Gathering Blossoms Under Fire

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Gathering
Blossoms
Under
Fire
A zine about rest & renewal
Spring 2007
Toronto, Ontario
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DEBBIE BROWN
Claudia
Up on the couch
she jumps
The exaggerated flop
belly up
head back
with that one crooked tooth
sticking out
over her lip
There's the little front paw wave
pat
pat
the air
which says
"rub my belly"
better than any words
Oh that moment
the snow outside the window
and the warmth inside
of a little dog next to you
a cup of tea
cooling on the table
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KATHY GUTHRIE
INSIDE
Acknowledgements
............................................................4
Sandra Sukhan
The Smell and Tasto of Self Renewal ....5
Marisol Ayala
Descansar... .........................................9
Clara Valverde
Renewal Through The Word..............10
Edie Steiner
Entering The Lake ............................12
Kim Elliot
A few years ago… ..............................15
Michelle Arroyo
Renewal ............................................16
Heather Lash
Phenomenology of the Giggles .........18
Giulio Cescato
The pros & cons of disappointment ..20
It’s cold ............................................21
A short essay on renewal ...................22
heather marie annis
Buzz Buzz a nonsensical rant ............24
Darashani Joachim
Ouvre Feu! .......................................27
Gabriella Agatiello
Travel and the journey of renewal .....28
Sushil Saini
Rest and Renewal ..............................29
María Lugones
Renewal’s Interiority .........................33
J’net Cavanagh
Rest & Renewal for a Multi-tasker .....35
Shary Bartlett
Buried Beneath .................................37
Frank Vetere
Syd “the Cat” Vetere In Memoriam ..41
Jocelyn Chandler
Hello Chris, .....................................44
Dan Yashinsky
Haiku ...............................................45
Amy Hallman
Comic ...............................................46
Kathy Guthrie
“The real voyage of discovery…” .......50
Debbie Brown
Claudia ..............................................51
Natalie Ambler
A reflection … .......................back cover
Cover Image: Isabelle Mignault
Back cover images: Natalie Ambler
Inserts: A Gift of Rest by chris cavanagh
All copyrights remain with the authors
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Acknowledgements
Thanks and much love to all those who responded to my call for
quotes, poems and stories and images for this wee ‘zine about rest
and renewal. Sandra Sukhan is a teacher, writer, student, doctoral
candidate (congratulations, by the way) who has shared with me
remarkable stories of growing up in Guyana before immigrating to
Canada. Marisol Ayala is an Ecuadorian environmentalist who is
currently researching condors. Clara Valverde is a poet, writer and
one of Spain’s leading activists fighting for the rights of people
living with Chronic Fatigue Síndrome and Fibromialgia. Edie Steiner is a filmmaker who grew up in Northern Ontario and now lives
in Toronto. Kim Elliot is publisher rabble.ca and I spent a lovely
week on a BC island a few summers back with Kim and friends.
Michelle Arroyo is from Mexico and she has liked Uruguayan
poet Mario Bennedetti’s poetry since she was ten. Heather Lash is
currently doing some work at the Faculty of Environmental Studies
befote she starts her PhD next year. Giulio Cescato was one of the
few planning students ever to have taken the popular education
course i teach at FES — his course paper was a short store about
homelessness — it was great. heather marie annis is a professional
clown and one half of the clown duo Moro and Jasp. Darashani
Joachim was one of the co-founders of the Catalyst Centre. Gabriella Agatiello is studying political science at Cork University
and knows a lot about Argentinian social movements. Sushil Saini
was a fellow student when we studied together at FES in the early
90s and this past winter she taught me to cook oatmeal. María
Lugones is one of the greatest influences in my life — a feminist
philosopher whose ideas are a vital bridge between the worlds of
popular education and feminist (US Third World Feminist, poststructuralist, post-colonial) theory. J’net Cavanagh formerly J’net
August, has been a dear friend for over 20 years and the world has
finally brought us together in marriage. Shary Bartlett was a fellow member of the wonderful workshop that Nick Bantock gave
on Hollyhock in BC last August. Frank Vetere has been a friend
and neighbour since Catlayst started in 1999 — there was many an
early morning that Frank and i would pass as i headed west to the
Catalyst office and he east to his; it always reminded me of those
Bugs Bunny characters of the wolf and the sheep dog who would
begin their daily contest by punching a time clock. Jocelyn Chandler starred as Sadako in a puppet theatre production on Grindstone Island that I directed in 1987 thereabouts. Dan Yashinsky is
one of Canada’s finest storytellers and he is an even finer friend.
Amy Hallman is a farmer from Sudbury and is studying food and
democracy at FES. Kathy Guthrie is a BC artist who I was very
pleased to meet in the Nick Bantock workshop. Natalie Ambler
was the first student in the popular education class last fall to do a
podcast for her course project. Isabelle Mignault is a visual artist
who painted the raven that graces the cover of this ‘zine. Debbie
Brown worked for Groundwood Publishing when Catalyst shared
an office with them; Debbie is from Newfoundland, sings in a band
with her husband with whom she just moved to Ottawa—we’ll
miss you, Debbie.
To all these folks and the many of you who wanted to contribute
but for whom notice was too short, life-too-frenzied or who had
priorities (like kids, paying the rent, loving those close to you) that
understandably had to come before a ‘zine
my love and affection
chris cavanagh
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SANDRA SUKHAN
The Smell and Taste of Self Renewal
As a young child growing up in Guyana, I watched my
mother in fascination as she read her cookbooks from
Britain and created fancy cakes, pastries and other assortment of goodies. She also made excellent Indian cuisine,
which was a puzzle for me because she never used recipes
and the food always turned out great. My own childhood curiosity led me to experiment with her cookbooks.
While most kids would be out playing, I spent hours poring over the recipes that I thought sounded interesting,
and I would plan how much time I would need to complete the task when my mom was out. I would secretly
mark the page and then I would wait for her to say that
she was going out somewhere at which time I would hurriedly gather my ingredients for my creations, and start
baking. By the time my mom came home, the kitchen
was clean and I had my cookies proudly displayed on the
table.
I even managed to convince my helpers – mostly
my sister, brother and my best friend next door – to do
some of the prep work and the cleanup. Beyond being
convenient, they were also my taste testers of the end
product. I would whip, beat and mix as the recipe directed and come up with my cake, donut, cookie or
bread. By age ten, I had mastered many recipes and had
graduated to altering recipes.
My confidence had grown so much that I wanted
to master cooking without recipes much like my mother
did. There were some disasters that my father was always
The Stream and the Desert
Once there was a stream that began high in a mountain range
where it was a mere trickle. As it travelled down the mountain it
grew and grew until it was a lovely cascade which coursed on
down into a valley to become a rushing river. It widened as it
crossed the land and it flowed strongly until it reached a vast
expanse of sand. The stream that had become a river tried to
cross this desert but as fast as the waters poured forth so equally
as fast the waters disappeared into the sand. The river was discouraged. It could see no way to continue its journey.
Just then a voice on the wind said, “you must let go.
The harder you try the more water you’ll lose to the sands.”
“But if I let go,” said the river, “how will I know
where I am to go, what I am to become?”
“Let go and see,” said the voice on the wind.
The stream that had become a river let go. It gave
itself up to the sun and sky and wind where it became clouds.
The clouds were carried high over the desert by the winds.
Now, having crossed the desert, the stream poured down from
the sky, with the power of storms. A Sufi tale retold by chris cavanagh
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willing to eat, and those that were too embarrassing were
buried in the backyard under the bushes. I eventually
concluded that some recipes had to be precise and there
was little room for manipulating ingredients.
