A fiery maiden appeared
and loved a man of ice;
They danced in the moonlight
so close, yet far apart;
Until he tried to possess her,
it is then she flew away refreshed
in cooling waters.

Watch out for knife . . . . . .

What do you plan to do with that knife? Butterball Turkey? Carve the male statue that she has erected out of her version of maleness. Men don't try to possess women. It is quite the opposite. Take it from me, a fallen monk(ey).

The Butterball Turkey Talk-Line is available to smooth ruffled feathers by providing one-on-one turkey advice. Every November and December, the Talk-Line's 48 professionally trained home economists respond to nearly 170,000 inquiries on virtually every turkey topic, from thawing to carving.

Cause I'm Free like a bird...hey that ones taken:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Bird

So now you'll have to become Free Turkey...at least when you invade our beer drinking, burping, etc.

In that gallery where mostly paintings are hung the statue, once shorn of stone, revealed a naked man without a penis. Some frequent gatherers, mostly women, say the penus was never there in the first place, and that the figure is a symbol of gestational unification of the species. By and large, real men have declined to comment in person.

Jeez, are we allowed to say all this? This is Phil's house and we're his guests.

I'm sure that in some of Christ's mansions there are food fights and the like.

Since I'm going to heathen heaven, I still hope that there's a squash court with and incline and with whipped cream smeared on it, so I can slide up and down, like when the Mad Hatter picked us up for my 12th birthday, in a Hearse. Then they sat us down on milk crates and taught us swear words. Finally at the end there was a hot dog fight. Parents and women not allowed of course. But the best part was the squash courts, on an incline and whipped cream. Buckets of it. Buckets kept coming. Buckets of that stuff. You could drink it throw it slide on it.

I'm shocked, WC. And I thought you were gearing up for the priestly vocation. I'll pray that you find a woman. Maybe you and Freebird will hook up;-)

Hahaha. She's singing about infinity and you're sitting there alone, in Nebraska, or whereever the hell you live writing about God knows what. Life is short and you never know; God may play a trick on you and say, hahahahahahaha. "I wanted you to have fun my boy, now go back down and be a good boy...have fun." Damn. Enjoying yourself is an art.

I love women. If it weren't for women I would take your knife. I remember after 7 years of celibacy walking in the mall and feeling attracted to every bloody woman I looked at. It was insane. i was alive for the first time in years. Damn monks and nuns will have a ball in my heathen heaven. Not orgies. Just friendship.

I'm dating this Protestant woman now, Johanna. I want to marry her. Her father's into Merton and Lewis so we should get along. I offered to give her a gumball ring today for an engagement ring and she asked me if a hermit could have children. Get that. Because I asked her if I married her, if I could lead a bit of a hermetic life...which doesn't mean I want to deny any responsibities, just when she does the rumba, I would like to be studying, or praying, or just being along which is good for me.

But I'm also quite attracted to this girl from Manila who started emailing me Hass poems. It is hard these other attractions, which is why I want to be hitched, which is why I offered Joey a gumball ring today. I also gave her a book by Merton since she wants to reestablish a relationship with Christ.

Maybe I'll brainwash her into advaita or Wilber. hahahaha. I told myself. Never will I want this life for my children. Let them live in a religious structure...much easier.

Maybe...I'm still struggling with how to raise children, whether Moslem or Christian. Let's see if she accepts my gum ball ring. I don't want any ceremonies though. Maybe common law. That's how it is with our age group now. But we have trust and that matters.

Yes, of course, being a war-mongering white boy, where else would I hail from but Nebraska, where one can go mad in a sea of corn fields, only to dream of burning one's farm clothes for a navy uniform.

quote:

Originally posted by w.c.:
[qb] Yes, of course, being a war-mongering white boy, where else would I hail from but Nebraska, where one can go mad in a sea of corn fields, only to dream of burning one's farm clothes for a navy uniform. [/qb]

haha. That's a great line of poetry! I know you're not from Nebraska, nor are you any old typical red neck white boy...otherwise...I wouldn't have invite you to Toronto for a beer...At one point, we should have a shalom gathering. Imagine that. Free bird would be free to sing. I would be in a tree writing my emotional crises. WC would be touching his naval. MM would be preaching to wheat. Phil, levitating; Brad coverting. J writing the name of Christ on a test tube labeled "consciousness." Grace turning into a cloud. Stephen...and...I forget everyone else, forgive me, but you are all there in Nebraska..

So it looks like "Nebraska" has become that place here at Shalom where all the socks are lost and found.

As for a Shalom gathering, that would be like a Rorschach test for Kafka's beetle.


"MM would be preaching to wheat."


While remaining powerless over corn.


"Phil, levitating."


