Ignorance Is A Bullet, Have Mercy On Us Everyone

(thanks Johnette Napolitano)

What happened to the dreams of a girl president
She's dancing in the video next to 50 Cent
They travel in packs of two or three
With their itsy bitsy doggies and their teeny-weeny tees
Where, oh where, have the smart people gone?
Oh where, oh where could they be? ...

Disease's growing, it's epidemic
I'm scared that there ain't a cure
The world believes it and I'm going crazy
I cannot take any more
I'm so glad that I'll never fit in
That will never be me
Outcasts and girls with ambition
That's what I wanna see

~”Stupid Girls,” by Pink

"Punks are running wild in the streets and nobody anywhere seems to know what to do and there's no end to it. It’s like everything everywhere is going crazy so we don’t go out anymore, we sit in the house and slowly the world we're living in is getting smaller and all we say is please and please leave us alone in our living rooms, just leave us alone.

Well I’m not going to leave you alone."

~”We’re Only Gonna Die For Our Own Arrogance,” by Bad Religion (Skunk Records Version)

So, here we are in the Age of Anti-Reason, an age of raging, proud, fierce ignorance.  In America.  The Trumpets tell us it is ok to be uncivil, uninformed, undisciplined, out-of-control.  Decorum?  What’s that?  Civility?  What’s that?  Knowledge?  What’s that?

And, what does it sound like?  I know it is a chorus led by a man of non-sequiturs, of nonsense, the ultimate, consummate narcissist.  It is a chorus led by a man full of sound and fury, signifying nothing—I am so sorry Will—except the amplification, the inflammation of rage looking for a place to land, to do damage, to let out the demons of disappointment and an easy, more comfortable way to deal with anger through blame and the lowest, most base expression of it.

Because anger is sexy.  It is easy.  It can make us feel falsely powerful. And, the ultimate deceiver that it is, it is most inviting to those who would rather not read, reflect, think. It is base reaction. It is far harder to dive deeper into the layers of the much more intolerable and important feelings it masks.  Like feelings of regret, insecurity, fear.  Regret that we might not have made better choices in our lives when we had them before us.  Regret that we did not, perhaps, get better educated, use our time to look under the covers of our troubled selves and ask harder questions that would make us feel vulnerable—sometimes unbearably so—and, in so doing, allow unknown doors within us to open and allow in the light that makes us—and all things—grow.  It is often a defensive reaction, this anger. If we are insecure, afraid, it may make us feel less so—momentarily.  If it were the cure, we would be healed once we expressed it.  In healthy acknowledgements and expressions of anger, it can be. But when it is an anger that cannot be assuaged, it is something else entirely.  It is corrosive.  It grows with incitement.  And not a thing gets better.  Being more reflective, deliberate, open, vulnerable is scary, indeed.  But, I know no braver way to face and progress through challenges, hurt, fear than to do exactly this.

I have read too much, seen too much, heard too much unbridled anger and ignorance in this way-too-long election cycle.  Brutal and bruising campaigns are nothing new in American politics, but this one takes the cake.  But, hanging back as I have for over a year before coming to this page, I have got to say, now, I want to be the girl with the most cake.  I want to plunge my hands in up to my elbows and pull it away from the gluttons feasting on it while our democracy starves for higher, better discourse.

I am sickened by the hateful rhetoric not only of the Trump campaign, but of the comments I read and hear in social media and just walking around in the real world.  I hear the repetition of insults, mis- and dis-information, lies, and a frightening rejection of facts and civility.  To those guilty of this behavior I say, Trump’s words do not fit well in your mouths.  They don’t fit well in anyone’s mouth.  Do not just swallow, regurgitate, and repeat.  As sentient beings, it is worth a little time to think, get better informed, and reject—even if you support Donald Trump—the way in which he speaks.  Being thoughtful is no crime. 

A family friend posted comments on Facebook last night that were embarrassingly ill-informed.  She wrote that “Killary” is causing great racial divide, hates whites and police officers, and that this “Isn’t what Martin Luther King wanted.”  She went on to say that King wanted to unite us, like her candidate, Donald Trump.  To her and those who think she wrote something brilliant I say, “People, I have read Dr. King’s speeches, books about him, the Civil Rights Movement, seen hours of film footage that, when strung together over my lifetime spans weeks, months.  I know Dr. King’s stances on policing, poverty, and political realities of his time that still plague ours. I admire Dr. King and his eloquence and non-violence, his call for peaceful and meaningful dialogues.  I love Dr. King.  People, your candidate is no Dr. King.”