When I started a family, I directed my love of
cooking into daily meal preparation as a way of saving
money and also to provide healthy meals for my young
children. Since my children could never eat as much as I
wanted to bake or cook, and my freezer would overflow
with goodies or ingredients for various recipes, I would
make packages for their school bus drivers, teachers,
classmates and anyone who showed a mild interest in
food (which seemingly was anyone who crossed my
path).
I became a teacher and found new audiences
willing to sample my baking. Each year I had a new
group of students and I would bake a cake for every student’s birthday. That was a lot of cakes each year besides
the ones for family and friends. I could turn any occasion, be it sad or happy, into a reason to bake or cook.
I got more creative with my cooking and baking,
always challenging myself to find the little nuances of the
food I was eating or to try to identify some secret ingredient. I learned to experiment with recipes, substituting,
revising, exchanging and adding new or different ingredients as I ventured into the world of microwave, convection and traditional ovens and gas and electric stoves.
That was certainly a long way from the kerosene stove
and oven I used as a child.
Some of the substitutions and revisions became
almost scientific challenges to discover why a recipe
The first wealth is health.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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AMY HALLMAN
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worked or failed and how I could alter it the next time
without losing the integrity. I became a detective about
cooking, factoring in altitudes, humidity, timing, temperatures and freshness of ingredients.
Then one day, it occurred to me that the single
most important thing that I had completely overlooked
but could not be measured scientifically, was my mood.
I started paying attention to the times I would cook or
bake and the reasons I would do that. I bake for happy
occasions and I bake for sad occasions. Mostly I bake
and cook when I need to think and the more thinking I
have to do, the more I bake and cook.
Baking and cooking are my ways to renew my
soul and re-energize me. I have something tangible to
show for my effort and sharing it with others make my
burden somewhat lighter. Somehow, the task of baking
and cooking becomes so much more than an end product. The look and smell of a cinnamon coffee cake or
lemon biscotti soothes my soul and makes me feel like no
matter what the burden, circumstance or event, the sweet
smell of my baking and the love I put into my creations
will somehow make me feel better.
More than 45 years has passed since I first remembered cooking something in my mom’s kitchen.
What started as childhood curiosity has grown into so
much more than art or science. I’ve fed a lot of friends,
family, students and strangers over the years and I will
likely be remembered for the cakes, pies and breads I’ve
created. The therapeutic nature of baking has become a
way for me to renew myself, and each day I find another
reason to celebrate life.
When you regard your life as a trust, you realize that the first
resource you have to take care of is your own body. This can
be startling. Even your body is not really your own. It belongs
to life, and it is your responsibility to take care of it. You cannot afford to do anything that injures your body, because the
body is the instrument you need for selfless action. That is the
fine print of the trust agreement: when we smoke, when we
overeat, when we don’t get enough exercise, we are violating
the terms of the trust.
If you want to live life at its fullest, you will want to
do everything possible to keep your body in vibrant health in
order to give back to life a little of what it has given to you.
Eknath Easwaran
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Sometimes I spend alone time in my kitchen with
my thoughts and I embrace the solitude. Some baking
takes concentration and others I can make while I think
about something else. There are times when I need to
work out a solution to some problem I’m dealing with
and even if I don’t come up with a solution, I have my
baking as evidence of accomplishment. There are times I
share my kitchen with family and friends and it’s noisy
and chaotic. But the result is always the same. The sense
of rejuvenation is indicative of a contentment that is hard
to explain but if you love to cook, you’ll understand.
Cooking and baking for the pleasure of it and to clear the
mind. Best therapy for self-renewal. Best elixir for rejuvenation. Biscotti anyone? Coffee cake? Multigrain
bread? Call me for your care package!
Sometimes the mountain is hidden from me in veils of cloud,
sometimes I am hidden from the mountain in veils of inattention, apathy, fatigue. When I forget or refuse to go down to
the shore or a few yards up the road, on a clear day, to reconfirm that witnessing presence.
Denise Levertov
DAN YASHINSKY
riding to work down
Bathurst hill, I see the lake:
cars and trucks vanish
Optimism is a strategy for making a better future. Because
unless you believe that the future can be better, it’s unlikely
you will step up and take responsibility for making it so. If you
assume that there’s no hope, you guarantee that there will be
no hope. If you assume that there is an instinct for freedom,
there are opportunities to change things, there’s a chance you
may contribute to making a better world. The choice is yours.
Noam Chomsky
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JOCELYN CHANDLER
MARISOL AYALA
Hello Chris,
your request for 'zine submissions has kind of stuck with
me. Of course when analyzing Ontario Municipal case
studies, anything can draw my mind into something that
might be considered procrastination. But you see, if i
could wish rest and renewal upon anyone these days, it
would be to our air, water and earth...which seems so
exhausted by us all. So...in that spirit, i contribute a
quote from my beloved Aldo Leopold, and an affiliated
thought of my own. Not that i wish anything less for humanity...but we seem to have greater debts to pay before
we get our turn.
Aldo Leopold once wrote:
Acts of creation are ordinarily reserved for gods and
poets, but humbler folk may circumvent this restriction
if they know how. To plant a pine, for example, one need
be neither god nor poet; one need only own a good shovel.
By virtue of this curious loophole in the rules, any clodhopper may say: Let there be a tree—and there will be
one. (A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There,
1948, Oxford University Press, New York, 1987, pg. 81.)
Our own very singular earth cringes and corrodes as the
demands of humanity heap upon her. If we each could
step back, scale down, slowen the pace and allow an opportunity for rest, we could at least hope that we have
not taken too much and overstepped the threshold. If we
each could then contribute back, as Aldo Leopold’s actors of creation, our future might also be honoured to
experience the renewal that once was within natures own
capacity.
Contribute to renewal….then rest.
Peace on earth my gods, poets, and fellow clodhoppers.
I go to nature to be soothed and healed, adn to have my
senses put in tune once more.
John Burroughs
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CLARA VALVERDE
Renewal Through the Word:
Living with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS)
I have changed. Like you. But in a different way.
Paul Verlaine
I feel you will arrive different
No exactly more beautiful
Nor stronger, nor meeker, nor more careful;
Only that you will arrive different.
Mario Benedetti
What was unnamable, that which kept up a seemingly
solid structure, was named. Beams, walls and ceilings
came crashing down and I was finally able to hear myself.
This is another world. These sensations: disorientation, fragility, fatigue and the great adventure of the
small distances, are another world. Another world to discover.
It is the poetry of immunology and the immunology of poetry.
The textures of the silence of CFS: now I demand that they become visible, that they be heard.
What I said and felt is not in my medical files.
Now I fill new pages with words about the bewilderment
at these changes and the discovery of what is unpresentable.
Slowly I have dismantled my heart’s tax department. No more do I multiply nor divide what I get and
what I give. Numbers do not exist.
Cardiovascular problems and an excess of citokines interfere with my memory. Memory and a sense of
You are older it seems, than some people, and so they call you
old. Old, old, old - you have wrinkles you do not cover, and
your hair is gray and you have lived for something like 74 years
on this earth, without much complaint. There is nothing much
to complain about. But some people look at you and think you
should stop now, rest now, grow old now, gracefully - but you
live gracefully enough, you don't have time to grow old. You
have a canoe - and that canoe has a river, and that river does not
end. And you watch the river flow, and watch it flow. And you
watch the leaves change colour, and you watch your hands turn
eighty years old in the middle of a river bend. You hike thirteen
miles at the end of the day, and that is how you rest. So let the
young ones sleep – let the whole world sleep - you will sleep
when you have to. You are crossing the water, crossing the
water, and there is so much water left to be crossed.