While carefully distinguishing it from formal Christology.


"Brad coverting."


To what?


"J writing the name of Christ on a test tube labeled "consciousness."


And setting the Guinness Record for most detailed inscription of a test tube.


"Grace turning into a cloud."


Turning?


"Free bird would be free to sing."


And yelling at everybody for not being loving enough.


Stephen . . . .


Will wear a Catholic priest's collar backwards.

"Stephen . . ."

You do well to hesitate, brother Asher.

Here I am at an ecclesiastical crossroads. . .
about to drop my Evangelical Protestant pants and rush headlong up Roman Catholic Alley (the Via (H)appia, if you will), tugging mercilessly at my reversible dog collar, hiding my shame with the cassock of Orthodoxy.

Am I headed for a hermitage? Do I linger for love? Should I wait for a woman or grow my beard long?

Hey, Nebraska isn't far from Kansas, and the way the wind is blowing today, I expect to see Toronto tumbling down I-35 any time now.

Stephen . . . will grow his beard long, hoping some Catholic hippie queen from the 60s takes note and resolves his dilemma.

Backtracking a bit to the subject of turkeys raised by Asher, let me inform you men of the sad predicament of a male turkey Tom. The males have been bred overtime to have larger and larger breasts for human consumption. Unfortunately their breasts are now so large for it to be physically possible for them to breed by themselves. Talk about cruel and unusual punishment. My heart goes out to these turkey Toms for their great suffering in pleasing the appetites of humanity. Therefore the turkey hens are free indeed. Free birds.

"Unfortunately their breasts are now so large for it to be physically possible for them to breed by themselves."


Alright Freebird, that's too much peeking into the men's room! Don't make me ban you from your voyeuristic activities.

well, at least i am tolerated on this site. get this, i get kicked off a site because i question the literary canon...Lord, what is the world coming too. i am more accepted on a (in appearance only, mind you) right winged Christian site...then with a bunch of lefties.

hahahaha.

ok baptize me...
:-)

what a nutty bunch of christians (just reading all your funny responses)!

. . . i am more accepted on a (in appearance only, mind you) right winged Christian site...then with a bunch of lefties.

Right-winged Christian site? Asher, you jest. With a forum on kundalini, and another on Contemplative Issues?

You misunderstand the Yellow vMeme (a la Spiral Dynamics). We value conservative opinions when they apply, liberal ones when they apply, and so forth. The way you know the difference between Yellow positions and others is that libs and conservatives just react to conditions, while Yellow sorts things out based on principles and critical thinking.

I've had to ban a few people, but not because they were conservative or liberal. The most common reason is they have an "agenda" and are just inappropriate in discussing topics. While I haven't always agreed with some of your opinions, I've always found you willing to engage in the rebuttals made and even learn from feedback. You are most welcome here.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
[qb] . . . i am more accepted on a (in appearance only, mind you) right winged Christian site...then with a bunch of lefties.

Right-winged Christian site? Asher, you jest. With a forum on kundalini, and another on Contemplative Issues?

You misunderstand the Yellow vMeme (a la Spiral Dynamics). We value conservative opinions when they apply, liberal ones when they apply, and so forth. The way you know the difference between Yellow positions and others is that libs and conservatives just react to conditions, while Yellow sorts things out based on principles and critical thinking.

I've had to ban a few people, but not because they were conservative or liberal. The most common reason is they have an "agenda" and are just inappropriate in discussing topics. While I haven't always agreed with some of your opinions, I've always found you willing to engage in the rebuttals made and even learn from feedback. You are most welcome here. [/qb]

Thanks...

I assume that some people would think this site is conservative, Phil. I think that many people who have come and gone have had this illusion...but I'm always happy to learn from you all...I like what you say about "yellow meme," Phil. How it can remain open to other viewpoints.

I even learn from Daniel Pipes, even if I don't agree. It seems important to know every side of an argument and not to get fumed up without gathering whatever factual evidence exists. Once this is done, one can really believe in something with a passion.

The poet John Keats used to have this idea of "negative capeability" which meant an ability to hold contradictions. It is usually at this point, that something above, or from within, descends, or opens, creating a synthesis. This takes years to develop, I understand. But I think part of it is, at first, simply remaining open to varying view points.

Hey I didn't want that tongue sticking out emoticon.

We're in the locker room...some male bonding, eh mm?

I'll let the master speak for himself:

"I had not a dispute but a disquisition, with Dilke on various subjects; several things dove-tailed in my mind, and at once it struck me what quality went to form a Man of Achievement, especially in Literature, and which Shakespeare possessed so enormously - I mean Negative Capability, that is, when a man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason-Coleridge, for instance, would let go by a fine isolated verisimilitude caught from the Penetralium of mystery, from being incapable of remaining content with half-knowledge. This pursued through volumes would perhaps take us no further than this, that with a great poet the sense of Beauty overcomes every other consideration, or rather obliterates all consideration.