The posting went into other postings that stated Muslims are killing Christians—in some Muslim countries that is happening—but never told the further truth that these extreme crazies are killing other Muslims in greater number than any other religious group.  If you have some background knowledge of religion’s role in war, torture, the utter subjugation of women and others who do not follow that particular religion, you would know the subject is vast in scope, and no religion—except, perhaps, Buddhism—

            comes away unsullied.  

                       

The postings continued to include that Trump did not leave thousands of U.S.  troops in Benghazi to be slaughtered and that “Killary”/"Crooked Hillary" did.  Really?  I was unaware of our vast invasion of Benghazi.  Probably because there was none. (And, while there were and continue to be mistaken nods to Secretary Clinton as Commander-in-Chief, she could not have sent troops anywhere as Secretary of State).  Now, when you put stuff out on social media, you ought to fact-check before you do so, because people with more knowledge can call you out on it.  In fact, facts don’t seem to matter so much in this political season.  But, they matter to me.  And when more well-informed responses are made to vastly uninformed commentary, the request that others not exercise their 1^st Amendment right and stop commenting to the posts is intolerable to me.  As Voltaire said, and I closely paraphrase, “I may disagree with what you say, but I would die for your right to say it.”  You see, it is rights such as our 1^st Amendment that make us great. That is not a slogan on a hat.  That comes from one of the greatest political documents in history: the Bill of Rights.  (And, one more thing about the Benghazi matter: requests for additional security to our embassies were made by Secretary of State Clinton and were denied by our Republican Congress.  In the Republican sequester that cut funding in so many areas, our nation has suffered terribly.  In Benghazi, the sequester, and Republican obstruction to all-things-Obama, proved lethal).  Ignorance is a bullet.  If it gets Trump elected, have mercy on us, everyone.

Change.   People want change.  I get that.  I want change, too. But it matters very much what kind of change to support.  You know, it’s funny that so few cannot see the change right in front of them—an epic, historical change: the first woman to become President of the United States of America; the first woman to hold the most powerful office in the world.  Now, that is change.  It would be a paradigmatic and seismic shift unlike any other in history. And that makes many uneasy.  Like Vladimir Putin.  I think we should question loudly and often why a dictator such as Putin does not want to see Hillary Clinton become president, or, why he wants to see Trump win the election.  I have a theory:  Putin would be able to swiftly—and with supreme confidence—take advantage of Donald Trump.  He entertains no great optimism of taking advantage of Hillary Clinton.  In fact, the world of awful dictators and subjugators of women fear the direct, even perhaps immediate, effects a Hillary Clinton presidency would bring.  Imagine the possibilities:  the emboldening of repressed women around the globe, the demand for greater human rights in patriarchal countries that stone, beat, humiliate, imprison women for wanting basic human rights.  Yes, the patriarchy is shaking in their shoes.  Even patriarchal Americans cannot wrap their heads around what the prospect of our first female president would do to their entitled sensibilities.  So, yes, the greatest change I can think of bringing to America and the world is President Hillary Rodham Clinton.  I wonder if many women in America are questioning why a brilliant, accomplished woman has to work so much harder to gain support and trust than a woefully uninformed man.  Oh, wait…I forgot.  That is the reality of the female experience in every field—and it is as powerfully at work today as it ever has been. 

Many women do not remember, or perhaps ever knew, there was a Women’s Movement.  Some Blacks, thankfully lesser-so, don’t seem to grasp the unbelievable fight for equal rights, equal justice under the law that was the Civil Rights Movement and continues to be a fight today (and, yes, equal, civil rights and equal justice for all includes our LGBT community, Mike Pence); and some Hispanics may fail to remember Cesar Chavez.  And a too-large portion of all American voters don’t know or remember much at all.  Yes.  This is the cost of the dumbing-down of our country.  It is exactly like that old adage:  “If you think education is too expensive, try ignorance.”     If there are punks running wild and rough-shod over our country, it is that 1/10^th of 1 percent.  And all those who would rather remain ignorant.  Are we really as stupid as polls suggest?  Are we really as bigoted?  Are we really as indecent, uncivil, and obscenely ill-informed in such great number? 

Well, we can’t be stupid any longer.