Unknown
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voice and some weight, but not his purr. The vet couldn’t find anything wrong, so I changed him over to wet
food and this seemed to help and he put on a few pounds
again. But again a few weeks ago he started to lose interest in his food and started losing weight again. I noticed
he was having trouble swallowing and was also starting to
wheeze. When I brought him into the vet’s, they found a
cancerous growth between his larynx and esophagus, undetectable initially. It was basically inoperable. Left unchecked, he would gradually suffocate and starve to death
as the tumour got bigger. As it was, he had to have a
tube inserted down his throat to breathe and be fed intravenously. My only choice was to have him “put to
sleep”. I was with him the whole time. He died with his
eyes open, a beautiful glassy green. I’m waiting to get his
ashes back, half of which will remain in an urn, the other
half to be planted in the garden of the property where he
lived his life. I also had a bit of his beautiful ginger hair
shaved for me to keep in a place of safekeeping.
Epilogue: His first night at the vets, I had a vivid dream
of him coming into my room as usual hopping onto my
bed to get his head patted and his tummy rubbed. He
then jumped off, headed for the door, and looked back
in my direction. I honestly believe he was communicating
with me telepathically! I will miss him terribly. Since his
passing, I at times hear noises in the house that sound
like his, and can almost feel the pressure of his weight on
the bed. When it feels right, I will adopt a cat from the
humane society. I think it’s what he would have wanted.
Syd, my best friend, went to cat heaven in the early evening of Wednesday, January 17, 2007. He was a great
gift to me in my life. Rest in peace, my sweet Syd!
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stray cats off the property. However, the odd cat did earn
his friendship. I recall one fluffy white “femme fatale”
from the ‘hood that he would share porch space with.
She had a winning way, I guess, and was so persistent,
that he just gave in to her charms.
In all the years of “policing” the property, he did
get into a couple of scrapes, including getting a bit of
one ear chomped off, and a puncture wound in his belly
from a tussle with another cat. This resulted in a stay at
the vet’s which he recovered from brilliantly, but which
at the time caused him considerable agony. Luckily, he
never developed any of the urinary tract problems so
common with neutered male cats and lived out the rest
of his days unscathed.
Syd was also well loved by the neighbours. He
would often go from house to house on the block, nuzzling favourite neighbours, sometimes even walking right
into their homes. One summer, he was lethargic and off
his food. A delegation of neighbours came to the door to
say they were “worried” about Syd. I was very touched.
As it turns out, he was just bored with his food and a
change of diet was all that was needed. A young woman
who lived a few doors down was very fond of Syd and
would often play with him and give him treats. One evening, she knocked on my door, and presented me with
two broadsheets of photos she’d taken of Syd which I
had mounted at Kinko’s. I’m including a sample with
this tribute. It’s a wonderful souvenir! I have many more
photos of him, more than of myself or any friends or
family members, for that matter! But then, he was a very
handsome fellow!
One of my favourite memories of Syd is the time
he followed me out the door and around the block,
jumping high fences and hiding behind trees all the way
home, only to follow me back in the house, ever so
stealthily. He also took pleasure in pushing my bedroom
door open in the morning and hopping up onto my bed
when he thought it was time for me to get up, or feed
him, or let him out. He would come just within reach of
me, I’d hold out my hand to touch him, and he’d jump
off and head towards the door, looking back in my direction. My favourite times were on those mornings when I
was treated to the sound of the wind outside my window,
soft music playing on the radio and the hum of his purring in my ear….A real symphony!
A couple of months ago, Syd started to lose his
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responsibility interfere with the dreams I have yet to
imagine.
Small victories: defeat the fear of getting worse
and cohabit with the body’s erroneous messages and the
exaggerated responses.
The white coats order: live, wait. I use their
words: I don’t wait, I live.
Where, in the diagnostic criteria, is the enigma
which happens to my body when your thirsty hand caresses my hair? Where are the nomad continents that I am
capable of imagining with only hearing one of your silent
words? Where is the bold hypothesis of my heart’s return,
that intimate rebellion that I cradle in my heart?
Am I a deserter? I have abandoned the absurd
hope in each new treatment, the intense watchfulness
over each symptom, other’s definitions, and the research
projects with bewildered molecules.
Am I an infiltrator in the world tightrope walkers
on the edge of a sonnet?
The molecules and gene theories do not have the
complexity that words have; words about here and there,
words about my rebellious dreams, words about windows in love with each cloud. Am I immunized against
everyday mirrors?
In this dialogue with you I have begun to rebuild
my new self, free of the definitions of what is able and
what is disabled, transforming what is impossible into
possible and what is serious into irreverent.
It has been evicted from my mind. This illness
which had colonized me totally, now lives only in my
body. The word has been the weapon that has forced the
Arguing Over Land
Once two neighbours fell to arguing over which owned a particular piece of land. Their argument threatened to grow into a
bitter quarrel as each was convinced that he owned the land over
which they fought. Another neighbour suggested that they go
and ask their rabbi for advice. This they did and each man presented to the rabbi his case and his proof for ownership of the
land. The rabbi listened to each man and said, “you both have
good cases, good proof and you are both correct. I cannot decide. Let us go to the land you are arguing over.” Once they
arrived on the disputed land the rabbi got down on his hands
and knees and put his ear to the ground. He stayed in this position for some time and then he stood up. “Gentlemen, I have
listened to the land. And the land says that it belongs to neither
of you. Rather it says that you belong to the land.”
A Jewish tale retold by chris cavanagh
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early defeat into exile.
Now the heart is free to feel eternally grateful to
these hands’ alphabet and to the challenge of the sunset.
I declare myself guilty. Yes, guilty of being a
woman in love with the silent desert, with the unknown,
with what emerges, with what has no name, with that
impossible blue colour.
It’s not a hero’s story nor a happy ending. It is a
voyage through the geography of fear and through the
freedom of that which is not defined. A voyage to fall in
love with each oasis.
To exist loving, to exist reconciling with the
wounded particles, to exist forgiving the damaged molecules, to exist cohabiting with my immune system’s faulty
memory, to exist hearing in your voice words which call
out to the echo of what is possible.
The Fall
An old man was walking along the banks of a river where rapids churned the water leading towards a high waterfall. He fell
into the water and those who saw this were sure that the man
was doomed. So it was astonishing to all when they saw the
old man sitting peacefully on the river bank beyond the falls.
People rushed to ask how he had survived. He explained, "I
gave myself up to the water rather than fight the water to suit
me. I let the water shape me. I plunged into swirling rapids, I
moved with the swirling water. In this way I have come safely
to this shore."
Retold by chris cavanagh
FRANK VETERE
Syd “the Cat” Vetere – In Memoriam – 1992 - 2007
Syd is a beautiful orange tabby who came into my life in
January of 1992. I was interviewing prospective roommates, and a delightful young Australian woman by the
name of Lisa showed up. I took an instant liking to her.
She was instantly interested in the space, but wanted to
make sure it was okay to move in with a kitten. I took
one look at him and said, “Yes, of course!” When I asked
her what his name was (Syd), I was floored, because the
original roommates who were living in the house when I
moved in had a cat by the same name! Call it fate!
Syd moved into the house, my life and my heart
instantly! When Lisa, who was training to be a massage
therapist, announced she was moving back to Australia a
couple of years later, she asked if I would adopt Syd. She
was reluctant to give him up, but she didn’t want to take
him on the long flight back, only to have him quarantined for six months. And she wanted to make sure he
had a good home. I immediately accepted her offer and
became a “dad”!
I also instantly accepted the role of cat chef, and
doorman. Yes, Syd was an outdoor cat who liked nothing
better than to sit high up on the porch watching the
comings and goings on the street, and supervising the
gardening. As the saying goes: “It was his place, we just
lived in it!”
