Personal high-points of this weekend’s retreat at The DeKoven Center
I sent this to the people on one of my listservs today:
At the last minute, I decided to go on my annual relatively vegan-friendly “wildly silent” meditation retreat this weekend. This is “mildly off-topic” only because you’d have to dig for an animal connection. (It’s there, historically. And I know the connections, even if it is only in the sound of the birds in the midst of the silence, bearing some message I’m “supposed to” get, when opening myself up, and memories of past influences. Those who know me well and for a long time, have been “victims” of past sharings, too.)
Oh, down by the bookstore on the reading rack were brochures for H.O.P.E. Safehouse . So that was cool. (I forgot to take my ASWA/ENAW “propaganda” this time. But interestingly, there were non-religious books on diet, too. So they seem open to a variety of information for their wide variety of guests. And if any of you authors have a book to promote, they get quite a cross-section of visitors over a year’s time. It might be a good place to donate a copy.)
I want to share a quote from the inside jacket of a book I found in the bookstore (if I can read my writing, and if I copied it correctly), some prayers, and a poem I wrote last night for “show and tell” today [where we shared art, poetry, or thoughts about the weekend].
We weren’t supposed to “read other people’s words” this weekend, because it would break our silence, so I just sneaked a quick peak on the inside cover of Flying Changes: Horses as Spiritual Teachers, by Carter Heyward+, which said,
“Other creatures of the Earth are asking to be our spiritual [teachers?] says Heyward, and learning from them is a source of hope for the world….”
After brunch, Sr. Dorcas… wrote out a prayer for me, that she said before the Eucharist today. (She’s a dancer, did or still does teach folk dancing…, and is the person who leads our movement meditations between the sittings at this yearly retreat.) She gave me permission to share her prayer with you, because prayers should be shared and prayed — as opposed to being copyright, for example.
tune our ears to the music of the Dance;
open our eyes to the patterns of the Dance;
fill our hearts with the Spirit of the Dance and
quicken our feet to the measure of the Dance.
Lord of the Dance, let our lives be danced by Your Love.”
(What I like about this, other than the message that reflects a positive view of God that some may not have, is that it illustrates a way to form a prayer around some attribute of God that we can identify with in our lives. That’s helpful for someone like me, who doesn’t know how to “pray right”, so avoid doing it in public like the plague.)
I think the liturgy we used for the Eucharist, called “Summer” might be from a Scottish alternative prayer book. But on the back of the sheet we were given were 4 versions of the Lord’s Prayer. The one I’m including comes from the New Zealand Prayer Book (1), and then the post-Communion prayer (2) probably comes from the Scottish liturgy. I’m offering these, because retreat Eucharists tend not to be as “by-the-book” as our weekly congregational worship. So these might be new words for some of you that might give a different meaning to prayers we repeat all the time by memory, without thinking a lot about them, other than their familiarity.
1)
Eternal Spirit,
Earth-Maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver,
Source of all that is and shall be,
Loving God, in whom is heaven:The hallowing of your name echo through the universe!
The way of your justice be followed by the peoples of
the world!
Your heavenly will be done by all created beings!
Your commonwealth of peace and freedom sustain our
hope and come on earth.With the bread we need for today, feed us
In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us.
In times of temptation and test, strengthen us.
From trials too great to endure, spare us.
From the grip of all that is evil, free us.For you reign in the glory of the power that is love,
now and forever. Amen.
2)
all good things. May this bread and wine be
the nourishment we seek, and may it
transform us into disciples who serve in
your creation. Amen.
Although I’m making a life project of trying to create something a little “DeKoven-like” in my yard (a sacred “place apart”) and spend too much time as it is in silence (except when I’m on the Internet), it was important for me to make my yearly trip because I needed to be with the people that I associate with there, and to relive one of my favorite weekends of the year in the “Brigadoon” of Southeastern Wisconsin. My poem is something that could be taken at face value (even the part about the dog fence, since I just have a cheap wire garden fence, that even my old cat knows how to knock down), but has some hidden meanings, too. I drew a picture of the statue of St. Fiacre that is in one of the gardens, after sitting in front of it for quite some time, having a silent conversation with a “graven image”, asking for advice about what to plant in my yard. (He really looks a lot like me, except for the beard and the monk’s attire.) So here’s my poem, for your entertainment, or whatever:
O, “garden god”, Fiacre,
(you could be my brother
if you weren’t made of stone):
I want to stop
at a garden shop
so I can take you home.
To bring a little memory
of my DeKoven stay,
a pine cone and a lilac seed
that might grow tall someday.
The season’s short.
I’m getting old.
Seeds take too long to grow.
I’ve wandered ’round
DeKoven’s grounds.
And this is what I know:
My lilies need more sunlight.
The weeds’ lives are worthwhile.
I’ll line my yard with potted plants
to fence my dog in style.
We may be “seeds”, or
we may be “plants”
(both are silent and still)
Both contain the power of life
and a strong internal will.
But planting seeds is not enough
to change the world around us.
Planting plants will fill the gaps
in dirt, and will astound us.
VIGEAT RADIX!
(I’ve heard that translated as “May the Root thrive”, but I translate it jokingly as “vegans eat radishes”.)
I stopped at a garden shop on my way home, and now have the “St. Fiacre of my dreams”.
Sue
(the “Dandelion”, who’s always looking for more to share our turf)
Click here for pictures I took at DeKoven last year.
[Today's posting bumped Open Letter to Episcopalians on choosing cruelty-free charities to reach the MDG goals from the home page.]