Namaste
Said my young friend who wants a connection:
“I wave. I shake hands, with no objection.
No pain, no remorse, no one intervening
a choice I make without much thought or meaning~”
“…Is there a gesture that honors each other?
That celebrates greeting sisters and brothers?
Can you show me HOW to express happiness
with social and spiritual significance?”
YES, my dear friend, I can show you a mudra~
a gesture of sorts, for kings, friends and sudras.
Place hands together from fingers to wrists~
like a knife, cut through difference that may exist.
This immediately gets you to the shared ground~
of ALL people, of all cultures, of all sound.
It’s a recognition, a united force~
that honors equality of all from the Source.
Close your eyes and tune into your own inner light;
your divine spark that forever burns bright.
That’s the key, my dear friend, you must see your OWN
in order to recognize others’ light shown.
BLEND your five fingers of action on the left~
with five fingers of knowledge on the right~
to achieve the symbol of perfection~
the union of opposites; interconnection.
FInd the Connection of your brain and your HEART;
your sun and your moon; your stop and your start.
Marry together reason and emotion~
Unite thoughts and feelings, stillness and motion.
JOIN positive and negative; hot and cold~
theory with practice, silver with gold~
Wisdom with Method, intellect with instinct~
talent with genius, and feelings with think!
Exhalation and inhalation, ,brain and heart~
Align in harmony, right from the start!
There is indeed no sphere of our existence
untouched by the symbolic significance~
of Namaste~
Namaste
{Tada drastuh svarupe vasthanam}
As Earth Day approaches this year, I am struck by what it means to truly foster Peace on this planet. I remember as a child, learning about anti-nuclear protestors who chained themselves to fences and were forcibly removed and jailed. These brave souls became my heroines and heroes in the late 1970’s and 1980’s. I was moved to tears singing Dylan’s “Blowing in the Wind” and hearing stories of civil disobedience and the message of non-violent resistance. Later in the 1990’s, when I danced barefoot on my very first Earth Day, a lump would form in my throat when I celebrated each small victory (and the Gigantic Hearts) of environmental protestors who sacrificed so much to save a single tree and worked to preserve open space for our children’s children. Peace.