Hillary stated something during the first debate that has not garnered the attention it deserves:  Words matter.  Words ought to be measured and precise.  Words ought to be deliberate and well thought out before they are spoken.  Because language is power as surely as knowledge is power.  “In the Beginning was The Word…and The Word was God…” I love language.  I understand its power.  Now, I feel something coming on, something welling up inside of me, and…I am going to—quite deliberately and with great forethought—use the “F-word.”  Get ready.  Here it comes.  I am a feminist.  FEMINIST.  Yes, I am.  I believe in the advancement, opportunity, and equal protection under the law of women. You see, there is nothing obscene about that.  This much-maligned “F-word” has been redefined by those who love the status quo, those afraid of powerful women.  Why else would patriarchy be so prevalent, so ancient, so brutal if women represented no threat?  In Hillary we have a powerful, intelligent, accomplished, incredibly well and deeply informed woman who can rock the world in a very, very good way.  I believe.  I believe.  Indeed I do.  And, at this most important, revolutionary time in our lives, our nation, our world, I call for change, too.  Elect Hillary Clinton to the presidency, and that is just what we will get.

I just have two more words for you of great power, great import that await their place on my lips:  Madame President.

~Joan

Gratitude For Beauty Among The Ruins

Gratitude For Beauty Among The Ruins

“…In a world so hard and dirty

So foul and so confused

Looking for a little of God’s mercy

I found living proof…”

                                                                        “Living Proof,” by Bruce Springsteen

            It is night.  It is quiet.  I am watching Karen.  She is not watching me.  She is at the computer.  On the screen is a partial family tree of her family.  I look at the screen.  Words in innocent font have an unimaginable power:

            “Auschwitz”

            “Married”

            “Father”

            “Mother”

            “Brother”

            “Son”

            “Poland”

            “1942”

I look at Karen.  Her face bears the weight of loss, of inhumanity.  It is an heroic face. The face of my wife paying homage to her loved ones lost at the hands of evil incarnate.  The face of one bearing eternal witness.  It is quiet. The silence has a decibel level of its own.  History and horror ring in my ears.  I am crying.  She does not see me.  She is seeing in her mind’s eye what no one should see.  On her lap is a Polish dictionary.  She is working to interpret the birth, the marriage records of her family.  The death records, too.  In neat boxes, they connect through time to her.  I want them to know her. I want them to know they will live on because of her.  I love her more than I thought I could love.  She is the beauty among the ruins.

She switches screens.  I see scanned photos appear.  The creases and worn edges cut me.  And, my heart is both proud and breaking when I see her face in those of the lost.  My mind goes where no mind should go.  Into the lines of the terrorized.  Into the world of stark black and white.  And, at the most unbearable point, I turn away.  Because I see Karen walking in those lines.  In Poland.  In Auschwitz.  And I want to do something, stop everything, protect and defend and save.  And I can do none of it.  But, I see Karen.  I see love in the work to figure out a Polish word.  I see grace and dignity.  I see my wife.  And I am grateful for this beauty among the ruins.

The Joy-Suckers Suck Club

The Joy-Suckers Suck Club

" O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock
The meat it feeds on…"

~William Shakespeare~ “Othello,” Act 3.3., Lines 163-165

“Do Unto Others As You would Have Them Do Unto You”

                                                                     ~The Golden Rule, The Bible

³ And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

~Matthew 7:3     The Bible,  King James Version (KJV)

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. 

                                                                                                  ~Edmund Burke

 ____________________________________

     Welcome to the Joy-Suckers Suck Club.  This is not the way I had planned to spend a blissful Sunday morning, BUT, negativity is epidemic, envy and insolence are the cudgels of the self-loathing, and this world, this space is mine, too, so, here I go: I love the freedom of speech—and the entire 1^st amendment— passionately, and, like Voltaire, I might hate what some say, but I would defend to the extreme their right to say it; yet, it is my role as a citizen of a world I would like to make a kinder place that I, too, exercise my rights, and use my voice, my writing as a candle I choose to light for those who wallow in the depths of darkness.

     What brought this on?  The joy-sucking haters of beautiful, gentle people whose attacks must not be borne in silence.  Here’s the deal:  Some Kelle Hampton Haters—a.k.a. Joy-Suckers—decided to launch pages of epic illness against her, AND—a most serious tactical error, indeed, on their part—my cousin.  My family asked Kelle if she would visit my cousin while she was celebrating a significant birthday in Florida.  Kelle did, and a most lovely day was had by all. Then the Joy-Suckers siege began.  Comments savaging both of them came in the thousands.

Now, if you aim to hurt good people, you deserve what you are about to get.  If you are foolish enough—and I don’t suffer fools gladly—to attack Kelle and my family, then, GAME ON. 

What is it with you people?  Have you nothing better to do than spew as you do?  Does no one love you?  Have you never loved?  Are you so poor in soul and heart that you have nothing good to share?  Are you bereft of simple kindness because you never went to therapy to work out your issues?  Do your envy, desire, and acts to twist and pervert goodness feed your ailing souls? I feel sorry for all of you; I really do. You all are like Shakespeare’s exquisite embodiment of evil in the character of Iago.  Yes, you are Iagos, destroyers of love and goodness.  And, as much as I feel sorry for you, you must be held accountable for the body-blows you rain on positivity and random acts of kindness:

1.     Try reading good books.  They will give you something positive to do with your lives, your misguided energies, and will bolster your meager self-esteem.

