This has been a bit of a mixed holiday so far, but that’s all right. I’m not Christian, so it isn’t really mine anyway. Christmas is meaningful to me, though, and I always like to dedicate some work time to drinking in the spirit. Christmas Eve is especially sacred. So many devout souls are praying all at the same time for the birth of the Prince of Peace. The Kingdom of Heaven feels a bit closer. We might still heal, after all.

Because of neighborhood conflicts mentioned earlier, this has been a season of mixed blessings. The process of pushing back has cost me a great deal of anxiety and stressed, and caused me to do some hard and deep thinking. I can feel so many influences at play. At this point, I can pretty much do one thing, as you see here. I am an unworldly person who has no intention of becoming an activist at this late date–I am far more of a quietist! But I can dedicate my work to the service of healing, and that is what I have done.

This is an audacious thing to say, within the hearing of others. It scares me a bit. It involves a commitment to listen a lot longer when others are telling their stories, for one thing. I have always preferred to work alone and to get inspiration through cracks and sidelong glimpses–‘leaks.’ That might never change, but I remember what it was like years ago when I was less reclusive, and everyone wanted to talk about their exceptional experiences. Such strange things happen every day. I want to work toward healing peace and quiet, within and without, for every person who needs it to be able to hear the voice of their spirit and soul. Spirit whispers back, it’s coming closer. When the present peace is healed, peace will heal you.

Still not a true believer–I just sit down to work and let it happen. This happened today:

24 December 2020

24

Healing Peace

We’ll search every world for the most healing magic and tender it carefully here, where you hurt.

You’ll feel it the moment we’ve safely retrieved it from where it’s been hiding in deep graveyard dirt–

in the body of land at the heart of the most shadowed forest. She’s humming her most soothing song,

and she has been since healing began. You are here because you have been hearing her hum all along.

And yet–if she still hasn’t found it, and still isn’t satisfied–what could remain so amiss?

Once you lay dreaming a scene of late August, an overcast sky, and a feeling of bliss

that not quite overcame you but gathered in waves until you were the shore and the shore flowed away.

She’ll hold you within an ecstatic embrace when the healing that hides in the vision at play

in the fields of the most fertile mind has been harvested root, branch and seed, and prepared for your use.

See your original essence restored–though we’ll spare you the scars of the well-plaited noose

that gave rise to a more florid vision of beauty between air and land, where the light becomes strange

and vast hosts of memories reach forth and beckon and each one might mean a new way to derange

what been balanced precariously for too long–but discriminate wisely, with help you can feel

leaking through between fibers of linen and wool and the wood you were made of, a tree made of steel

to the lightning that sought you but struck its own self. Then the tree becomes supple and yielding once more

when the storm passes by but the rain settles in and it’s warm here inside; let the wild weather pour

all it has. When it’s over, we’ll gathered the vessels cast over the sand, little bowls of grown shell

in which we shall collect and preserve–more than ever, you need our protection; we’ll tender it well,

but you also must listen as hard as you’re able: The salve will leak through every hour of the day,

but it works so much better if you are receptive to words not your own and the prayers others pray

when they also are drawn to and over the border of what they can bear and what must happen next.

All the best blossoms alive in the glade between letters and words in the lines of a text

that was borne across fields by a desperate woman who woke in the earliest hours sick at heart

because she was within the grim reach of a place where foul vapors pronounced their intent–darkness art–

extracted and purified many times over till so many strong healing elements swam

to the surface and waiting hands swept them toward open shells–you’ll soon learn how devoted I am

to the work we’ve been doing together; it’s grown so much harder since we have seemed parted; we’re not.

Look to the droplet of luminous oil in the lamp of the shell and, with stillness at thought,

wait–only silently wait for the moment. Balm of the last world we’ve yet to create,

precious, extractable inherent substance beneath the sad skin of your present lorn fate–

listen to what you’ve become in the meantime, between open air and the landing below.

If time once betrayed you, it’s now in your favor. You’ve healing now leaking–but soon in full flow.