Each Other'. It could be these words are intended to be read between two or more people. Or it could mean to be read to the different parts of oneself, or even between you and a more than human being. It's in the in between places that differences can be most felt and the thread that connects all things can be seen. This connection is spoken about by many of the mystical poets. It's the invisible relational line that flows between everything ultimately rendering us inseparable, lest we forget, it's important that awake people be awake.