Letting Go

Dear Brave Souls

To let go 

Some have a hard time 

letting go of what is no longer, 

what cannot be, what is not,

what has never been. 

People say 

'just let go, 

just let go, 

just let go' 

scattering the platitude like confetti 

immediately swept away by any wind. 

What is it exactly, this letting go? 

No longer allowing the eye

to be caught by the hook...

No longer fastening the lock on the door, 

just letting the door swing as it will...

No longer visiting the graves 

where there is no love 

and no blessing in both directions...

No longer reviewing and reviewing the past, 

even the last moment, 

as though there will be a test. 

There will not be a test, dear soul.

What is it exactly, 

this letting go?

Not reading the same chapter over and over

and over and over, futilely attempting 

to make the indelible facts be rewritten… 

Making new memories of quality

to bathe old scars and new life...

Moving into a larger world 

in which the past 

is but a dot on the landscape

rather than the only continent in sight.

We all find our ways… 

letting go is shaking loose,

letting go is turning

in your great coat, into a new wind

forward into new sky and open road

leaving what cannot be,

and taking all treasure

from the wreck. 

Each in her own way.

Each in his own way.

This comes with love. Hang in there. No one deserves to be nailing the hem of their cloak to the crossroad that once was, but that is not now.

Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Painting by Helene Knoop

Noli Me Tangere

Noli Me Tangere

‘Noli me tangere’, he quietly said

‘Do not touch me.’

But how could I not reach out

for my Dear One?

How could I not long to hold

even the hem of his garment,

gain some measure of substance

for what I had thought was lost to me?

Around us, all was still.

Even the birds had fallen silent

in the still air of that miraculous place

as if in wonder at this marvel.

And I, overcome, reached towards him.

‘Noli me tangere’, he softly said

in caution and in love.

Neither man nor shade,

but part of both these things:

a creature between worlds,

between realms, between kingdoms,

between what has been

and what is still to come.

And I reached out to him.

But ‘noli me tangere’, he said.

And I must stay my hand

And my great longing.

And so I showed him my greatest love

as he intended, and as he already knew.

For what he already knew

was that he would never be lost to me.

And my greatest love, in knowing this,

was to let him go.

   

Painting of Mary Magdalene by Louis Janmot Mirror

The Mothers

The Mothers

They are saying that he is of us all.

If this is true .. and we trust that it is so ..

and he truly is the son

then he also must be our son

and we, his many mothers.

What, then, must we think

when we see him ride between

the waving fronds of palms?

What, then, must we feel

when he passes by us,

almost close enough to touch?

Donkey and colt are enough

to carry him to his destiny.

But we, the mothers

who line these streets

to watch him pass

among the adoring fronds 

do not see a king, triumphant.

We see no crown, no royal robes,

no hem to kiss, no kingly sword. 

We do not see the one

whom those around us

hail as lord.

We, the mothers, only see our son,

and as mothers know these things

we see only the dear son

for whom we soon must mourn.

For the crowd, he leads,

and they will surely follow.

But he himself must follow his own road

And where that road must go

and our grief will be the grief 

only a mother’s heart can know.

Riding the Donkey

Scripture tells us that, just one week before his crucifixion, Jesus rode in triumph into Jerusalem. We also are told that, before this ride of triumph, he was very specific in his instructions to his disciples about the animal that he wished to ride. As we know, it was a donkey. He even told his disciples where they would find the specific donkey that he wished to ride for the purpose. We might ask why such a humble animal was the mount of choice for this moment of supreme acknowledgement and recognition of Jesus’ earthly worth. 

The worldly reason might have been a practical one: a donkey certainly would have been a readily-available animal. And the symbolic reason might seem apparent enough: what more humble animal than a donkey to underscore Jesus’ own humility? What more telling way to demonstrate to the crowd that they might hail him as a king, but that his own trappings of kingship were the very things of their own everyday use? This is as far as explanations usually go. But is it possible to go a little further, to dig a little deeper, to discover that there is more to this tableau of humility and triumph than at first seems apparent?

A carving which was discovered on a pillar in Rome depicts, of all things, a crucified donkey. This rough carving, which dates from the second century, might at first seem mocking: perhaps the equivalent of a political cartoon of its day. But the image points us towards a mystic teaching of Gnosticism, in which the donkey is symbolic of the human ego. And a fitting symbol it is! Like the obstinate and stubborn donkey, the ego can be unruly. We might wish to go in one direction, but the donkey (and the ego) insists on asserting its own will, on telling us that it is the most important thing there is, and its will carries us along with it.

Putting the ego in its place, triumphing over its illusory dominance, is a striving common to various beliefs. In Zen Buddhism it is symbolised by the bull, which in its temperament is seen as being much like the wilful donkey. To ride the bull is therefore the embodiment of subjugating the pompous ego, of achieving a necessary detachment from the forest of illusions which clamour for our attention and insist to us that they are real.

But riding the bull, riding the donkey, is not the final phase of the process. In these mystic teachings we are told that only with the complete defeat of the ego will true transcendence find place. The bull will itself be seen as an illusion and will dissolve and vanish. The donkey will be sacrificed on the cross of worldly pretence - and the man as well. For the supreme triumph is not the ride, but the moment of ultimate transcendence that will surely follow.

Painting Christ's Entry into Jerusalem by Hippolyte Flandrin, 1842

Cherokee basketweave cross by Baskauta

The passage in scripture can be found in Matthew 21:1-7

Rhythm of Life

RHYTHM OF LIFE

Wait, have you not understood?

Feel how the earth now warms you

when night has passed.

Time stands still ..

Sand slips through your fingers,

and in your hand still rests

the crystal glow

that once lit up your day.

You are still connected

to the current of your existence.

When will you understand?

It is not yet too late

to let your spirit fly.

Listen now

to how your wishes and desires

perform their symphonies,

how heavy drumbeats

in your heart's orchestra

shake the ground beneath your feet

to life once more.

Let the strings sing!

And pluck all the chords

of your soul ..

Do you now understand?

Painting Hope by George Frederick Watts, 1886