He quickly became the house mascot, and even
non-cat people were
amazed by
his friendliness and sociability. Everybody liked,
no LOVED
Syd! He was
a people cat,
but couldn’t
abide other
cats muscling
in on his territory. So he
would routinely chase
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community. Myriad streams, though no longer visible
on the urbanized surface, still flow today beneath the
ground. Kind of like love, I realize. It carries on even
though the beloved can no longer be seen or touched –
it’s just a different manifestation of love. Bending down,
I see my face reflected in the water below.
Meandering on, I’m flooded with quiet recollections, marveling at how many years of life have rendered
me rich with memories. And I wonder at this day. Is it
simply serendipity that has called me to walk alone, this
first time ever, on what happens to be the anniversary of
my father’s death?
Some say there is no such thing as “serendipity”
or chance coincidence – that these moments occur all
around us – we just don’t take the time to slow, to listen,
to notice most of the time. That it’s only in stillness – in
the quiet heart and quiet mind – that there’s a readiness
to receive.
Retracing my path home through the cemetery,
I’m struck by how important my dramas seem to me, like
the scores of forgotten stories buried forever with these
bodies. I think of how minute my life is to the history of
the universe, and wonder how the infinite, perhaps, may
be contained in the finite.
I approach the cedar hedge encasing the graveyard, hear the traffic scraping coloured streaks just beyond, but before stepping back out, I draw deeply a long
breath, grateful for the voices of wisdom whispering within – for the grace of serendipity buried beneath.
EDIE STEINER
Entering The Lake
At the shore of Lake Superior, I stand on a pristine beach
with fine sand and no hidden rocks to stumble over. The
water is elementally pure, a turquoise metaphor, a
touchstone for clarity. There are few tourists here on this
mid-July day and I feel a sense of superiority as a northerner. We still have space here.
The water is temperate, perfect for immersion. I
move into its embrace for refreshment and healing. Diving beneath the surface, my closed eyes perceive
impressions of spirit forms – animal shapes and totems
that confirm the water’s essential state. I am submerged
and emerge purified. The energy circles around in a
loop, from water to sky and down again. I could stay
here for hours.
But I must continue my driving to arrive at my
next destination before closing time. Another five hundred more kilometers to go and I’m cutting it close. My
mind now begins to focus on the time, on the exact
length of my swim. Twenty minutes will suffice as a time-limited exercise session, one I can log into my calendar of obsessive taxonomies and necessary tasks.
I swim vigorously now. I’ll be sitting in the car
all day.
I pause to float on my back without moving my
limbs, a resting position that realigns my vertebrae: a
soothing exercise for the spine and an instant cranial massage. Relaxing a little now, I begin to realize that I will
There is a pervasive form of contemporary violence to which
the idealist fighting for peace by non-violent methods most
easily succumbs: activism and overwork. The rush and pressure
of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of
its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a
multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many
projects, to want to help everyone in everything is to succumb
to violence. More than that, it is cooperation in violence. The
frenzy of the activist neutralizes one’s work for peace. It destroys one’s inner capacity for peace. It destroys the fruitfulness
of one’s work, because it kills the root of inner wisdom which
makes works fruitful.
Thomas Merton
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miss the beauty of my encounter with this aquatic heaven
by narrowing it into a discipline or project. When will I
have such perfect water to swim in again? There will be
no more northern journeys this year. Here, there are no
sharks to avoid. No unknown creatures to sting me. No
unknown currents to carry me away, as they once
did. That changed my life. It was a near-death experience, one that shattered my expectations of water. But this
water is safe.
I will myself to be in this water in this moment,
to expand this interlude for as long as this short interval
will offer. I gaze around at the landscape, at the edge of
the horizon over water. This is the lake of my childhood,
my most sacred place of renewal, my family plot.
When I met my companion, I said that I wanted
my ashes cast upon this lake. I’m not sure if I was heard,
or if it will come to be, but as I swim, I think of this, and
of the reason I must get to my next destination on time.
2007
Far away in the heavenly abode of the great god Indra, there is
a wonderful net that has been hung by some cunning artificer
in such a manner that it stretches out infinitely in all directions.
In accordance with the extravagant tastes of deities, the artificer
has hung a single glittering jewel in each "eye" of the net, and
since the net itself is infinite in all dimensions, the jewels are
infinite in number. There hang the jewels, glittering like stars
of the first magnitude, a wonderful sight to behold. If we now
arbitrarily select one of these jewels for inspection and look
closely at it, we will discover that in its polished surface there
are reflected all the other jewels in the net, infinite in number.
Not only that, but each of the jewels reflected in this one jewel
is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that there is an infinite
reflecting process occurring.
Francis H. Cook
Hua-yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra
through generations, I realize how very afraid I am of
that fifty-first year. As my body ages, or in times of illness, I lose trust that I am strong, that I’ll grow to be
old. I remember a few years ago being in a Nairobi hospital, hovering in some hazy portal between life and
death. I was aware that below me lay the maternity ward,
where tiny spirits were entering the world, and all around
me, the dead were departing. The energy of these comings and goings through this earthly spot was aweinspiring.
Graveyards, too, must be places of passage.
Across the grass, I stumble upon a monument to the many babies buried here. A path of stones curls through the
grass, one for each baby honoured, some engraved with
names: Valerie Stubbe, Aug. 26, 1957; Pruden twins, June
21-23, 1947; my almost-sister, Spring 1951. They remind
me of the day I returned home with my first-born son,
when I phoned my father’s second wife: “But Daddy will
never see him,” I cried to her on the phone. “This is a
time for joy, not sadness,” she told me in her voice of
gruff practicality. And in this silence of remembered moments, I hear my father speak to me now: “This is a time
for living, Honey, not for fearing death.” And I feel loved by him. Becalmed. Guided by his spirited voice.
I step out of the shrine and wander on a few more steps, arrested by the sound of water. It hasn’t rained
for the last few days, so this trickle makes no sense to me.
A cast iron grate is set into the ground nearby and I approach it. Several feet below runs a briskly flowing
stream. A couple of days earlier I’d been looking at a
map of the many waterways that once ran through my
Solomon’s Ring
King Solomon once commanded his councillors to fashion
him a ring and inscribe on it one phrase that would make him
happy when he was sad but sad when he was happy. He ordered them to do this or risk losing their heads. The councillors returned in a matter of days and presented Solomon with
a ring. Solomon took the ring, read the inscription and was
pleased for it would indeed make him happy when he was sad
and make him sad when he was happy. The inscription read:
And this too shall pass.
Retold by chris cavanagh
15
38
me. The scent of love and grief is still wet in these flowers and I see by the date on the gravestone that the
man, buried deep in the earth below, has been dead a
year today: February 11, 2006. His loved ones surely left
this basket for him this morning: remembering, honoring, mourning. I pause a moment for a man I did not
know, then carry on through the graveyard, noting how
most other monuments mark the year, not the precise
date, of passing. This gravestone that drew me is unusual.
I think of my great losses: my grandmother, my
father, and the space they have left behind. What was the
date my father died, I ponder? And in a frozen heartbeat
I remember: February 11th, 1986 – exactly 21 years prior.
A snowy, bristling day he was buried, when I stood, the
last to leave his pit in the ground, until someone finally
drew me away saying, “You must go now, dear.”
He seemed an old man to me when he died,
greying at the edges: I was 27 and he, 51. Complications
from some silent cancer. In some ways I lost him when I
was a girl: divorce and miles across a country drove us
apart; it was not until I was a young woman – a couple of
years before he died – that I learned how much we loved
each other, how falling out of love with a woman had
lost him three daughters. Now that I have children of my
own, I feel even more greatly this tragedy.
