Each Moment Lived Fully Awake is Both Prayer and Lovemaking

Since 11/9, poetry has been saving my life.

It's been pulling me out of bed and dragging me to my altar for morning practice. It's been lulling me to sleep, gently stroking my hair, reassuring me that everything is going to be okay, that I have a purpose here. Now. That it's okay if I don't yet know exactly what that purpose looks like in action.

It's been reminding me that turmoil and challenging emotion are the mothers of vision and hope. That the peace and the wisdom of the body is available in every moment by simply drawing awareness to my senses. That the earth is holding me and I can embrace her back by simply touching my own heart with my hand or by touching the backs of those I love. That the fiery passion of creativity is a byproduct of confusion. That making love to the moment saves us. That "each moment lived fully awake cannot help but be both prayer and lovemaking" and that "our lovers are everywhere," even in the midst of the chaos, death, disappointment and the impending rebirth of this historical moment.

Here are two pieces, each holding my heart, in conversation with each other. May they gently stroke your head tonight if you forget who you are for a moment.

By Mattthew Licata:

Yes, a death has occurred, it was never going to turn out the way you thought it would…. Death has come but the rebirth has not yet appeared. What will arise out of the ashes of that reorganization?… An old dream has dissolved and a new one is forming, but has not yet erupted into conscious awareness. It’s okay to feel anxious, shaky, a bit disoriented. There is pregnant, full spectrum creativity inside the core of death. Rather than scramble to exchange it for the known, the invitation is to turn into it, for in its center is a hidden gold. Return back to your senses. Touch the earth. Look up at the sky. While it may seem confusing and overwhelming to a mind longing for solidity, love will never ask you to abandon your present experience and trade it in for another. For each of her children is an illumined portal into the sacred. Look carefully, your lovers are everywhere.

(A Dream) by Oriah Mountain Dreamer

May we give birth to a new dream of the people
A dream that can sustain us in the new millennium
A dream that remembers there is no separation between spirit and matter
A dream that infuses the life of the people the power of the erotic
A dream that reminds us of what is holy
I call on a dream that remembers the power of life-giving moisture, that recognizes the smell of the sea in the scent of our sweat, the salt of our tears, the slippery wetness between the thighs of a woman well loved.
I call on a dream that reminds us to focus on our fingertips, on the shape and weight of our hand, on blood and bone and a thousand nerve endings as we raise an apple to our mouths and let the tip of our tongue slide on the round, smooth firmness of the cool surface and feel the spray of juice as our teeth pierce the skin and enter the softness inside.
A dream that helps us taste the weeks of rain and sun, the ripening on the tree, the labor of the farmer, touch of the fruit picker, journey of the men and woman who bring fruits from grove to table.
I call on a dream of the people that remembers there is no separation,
That knows each act lived fully awake cannot help but be both prayer and lovemaking.

May we all continue to circulate the poetry of sacred activism. If you have a pebble of hope in the form of a poem- share it. Please.