Category Archives: metaphysical

A Moment of Communion

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Half a century has passed since I first heard John Shea speak. I bought his books of poems, other books, some tapes, and I followed him on the internet as he flourished in worlds beyond my kin— John Shea: theologian, author, historian, scholar, story teller, poet, master of miracles wrought by the spirit—possibility in the house of the impossible. Given wings by technology, I e-mailed Dr. Shea to ask to quote him on my blog. “Quote away!” he answered. Give freely of what is freely given! Now with his blessing, which words of his should I use? Many of his writings caught my eye and my heart, but there was one…

In 1976 a book of poems by John Shea entitled The God Who Fell From Heaven contained “A Prayer of Communion,” enhanced with the image of a girl on horseback in the rain. It was my favorite poem then and now, perhaps because I felt like I was that girl watching him pass by, connecting in that moment that, fixed by his words, lives forever.

A moment of communion from The God Who Fell From Heaven by John Shea
A moment of communion from The God Who Fell From Heaven by John Shea

On a day
that would not become day,
when fog made the sun a memory
and the unceasing night rain
gave morning a midnight mood,
the car took the forest preserve drive
to become one
with the grey, wet world of woods.
It was already inhabited.
By the side of the road
mounted on a motionless horse
she waited,
the fog hugging her,
the rain braiding her hair,
her jeans and shirt
dripping the low sky.
She blurred and focused
with the swish of the wipers.
As the car splashed past,
her soulful eyes
moved beyond the locked doors
into the dry interior of the driver.
The rearview mirror caught the fog and forest
carrying her away.
Now on days
that will not become day,
she waits
in the downpour of memory,
about to dissolve into earth and sky
but bearing for the moment
the marks of communion.
cover of The Way Back
New novel: The Way Back

 
Order the Historical Novel by S.K. Carnes,  The Way Back, recently released in all e-book stores.     To find it on Amazon, go to http://bit.ly/SoldiersJourney

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I Am Calling You

It started with an inkling that got crossways in my mind. After it came, everything else coursed around it like a stream does round a wind-fallen tree. I dodged it long as I could, you know—the plates needed to be stacked by size, there was dust on the door-tops—but it was alive and burrowing in until all my thinking began to pile up against it like water before a dam. There it was calling me “Time to go.” It was the essence in the lilac scented air, the verve in the spring green of the new leaves coming on, it was the song spun by the river swelled full and rushing by. It started as an itch to scratch but with the first touch it pulled me in, wound everyday with a beanstalk of desire until I was crazy wild to go.  Only—except—but still—I was afraid.  I stalled.  And the pastel spring passed, as did the watercolor summer, and autumn, layered like the oil painting of a master in russet and gold, left me alone and exposed cowering in fear before the ravages of winter.
I had made my intentions clear, said that I was leaving and going West; the canoe was in the river, so to speak, and caught-up by the current, there was no way to paddle up the rapids.  At last, with Christmas approaching and the blizzards out of Canada descending upon Lake Superior-land, it was passed time to go.  I had to leave now. The calling was deafening, self-loathing at my inaction and cowardice had reached a climax, and I could not live with myself anymore.  So I set a date to suffer over, packed up and drove away, my little car sliding on the frozen road as it strained to pull the smallest U-Haul trailer available; aimed to cross out of Wisconsin, and get through Minnesota and North Dakota before the storms caught me. I was terrified.
How did I manage to do this? How had I overcome my fear and guilt? And what force haunted my being? What Pied Piper beckoned, his calling ever more insistent?
Gently probing. Ever deeper
Comes this urging Quantum Leaper
Crooning song of wistful hue
Sweetly haunting
Heart breaking
Words so meaningful and true
They raked my soul as in they flew
“I am calling you,” it sang
Words that hurt, Words that rang!
I am calling you

http://www.lindenarts.org/umbraco/
http://www.lindenarts.org/umbraco

 
 
Next Week:  Overcoming fear.
 
 
Please click on the link below to read about The Way Back , by S.K.Carnes. Three Reviews and a description are posted. http://readersfavorite.com/book-review/28930
 
cover of The Way Back
New novel: The Way Back

 
 
Order The Way Back in all e-book stores. Amazon: http://bit.ly/SoldiersJourney
 
 
 

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Coincidence?

just beyond
Out of the blue, the year my father turned 81, I inexplicably fell into depression. I cried every night, and lost 20 pounds,  grieving for what seemed to be no reason at all.  After two weeks of this, my mother told me that my Dad, who long had entertained perfect health, would stay overnight in the hospital for his yearly exam. We went to church on the way to pick him up.  During Mass, I sobbed so loudly people seated in our pew moved away, disgusted by my lack of decorum.  Later, at the hospital, as we prepared to go home, my father died.   Would you call my grieving coincidental?
One morning before school, my college room-mate Gloria told me of her disturbing dream.  “Last night,” she said, “I dreamed that in spite of all I could do to help, grandma couldn’t climb stairs because of a pain in her leg.  She wanted to get to a bed at the end of the hall upstairs, but died before we could reach it.” Gloria went off to classes shaking her head, for she had never dreamed of her beloved grandmother before. Later that morning came the news that grandmother had died overnight from a blood clot that formed in the leg and traveled to the heart. But the dream was just coincidence-right?
Since we lived near a mining community, I heard stories of mine disasters, and the amazing way people and animals knew of them before they were announced. It became impossible for me to dismiss these experiences as mere coincidence, and I came to believe we have powers we neither can control or explain away.
Have you ever seen a dowser work-or better yet, have you held in your own hands a make shift coat hanger rod or a professional tool, watching/feeling it twist and point at a water pipe or aquifer?  Try it-you may be surprised. And if it happens to you, you might even put a new name to coincidence, perhaps naming it instead, for psychic gifts of sensing, seeing, hearing or knowing (clairsentience, clairvoyance, clairaudience or claircognizance).
The media is deluged with mysterious stories, an example is the series “Weird or What” on the Discovery channel.  The host William Shatner weighs psychic and scientific theory, but some people will be afraid of what the wierdness means and label it as evil.   Others seek out exercises to develop their intuitive powers, hoping to use them for the good of humanity.  And you, what do you think? Do you watch for omens: a lone bird in the sky, a four leaf clover, a shooting star; do you take special note of a sudden chill sensation, a tingle, a feeling of dread; perhaps you concentrate on the ‘here and now’, becoming mindful of your thoughts and receptive to intuition? What are your stories that some might label coincidental but you think might be a personal experience of the sixth sense or the supernatural?