I am now a couple of years shy of 51 myself, and
I want to shout, “I am not old! I’m just finding myself.
Not ready to leave my children – too much to do here.”
And as my feet pad still the soft moss of the cemetery,
weaving amongst bodies long gone, past lifetimes woven
Why Are Fire Engines Red?
Two and two is four
Three times four is twelve
Twelves inches is a ruler
Queen Mary was a ruler
Queen Mary ruled the sea
There are fish in the sea
The fish have fins
Thye Finns fought the Russians
The Russians are Red
Fire engines are always rushin’
That’s why fire engines are red.
Anon
KIM ELLIOT
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16
MICHELLE ARROYO
SHARY BARTLETT
Renewal
Buried Beneath
“Love begins with acceptance—the recognition that
wherever we are, is the appropriate place to practice,
that the present moment is the appropriate time.”
bell hooks
Since I accepted the offer to study in Canada I knew that
was time for renewal, but it was not until two weeks ago
that I’ve realized that was a profound renewal.
In the beginning I couldn’t be happier because
finally it was where I dreamed almost all my life: studying
overseas. Besides I knew all these beautiful people whom
adopted me not only as a friend or colleague but sometimes as a daughter. All was new and shining! It was the
end of the summer. Everybody seems to be happy, including me.
Then the courses started and all the time I was
occupied. I was reading and learning the entire time, sometimes I had headaches and I assumed it was my brain
telling me: “Enough learning for today!” After that I just
began to enjoy living in Toronto.
Suddenly it was time for final assignments and
my return to Mexico because of Holidays. It was so fast
that I could not believe it. Back in my parents house I
could not be happier and that is because my family put all
their efforts in make me feel like that. Although I have
this strange and new feeling of “not belong to” because
in so many ways this “me” was brand new. I realized just
until that moment. So I began to combine the new and
old Michelle, but they does not really match, or not as I
wanted. That was the moment when I think that living in
Finding Paradise
Two people lost in the desert are dying from hunger and thirst
when they finally come to a high wall. They can hear the
sound of running water coming from the other side. They hear
birds singing and the leaves of many trees swishing in the
breeze. They look up and see the branches of a fruit tree extending over the top of the wall. The fruit is abundant and
looks delicious. Working together one of the travellers manages to climb onto the top of the wall. They reach down to
help their friend over. But the one standing on the sand says,
“you go ahead. I will return across the desert where I can help
other lost travellers find their way to this place.”
Retold by chris cavanagh
I am sitting at my computer this grey, sighing day. For a
moment, sun strains through misty clouds. Whispering.
Beckoning. Walk.
I am not a walker. During nine years in this
neighborhood I have never walked, save for a purpose. I
turn back to my computer. Two hours later, the skies
have dulled, but the whispering remains. Walk. I remember my resolution to slow down, to quiet my overproductive spirit. Despite work, I shut off the computer
and rise. Donning coat and hat, I reach for a CD but
remember provocative advice from an artist I’d met: Listen to your heart, not to music.
I set out, unplugged, on the concrete sidewalk
jailing my home, turning in the direction of the nicest
stroll in this checkerboard neighbourhood – the graveyard. Walking briskly, fanning arms by my side like a panicked fish, I think: Might as well get some exercise – but
once inside the grounds of the cemetery, I feel compelled
to dwell. The sense of quiet, the rich grass, call me to
step into this space, to sink the grass deep with my footsteps. Is this disrespectful?
Gravestones glaze before me. I do not read their
names, rather, stroke the lichen sewn through their inscriptions, gloss hands over the polished marble of others.
A short distance away, a basket brimming red and white
with carnations jerks my eye; their freshness stands apart
from the long-withered bouquets garnishing other monuments, from plastic flower heads grown dusty over ti-
36
what we love is the cornerstone of abundance” affirmed
the need to nurture my natural talents. Yes I can write a
thesis, I can even type faster, yet another creative chapter
begins as my sewing renews a sense of celebration in my
true talents and passionate expression of my cultural pride. Thank-you for listening, I remain,
Respectfully Playful
J’net Cavanagh
AyAy Qwa Yak Sheelth
(One who gives away and still stands tall)
When asked what makes a good dancer, the master replied:
First, to be a good dancer, one must know the music as well as
the dance.
And what else?
To be a better dancer, one must understand the stories and be able to interpret the characters being played.
Is there more?
The best dancer is the one who has all those things I
have told you about and is a farmer.
Javanese proverb
17
Toronto made me renew myself. Obviously I remember
Maria Lugones when she says: “Sometimes, the ‘world’traveler has a double image of herself and each self includes as important ingredients of itself one or more attributes that are incompatible with one or more of the attributes of the other self.”
Because of this feeling I started to look what was
the ‘ingredient’ which made me feel uncomfortable. Sadly, I noticed that was being in a serious relationship with
somebody whom I admire but did not love anymore.
When people asked something like “And how serious is
your relationship?” or even more “When are you going
to get marry?” I just feel a shiver; but when he responds
“Ask Michelle, I am just waiting”, I was overcome by
panic.
Consequently I realized that I have no intention
to get married or moving with somebody (or anybody),
and that I need to have my space. So, I took the most
important sentimental decision I ever made: to finish the
relationship. It was a distressing decision but until now I
believe is the best one, not only because of the distance
(he’s still living in Mexico) but because I need to separate
my goals from his goals. I never was the kind of girl who
aspires for being married and have children. My problem
was to put all my efforts in believe that (because he is
such a great guy) I want all that stuff. So, I ended a four
years relationship and my parents’ illusion to see me walk
down the aisle wearing a wedding dress.
When I arrived to Toronto, a month ago, I felt
that in some way I was renewed, ready to find again my
true goals in life, happier and with arms wide open to live
I believe as long as we have only one life to live it is a pity not
to share it with others. Wilderness can be appreciated only by
contrast, and solitude understood only when we have been
without it. We cannot separate ourselves from society, comradeship, sharing and love. Unless we can contribute something from wilderness experience, derive some solace or peace
to share with others, then the real purpose is defeated.
Sigurd Olson
(wilderness canoeist in
Boundary Waters/Quetico region)
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18
HEATHER LASH
J’NET CAVANAGH
Phenomenology of the Giggles
Upon taking the Meyers-Briggs personality thing online, I
tested overwhelmingly as an “introvert”, meaning I get my
juice from my own sources. But perhaps I am changing,
because right now when I think of renewal, that which recharges and truly nourishes me, I think of the laughter of
my friend, my lover, and my son.
3 such different people, and the 3 of them laugh so
differently, but with one identical aspect among them. The
common element is that their laughter is something that
happens to them, it’s not something they do. They are, in
their ways, besieged by laughter, attacked, powerless against
it. To be in the laughter’s mighty presence is to be returned
to something elemental and precious.
•
Resting is coextensive with the feeling of time slowing
down. Finally the haunting sensation of being late disappears and every moment is exactly the length that it is,
because you are present to all of it.
So when I am at rest I remember that I am creating myself at every second. It is kind of binary, to the
extent that at each moment, with each choice I make at
the subtlest levels, it’s a yes or a no. It’s making a decision regarding who/what I am, and being accordingly.
And when at rest, there’s actually a bit of time to think
about it, enough time to hesitate, to pull back from making a choice, and just listen for a while. Vegetate!: in
Bicycle Zen
A teacher of Zen was sitting outside the monastery when he
saw five of his students riding bicycles as they returned from
the market. The students arrived at the monastery, dismounted, and greeted their teacher show asked them, “Why
are you riding your bicycles?”
