Tag Archives: poetry

Turning Point

Posted on September 13, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

We tend to live isolated worlds and the boundaries are often rigid rather than permeable. We come in contact with many and absorb something from each. Life is a relational experience whether the relationship is with our self, another person, another being, the Cosmos. It begins inside and emerges. It is blending of all into one that makes us human and allows us to be a part of the macrocosm. We only need to turn to those relationships. Rainer Maria Rilke wrote this beautiful poem about turning points and the need to look inward.

For there is a boundary to looking.

And the world that is looked at so deeply

wants to flourish in love.

Work of the eyes is done, now

go and do the heart-work

on all the images imprisoned in you; for you

overpowered them: but even now you don’t know them.

Learn inner man, to look on your inner woman,

the one attained from a thousand

natures, the merely attained but

not yet beloved form.

5 Comments

Posted in Community, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments and tagged community, Mindful Practice, poetry, Rainier Marie Rilke, spirituality, teacher as transformer, Turning Point. Bookmark the permalink.

Life Is a Prayer

Posted on September 13, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

I keep a daily journal and. As I wrote yesterday, this kept surfacing. I jotted the ideas down on Sticky Notes and let them percolate for the day. This is what dripped from the coffee pot.

Life is a prayer;

A mystery

It holds answers

And unshakeable questions.

In the oneness;

Alchemy loosens–

It transforms

In that mystery.

Prayer is listening;

It is an ordinary passage of time

It is the extraordinary voyage of life

Unpretentious, fully lived quest.

17 Comments

Posted in Mindful Life, Poetry and tagged creativity, Life is a Prayer, Mindful Practice, poetry, spirituality, teacher as transformer. Bookmark the permalink.

Throw Yourself Like Seed

Posted on September 12, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

I spent a good part of the afternoon writing based on a book by Ralph Siu, The Tao of Science. I wrote and broadened the scope to include the Tao of Technology and the Tao of Learning or Education. I grabbed a couple of other books because words like communion and humility came up in relationship to leadership. I refer to Educating for Humanity a lot. and it is one of my most well-used books. An article had this beautiful poem about life`s abundance by Miguel de Unamuno. The way (the Tao) I look at life and my perception is one which is life-giving or not. I think this holds in terms of my interactions with other beings. Life is not separated into fragments but lived wholly and fully with reverence.

Shake off this sadness, and recover your spirit;

sluggish you will never see the wheel of fate

that brushes your heel as it turns by,

the man who wants to live is the man in whom life is abundant.

Now your are only giving food to that final pain

which is slowly winding you in the nets of death,

but to live is to work, and the only thing which lasts

is work; start again to turn to the work.

Throw yourself like seed as you walk, and into your own field,

don`t turn your face that would be turn to it to death,

and do not let the past weight upon your motion.

Leave what`s alive in the furrow, what`s dead in yourself,

for life does not move in the same as a group of clouds;

from your work you will be able to gather yourself.

15 Comments

Posted in Education, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments and tagged creativity, education, Miguel de Unamuno, Mindful Practice, poetry, Ralph Siu, science, teacher as transformer, The Tao, Throw Yourself Like Seed. Bookmark the permalink.

Breathe

Posted on September 5, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

When I write in my journal, I can use various creative forms. When I stopped for lunch in Priest River, I wrote and poetry emerged. Since I began pausing and taking three breaths each time I wash and dry my hands, I find I pause similarly other times and the calm it brings is beneficial.

Draw a breath in–

Inhale its energy–

Feel inspired–

Bathe in its freshness.

Pause at the peak–

Bask in a new-found glow–

See the world anew–

Be just in that space.

Release that breath–

Exhale its waste–

Let others use it–

Let the world grow.

Let go of that moment–

Be ready for the next ascent–

Look upwards–

Follow breath’s cycle.

25 Comments

Posted in Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments, Sabbath and tagged Breathe, creativity, Ivon Prefontaine, Mindful Practice, poetry, priest river, spirituality, teacher as transformer. Bookmark the permalink.

Life’s Mystery

Posted on September 3, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

I registered for a class which doubles as a retreat. The underlying theme is the Sabbath. I began a journal and will write for the next 6 weeks based on weekly Sabbath practices. For the first week, I chose one which Thich Nhat Hanh speaks about. I chose a common activity, one I do mindlessly. Each time I do it, I breathe three times and complete the task.

