Merry Christmas
Ok,
so,
it is now 2:18 am here in Michigan.
Christmas morning!
I hope everyone in the whole world is enjoying a peaceful moment as I write this. We know that is not true. We also know that the idea begins the reality.
I am typing all of this out on my Mother's computer with dial - up internet access and I only hope that this post isn't destroyed when I publish it in about 20 minutes. That is the extent of my worry at the moment. I am full of food and wine and am being inundated with messages from well-wishers via every medium available. I assume many of you may be finding yourselves in the same position over the next few days.
Rember there is almost no place for guilt in this world. Most of the time when we feel guilty it is really not ours to feel. It is ridiculous for a rich man to feel "guilt" at a poor man's poverty. In the meantime Justice is Everyone's business and I believe that many of us (in my communities anyway) have done a great job this year working against the new fronts of tyranny and criminal control in our country, but we can do more, much more and because that is true we MUST do more.
Not because we feel guilty (oh, I almost puked a little there) but because our blood boils at the sight of injustice and because we have decided to put more of ourselves on the line as we look into the dark eyes of the days to come.
You don't have to be a Christian to borrow directly from the Spiritual traditions of this Holy-Day and remeber that the best inside of each and every one of us is Light and Love and Understanding.
Combine that potential with an iron-rod-spine incapable of compromise in the face of Fear and you are a real motha fucka, motha fucka.
On that note here are a couple of gifts I created for you all while I was stranded in the airport for 6 hours on Wednesday.
"Poem of Advent"
Good morning curls halo my
head at the crack of crackling dawn
and I salute the high, golden, cock-
sure sun with last night's
wine and
the assurance of the magic
mind that lives in my own like
a Pollux and
a parasite.
We are separated by a Paradise.
It does separate us -
and it is
a Paradise.
And a new song:
"Faraway Sound"
Seen my baby walkin'
Seen her turn away
Seen my baby leave me
On a Winter's day
When a raindrop crashes to the sidewalk
it makes a tiny crown
When a teardrop crashes to the sidewalk
it makes a faraway sound
The day I met my baby
The day of the eclipse
I thought hey, Joe, maybe you should kiss those secret lips
When there's a black shadow on the sun
There's no shadow on the ground
And the shadow of your lover leaving
Makes a faraway sound
Ma cheri est la mer
Oui ma cheri est le soleil et la lune
Elle est printemps, elle est automne
Elle est septembre, elle est juin
Seen my little baby
Smiling in a Dream
Like a stack of bullets
In a black magazine
And a Dream ain't nothin' but a Slave
who's bonds have come unbound
And a Slave rushing through the rushes
makes a faraway sound
God Bless Us, Every One.
Big Love and Fierce Joy,
Joe Nolan
2 Comments:
Merry Christmas, Joe. Hope you're having fun freezing your ass off in Michigan. Lela and mom and dad and I (all say hi) are having fun freezing our asses off down here in the 'nooga. Dad and I both gave each other the Bob Dylan memoirs. Good reads, all around. See you when you get back.
--Sarah :)
Hallo Joe - Merry Christmas (again) and it's still Christmas in Hawaii for almost 4 more hours, eh?
Well, firstly - I really like the song. I can hear the faint strumming of your ukulele coming from behind the lyrics - sort of inviting and beckoning, it is . . . What a funny, oddly sexy, outdoors-y sort of instrument. (or maybe you make it seem that way)
Now . . . I was kinda wanting to broach the guilt topic.
"feelings of culpability especially for imagined offenses or from a sense of inadequacy: morbid self-reproach often manifest in marked preoccupation with the moral correctness of one's behavior" (Mirriam-Webster Medical Dictionary as taken from dictionary.com)
Humm... okay, guilt isn't a grand way to motivate oneself but MAYBE.... just maybe there is a place for it and a positive outcome, if it spurs people to act charitably when they might not ordinarily. Maybe some people don't like to think about the "big picture" or can't place themselves in the bigger picture and if guilty feelings motivate them to do good deeds - well hmmm.. maybe the rich man feels guilty because he realizes he has indirectly oppressed those less fortunate and walked on and used people to achieve his wealth. And so his guilty conscience insists that he donate a portion of his wealth to a worthy cause.
I don't know... I feel guilt quite frequently but I think it's because I don't see myself at the helm of the moral ship I should be sailing. I might be hitching a ride on it half the time but I'm certainly not yet living up to those expectations. So then... I'll hopefully channel the guilt into passion and the passion into action... but ... but the guilt started it all, eh?
Okay - well... I dunno, really. I could be talking completely out of my (nice?) ass. But anyhoo, there it is.
Post a Comment
<< Home