Centers of Light Directory
|
Centers of Light Directory
|
|
US Directory
|
--- by Jean Oxenham How do you build a tomorrow on a thin, threatened today? There are no tools to borrow, just a sack full of paper
mache Because people are paper dolls, flattened and flimsy
Paper doll people with fixed faces and fronts—
No backs – people of just one dimension. Paper doll people, copy after copy etched identical by
Dictator billboards,
By hypnotic screens and bilious magazines
And street signs and headlines
And status symbols and high styles Paper doll people safe in their sameness – safe and soft
And spineless living in cardboard houses – row after row
Moving in tiny tin cars - - stream after stream
On ribbon roads and frightening freeways. Paper doll people working in ugly block buildings, stack
After stack with glass walls and hurrying halls Paper doll people consuming tired rubber sandwiches, bitter
black
Coffee and coke and smoke and smut and smog. People speaking at each other in copy-cat conversation,
Quoting others who quote others – who quote still others,
With minds that memorize monotonous mechanics and term it thinking. How do you build a tomorrow on
such a thin, threatened today?
Where values are vended like vegetables –
Loveliness is a lipstick - - or a lather
Love is a bikini - - or hip-low pants
Beauty is a bath - - a bra, a bed or a bottle
Culture is a Broadway play banned in Boston
Music is a twist - - a tortured disc
Nature is a plastic plant, a poodle in a jacket, grass in a packet
Discipline is 2,000 calories a day
Friendship is in alcoholic flavors – gin and julep – brandy and beer
Philosophy is a label on a library shelf
Religion is a church supper, a collection plate
Marriage is a meal, a stopping off place, a namesake, a between work
break.
Honest is a required tax statement
Compassion is a welfare office, an alphabet check. How do you build a tomorrow on
today’s paper values
Vended to paper people to past upon their differences
And cover them with a colorless, predictable pattern? How do you build a tomorrow on
today’s corrugated canyon
Where there’s no room for eyes to see – ears to hear – minds to
meditate
No room for souls to grow
Room only to copy, to complain, to criticize What happened to people who stand
out like giants with vitality and vigor? What happened to minds that
design, hearts that hope
And faces that respond to delight and concern
To anger and sorrow
To happiness? What happened to people with
purpose and pulses, and muscles and motives
And dimension, depth, determination? The paper must be split, the
pattern broken, the canyon scaled So real people appear
With eyes uncovered
And ears opened,
Hearts bared,
Minds unleashed,
Souls exposed. Real people who know
Loveliness
in a listening face Love
in a held-out hand Beauty
in a beating rain
Culture
in a student’s struggle Music
in aria, in a bird’s pure note Nature in a baby sapling, in a
polliwog’s wiggle Discipline
in a tasteless task Friendship
in one unlike the self
Philosophy
as a deed, not a work Religion
that goes home from church Marriage
that is both heaven and haven in one’s heart Honesty
that respects the self - - not the law Compassion
touches close at hand to spread itself across a land. Peel the paper to the person
beneath Crumple the dolls to the soul
inside Probe to the real people Each
different, one from the other Each special, each capable and
creative Each needed, each God designed,
one of a kind. Real people with eyes to envision
the loveliness
God lay bare and beautiful for is to see stretching
The land, the lake, the massive mountain
The flung stars, the cool forest, the vast desert Eyes to see around the earth and beyond through space Real people with ears to hear
music in moving, loving things
A cricket cheep, a thunder clap,
A bird’s trill, a fall’s roar. With hearts to leap in love for
another
To despair in grief for another To
feel, to care, to beat steady To
pulse strong With minds to act on, to fill
with facts
To rely upon, to breed ideas
To create, to meditate Minds to build a tomorrow Giant people of strong spines,
sure minds
With values worth a child’s learning
And deeds worth a world’s remembering Real people each god-designed,
one of a kind,
Must re-build a today strong enough
To reach a tomorrow.
|
INT Directory
Resources Historical Nature of Democracy Practical Sphere of Spiritual Life
|