Sbelley's poem is out, and there are words about its being obiected to as much as "Queen Mab" was. Poor Shelley, I think he has his Quota of good qualities, in sooth la!! Write soon to your most sincere friend and affectionate Brother


John [Keats]"

Asher, I really do not believe that you are imagining
that shalomplace is right-wing. The fanatical 18% of the population that still support Dick Cheney are well represented here, although they do not think so.

It must seem like Darth Vader incarnate to a Canadian.

well, not darth vadar:-) as i can allow myself to listen...i posted that keat's quote...negative capeability is some faculty that the contemplative uses, except that the poet uses it in the realm of conflicting memes...holding them, until sythesis arises from within, or without. this synthesis is beauty.

but it gets frustrating when my points are not responded to (at times)...when learning is unidirectional, and little dialogue takes place...like, yeah, i can see what you mean by two cultural identities causing problems in identity formation...so than how can we recontextualize certain issues, adding this missing piece...culture, a huge interface.

wilber seems to place everything postcolonial in "green." this is a reification, of course, which recalls and reiterates colonial assumptions about culture, 'race,' thought-formations as being congealed in a "memes."

it uses the same telos as the enlightenment telos which creates many problems for me. what of a shaman who appears in a tribe and can commune with the subtle realms...since he is in a tribe, he is "read" only at the level of a mythic meme?

these systems can easily be deconstructed when you find these points where exceptions are present, where the exception destabilizes the whole totalizing enterprise. and the deconstruction, contrary to wiber's understanding of the term, actually does lead beyond the self, while re-cognizing the necessity of the self.

of course shalom is mainly right winged and other sides get the silent treatment...this is, of course, part of the reason for my incomprehension and outbursts...which are justified...but at any rate, i have decided not to engage the political aspect of shalom....

i have found some means to understand how dual and incommensurable cultural identities can create a break through in consciousness. this is why i am intrigued, not by wilber, whose integral system does not inspire, but by deleuze, who has implicit in his framework, an orange and red force which i need to express in order to move out of mythic membership consciousness.

one need not subscribe to a system to reach these plateaus, but simply has to hold opposites and be comfortable not knowing. this is what i try to express in my journey, and this is the point where a leap occurs for me, by living between, in the liminal, identity, and all difference is brought into light and the tension released through a spiritual practice. from this beauty descends from the tension of opposites being held. and beauty can be of many sorts. it can be christian, or moslem, or hindu.

i believe that one then begins from there the process of reconstructing the traditions, beyond the mythic. you can't undo postmodernity. it's now well engrained.

wilber does not inspire because he glosses over key issues which are important for my journey.

anyway. huuuu. i love the journey, sharing it, questioning it, recoiling from it, living it so much so that it is no longer a journey, but an arrival.

this i do not equate with non-dual states, which i have experienced...but with enhanced clarity, beauty, and ability to move into authentic relationship. so i see no reason to overthow poststructualism...

a dream proposition: One of the ways to approach the essay is to have learn every competing side of a position and have a debate within the text of the essay�a debate that is not unlike the cacophony in an Indian bizarre. Voices answering each other, but no ground, no meeting point�points intersect, the structural functionalist approach (of development theory) takes on new meaning, Foucault takes on new meaning�an essay that comes close to being a poem, not a proposal, not to lead to some end, but to spark debate, to cross still isolated disciplines. The �other� speaking? (possible?) without framing him/her. An essay that is based on difference and contradiction, an essay that exposes its own contradiction, that laughs in its own face. That uses many forms that draws from many sources; that uses contradictory paradigms, that laughs and sings the song of contradiction�I always seem to feel that from contradiction, dialogism arises � and from dialogism, ethics organic. What would be the political impulse behind this? No politics, but art, art being the place where multiple view points are debated�the artist, like Keat�s notion of �negative capability� holding shifting �ground.� Join the band wagon�find a position. Find no ground. Sing no ground. Make people engaged with no ground. No ground is the way! A parable, to enable, multiple discourse, possibility of linking. Still, this is Hutcheon's apolitical notion of po mo. But has any one done it. currie says, not really. joyce perhaps...at the bar.

