Sunday, April 4, 2010
Heaven in the Vortex
Oh, m' G'd, another delightful evening with the emotives. I had no idea there were places like this in the universe!
Friday, April 2, 2010
Landslide, cont.
The following is what I plan to share with the "Emotives" tomorrow night:
As the tall man advances on the small slim young woman with the large beautiful voice, it becomes an image of the desire, immediately, here and now in this moment, to create the possibility of yet another strong, young beautiful voice, encased in the flesh, flesh created here and now in the union of the flesh of these two free souls.
And what you can't see, in the audience, is that she draws this response from each and every one of you. This is how we respond in the presence of her song, this is the song of our soul: "I want to be with you, always and forever, to make this possible for our offspring." We will never once stop to consider whether that possibility is a reality. Thus my claim that she will turn you, if you are a woman, into a Lesbian. And if you are a man, your heart will become unfaithful, guaranteed.
I know what it is that he feels when he says "Brandi Carlile Brandi Carlile Brandi Carlile You've got a voice in you kid"
He means Woman, you make me, who am a Man, glad that I am a man when you sing. When I hear you sing, I want to reproduce, I want to make sure that you will always be there: a woman, before me, in song. I want to know that there will always be a Woman there. This is love, this is Man who rejoices in the presence of Woman.
Nevertheless, in spite of the foregoing, I'm certain that there is a confusion between sex and truth in our century. I think that the prevalence of "sex" in our cultural discourse has clouded the power of Truth to work its 'magic' in our lives. And therefore, my friends and coworkers assume that my obsession with the gift in the world that is Brandi Carlile is based on sex. And that woman herself, the woman who is in my life, the one I come home to, the one who is "us" when I talk about "us," does not *betray* jealousy in her assessment of my obsession with this "other" woman, but I fear that perhaps she too associates my obsession with sex.
However, I claim there is a difference between “obsession” and “seeing it.” When you "see it" you know that that is where you wish to return. And you know that if you have in fact seen truth, that it will not fade in its effect upon that return. And people who are out of practice at seeing Truth, associate your desire to return with "obsession." I've read enough Aristotle and Aquinas. We are made to behold Truth. It is the only moment we are who we were made to be.
There is a piece of writing that took place somewhere in my foggy memory, however, I have failed to discover whether that writing actually took place in the physical realm or if it was, in the words of William James, only left on an imaginary hook in an imaginary museum. A cleaner way of describing it is, that, I'm not sure if I wrote it, and if I did, I can't find it.
So this is, an attempt, in the light of the preceding, to resurrect it.
I have wandered, lost, in this world for many years. I have never experienced before the feeling of the land beneath your feet falling away. I understand this is what they feel-those who have survived an earthquake. I never thought that "Church", a place I lived for years on end, would ever enter the world of my mind-and my heart- again after I walked away. I never knew that Holy Silence would draw me into it's cleansing orb again. I never knew that the voice would be wrested from me and the thousands of others in the same room at the same moment. I recognized the silence we inhabited because of those years of experience. We were all inhabiting it at that moment. It was a silence I had lived with for years. It is a silence held naturally by the creature in the presence of the holy, so that I, a mere mortal, can hear every sound that is made by the Holy Presence. This is how human beings respond to holiness. With silence. And I declare to you now that the land slid away beneath the pure and holy notes that arose from that place. We would have-had we been able-fallen to our knees. We would have wept. We did weep. Those of us who saw what we saw, who heard what we heard. And we are sharing this with you now, so that our joy may be complete.
Silence engulfs the crowd the silent response possesses the crowd. That which we have seen, that which we have heard. That before whom we fall to our knees in silent and reverential awe. We are writing this to you so that our joy may be complete.
We came to this place knowing we would see beauty, we joined together expecting to hear joy. But the silence into which we fell, the weight of unworthiness that returned us to our seats, the respect we held before her, and the natural relinquishment of honor that took us from our feet, that is what engulfed us.
Had it been Church, we would have knelt, in absolute silence of awe we would have worshipped at this fountain, we would have communed at this distillation of beauty and truth. As it was, we responded with all the secular respect and awe we could muster.
The tears we shed were a natural response to the fulfillment of our most treasured and deepest hopes. We held hands tightly so as to preserve and to share for as long as possible this sacred and holy moment.
As the notes were rising and falling, as the soul of our goddess soared in song in the sweet and silent night. As our tears rose in response to the rare and religious rendition of this song from childhood.
Perhaps we joined hands to complete the peace that this song had brought us throughout the troubled days of our youth. Perhaps we joined in solidarity with that white Welsh Witch whose Wild Heart sang the notes of our own lonely stories. We knew that here we had returned to the sacred place where beauty is created, where youth is recovered.