2.     If you cannot manage number 1, and see yourselves as the self-appointed judges of others—or, worse yet—those who believe your attacks are sanctioned by God or whatever you call Right, try walking on water or join ISIS jihadis who believe as you do.  I hear they need people just like you.  As we do not, you may find satisfaction going where you will be most welcome and appreciated for destroying what is good in the world. And, in case you are wondering, they even accept women.

3.     If neither number 1 nor 2 seem like a good fit for your particular skill set, and you do not wish to see light and positivity, wanting instead to stay your course, then perhaps you could draw a bath, plug into an electrical outlet your laptops, and get in the tub.  Since you are already high and mighty, maybe you will be proved right.  If so, you could then contact the National Institute of Science and be featured in an article, which would give you the attention you so crave.  Just a thought.

And I’m just saying this:  the world has a plethora of Joy-Suckers.  The world needs more people like Kelle and my cousin.  Since you cannot even hope to compare, take pleasure in the ultimate sin of reveling in being part of the problem and not the solution.

Ragged, needy souls, I will pray for you.  But, I do think an understanding therapist just might do more for you than prayers.

Next time you want to attack Kelle or my cousin, CYBER BULLIES, think again, and remember this:  I am now your adversary.  And I have goodness on my side.  I’m also from Brooklyn. Read into that what you will.

She Moves In Mysterious Ways

           

“…take a walk
With your sister the moon
Let her pale light in
To fill up your room
You've been living underground
Eating from a can
You've been running away
From what you don't understand...
Love…

… take a dive
With your sister in the rain
Let her talk about the things
You can't explain
To touch is to heal
To hurt is to steal
If you want to kiss the sky
Better learn how to kneel…

She's the wave
She turns the tide…

It's all right, it's all right, it's all right
She moves in mysterious ways
It's all right, it's all right, it's all right
She moves in mysterious ways
Love
It's all right, it's all right, it's all right
lift my days, light up my nights
Love

One day you will look... back
And you'll see... where
You were held... how
By this love... while
You could stand there
You could move on this moment
Follow this feeling

It's all right, it's all right, it's all right
She moves in mysterious ways
It's all right, it's all right, it's all right
She moves in mysterious ways…

 

The spirit moves in mysterious ways...

 

“She Moves In Mysterious Ways” – U-2

            I know I could be expected to write on the coup in Egypt, the messes and misses of the world, but, today, I take a departure.  One I need to take more often. One from bombast and bad language thrown at far flung places and people who detract from beauty and justice.  Today, I want to write about Nella Cordelia Hampton and her mom, Kelle Hampton.  Because both of them move me in mysterious and beautiful ways. In fact, their whole family does.

            Kelle Hampton, for those who don’t know her, is the mother of three beautiful children, a writer and photographer, a lover.  A lover of life in all its pastels and shades of gray.  She became famous when her sister posted Nella’s birth story.  Nella has Down Syndrome.  Kelle’s beatific journey is captured in gorgeous photographs and words on her own blog.  My wonderful cousin Maria, my soul mate and greatest nurturer, turned me on to this woman, her life, her PERSPECTIVE (and yes, that does deserve to be capitalized).  I want to thank my cousin because, yes, we all need perspective, and the transformative beauty that Kelle provides.  Yes, they move me in mysterious ways.

            Kelle, my cousin tells me, has some detractors.  Because she chooses to love and live fully, to see and embrace beauty where others would only see and embrace heartache, she has haters.  I am told they even have web sites where they bash her. I will not go there because I would resurrect Tony Soprano, may he rest in peace, and go Mafia all over them.  Why do that?  If they choose to spread shit, thick on, like a peanut butter sandwich that would choke rather than nourish, with nothing to wash it down, I can choose to eat manna from Kelle.  If offered on a menu, which would you choose?

