Music

To quote Madonna, and to be fair it's not often I get to do just that, 'Music makes the people come together. Music mix the bourgeoisie and the rebel - Hey, Mr DJ put a record on I wanna dance with my baby' - quite!

Music lifts and shifts a mood quicker than an escaped tiger empty's the streets.

This morning whilst doing my normal walkabout of the interwebs I alight upon some might morsels of musical delicacy, such that I felt the need to share.

If only to possibly raise a wry smile or two ...



A contemporary remix of a 90's classic ...



#Peace and Love

Feats Beyond Words

Check this video out of mountain biker Danny Macaskill cycling The Ridge on Skye. How is this possible? Never mind being on the edge of my seat, I couldn't ever sit still long enough to stay on the edge while watching this incredible challenge. Set amidst the breath taking beauty of Skype a guy and his bike achieve incredible feats. The ending is something else. I've only ever done that by accident and it didn't end so well!!! Now I want to go out on my bike ...

Brand New Ancients

A rising star in the world of poets ... Kate Tempest. Here she is reciting part of her epic poem Brand New Ancients. One word - Incredible!
 
 

Linguistic Tree

I love maps. Today I came across this image by Minna Sundberg. She has drawn the antidote to the boring linguistic tree diagram. It is interesting to see how far away the Gaelic and Welsh languages are from English. Fascinating stuff.

Beauty

I am mesmerised by the beauty of this creatures incredible eye lashes ...

Another 5 minute poem

He paid the bills

he paid the bills
and counted his money
running down the stairs declaring - nearly a million!
who cares? we'd reply
when you die
we're going to give it away

it didn't seem to bother him
money meant something different in his world
something good
something to attain
something to be proud of

to him money was love
a very mixed up
fucked up kind of love

he loved me
although he never said those words
and I loved him
although it breaks my heart

love in different languages is very confusing
and sometimes hurtful

when did love become money?

and, how can we learn to speak each others languages
without hurling arrows at one another?

Not for beginners

Whilst watching a biographical film about the US poet Elisabeth Bishop I heard this famous quote by the musician Tom Joabim, 'Brasil is not for beginners'. In five words it summed up my experience. Brasil is an amazing country full of the most incredible, sometimes unfathomable, extremes. It can be quite uncomfortable sitting in opulence looking out on scenes of abject poverty. And yet this is a common occurrence. Not necessarily to be accepted, but to be somehow internalised and lived with. I for one have my struggles and discomforts with the inequality, with the corruption, with the lack of infrastructure and the list could go on.

To stay too long in this place of confusion would be to miss the beauty and the joy that is also a central quality to the country and the people. Reconciling the differences is what makes Brasil a complex country and one that as Tom Joabim says quite accurately is not for beginners. To not only survive Brasil, to appreciate and enjoy the people, climate, landscape, culture and natural abundance one needs to be open to the present, to the possibility for change and to the endless riches.

As Elisabeth Bishop observed in her time - the country and it's people cried tears of sadness when JFK was assassinated and yet when the military took control of power in Brasil - nothing - daily life continued, people played football on the beach just like any other day. These differing responses to major political events is hard to reconcile. When discussing this with a Portuguese friend he described the different ways countries stereotypically respond to significant events. For example, if there was an announcement that the world was to end tomorrow - Germans would turn to their spreedsheets to analyses the implications, Portuguese would run to the banks to withdraw their money and the Brasilian's would simply order another beer, smile and carry on like nothing happened. Not because they are blase, it's more akin to a sense of why get stressed out when there is nothing you can do, enjoy life while you can. From that standpoint the Brasilian response has much to offer.


 

Family and Fruit

Day one in Brasil and it's been all about family and fruit. In someways these two words are interchangeable. families fruit and fruits come in families.

Families are constantly changing, flowing like a dynamic river and my family in Brasil keeps on growing too. A new edition since my last trip is little Lucinhas. We went to visit him at home during the afternoon. He was understandably cautious when we first arrived in the apartment. After a few minutes he was more comfortable around us and began to play. At just one year old he is already walking about and exploring the world unfolding before him. Being the youngest he gets lots of attention from all those around him including his older sister Juju. Yesterday evening when we met up with everyone for pizza he was perfecting his raspberry blowing technique with the help of his Grandma.