As the tall man advances on the small slim young woman with the large beautiful voice, it becomes an image of the desire, immediately, here and now in this moment, to create the possibility of yet another strong, young beautiful voice, encased in the flesh, flesh created here and now in the union of the flesh of these two free souls.
And what you can't see, in the audience, is that she draws this response from each and every one of you. This is how we respond in the presence of her song, this is the song of our soul: "I want to be with you, always and forever, to make this possible for our offspring." We will never once stop to consider whether that possibility is a reality. Thus my claim that she will turn you, if you are a woman, into a Lesbian. And if you are a man, your heart will become unfaithful, guaranteed.
I know what it is that he feels when he says "Brandi Carlile Brandi Carlile Brandi Carlile You've got a voice in you kid"
He means Woman, you make me, who am a Man, glad that I am a man when you sing. When I hear you sing, I want to reproduce, I want to make sure that you will always be there: a woman, before me, in song. I want to know that there will always be a Woman there. This is love, this is Man who rejoices in the presence of Woman.
Nevertheless, in spite of the foregoing, I'm certain that there is a confusion between sex and truth in our century. I think that the prevalence of "sex" in our cultural discourse has clouded the power of Truth to work its 'magic' in our lives. And therefore, my friends and coworkers assume that my obsession with the gift in the world that is Brandi Carlile is based on sex. And that woman herself, the woman who is in my life, the one I come home to, the one who is "us" when I talk about "us," does not *betray* jealousy in her assessment of my obsession with this "other" woman, but I fear that perhaps she too associates my obsession with sex.
However, I claim there is a difference between “obsession” and “seeing it.” When you "see it" you know that that is where you wish to return. And you know that if you have in fact seen truth, that it will not fade in its effect upon that return. And people who are out of practice at seeing Truth, associate your desire to return with "obsession." I've read enough Aristotle and Aquinas. We are made to behold Truth. It is the only moment we are who we were made to be.
There is a piece of writing that took place somewhere in my foggy memory, however, I have failed to discover whether that writing actually took place in the physical realm or if it was, in the words of William James, only left on an imaginary hook in an imaginary museum. A cleaner way of describing it is, that, I'm not sure if I wrote it, and if I did, I can't find it.
So this is, an attempt, in the light of the preceding, to resurrect it.
I have wandered, lost, in this world for many years. I have never experienced before the feeling of the land beneath your feet falling away. I understand this is what they feel-those who have survived an earthquake. I never thought that "Church", a place I lived for years on end, would ever enter the world of my mind-and my heart- again after I walked away. I never knew that Holy Silence would draw me into it's cleansing orb again. I never knew that the voice would be wrested from me and the thousands of others in the same room at the same moment. I recognized the silence we inhabited because of those years of experience. We were all inhabiting it at that moment. It was a silence I had lived with for years. It is a silence held naturally by the creature in the presence of the holy, so that I, a mere mortal, can hear every sound that is made by the Holy Presence. This is how human beings respond to holiness. With silence. And I declare to you now that the land slid away beneath the pure and holy notes that arose from that place. We would have-had we been able-fallen to our knees. We would have wept. We did weep. Those of us who saw what we saw, who heard what we heard. And we are sharing this with you now, so that our joy may be complete.
Silence engulfs the crowd the silent response possesses the crowd. That which we have seen, that which we have heard. That before whom we fall to our knees in silent and reverential awe. We are writing this to you so that our joy may be complete.
We came to this place knowing we would see beauty, we joined together expecting to hear joy. But the silence into which we fell, the weight of unworthiness that returned us to our seats, the respect we held before her, and the natural relinquishment of honor that took us from our feet, that is what engulfed us.
Had it been Church, we would have knelt, in absolute silence of awe we would have worshipped at this fountain, we would have communed at this distillation of beauty and truth. As it was, we responded with all the secular respect and awe we could muster.
The tears we shed were a natural response to the fulfillment of our most treasured and deepest hopes. We held hands tightly so as to preserve and to share for as long as possible this sacred and holy moment.
As the notes were rising and falling, as the soul of our goddess soared in song in the sweet and silent night. As our tears rose in response to the rare and religious rendition of this song from childhood.
Perhaps we joined hands to complete the peace that this song had brought us throughout the troubled days of our youth. Perhaps we joined in solidarity with that white Welsh Witch whose Wild Heart sang the notes of our own lonely stories. We knew that here we had returned to the sacred place where beauty is created, where youth is recovered.
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