            I can see why some might think Kelle is smoking crack, that she is full of hippie-dippie hokum, that she cannot possibly be so full of grace and love, that she cannot choose to be happy because, after all, how many of us are happy?  Know that it can—and MUST—be a choice?  Understand that you can choose to breathe in beauty, or continue to choke on the smoke of your own inner incinerator that feeds off your soul?  Yes, it is hard to make choices and easy to let life drown you.  I would rather be baptized by the waves that Kelle makes than to drown.  For those water-boarders out there, those haters, I say,  “ You can kill time and injure eternity with your hateful rhetoric, but you will not waste mine, my time, my moments here, each one passing leaving fewer to find the gold in a vein running through gray rock, the silver in the lining of magnificent and scary storm clouds, but, more to Kelle’s point, and mine, the majestic, the glorious in the everyday, every-little-thing-she-does-is-magic world we can all choose to live in.”  Kelle says, “…there is magic in that extra chromosome.  Yes, magic.”  She is right.  Nella is magic.  Kelle could have made her existence tragic for everyone in her life.  Instead, she makes Nella’s existence a gift to everyone who will accept it.  If offered to you, would you take a beautiful gift or the shit sandwich?  I would take the gift, eat it like a holy offering, eat it like ice cream running down a child’s chin, with sprinkles all over the place, bathe in it, throw it all over my walls like a Jackson Pollock creation, roll around on the warm, beautified earth, and be satiated.

            To be sure, and very clear, Kelle does not live in a fantasy.  She creates the wonder, discovers it in everything she experiences, but does not fool herself that life is always beautiful.  In fact, she writhes in pain, struggles like all of us, only she puts it out there to be taken in, if one wishes, to be instructive, to be inspirational, to give us all a little window that does not only frame hope, it gives us a way to it, a portal through which to grab it, hungrily, honestly, as the mere mortals that we are.  And, as in Yeats’s poem, The Second Coming, there is nothing “mere” about being mortal, being here.

            Let’s be honest.  We are all experts in hate.  We know it intimately.  We see it on every news broadcast, in every paper, in the too-hard-to-take cruelty toward animals, the elderly, the poor, the ill, the earth.  But what about love?  Philosophers have struggled mightily to define it.  Everyone looks for it.  Many complain they cannot find it.  How many more “Christian Mingle,” “E-Harmony,” or “Match.Com” ads do we have to see to know the desperation?   Well, love is within and all around us.  If we choose to see it, reach in and grab it, wrap our arms around it.  If you love your kids, nieces, nephews, any kid, actually, what is more important—allowing them joy by splashing around in mud, getting sand in your grout work, glittering your hair, your food, your floors—or, keeping your house pristine, the mess unallowed, as the kids nurture deprivation and Mr. Clean gets rich?  Well, love is messy.  Joy is messy.  Living fully is messy.  It’s Mr. Clean or happier kids.  It’s a little more work to get to love.  Is any journey straight and neat?  Are there no stones or bends or boulders in the road? It’s the rocks and the road, the stumbles, falls, and scars or the not going, the not striving, the not living at all. If offered the choice, which would you take?  Do you only see the muddy, stony, scary forest, and not the beautiful tangles and trees making trellises of light to hang memories on?   “What’s your focus?” as Kelle says.

            I spent hours yesterday reveling in Nella, Kelle, their family, their lives.  I found her to be more honest than I can sometimes dare to be.  So, what brought me to Kelle?  Well, here’s some honesty.  I feel so broken by the world sometimes. I was talking to Maria about pain. She directed me to Kelle's lovely blog.  I began to feel the heal.

           I love broken things, broken kids, broken people.  Because I am one.  But, I got help and made a tapestry out of my own shatterings, one as beautiful to me as the Unicorns that hang in the Metropolitan Museum.

So, I went in pain to Maria, to whom I always go for everything.  Maria knew just what to do.  She told me I had a choice about how to see things, how to deal with painful fractures of the heart.   Be the bigger person always or as often as you can. Choose happiness,  Choose love. We spent nearly five hours on the phone, she reading Kelle to me, me crying, and headache and all, going to my computer to see the beauty she was relating.

            Yesterday was Independence Day in more ways than one.  I spent the day with Kelle and her family.  I spent the day looking at pictures of Nella.  I spent the day flying free, with beautiful words and pictures taking me on a wonderful journey.  I spent the day in Nella’s almond eyes, feeling the softness of imperfection so perfect, I cried with gratitude for so much beauty.

I spent the day falling in love.

Thank you, Maria, my great, great love, and Kelle, her family, and, most of all, Nella.  I slept in your eyes, Nellabean, your smile, seeing your little pink hands and knitted hats, your too-small-to-be-possible socks and feet in my dreams. You are the wave of grace who turned the tide.
You move me in the most beautiful ways.