“I use the bicycle to carry the bag of potatoes, which spares
me from having to carry them on my back,” said the first student. The teacher praised the first student, “You are very smart
for when you are old you will not walk hunched over as I do.”
“I love to watch the trees and fields pass by as I roll down
the path,” said the second student. “Ah, “Your eyes are open,
and you see the world,” said the teacher.
Rest & Renewal for a Multi-tasker
What could rest and renewal mean for a driven
career woman, solo-mother, and Masters of Arts student?
Where does creativity and socializing fit in for an extrovert stuck in front of a computer for 2 ½ years raising a
family of two children seven years apart? Rest and renewal began when I hit the last send button to Royal Roads
University to finish my course work and secure my convocation this coming June 2007 with a M.A. of Leadership and Training.
Reading a series of fantasy novels was one delight
that generated a sense of renewal. Reading a novel compared to academic material lifted the weight of incorporating the ideas being read into a looming thesis. Gently
suspend the grip of the critical intellect and succumb to
the creative pace of my imagination.
On the side of creativity, renewal was generated
when I stepped further away from the world of letters
and books and surrendered to the deeper pleasure of sewing and native fashion design. My sewing inspiration
was motivated by a marriage proposal from a dear friend
of 20 years, Chris Cavanagh. I sewed all the native designed outfits for the wedding party of seven for a private
civil marriage ceremony at Toronto City Hall chapel this
past winter. And Chris can confirm I’ve continued to sew
and pursued native fashion opportunities now that my
thesis is done!
A quote by Wayne Dwyer reminded me “Doing
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moved again, inside the embrace, by her company.
Up and down she goes. The manyness of meaning spilling in and out of her like a right side up and
wrong side up waterfall.
the way that lichen is only its opening, not a word and
never uttered. And so it does not summarize.
*For an unfolding of Relation, Edouard Glissant, The Poetics
of Relation.
Renewal goes beyond feeling rested, it’s a cleansing too.
It somehow carries with it a restoration to purity and innocence; there’s something that implies redemption
about it. And I would certainly love to be redeemed. Just
like a coupon: a symbol traded for the actual, the concrete. The free doughnut.
•
While I was at it, I would be happy to exchange
my concepts for intuition, and I’d gladly trade in my
ideas about time for my experience of the flow of the river. In a heartbeat, I would.
•
I have completely abandoned my sanity. I jump onto the
table at the pub with my snowy boots and sing you a very
loud song about how your eyes are like the stars. Because in
the song, I rest in them and am renewed by them. In the
song, when you look at the stars, the no disappears into a yes.
That is how fabulous you look when you laugh, Baby.
“As I ride, I chant and meditate,” said the third student. The
teacher praised this student saying, “Your mind will roll with
the ease of a newly trued wheel.”
The fourth student said, “Riding along, I live in harmony
with all sentient beings.” “You are riding on the golden path of
non-harming,” said the teacher.
The fifth student replied, “I ride my bicycle to ride my
bicycle.” The teacher sat at the feet of this student saying, “I am
your student!”
A buddhist story retold by chris cavanagh
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20
GIULIO CESCATO
MARÍA LUGONES
The pros and cons of disappointment
Renewal’s Interiority
The alarm shatters my sleep and I jerk awake like a hooked fish.
Once upon in ‘My’ time, she touched the sky. ‘My’ time
is like everyone else’s time: dizzying in its many circles,
turns, crisscrossings, stops and go’s, directions. ‘My’ times, like everyone else’s explode, scintillate, writhe,
crawl, dull, terrify, calm, endure. In one of her good
times, ‘My’ is in the tense stance, on the ready. Her attention, her intentions, her muscularity, all up against a
wall that is pushed, moved, transformed together, in the
solid tension of a heterogenous collectivity in resistance.
This is an exhausting time, some of the time dulling the
imagination, particularly the embodied imagination.
Anyway, once upon in ‘My’ time, she touched
the sky. She stood erect after a long time of being folded
two times over in one of those terrifying times of being
all normed out of shape. She touched the sky with the
tendrils that elongate one’s fingers, her body infinitely
long, calm inside. Up, up, up she unfolds. Up, up, up she
feels large and graceful, energetic in a peace-inside and
peace-outside way. The sky is cool and the tendrils in her
fingers draw nonsense signs that take meaning in the
newness of her stance. The meaning takes tendril-like
root in Relation. (*)
‘My’ shrinks down a little, as her body takes the
tango stance. Her feet start the long, sensual, languid
steps, her whole body moved into the embrace form. She
slides on the earth, writhes, graceful and strong on the
ground. Her feet draw circles and turns and rhythmic
cradles, and lines that move on the earth mirrored and
For a moment there’s disappointment,
The pillow I’m clutching isn’t the sweetheart I’d been
dreaming about.
Still, it’s a foolish disappointment.
My one eye refuses to obey my simple request to open
and I turn.
For a moment there’s disappointment,
The clock says its 6 am and my life feels all too regulated
right now.
I’m getting tired of disappointment.
I’m tired in general; I can’t remember my last good
night’s sleep.
For a moment there’s disappointment,
I weigh the advantages of sleep over the advantages of
getting paid.
Today, no more disappointment.
I roll over and go back to sleep, I think I’ll call in sick
today.
Escape
Once there was a Sufi who was captured by the police and accused of theft. Despite his protests of innocence he was convicted and sentenced to three years in jail. He had a loving wife
who visited him every day. One day she was allowed to bring
him a carpet on which he could pray. Three times a day he
would unroll the carpet and, kneeling and bowing down,
would pray. Weeks and months passed in this manner. One day
he the intricate pattern of the carpet’s weaving caught his notice. There was something unusual about it. Still, day after day,
he prayed and gradually the intricate detail of the carpet began
to make sense to him. As the days passed and he continued to
pray the pattern resolved until one day it was clear to him. The
pattern in the weaving was the design of the lock on his prison
door. Using his knew knowledge he picked the lock and escaped.
A Sufi tale retold by chris cavanagh
preservation, sixth sense, subliminal awareness (each of which,
too, is invisible yet present). Once upon a time what took such
good care of me was a guardian spirit, and I damn well knew
how to pay it appropriate attention.
Despite this invisible caring, we prefer to imagine
ourselves thrown naked into the world, utterly vulnerable and
fundamentally alone. It is easier to accept the story of heroic
self-made development than the story that you may well be
loved by this guiding providence, that you are needed for what
you bring, and that you are sometimes fortuitously helped by it
in situations of distress.
James Hillman
The Soul's Code
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sed, hyper, and mentally ill. Researchers are only now
beginning to explore the impacts of exhaustion on the
delicate body chemistry that sustains the human organism.
Rest is denied its anarchic unfurling in our lives;
we are told it must fit into prescribed weekends, holidays
and sleep patterns. But rest is not prescriptive – it is a
languorous process that has its own internal logic. It defines its own needs as it moves toward its goal of renewal.
A holistic process, it requires the creative investment of
the individual in crafting a resolution and above all, it is
fun.
We are into February and I am enjoying my moments of renewal. I have recalibrated myself back in tune
my inherent rhythms. Work is an exciting beacon, my
son’s behaviour makes me laugh more than stress, and
my body is getting the loving attention it deserves. I remember who I am.
GIULIO CESCATO
It’s cold
My breath frosts in the air,
There is ice in my hair.
I can’t remember being warm, and the shovel is heavy in
my hands.
My driveway is clear at last, and I’m thinking of warmer
lands.
Even my dog seems cold,
I need someone to hold.
I strip down and step into the shower, turning the water
to hot.
