July 24, 2016 CENTERING IN POTTERY POETRY AND THE PERSON
There is something I wanna share that goes along with the I AM
THE CLAY theme that's been playing in my life center stage recently. I can't
think of clay without thinking of M. C. Richards who wrote
CENTERING: IN POTTERY POETRY AND THE PERSON.
I have a really old version of this book.
Please take a few minutes to spend time with this wondrous lady:
You can read about her life @
I also have the movie about her THE FIRE WITHIN
Here are a few of my favorite quotes:
~ To have character is to be big enough to take life on.
~~~
~ We have to believe that a creative being lives within
ourselves, whether we like it or not, and that we must get out of its way, for
it will not give us peace until we do.
~~~
~ All the arts we practice are apprenticeship. The big art is
our life.
~~~
~ For since most of our living is unconscious, play is
like matchstrokes in the void, bringing into light the structures we behave by,
illuminating for us, however briefly, our deep meanings.
~~~
~ Love is not a doctrine, Peace is not an international agreement.
Love and peace are beings who live as possibilities in us.
~~~
~Let no one be deluded that a knowledge of the path can
substitute for putting one foot in front of the other.
~~~
~Am I willing to give up what I have in order to be what I am
not yet? Am I willing to let my ideas of myself, of man be changed? Am I able
to follow the spirit of love into the desert? To empty myself even of my
concept of emptiness?
~~~
~There is a creative spirit in you desiring to be free, and you
may as well get out of its way for it will give you no peace until you do.
~~~
~People don't want to feel stuck, they want to be able to
change.
~~~
~In a lethal world, poetry is necessary for survival.
~~~
~~~
~From the
seed grows a root, then a sprout; from the sprout, the seedling leaves; from
the leaves, the stem; around the stem, the branches; at the top, the flower. .
. We cannot say that the seed causes the growth, nor that the soil does. We can
say that the potentialities for growth lie within the seed, in mysterious life
forces, which, when properly fostered, take on certain forms.
~~~
~~~
~Bear ye one another's burdens, the Lord said, and he was
talking law.
~~~
~Who are enemies? Those who oppose each others will.
~~~
~Inhabit ourselves that we may indeed do what we want to do.
~~~
~It is for each of us freely to choose whom we shall serve, and
find in that obedience our freedom.
~~~
~The child takes in his world as if it were food. And his world
nourishes or starves him. Nothing escapes his thirst. Secrets are impossible.
He identifies with his surroundings and they live within him unconsciously; it
is perhaps for this reason that the small child has been characterized as
naturally religious.
~~~
~~~
~We must be steady enough in ourselves, to be open and to let
the winds of life blow through us, to be our breath, our inspiration . . .
~~~
~And with listening, too, it seems to me, it is not the ear that
hears, it is not the physical organ that performs the act of inner receptivity.
It is the total person who hears. Sometimes the skin seems to be the best
listener, as it prickles and thrills, say to a sound or a silence; or the
fantasy, the imagination: how it bursts into inner pictures as it listens and
then responds by pressing its language, its forms, into the listening clay. To
be open to what we hear, to be open in what we say.
~~~
~Our works and our play. All our pleasures experienced as the
pleasure of love. What could be better that? To feel in one's work the tender
and flushed substance of one's dearest concern.
~~~
~~~
Posts
I got up and worked with colored pencils in my art journal
Wrote my haikus but didn't have time to post them
Just got outta a wondrous yoga class
Lunch @ Rosie's to discuss WHEREVER THERE IS LIGHT for Pulpwood Bookclub
Reading TIMBER ROSE in between for PAGE & PALETTE Bookclub Tuesday
It's set in Portland and Seattle in 1907
They talk about the 1907 New Woman
It's written by J L Oakley
Do you know her?
~~~
Tonite is very special. My husband Steve and I are going w/ our next door neighbors to see Michael Franti @ the Saenger Theater in nearby Mobile.
We saw Micheal Franti 2X w/ our son before he was accidentally killed when Michael performed on the beach @ the Hangout Musical Festival in nearby Gulf Shores. Going to see Franti is like a pilgrimage for us. He sings uplifting music and even walked around Iraq barefoot playing his guitar and singing in hospitals and on the streets during the day and for U. S. soldiers at nite. He teaches yoga and is a DO Good person all around the world. He has even invited Steve up onstage.
They say there may be rain but the sun is hot.
I wish I had some time just to kill today,
And I wish I had a dime for every bill I had to pay.
Some days you lose you win and the waters as high as the times your in.
So I jump back into where I learned to swim.
Try to keep my head above it as best I can.
That's why;
Here I am,
Just waiting on this storm to pass me by.
And that's the sound of sunshine coming down
and that's the sound of sunshine coming down...
(Aye, aye, ayeehey...)
I saw my friend Bobby he said "What's up man?"