           

'Jihadis' Everywhere, Listen Up

“…Poor poor pitiful me
Poor poor pitiful me
Oh these boys won't let me be
Lord have mercy on me
Woe woe is me

Well I met a man out in Hollywood [wherever]
Now I ain't naming names
Well he really worked me over good
Just like Jesse James
Yes he really worked me over good
He was a credit to his gender
Put me through some changes Lord
Sort of like a Waring blender…”

“Poor, Poor Pitiful Me” – Warren Zevon

            …And, woe, woe, woe are WE.  Is God, Allah, Yahwey.  Is Islam.  Are Muslims, Christians, Jews, everyone.  Are the good.  TO “JIHADIS” EVERYWHERE, LISTEN UP:

You are not Muslims.  You hurt Islam.  You hurt God.  You hurt all the Prophets. ANY “JIHAD” MUST BE AGAINST YOU; FOR YOU ARE THE TRUE ENEMIES OF ISLAM, OF GOD, OF LOVE; FOR GOD IS LOVE, IS CREATION, NOT DESTRUCTION.  STOP MISINTERPRETING THE QU’RAN.  STOP INSINUATING YOUR POVERTY OF THOUGHT, “REASON,” HATRED INTO THE WORDS OF MUHAMMED, INTO THE “INTENTIONS” OF GOD.  YOU ARE A BLIGHT UPON GOD’S WORLD.   YOU DO NOT “DEFEND” ISLAM.  YOU HURT ISLAM AND OUR MUSLIM BROTHERS AND SISTERS EVERYWHERE.  YOU HURT EVERYONE AND ALL RELIGIONS.  YOU DEFILE CREATION WITH YOUR DESTRUCTION.  YOU HURT GOD.

            Radicalization.  It used to mean “becoming extreme, radical in ideology,” NOT “mission creep” into violent action.  THERE IS NO “MISSION” BUT THE ONE “RE-WRITERS” of the QU’RAN are creating to feel powerful, act out their hatreds, the unhealed wounds of sick psyches, USING YOU AS THEIR INSTRUMENTS.  The only thing “FUNDAMENTAL” about the wrongly used term “FUNDAMENTALIST” is the fundamental crack in the mental foundations of those who would act heinously against anyone in the name of any religion.  This includes crazies who call themselves “Christians,” who go blow up abortion clinics.

IF THESE BOYS WON’T LET YOU BE, IF ANYONE IS TELLING YOU THEY HEAR GOD TELLING THEM TO RECRUIT PEOPLE TO DO HARM, YOU MUST, MUST KNOW THEY ARE MENTALLY ILL AND NEED MEDICATION, NOT PROLIFERATION OF THEIR PROFANE IDEAS THEY WANT YOU TO ACTUALIZE, TO ACT OUT.

IF YOU ARE ANGRY, LOST, GO TO THERAPY, DO NOT SEEK OUT THOSE WHO WOULD PLAY TO YOUR BASEST INSTINCTS. SEEK PEACE.  IF YOU SEEK SOME KIND OF VENGEANCE YOU WRONGLY PROSCRIBE TO ANY RELIGION, UNDERSTAND THAT THE HOLY BOOKS OF ALL THE MAJOR RELIGIONS STATE THAT “GOD SAYS, ‘VENGEANCE IS MINE,’” NOT YOURS. THERE ARE OTHER GREAT TRUTHS THAT ALL MAJOR RELIGIONS AND SANE PEOPLE ASCRIBE TO:  “THOU SHALT NOT KILL…  LOVE THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF…IF YOU SEE A MOTE IN ANOTHER’S EYE, LOOK INTO YOUR OWN…HE WHO IS WITHOUT SIN, CAST THE FIRST STONE…”

NO ONE, NO RELIGION, NO IDEOLOGY IS SERVED BY VIOLENCE.  IF YOU ACT VIOLENTLY IN THE NAME OF ANY RELIGION OR PHILOSOPHY, YOU ACT AGAINST YOURSELVES AND ALL OTHERS.

In other words, your actions backfire.  And all you serve to do is unleash an UNGODLY moment of anarchy, and God weeps.  As the great poet, William Butler Yeats, said in his poem, “Second Coming,”

           

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity…”

…The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”

We are all tempest-tossed, turning and turning in the widening gyre.  We all have tear-stained, broken dreams.  We all are hurt, are human, are vulnerable.  In our human condition, our pain, and, through our vulnerability, we learn lessons, find strength, hope, faith, and we go on.  We suffer dreams deferred or defeated--yours as well as ours.  We all suffer when one among us, among humanity suffers.  We suffer for the women who are raped, beaten, burned, killed.  We suffer for the men, women, and children in poverty, in hunger, in danger, in despair, in ALL countries.  We suffer over injustice.  BUT, WE ACT IN CONSTRUCTIVE WAYS TO SEEK HEALING, ALLEVIATION.  WE DO NOT BOMB, MAIM, DESTROY. DO NOT CONFUSE US—EVERYWHERE, ANYWHERE—WITH THE ACTIONS OF GOVERNMENTS; FOR WE ARE INDIVIDUALS WORKING COLLECTIVELY, PEACEABLY FOR JUSTICE AND PEACE, UNIVERSALLY.

