Diamond Poem

Unbounded sky. Vast

beyond words. Sunlight, darkness

your blessed children.

Jesus, Buddha, the Hasid

Masters spoke to the human family of these spaces.

Our family. The world’s peoples.

Connections are created: by blood and marriage, love

and fate, spirit and soul. The persons intermix, Stu, Mary, Sally,

grands and great-grands, siblings, offspring, old ones and youngsters.

Within this web resides Lee. One woman among millions whose passion

for life expresses through theater, sculpture, a grounded caring for those around

her: dropping everything for a loved one in need. Lee racing to the

emergency room, steady, supportive, loving; re-

turning home tired, ready to receive nourishment. Now, her passion

renewed, off into the fray, her heart leading the way.

The Masters know heartfulness

dotted across the earth by us will re-create the

godliness of which they spoke.

A godliness so

vast that to speak of it is

to miss it. No sky.

Off-Planet Species, Part I of IV

There is an interesting, somewhat disarming video on YouTube which reproduces a series of mainstream media reports of recent mass UFO sightings.

Video of Mainstream Media Reports of UFO Sightings

The information contained in the video is not news to Dr. Steven Greer and the Disclosure Project.  They have been compiling eyewitness testimony from citizens, and government and military personnel for years.

Disclosure Project Website

I think it is time to re-frame the issue of "first contact."  I think it is very simple to equate our first meeting with an alien (or off-planet) race to first meetings which have been occurring for centuries "on-planet."

Consider:  1,200 years ago it was impossible to cross the Atlantic or Pacific oceans.   Red people (Native Americans), white people (Europeans), and yellow people (Japanese) lived among themselves, each with their own distinctive facial features, skin color, eating patterns, clothing design choices, physiques, languages, and other cultural attributes. 

It is certainly the case that when Europeans first came into contact with Native Americans, there was the sense that the other group was "alien" to them.  To cut to the chase, I would argue that, after dealing with the surface attributes, the fundamental issues were these (from the point of view of the Europeans):  1) are the Native Americans stronger than us or weaker than us?, 2) will we be building a friendly relationship or an adversarial relationship?, 3) do the Native Americans have something we want or need?, and 4) do we have something the Native Americans want or need?

There have been enough meetings of cultures on planet earth for us to get, as a species, that the superficial stuff (skin color, tuning of musical instruments, etc) is merely window dressing.  To be certain, there are plenty of ways in which we can spend our time exploring and celebrating our differences. 

But the core issues are the most imperative:  friend or foe?  Potential dominator or dominated?  Trade potential?

I would argue that there is very little difference between the distance of an ocean separating two cultures, and the distance of a galaxy.  Life is life.  Intelligence is intelligence. There is not much difference between a red skin / white skin meeting, and a slimy skin / white skin meeting; or a slanted eye / oval eye meeting and a big, bald, green head / average-sized, hair-covered white head meeting.

** End of Part I **

On rag-dolls and zombies...

 "Please: No violent video games."

A simple request of a sixth grade computer class in which I was the substitute teacher.

Of course, this becomes "the line in the sand."  Thoughts race through the students' minds:  "How much can we get away with -- our guy being a new substitute and all." "Dude -- how do you pronounce your name?"  Never mind that I've already veered away from the optional lesson plan which would involve actual teaching and learning.

First there are the sports games. While they provide a comparatively healthy outlet for pent-up energy, they are violent.  (Wouldn't you call twenty two big men crashing into each other with all their might violent?)  Given the options, the lesser of available evils.

Then there is the otherwise-bright girl who decides to pull up a game which involves throwing rubber balls at a "rag-doll-person," who appears to be injured by the pelting.  Certainly violent, but at least she's firing rubber bullets.  I could relate to this girl. The peer pressure is intense -- fit in or else...

What about the on-screen bicycle rider, careening down a set of stairs, body parts and blood flying. Is this a violent video game?  The students I asked did not think so.  After all, the only person getting hurt is the bike rider himself.

And of course the zombie games: first person shooters with blood and gore everywhere.  The 12-year-old's analysis:  "The zombies start out dead, so it's not really violent."  I kid you not.

To be fair, one student spent five minutes on a web site which creates opportunities for students from 130 countries to work together on projects which make a meaningful contribution to the health and welfare of the planet.  A drop of sanity in a sea of lunacy.

My classroom was being dowsed with violence. Energies from parents, teachers, and friends who are not getting what they want, and who would rather fight with each other than sit down and discuss their differences like grown human beings. Discuss, collaborate, and share the resources we have available to all of us.

Think of the paradise on earth we could co-create if we took all of the resources we employ to beat each other up, and instead used them for the things we all need to live a beautiful and rich life.

I will not be silent any longer. I will speak common sense until my last breath. There is just too much at stake to do otherwise.

Links to the Music of Prahas

Hello, Readers,

I thought you might enjoy hearing a bit of my music.

1) Sky (a lovely three-minute music video)

2) Samples of my theatre music in video format (running time:  two minutes)

3) Haiku for Piano (Piano poems which sound like George Winston at a meditation retreat.)

4) A Trapeze Artist’s Nightmare (a two-minute theatre music video)

5) It’s a Dream! (a four-minute avant garde music video)

I’d love to read your feedback!

Sport and Peacefulness

I just came home from a morning of sport.  Playing, not watching.  A warm-up session for a team sport, which is a competition, involving among other things guile and deception, the struggle to gain and control territory, and the final goal of defeating your opponent (all with a playful spirit, of course).

Aside from being good for the physical body (apparently the lymph system gets stimulated, which helps remove toxins from your system) sport is pleasant; it gets me associating with others; it gets me out in the sunshine.

But as I left the grid iron, the question arose:  does sport support peacefulness?  Certainly it took me out of my head, and moved some rather stale energy.  But is putting juice into an arena which by definition pits one person against another helping to increase the sum total of peace in the world?

Compare to this:  giving a healing massage to another person.  Or this:  sitting silently on a park bench, beside a friend, holding hands, feeling a cool breeze on your skin.

Of the tens of thousands of ways one can spend their time, why compete when one can melt?

Here's why: to get what I need, plus a little bit more.  It is true.  But is that where I stop competing?  Or do I push for more?

I notice myself greeted with choices each moment.  I notice myself addressing them: with brain, with heart (with luck, with Being).  I notice I know not what to do.

And then, with forever limited information, I choose.