Curling up in the corner I hold myself, a victory hard
fought.
My toes thaw out for good,
I’ve never felt so good.
But why is it so difficult to imagine that I am cared about, that
something takes an interest in what I do, that I am perhaps
protected, maybe even kept alive not altogether by my own will
and doing? Why do I prefer insurance to the invisible guarantees of existence? For it sure is easy to die. A split second of
inattention and the best-laid plans of a strong ego spill out on
the sidewalk. Something saves me every day from falling down
the stairs, tripping at the curb, being blindsided. How is it possible to race down the highway, tape deck singing, thoughts far
away, and stay alive? What is this "immune system" that
watches over my days, my food sprinkled with viruses, toxins,
bacteria? Even my eyebrows crawl with mites, like little birds on
a rhino's back. We name what preserves us instinct, self-
22
GIULIO CESCATO
A short essay on renewal
I can’t say I’m a church going man, although I was in the
past. There are reasons I stopped going but the cynic in
me admits that most of them are pretentious. I know
I’m not a better man for not going. So, it’s not without
some surprise that I find myself standing in the warm
foyer of a Church I’ve never been too. Although I’m
sure the pretty girl standing next me, holding my hand,
with a smile like the rising sun had something to do with
it.
I’ve never been here but the familiarity strikes me
somewhere primal within my soul. We pass into the
church, habit ingrained somewhere in my muscle memory makes me dab my hand into the font of holy water and
cross myself absently. What does it even mean? The idea
that you can bless yourself fascinates me.
We sit down, mass begins. There’s familiarity
here. The verse I know almost from memory, the boredom, I smile. We wish each other peace, what a lovely
idea. My girl friend gives me a kiss on the cheek. I actually listen to the priest’s homily, I’ve never done that
before – you know? It’s not that bad.
Communion comes. I remember being told that
Catholics were cannibals because they receive the body
and blood of Christ. I can still see the ill concealed sneer
on the face of my antagonist, the high brow pretension,
the need to point out the flaws in every belief system but
his own. I remember being angry, but all of a sudden it
just doesn’t matter anymore. Despite or perhaps in spite
31
1989 CBC Massy Lecture series is a polemic on technology. She argues that it is as a process and that the two
types, holistic and prescriptive technologies, affect how
whole societies and individuals live.
Holistic technology, she explained, is a creative
whole picture approach normally associated with craftspeople who are invested in each stage of the process of
creation: be it a vase, a novel, a meal, an article. Experience of the process is as equally valued as the wealth
creation inherent in production. The result, according to
Franklin, is the socialization of societies and individuals
who are self responsible, less easily led and who value the
work of others as they value their own work.
Prescriptive technology, the dominant form in
today’s society, is one in which processes are broken
down into successive stages and each allocated to different sets of workers who complete and then pass on responsibility for the completion of the product, be it a
computer, a meal, a vase. It is a wildly efficient production method with wealth creation as the primary and underlying value. Franklin believes the result is the socialization of societies in which individuals are disconnected
from their work, their own creative processes and the
powers that define the parameters and roles of individuals
of a society. They think less for themselves and are more
easily led and controlled.
In this day and age of commodification where
everything – including rest – is defined by prescribed
steps, categories and boundaries it is no wonder that so
many people are beyond tired. I call them soul tired but
more common definitions include depressed, sad, stres-
When you are not separate from the creative process, time
ceases to exist. You might start to feel tired and suddenly realize that much time has passed. It isn't necessarily a happy time
- and may be very difficult to start if it is a job or an obligation.
But if' you start with all the concrete needs and proceed in a
thorough way - the creative process will take over and you will
forget whether it is work or play. Working in the here and now
is one of the most uncontaminated ways to work.
Corita Kent
30
it has become a powerful marketing tool.
Rest is a process, like a good story or a daydream,
it is a process of shedding the world and its sticky residue. Rest is peeling the magic onion. Rest is love without
object.
Last fall was a brutal exercise in pushing myself
too far physically, intellectually, spiritually and emotionally. My Solstice holidays were a treasured 10 days with no
other responsibilities other than providing food and comfort for my son and I. About seven days in, as I was sitting down with a cup of tea, I felt a tremendous loosing
of spirit. It was as if some energetic muscle tense and
knotted in the core of my body suddenly released and
melted. I sat down heavily, surprised that I had gotten so
away from myself that I had not even been aware of this
tight knotting up Self. Over the next few days I took deeper breaths, I laughed, my creativity expanded and I made art. Essentially, the process of rest had finally begun.
It took seven days of ‘holiday’ but finally I was able to
rest fully.
The process had begun and it wasn’t something I
could suddenly stop when responsibility returned three
days later. Instead I spent much of January napping on
the couch when I should have been researching and writing. I dreamed, I read science fiction, I watched movies.
I sought solitude. I walked more slowly. I did only what
had to be done and I took a trickster’s pleasure in redefining ‘had to.’
During this process I remembered an article read
during the previous fall. The Real World of Technology
by the estimable Dr. Ursula Franklin from her bestselling
What are you carrying?
Two monks, one old and one young, were walking through the
forest from one monastery to another when they came upon a
woman standing beside a river. She was finely dressed in delicate fabrics and was clearly afraid to attempt crossing the river
however shallow it might be. The old monk approached the
woman and offered to carry her across. The young monk was
shocked. Once on the other side the old monk put the woman
down and together with his young companion continued
through the forest. Many hours later, as the day was drawing to
a close the young monk spoke up saying, “Master, I do not
understand. It is strictly forbidden in our order to touch
women and yet you didn’t hesitate to pick up that woman and
carry her across the river.” “Ah, yes,” said the old monk. “I am
surprised at you. I put her down many hours ago. You must be
very tired from having carried her all day.”
A Buddhist tale retold by chris cavanagh
23
of myself I feel at peace, a little renewed.
Maybe it’s the familiarity, maybe it’s the girl beside me. Maybe it’s some childhood memory of warmth
and Christmas and candles and incense. I don’t know,
but I feel good. We’re walking out now, I heard a joke
once that God ends in the parking lot, but I walked today, maybe I can hold onto this feeling for a little while
longer. Just a little longer.
At the very thought of “circus”
a swarm of long-imprisoned desires breaks jail.
Armed with beauty and demanding justice
and everywhere threatening us with curiosity
and spring and childhood,
this mob of forgotten wishes
begins to storm the supposedly impregnable fortifications
of our present.
e.e. cummings
29
24
HEATHER MARIE ANNIS
SUSHIL SAINI
Buzz Buzz a nonsensical rant
Rest and Renewal
Buzz Buzz
My brain on drugs. Caffeine that is – a good
drug?
Needing to calm down, come off this high… find
my Zen…or just plain old relax… somehow. But how?
With so much to do…
Rest and relaxation? I don’t remember what that
is.
So I keep writing lists of things to do that keep
getting longer and longer and longer until I cant remember what else to add or even what I was writing the list
for in the first place and – Shit - I missed something.
Start over.
Buzz Buzz
So I try to sleep (it will all make sense in the
morning. … will it?)
Buzz Buzz
I can’t sleep. Have a bath? “Well that’s a waist of
water,” says the little voice inside my head, “…you had a
bath this morning.” Shut up! “NO!” OK, I turn on the
TV instead…
BOOM! Wow!
Bad idea!
