September 02, 2023 -B

William Wordsworth nailed it 
with his, 
"The world is too much with us late and soon..."
and its lament regarding
our lost connection with nature
and nature's way of getting things done.

"We have lost the magic,"
he would say,
or better perhaps,
"We have traded the magic
for thirty pieces of silver,
or its modern equivalent!"

The older I get,
the more unfamiliar the world becomes--
and that, I think,
is a common experience among humans
at least since the Industrial Revolution,
though I expect long before,
before the advent of "civilization."

The world is not a trustworthy place to be.

I have seen it in the eyes
of my six-month old great grand daughter,
and regret her coming encounter
with the world beyond mom and dad
and their extended families,
as she enters day care or "preschool"
and the regimen/realities 
that come with it.

Do we ever out-grow what we lose
in that "bargain"?

Barbara Navarro's work in protesting
the loss of life and a way of life
among the indigenous Yanomami people
to gold "miners" in South America
highlights the world of a small tribe
of families where the children
never leave home in our sense of the word,
but live out their lives within the "family"
providing stability and security
with no preschool, etc. to intrude.

The love of money is destroying their world,
and there is no fair exchange in that transaction.

We have lost what they are losing,
without noticing/grieving/knowing
what we do not have.

But something knows within,
and we carry the burden of our alienation
from what something knows
throughout our life,
knowing only that something is not right,
and not-knowing what to do about it.

The old Yogis and Taoist/Zen masters
withdrew into the silence
of the lost world of Yin/Yang,
seeking the balance and harmony,
the stability and security,
of their ancestors way of life.

Aren't we all drawn to the AUM
of union with the source and goal
of life and being?
To know the peace of our belonging
to our place in "the great scheme of things,"
now beyond recovery,
beyond remembering
past the sense that this is not it
and never will be again?

To know this much is to mourn our state,
and follow the old Yogis, Taoist/Zen masters
into silence seeking the way 
to peace and wholeness
through recognition and realization,
walking two paths at the same time
in acquiescing to what has been lost,
while consciously adjusting to what now is
in a "We're not in Kansas anymore" kind of way.

Making the best of what we have to work with
through rituals,
ceremonial objects,
stories,
and small communities of like-minded people,
grounded and centered upon
"Here we are now what?"
as we find our way through this world,
knowing that our place is with that world
before this one became what it is. 

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