am i to use wilber's novel as a model? wouldn't this be slightly mythic? isn't wilberian 'culture' slightly mythic? is po mo culture really mythic? is this

really a case of "boomeritis," or can deconstruction lead to questioning identity and deconstructing the social conditioning which created a mythic self? paradoxes and puzzles are fun, because they lead to a green ethics...collapse of tradition? no. i don't think so. but a whole generation of people writing the traditions through the form of biography...new ways of experiencing the traditions. how

the self can leap from position to position, even on the subtle level. there is no absolute truth and if there is, it would kill the creative movement and deaden the senses. there is

the witness, but one cannot deny the personal - to do that would lead backwards...i find something historically regressive in that movement...if one understands something about our generation, they will understand that wilberism will not appeal precisely because it offers an answer...and that answer is a structure which precludes the creativity which they are needing to express. they will re-locate the traditions in and through their own creativity and visionary abilities. their search will recontextualize the traditions, imo...and hopefully raise a whole new set of questions about culture and its relation to globalization and fragmentation...will be a place where reconstruction occurs - not by imposing a suprastructure on the self- but by a more organic healing process.


at any rate, this i love (from someone who has read all of wiber's work and read it in a balanced way. it's funny that wilber never REALLY engages with these balanced points of view):

"Except for the occasional cooperative freshman, one cannot find anybody who says that two incompatible opinions on an important topic are equally good.�# This is why Wilber never quotes any of his so-called relativist opponents actually asserting the view. While Wilber never ceases to delight in chopping his straw man relativists down, the reader grows frustrated having to sit through such a self-serving display. The problem is, as Rorty says, that �such neat little dialectical strategies only work against lightly-sketched fictional characters.�# I referred to this weakness of argumentation as a problem, but it�s only a problem for those serious about argumentation. For Wilber it�s not problematic, but functional. By deploying his self-contradiction argument he can avoid the real difficulties that serious scholars present for his position."

and this, a great point:

"On an even more fundamental philosophical level, Wilber assumes that all true statements should fit together. This assumption presupposes that all true statements share something in common, such as a connection to the world as it is in itself. But it�s clear that there are true statements that contradict each other and are not reconcilable by appeal to some larger more inclusive perspective."

so if there are true statements that contradict each other, then what happens when you bring them together. confusion, dilution, spirituality that turns out to mix things up. i would rather see a paradigm that allows for a radical difference (in Derrida's sense of the word), while allowing for one to nomadically move and learn from other traditions, without conflating them. any one with any authentic understanding of the subtle realm will understand this point. you have exceptions, yogananda meeting christ. etc. it is these points which provide the means for mutal appreciation between traditions and provide a real and authentic space for inter faith dialogue.

what we need to develop is a new theory on subtle energies, on how thoughts from one lineage may conflict with another. ramakrishna could move from one to the other, but he never mixed them up. aurobindo the same. radical difference creates the space for an inter faith dialogue to appear organically. find key nodal points where transformation may be similar.

different ends...in sufism, for instance, a completely different manifestation. maybe points where we can concur, but ultimately different energies...so if you want to understand the problems with wilber, his theory on subtle energy is off. radical difference creates clarity. trust me, i've seen how leaping from one to the other (not physically seeking this, but this happening on its own) creates confusion.

so what is the "Christ self;" to me it is a new age dream. it can and should be studied sociologically, a yearning for something other then ones own tradition. I usually find such a search, somehow orientalist...but I'd have to listen more...to see.

Asher, you wrote: but it gets frustrating when my points are not responded to (at times)...when learning is unidirectional, and little dialogue takes place...like, yeah, i can see what you mean by two cultural identities causing problems in identity formation...so than how can we recontextualize certain issues, adding this missing piece...culture, a huge interface.

Asher, I'm sorry you're not getting more interaction with people here, but we only have a few "regulars" and I, for one, have only so much time to give to reading, reflecting and dialoguing. Too much and I become fatigued and headachey. So I kind of "Triage" my replies and hope that others can pick up the slack.

Anyone wanting to pay $35 and hour for a consultation or spiritual direction will receive priority attention, however. The rest of you are getting your money's worth.

Yes...Phil...

It's not so much that I need consultation...or specifically to dialogue with you. It's better to remain quiet about politics here. That was my only issue...really...and I guess some of my points need to by thought over...and expanded upon...it's strange how my issues actually really involve politics and spirituality, together.

smily tongue right back to you, you, you, you...
hmmm. Friend.

hahahahahaha.

I'm not sure a consulatation for a poetmodernist like myself would be useful.

that's cheap...35 Canadian bucks.

quote:

Originally posted by mysticalmichael9:
[qb] Asher, I really do not believe that you are imagining
that shalomplace is right-wing. The fanatical 18% of the population that still support Dick Cheney are well represented here, although they do not think so.

It must seem like Darth Vader incarnate to a Canadian. [/qb]

Examples, please, of this "right-wing" bias. And what does "support Dick Cheney" mean?

phew...