Yes, the worst ARE full of passionate intensity.  Read “worst” as all of those whose “convictions” wreak havoc:  Republicans, Evangelists, “Crusaders” for anything against humanity, the human condition, and who all seem to co-opt GOD as their back-up guy.  YOU.  We cannot afford, nor must we allow, mere anarchy to be loosed upon the world.  We will not swim in blood-dimmed tides.  We will all be bloodied by the acts of those with such HUBRIS as to think they know what God wants.  What you, politicians, evangelists, extremists, “jihadis” want is POWER, and it is more illusion, delusion than real.  True power is not pitched to a wail.  It does not need to be.  It can be quiet.  It can be humble.  It can only be humane, as it must be just.

The Poverty of Power.  Those seeking it are in need.  Those trying to hold it are in the grasp of the elusive.  And centuries of sleep, the “not knowing” of the kind of evil that wants to be all-powerful, that steals children, that makes them forget their humanity, their place, a holier, humane purpose to life, has been vexed to nightmare by the rocking cradle you once lay in, rough beast, until you grew into ability, and went stumbling to Hell, not Bethlehem.

Poor, Poor Pitiful You.

The Poverty Of Power

“…Poor poor pitiful me
Poor poor pitiful me
Oh these boys won't let me be
Lord have mercy on me
Woe woe is me

Well I met a man out in Hollywood [wherever]
Now I ain't naming names
Well he really worked me over good
Just like Jesse James
Yes he really worked me over good
He was a credit to his gender
Put me through some changes Lord
Sort of like a Waring blender…”

“Poor, Poor Pitiful Me” – Warren Zevon

            …And, woe, woe, woe are WE.  Is God, Allah, Yahwey.  Is Islam.  Are Muslims, Christians, Jews, everyone.  Are the good.  TO “JIHADIS” EVERYWHERE, LISTEN UP:

You are not Muslims.  You hurt Islam.  You hurt God.  You hurt all the Prophets. ANY “JIHAD” MUST BE AGAINST YOU; FOR YOU ARE THE TRUE ENEMIES OF ISLAM, OF GOD, OF LOVE; FOR GOD IS LOVE, IS CREATION, NOT DESTRUCTION.  STOP MISINTERPRETING THE QU’RAN.  STOP INSINUATING YOUR POVERTY OF THOUGHT, “REASON,” HATRED INTO THE WORDS OF MUHAMMED, INTO THE “INTENTIONS” OF GOD.  YOU ARE A BLIGHT UPON GOD’S WORLD.   YOU DO NOT “DEFEND” ISLAM.  YOU HURT ISLAM AND OUR MUSLIM BROTHERS AND SISTERS EVERYWHERE.  YOU HURT EVERYONE AND ALL RELIGIONS.  YOU DEFILE CREATION WITH YOUR DESTRUCTION.  YOU HURT GOD.

            Radicalization.  It used to mean “becoming extreme, radical in ideology,” NOT “mission creep” into violent action.  THERE IS NO “MISSION” BUT THE ONE “RE-WRITERS” of the QU’RAN are creating to feel powerful, act out their hatreds, the unhealed wounds of sick psyches, USING YOU AS THEIR INSTRUMENTS.  The only thing “FUNDAMENTAL” about the wrongly used term “FUNDAMENTALIST” is the fundamental crack in the mental foundations of those who would act heinously against anyone in the name of any religion.  This includes crazies who call themselves “Christians,” who go blow up abortion clinics.

IF THESE BOYS WON’T LET YOU BE, IF ANYONE IS TELLING YOU THEY HEAR GOD TELLING THEM TO RECRUIT PEOPLE TO DO HARM, YOU MUST, MUST KNOW THEY ARE MENTALLY ILL AND NEED MEDICATION, NOT PROLIFERATION OF THEIR PROFANE IDEAS THEY WANT YOU TO ACTUALIZE, TO ACT OUT.