A movie? But I cant decide between a frivolous
nonsensical type, which would just make me feel as
though I’m supporting a wasteful industry of corruption,
not to mention electricity, or the educational documentary that will inspire me into action. More action. As
With the absence of remorseless time and space, the past becomes lost and falls into nothingness. ... God abandons life, to
inhabit the eternal domain of death. No longer present within
the cycles of time, no longer the hub of these cycles, he becomes an absent, waiting presence. All the calculations underline how long he has already waited or will wait. The proofs of
his existence cease to be the morning, the returning season, the
newborn; instead they become the “eternity” of heaven and
hell and the finality of the last judgement. Man now becomes
condemned to time, which is no longer a condition of life and
therefore something sacred, but the inhuman principle which
spares nothing. Time becomes both a sentence and a punishment.
John Berger
And our faces, my heart, brief as photos
Renewal is to remember who I am. Rest is the process by
which I get there.
Still, having time to rest has been the challenge
of my lives as writer, activist, advocate, Doctoral researcher, outspoken sensitive woman and parent a five year
old son. I cheat a little, trying to integrate the rest process into my work process. A favourite quote, its origins
lost in memory, that I have used on many a friend and
sweetheart is that, “the spouses of writers fail to realize
that staring out the window is work.”
I used to berate myself for the time I spent staring and daydreaming on the couch, in bed, on the bus,
at parties. It seemed that the more I had to do, the more
time I spent in the sanctuary of my imagination. It was
years before I realized how much hard work went into
my conscious dreaming. Like dreams these imagining
manifest spontaneously on the levels of metaphor and
symbol which also reflected the day to day struggles that
welled up from the stuck places in my soul. The resolution of these conscious dreams provided insight and release from the realities that sent me into daydream in the
first place. Accepting this newly realized skill radically
altered my relationship with rest. And every time I get
too tired, the recovery process deepens my understanding
of rest.
Rest is not just quiet and solitude – although
they are favourite tools to get there. Rest is not an activity or lack of it. Rest cannot be bought or sold - although
God respects me when I work but He loves me when I sing.
Rabindranath Tagore
28
GABRIELLA AGATIELLO
Travel and the Journey of Renewal
Cuando uno viaja, siente de una manera muy practica el acto de
Renacer. Se esta frente a situaciones nuevas, el día pasa más
lentamente y la mayoría de las veces no se comprende ni el idioma
que hablan las personas. Exactamente como una criatura que
acaba de salir del vientre materno. Con esto, se concede mucha
mas importancia a las cosas que nos rodean, porque de ellas depende nuestra supervivencia…. Al mismo tiempo, como todas estas
cosas son para nosotros una novedad, uno ve en ellas solamente lo
bello y se siente más feliz por estar vivo.
Paulo Coelho, “El Peregrino”
When you travel, you experience, in a very practical way, the act
of rebirth. You confront completely new situations, the day passes
more slowly, and on most journeys you don’t even understand the
language the people speak. So you are like a child just out of the
womb. You begin to attach much more importance to the things
around you because your survival depends upon them…at the
same time, since all things are new, you see only the beauty in
them, and you feel happy to be alive.
Paulo Coelho, “The Pilgrimage”
This quote for me really speaks to the subject of rest and
renewal. Travelling allows me to break away from my
daily habits and routine and ask myself questions that I
normally would not ask. By leaving the familiar and immersing myself in a different environment I am able to
look back and reflect on my life, see myself through a
new lens. The pleasure and magic of surprise, of new encounters and experiences that comes from embarking on
a journey fills me with joy and hope. I open myself up to
the unknown. Filled with a sense of wonder I allow myself to experience life more fully, to shed my fears and
take risks. I travel to renew myself.
25
though I am in need of inspiration to act. I can barely
keep up with the current action. Please no more.
OK, no movie.
Something to regenerate… something simple.
It’s too bad I’m against smoking…
Chocolate! Yes! I run to the store realizing that I
only have $1.50 in my pocket. That’s fine, the cheap stuff
will do. But there’s that voice again, this time as a nine
year old boy in Cote d'Ivoire, describing the cocoa and
sugar plantations. I run to the Fair Trade/Organic section and pick up a bar letting out a sigh of relief until I
notice the price. Fair trade chocolate is a lot more than
$1.50. Leaving the store I am in more disarray than
when I started. Is this why I have neck problems?
BUZZ BUZZ
I would love for a moment to have clear
thoughts… or no thoughts at all. I’d walk around the
block except its so cold I can’t feel my toes and wasn’t
someone attacked down the street the other day, down
some street, any street is a street too many. I should volunteer for a program against violence. I should do that
soon.
Opening the door –SHIT – I see that I left on
my bedroom light and my computer. Both on for twenty
minutes and I wasn’t even here. How wasteful!
I pull out my every day activist book searching
for a way to repent my sins, looking for some kind of
comfort. “Buy an environmentally friendly car”, it says. I
don’t even have a car. I am punished by my efforts everyday when I have to wait in the cold for the bus and even
though I left the house early still end up late for work.
Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor
do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is
either a daring adventure, or nothing.
Helen Keller
Let Us Have Faith
27
26
That’s not helping.
BUZZ BUZZ
I’m too wired to read anyways, but despite the
fact that its 2:00 in the morning I still can’t sleep. Does
anyone else have this problem or am I just neurotic? So I
sit. I sit in the dark with even the heat down low. I’m not
hurting anyone or anything this way, not doing anything
wrong. Am I? I just sit and stare out the window at the
trees. Wow… the trees.
I can feel my body filling with breath. That’s
what I had forgotten to do… breath…
… just look at the trees.
DARASHANI JOACHIM
Ouvre Feu!
Vitraille éclabouie
Sous pression de la mitraille
Corps tomber
Lourd sur le plancher
Partout
Papier éparpiller
Le silence muet
À tous aux aguets
Lève la tête
Ce n’est pas encore la fête
Le vent est doux
On se met à genoux
Silence
Complet
Papraille
Étaler en éventaille
C’est le moment de représaille
Tout le monde retourne au travaille
L’instant sur ton dos
Était ton repos
Immaculate Heart College Art Department Rules
Rule I: Find a place you trust and then try trusting it for a while.
Rule 2: General duties of a student: pull everything out of your teacher.
Pull everything out of your fellow students.
Rule 3: General duties of a teacher: pull everything out of your students.
Rule 4: Consider everything an experiment.
Rule 5: Be self disciplined. This means finding someone wise or smart
and choosing to follow them. To be disciplined is to follow in a good
way. To be disciplined is to follow in a better way.
Rule 6: Nothing is a mistake. There’s no win & no fail. There’s only make.
Rule 7: The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It’s the
people who do all of the work all the time who eventually catch on to things.
Rule 8: Don’t try to create and analyze at the same time. They’re different processes.
Rule 9: Be happy whenever you can manage it. Enjoy yourself. It’s
lighter than you think.
Rule 10: “We’re breaking all of the rules. Even our own rules. And how
do we do that? By leaving plenty of room for x quantities.” John cage
Helpful hints: always be around. Come or go to every- thing. Always go
to classes. Read anything you can get your hands on. Look at movies
carefully, often. Save everything it might come in handy later. There
should be new rules next week.
From David Mekelburg. Corita Kent’s Rules & Hints for Students and Teachers.
Cheap Art Manifesto No.4
10 Purposes of Cheap Art
1.
2.
3.
Provoke the correct thought at the right moment
Realize Meaning where normally there is no meaning
Service a particular instant - either ordinary or extraordinary - in everyday life, by directing attention either to that
instant or away from it
4. Provide the appropriate symbol for event or chore
5. Provide the inappropriate symbol for event or chore
6. Decorate general universal thank-you to existence
7. Hang in unlikely places, i.e. closet, bathroom, pantry, etc.
8. Shift concentration away from intolerable newsreport
9. Accelerate concentration on intolerable newsreport
10. Compare apparent mess 2 primal image
Bread & Puppet