Prompt: JOURNEY
What is a journey
but a letting go
and an embrace,
a sheltering in
and a calling out,
a displacement
and a return home,
a question
and an answer,
a threat
and a forgiveness,
an understanding
and a confusion?
What is a journey
but a deep,
resounding yes
and a booming no,
a careful loving
and a moving on,
a gut feeling
and a deep-thought response?
What is a journey
but you and me,
in the world
and outside it,
running toward the ocean
and against the tide
all at once?
The journey,
then,
is simply
everything,
and nothing,
and whatever waits
in between.
Long before smart phones
Little battery powered transistor radios
Poster for a Seattle Radio station
In the 1960’s
Drawing of a classic hobo
Dancing down the railroad
Tracks
Transistor radio pressed to his ear.
Caption:
“Those who dance, are thought
Quite insane, by those who
Can’t hear the music”.
That poster has been a guide
For me for years
At my best I have heard and followed
The music.
I have not settled, I have not let the
Many, compelling and seductive sounds of caution, fear and taming keep
Me from dancing to a different and truer tune that draws me onto a magical mystery journey.
Jesus, St Francis, Mother Teresa,
Martian Luther King Jr., Dorthy Day Clyde Bellecourt, Greta Thurnberg, Winona LaDuke.
All thought crazy
All hearing divine music
All calling us to journey, all inviting us to
The dance of a greater life.
The word "journey" comes from the
middle-English word for a day's travel,
or, a day's work.
When we talk about life being a journey,
most people think about it as though
we are simply traveling through life,
and it makes it seem like the destination
is the important part,
and that the purpose of the journey
is just to get to wherever we're going.
They've built entire religions
around the idea that the whole point of life
is to get to the end,
and that the only thing we should care about
is whether or not we're going to end up
at the right place,
with the right people.
But I think that life, as a journey,
is our life's work.
The life is the purpose.
The life is the important part.
When we think about it that way,
it becomes a lot more difficult
to ignore our impact on
the space we are traveling in,
and those who are traveling with us.