IF YOU ARE ANGRY, LOST, GO TO THERAPY, DO NOT SEEK OUT THOSE WHO WOULD PLAY TO YOUR BASEST INSTINCTS. SEEK PEACE.  IF YOU SEEK SOME KIND OF VENGEANCE YOU WRONGLY PROSCRIBE TO ANY RELIGION, UNDERSTAND THAT THE HOLY BOOKS OF ALL THE MAJOR RELIGIONS STATE THAT “GOD SAYS, ‘VENGEANCE IS MINE,’” NOT YOURS. THERE ARE OTHER GREAT TRUTHS THAT ALL MAJOR RELIGIONS AND SANE PEOPLE ASCRIBE TO:  “THOU SHALT NOT KILL…  LOVE THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF…IF YOU SEE A MOTE IN ANOTHER’S EYE, LOOK INTO YOUR OWN…HE WHO IS WITHOUT SIN, CAST THE FIRST STONE…”

NO ONE, NO RELIGION, NO IDEOLOGY IS SERVED BY VIOLENCE.  IF YOU ACT VIOLENTLY IN THE NAME OF ANY RELIGION OR PHILOSOPHY, YOU ACT AGAINST YOURSELVES AND ALL OTHERS.

In other words, your actions backfire.  And all you serve to do is unleash an UNGODLY moment of anarchy, and God weeps.  As the great poet, William Butler Yeats, said in his poem, “Second Coming,”

           

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity…”

…The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”

We are all tempest-tossed, turning and turning in the widening gyre.  We all have tear-stained, broken dreams.  We all are hurt, are human, are vulnerable.  In our human condition, our pain, and, through our vulnerability, we learn lessons, find strength, hope, faith, and we go on.  We suffer dreams deferred or defeated--yours as well as ours.  We all suffer when one among us, among humanity suffers.  We suffer for the women who are raped, beaten, burned, killed.  We suffer for the men, women, and children in poverty, in hunger, in danger, in despair, in ALL countries.  We suffer over injustice.  BUT, WE ACT IN CONSTRUCTIVE WAYS TO SEEK HEALING, ALLEVIATION.  WE DO NOT BOMB, MAIM, DESTROY. DO NOT CONFUSE US—EVERYWHERE, ANYWHERE—WITH THE ACTIONS OF GOVERNMENTS; FOR WE ARE INDIVIDUALS WORKING COLLECTIVELY, PEACEABLY FOR JUSTICE AND PEACE, UNIVERSALLY.

Yes, the worst ARE full of passionate intensity.  Read “worst” as all of those whose “convictions” wreak havoc:  Republicans, Evangelists, “Crusaders” for anything against humanity, the human condition, and who all seem to co-opt GOD as their back-up guy.  YOU.  We cannot afford, nor must we allow, mere anarchy to be loosed upon the world.  We will not swim in blood-dimmed tides.  We will all be bloodied by the acts of those with such HUBRIS as to think they know what God wants.  What you, politicians, evangelists, extremists, “jihadis” want is POWER, and it is more illusion, delusion than real.  True power is not pitched to a wail.  It does not need to be.  It can be quiet.  It can be humble.  It can only be humane, as it must be just.

The Poverty of Power.  Those seeking it are in need.  Those trying to hold it are in the grasp of the elusive.  And centuries of sleep, the “not knowing” of the kind of evil that wants to be all-powerful, that steals children, that makes them forget their humanity, their place, a holier, humane purpose to life, has been vexed to nightmare by the rocking cradle you once lay in, rough beast, until you grew into ability, and went stumbling to Hell, not Bethlehem.

Poor, Poor Pitiful You.

How It Happens

I am invisible

When I walk into

A room

I have to be

Loud, intrusive

If you are

Talking to another

Then you

Are not

Talking to

Me

So I interrupt

You

Because you

Don’t

See

Me.

I am hungry

For attention

I don’t get

And never did

The growl of

My need

Spews out

My mouth

Knocks people

Down

Screams over

Others.

I am empty

Nothing

Fills or

Satisfies me

Not

Food or

Sports or

School or

Smiles or

Empty conversation.

I am no one

I will turn

To

God

Or

Gangs

Or

Guns

Or

Gutters

To

Learn

To

Be

And

To

Be

Seen.

I will join a

Church

Temple

Mosque

Jihad

War

Fight

Rape

Kill

Condemnation.

I will feel

Better

Blessed

Chosen

Crowned

Brother

Sister

Soldier

Martyr.

I will die

Killing

Maiming

Shaming

Many,

Many

Others

Too

Blind

To

See

Me

Before.

I will be

Famous

Omnipresent

Bogeyman

Monster

Under

Your

Bed

Every

Night

And

Day.

I will leave my

Mark

Scar

Piss

Shit

Desecration

Abomination

Everywhere

And

For

All

Time.

I was once invisible

You did not

See me

Hear me

Want me

Hold me

Touch me

Feed me
Watch me

Know me

Guide me.

But now

You will

Never

Forget

Me

Because

I Am

And

Always

Will Be 

Blasphemy