[thomasmerton] Solitude/Silence

[Guest guest]

ahh...the blue rose blossoms in the heart of the desert.....^^~~~~~

 

Forty Years of Wrath

 

For forty years I have wandered in the desert of vengeance and wrath

Stubbornly refusing to yield

insisting that lust is love and kindness is compassion

 

If you yield you can stay centered

 

For forty years I have been lost in too much darkness at night

Stubbornly refusing to bend

insisting that by myself I could find the way

 

If you bend you will stay straight

 

For forty years I have been blinded by too much lightness at day

Stubbornly refusing to fast the fast of abstinence

insisting that satiety is transcendence and joy

 

If you become empty you can be filled

 

For forty years I have refused to sleep

Stubbornly refusing to admit weakness

insisting that the I am that I am is sufficient in all ways

 

If you allow yourself to be exhausted you will be refreshed

 

Then, suddenly there was you on the horizon

playing the music on a burning violin

And now I know that I must yield, bend, confess, surrender

to a passion which eclipses all I have know in this life to this moment

In your presence everything in the universe sings with fire

Words crack, break under the weight I would have them bear

For you, I will try once again to say it

 

I am ice. I am drunk. I am asleep. I am music.

I am fire. I am sober. I am the dream of being awake. I am silence and

tranquility.

I am rushing into the stillness which never stops moving.

I am the words which love has not yet spoken for the first time.

I am smitten. I am pierced. I am yielding to you.

I bend and do not break. I am empty and therefore full.

I am exhausted and there no longer need to sleep.

Soon I will be nothing but smoke drifting, pure white smoke

drifting back on the cosmic wind that is our mutual root and source.

You and I are the one that is two, the two that are one.

I have been looking for you ever since I ran away and left you

Now that I have found you once again I am afraid to be alone ever again

 

Now that I remember your name, I will never stop singing it

Your name is Love. Your name is Joy. Your name is Compassion.

I will follow you to the end of time and space

until everything that is slowly stops spinning

and once again we hold hands forever and ever and forever.

 

Universe without beginning, middle or end

I yield to you that is me, the me that is you.

Mark. Christopher Valentine

 

 

> Dear Merton Group,

>

> I realize that we have all been distracted from our RetreatOnline by the

> events of September 11 and following. But let me offer some focus

> assistance on our fourth and final topic of the importance of solitude

> and silence, The Desert, without which the Journey from the false self

> toward the True Self simply cannot be engaged, according to Merton.

>

> Some focus questions:

>

> 1) What kind of time do you choose for solitude/silence?

>

> 2) What special place/places are helpful for this experience?

>

> 3) Do you experience what Merton said: "When you are alone, you are

> with God. No matter where you are." ?

>

> 4) What's it like for you to be alone and quiet? Peaceful and

> centered? Nervous, scared, bored...?

>

> How about some reflections on these questions in that order to hold our

> final days of retreat together.

>

> Patrick Collins

>

>

>

> "Christ came on earth to form contemplatives" Thomas Merton

>

> Your use of is subject to

>

>