 

I have tried many fruits whilst in Brasil. One of my favourite drinks is fresh water melon juice - melancia. Yesterday whilst out shopping in a local super market we saw many new unrecognisable fruits. Among them was this one called Fruta do Conde or Fruta Pinha here in Brasil.

In English it is known as a sugar-apple or the custard apple. It grows on the Annona Squamosa plant - that is one cool name for a plant.

A google search told me this fruit is high in energy, an excellent source of vitamin C and manganese, a good source of thiamine and vitamin B₆, and provides vitamin B₂, B₃ B₅, B₉, iron, magnesium, phosphorus and potassium in fair quantities.

Inside it has a creamy white flesh that tastes a little like custard. Held with in the flesh are black seeds the size of kidney beans. From the picture you can see it's not the prettiest fruit. If we weren't encouraged to try it the look might have been enough to put me off.
 

In the supermarket I was being a classical tourist !!! taking pictures of the aisles of unusual looking items before me. I got to the fruta do conde and pointed at this strange 'to me' looking green bobble shape. The guy stacking the shelves picked one up and with a quick twist of the hand he'd broken the fruit in half. Kindly he passed it to us for a taste and boy what a sweet soft and delicious fruit this is. Quite sticky and slimy with a soft very sweet flesh that almost dissolves in the mouth.

I don't know what I was expecting it to look like on the inside or what it might taste like, but what I experienced was nothing like I'd imagined. Maybe I thought it would be less sweet more like an avocado or artichoke.

I am now on the look out for more exotic fruits to sample. Watch this space.

I can always recommend a trip to the local market to see what you can find to tantalise and educate the taste buds. In a UK supermarket we tend to find one type of bananas or orange. It's good to know there is more to fruit than I this small range. One of my favourite snacks is the tiny finger sized bananas. They get even smaller than the ones I'm holding in the picture below.

The path to the beginning

The path to the beginning is
Greatness
Crow feathers soften your cheeks
As
Black beetle lifts its eyes upon you.

You ride the back of the blue
Whale
Plunging deep below the known
Depths you go
There are no caves to hide in now

Your heart shines like an uncut
Diamond
Out from the green valley you
Emerge
Resplendent like a story yet to be told

Start pushing your own myth to a better world

I'm drawn to the story of Sisyphus pushing a rock up the hill. I feel this myth needs refreshing and renewing for our times.

Ukrainian street dup Intererni Kazki created this modern interpretation of Sisyphus on the side of a building in Ekaterinburg, Russia.
 
It has been suggested that the image connects the myth of Sisyphus to consumerism, highlighting the emptiness and futility of accumulating more and more things. It raises the questions: Does being trapped in consumerism feel like a punishment from the gods? Or, do we have the power to escape from this sentence?"

Or we could re-imagine our myths? We could stand back a little from this close up scene and take in the bigger picture. Maybe Sisyphus is averting some great danger by preventing the consumer goods with all there waste and polluting possibilities from ending up in a landfill. Instead he is taking the difficult path of moving these redundant objects to the upcycling, re-purposing, re-use depot over the hill. Now it does not seem like such a ridiculous and futile task. Sometimes we have to make hard and difficult choices. Sometimes we have to do things which to others may appear stupid. Sometimes changing behaviour takes vision, discipline and hardwork - and yet it's worth it.

Be more like Sisyphus and take the lead to a better future you know is just over the hill.
 
 

Where will you find me?

I could be sitting at the cross-roads, or on the edge of the village, around the fire, or down next to the babbling brook, or in the glade of the forest - wherever you find me come and sit next to me for a while, rest your bones and tell me your story.

In the same way as the people of Europe discovered from Copernicus in the 16th century that the earth was neither flat nor the centre of everything, that the earth revolved around our sun – we the same people with the Western or European questioning mind are now learning the difficult news that we the human species are not at the top of the ladder of evolution or existence for that matter. We are not at the centre of life. We are learning that life is a community, an ecosystem in which all forms of life carry a novel and essential gift to be passed from one to another. We need each other. We are inseparably one and whole and therefore immutably connected.

This boundary crossing point of realisation is what Martin Shaw would call a Trickster moment, what Goethe might describe as inter-subjectivity or Thich Nhat Hanh suggests is interbeing and what Thomas Berry names as the Great Work. The western, dominant cultural story is changing. We are in a period of transition, shifting sands below, moving clouds above, consciousness rising. The constellations are reconfiguring our perception of the inner and outer landscapes and images we navigate by.