You gotta little work or a twenty to lend?
I opened up my hand
He said I'm glad to see, they can take away my job but not my friends you see.
And here I am just waiting for this storm to pass me by.
And that's the sound of sunshinen coming down
And that's the sound of sunsbhine coming down
(Here we go)
I want to go where the sun will never end
With my guitar on the beach there with all my friend.
The sun so hot and the waves in motion and everything smells like suntan lotion, the ocean, and the girls so sweet
So kick of your shoes and relax your feet
They say that miracles are never ceasin', and every single soul needs a little realeasin'
the stereo bumpin till the sun goes down, and I only want to hear that sound
And that's the sound of sunshine coming down
And that's the sound of sunshine coming down
And now say
You're the one I want to be with, when the sun goes down.
You're the one I want to be with, when t esun goes down
Sing;
You're the one I want to be with when the sun goes down.
You're the one I want to be with when the sun goes
That's the sound of sunshine coming down
And that's the sound of sunshine coming down
(Aye, aye aye, Ha, aye aye)
He dances around all over the place
Has people come onstage with him
Goes out and sings in the audience
Even had a stage set up halfway back downstairs
Came upstairs on the front row of the balcony where we were sitting and stood next to Steve and they sang 2 songs together!!
He ended with all the little kids from the audience up on stage with him and the band. He had a keyboard player from California A drummer from Aftica A lady singer from Jamaica A guitar player from Louisianna and Texas. He sang and danced with kids and men and women from the audience. He talked about his adoptive mother's love for him and stories about wonderful people he's met on the road. His songs are so uplifting
One love
One blood
One heart
One soul
And one drum
And only one rhythm
And we share the air we breathe
We're all made from Heaven's seeds
And we are all earthlings
And I love this life we live
And I love to give this feeling away
I love this life we live
And I'm gonna give it all away
So shine your light until the break o' dawn
And shine your light if you're all alone
And shine your light until the early morn'
Let it shine on and on and on and on and on
We are all earthlings
From the cities to the mountains and the deserts and the deep blue see
To the palaces and prisons and the paradises that I see
That we are all earthlings
And I love this life we live
And I love to give this feeling away
I love this life we live
And I'm gonna give it all away
So shine your light until the break o' dawn
And shine your light if you're all alone
And shine your light until the early morn'
Let it shine on and on and on and on and on
And we all sing
(It's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright) (it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright) (it's alright yeah)
(It's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright) So shine your light until the break o' dawn
(It's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright) And shine your light if you're all alone
(It's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright) And shine your light until the early morn'
(It's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright)
(It's alright, it's alright) Let it shine on and on and on and on and on
We are all earthlings
We are all earthlings
Everyday I wake up and turn my phone on
I read the news of the day, just as it's coming down
I do my best not to let it get me down
I try to keep my head up, but is Babylon
This world's in crisis, we try to fight it, this changing climate
The scientists and politicians divided by it
So many ways we could solve it but they would never sign it
This mountains tumbling down, but still we try to climb it
It's in the Torah, Quran and in the Bible
Love is the message for some how we turn to rivals
It's come to people always picking up their rifles
Another school getting shot up; homicidal
Some people tryna look fly, some people tryna get high
Some people losing their mind, some people tryna get by
And when you look in my eyes, you see the sign of the times
We all looking for the same thing
But what if this song's number one
Would it mean that love had won?
Would it mean that the world was saved?
And no guns are being drawn today?
What if everybody had a job?
And nobody had to break a law?
What if everyone could say
That it's good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Is it good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh
Is it good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Is it good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh
No matter what nobody say
People used to feel safer when they would hear a siren
Like help is on its way but now they only think of violence
Another youth in the streets and police is in a conflict
And now they hear the guns click, yo
Ebola crisis and ISIS is taking heads off
A drone is bombing a village and now the kids all
Signing up to be soldiers, but they all willing now
To do the killing now, now are you willing now?
Some politicians out there making up some problems
And tryna tell the people that they can solve them
With TV shows and soundbites and quotes
But everybody knows that it's all about the cash flow
They telling you and me, they're making progress
But tell it to the millions of jobless
It's like a players club with billions of dollars
To get the votes you got to make it rain in congress
Some people tryna look fly, some people tryna get high
Some people losing their mind, some people tryna get by
And when you look in my eyes, you see the sign of the times
We all looking for the same thing
But what if this song's number one
Would it mean that love had won?
Would it mean that the world was saved?
And no guns are being drawn today?
What if everybody had a job?
And nobody had to break a law?
What if everyone could say
That it's good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Is it good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh
Is it good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Is it good to be alive today?
Oh, oh, oh
And we all say
One day, one day
One day, one day
One day, we all will say
That it's good to be alive today
One day, one day
One day, one day
One day, we all will say
That it's good to be alive today