Charles Eisenstein puts it like this – the new story is the old story. I would declare it’s more than new wine in old bottles. Perennial wisdom has been carried and cared for by first nation’s people down the millennia. They have kept the flame burning during some extraordinary arduous tough times and yet the new old story is more than harking back to the past. The western curious mind is on a journey, as dark and violent as it has been like all quests the detritus possesses gifts to be revealed and to be shared among us. Let us honour the lotus flower, praise the baby to be born in this creative moment. To overlook them, worst still, to not even expect or seek the jewel would be a tragedy.

What is different now?

We no longer need gurus or lone wolfs as we have – we do not need to perpetuate the culture of individualism. That time has gone.

The task we are grappling with can’t be done without one another, shoulder to shoulder. Nor can we do this unless each one of us reflects within and takes responsibility for ourselves and does our own shadow work – shit shoveling if you will. Unity, wholeness, healing comes at the cross-roads at the meeting point of paradox. In this uncomfortable place change can happen. To do this we need to carve out our practices, whatever they maybe – singing, music, arts, movement, prayer, writing, silence, pilgrimage, incantation ...

The old story can slip from our eyes and we can see a new. We need to be initiated by one another. We need to be heard, to be listened to and for others to bear witness to all our stories. We need to meet in circle. More than that we need to participate together in this process. This is not a time for passivity, for observers, for hangers-on. We all need to step up and be seen in our uniqueness and in our unity.

This is not only a human experience. Now is the time for interspecies recognition and communication.  There may be a human family, joyous as this is – there is a far bigger life family ... a consciousness coming into being – each of us has a role to play and a gift to offer in service to the planetary cosmic consciousness we are. 

It’s a time to wake up and be awakened with no judgement, no shame.

I think Joanna Macy’s 'Work That Reconnets', the Be The Change symposium and other eco-workshops are designed to awaken people. It’s like the hero’s journey described by Joseph Campbell; or the first half of life described by Richard Rohr; or the first half of Parsifal’s quest to heal the Fisher King. Finding and falling in love is not the end of the story; persisting in love is the key that needs turning now. The Hollywood ending of romantic love is where many people are stuck believing this is it – as good as it gets! This is not it, it's not enough, nor is it the end of the road and yet still it is where many of us find ourselves today, perpetually going round the falling in love wheel – hence the fixation on youth and newness.

What we need is the post-heroic quest. We need to heal the Fisher King, find our holy grail and return to the village with our gift in service to our community - human and other than human. And this in part is why we need to sit together and listen to each others stories – to witness people’s arrival back into the village - The Return - This is why we are so sadly missing our elders. They are needed now to welcome the creative genius of youth as it ventures back from the desert, forest or wasteland into the village. For this to be done as it should it needs ritual space and a reverence for the sacred in life. 

I am a story carrier. Please come and tell me your story.

Pants!

Global warming - no further proof needed, really. There's scientific evidenced based research and then there's underwear size research. I think the pants argument wins. Fact - as some might say. Only downside to this is I've learnt my sartorial styling may be stuck somewhere between 1900's and 1950's. What does this mean, I ask myself? I'm behind the times, a late bloomer even.

Sisters ...

The perfect one and the wild goat riding one.
I tip my hat to Tatterhood.

A Bonded Pair

The wooden spoon was waving helicopter like round her head.

Meat ! Meat ! Feed me Meat !

I was yanked out into the world head gripped between forceps.

What the fuck are you doing to me people !

Riding a wild goat she rode off on her own path

No care for the thoughts or consideration of others

I was wrapped up as tightly as you can imagine, cocooned in wool

Stoically I sweltered under the burgeoning summer sun

Let’s go on an adventure she said to her sister

Into the deepest darkest woods we can find

I love you so much, little sis I’ll even share my smarties with you

Let’s run around all summer long in our little red wellies

Oldest sister marries first, you should know that

Now who is going to marry me?

Oldest and youngster sister swop rank and responsibilities

Thank the Lord she followed convention, it’s not for me.

Like chalk and cheese they both were - and yet,

Those sisters born of the same mother remain a bonded pair.

How come so such difference to the eye

Are born and surmounted by ties of blood and kinship?