I feel rushed this summer as I move from one life phase to another. I felt calmer the last couple of days. I began Sunday, my usual sabbath. When I settle like this, I discover paths to questions, thoughts, and wisdom that are not forthcoming when I am busy. The quiet place is like a deep pool which opens up only when I rests quietly.

A gentle breeze

My breath

Crosses a silent pool.

A sacred space

A simple way

Leads me forth.

Wisdom revealed

Questions emerge

Life’s paths opened.

Be present

Listen mindfully

Embrace life’s mystery fully.

8 Comments

Posted in Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments, Sabbath and tagged creativity, eloquent questions, Ivon Prefontaine, Life's Mystery, Mindful Practice, poetry, spirituality, teacher as transformer, Thich Nhat Hanh. Bookmark the permalink.

The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain

Posted on September 1, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

Wallace Stevens encapsulated the poetry’s strength. It recognizes each person’s artistry and fuels the rhythm of life. Life is a creative process. Our creations anchor us as we sense our way through life with no visible path and markers. We are adventurers in an uncharted space. No one else has lived this before or afterward. In this way, life is a work of art and takes the place of a mountain. We experience it as a deeply sensual, intimate, and creative voyage that comes from deep within our souls.

There is it was, word for word,

The poem that took the place of a mountain.

He breathed its oxygen,

Even when the book lay turned in the dust of his table.

It reminded him how he had needed

A place to go to in his own direction,

How he had recomposed the pines,

Shifted the rocks and picked his way among the clouds,

For the outlook, that would be right,

Where he would be complete in an unexplained completion:

The exact rock where his inexactness

Would discover, at last, the view toward which they had edged,

Where he could lie and, gazing down at the sea,

Recognize his unique and solitary home.

19 Comments

Posted in Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments, Sabbath and tagged creativity, learning, Mindful Practice, poetry, spirituality, teacher as transformer, The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain, Wallace Stevens. Bookmark the permalink.

The Layers

Posted on August 28, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

Stanley Kunitz wrote this lovely poem about life and the journey we take. I look back and I am tempted to see litter and not layers of good. It seems so much easier, at times, to see the past in this light. Something speaks to me from deep within me and reminds me to consider the good that happens. When I take time and place this at the forefront there is so much more energy given to live and know I am not done with the changes.

I have walked through many lives,

some of them my own,

and I am not who I was,

though some principle of being

abides, from which I struggle

not to stray.

When I look behind,

as I am compelled to look

before I can gather strength

to proceed on my journey,

I see the milestones dwindling

toward the horizon

and the slow fires trailing

from the abandoned camp-sites,

over which scavenger angels

wheel on heavy wings.

Oh, I have made myself a tribe

out of my true affections,

and my tribe is scattered!

How shall the heart be reconciled

to its feast of losses?

In a rising wind

the manic dust of my friends,

those who fell along the way,

bitterly stings my face.

Yet I turn, I turn,

exulting somewhat,

with my will intact to go

wherever I need to go,

and every stone on the road

precious to me.

In my darkest night,

when the moon was covered

and I roamed through wreckage,

a nimbus-clouded voice

directed me:

“Live in the layers,

not on the litter.”

Though I lack the art

to decipher it,

no doubt the next chapter

in my book of transformations

is already written.

I am not done with my changes.

11 Comments

Posted in Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments and tagged creativity, Mindful Practice, poetry, spirituality, Stanley Kunitz, teacher as transformer, The Layers. Bookmark the permalink.

The Thought-Fox

Posted on August 25, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

I used this poem with students to explain the source of poetic inspiration. It is probably already there and sneaks out to find literary life and expression. Ted Hughes described the creative process of poetry writing as an animal quietly emerging and appearing.

I will sit, close my eyes, and write each day in my journal. Perhaps, a thought-fox will creep out of the shrubbery of imagination. Sabbath is a good time to start.

I imagine this midnight movement’s forest;

Something else is alive

Beside the clock’s loneliness

And this blank page where my fingers move.

Through the window I see no stars:

Something more near

Though deeper within darkness

Is entering the loneliness:

Cold, delicately as the dark snow,

A fox’s nose touches twig, leaf;

Two eyes serve a moment, that now

And again now, and now, and now

Sets neat prints into the snow,

Between trees, and wearily a lame

Shadow lags by stump and in hollow

Of a body that is bold to come

Across clearings, an eye,

A widening deepening greenness,

Brilliantly, concentratedly,

Coming about its own business

Till, with a sudden sharp hot stink of fox

It enters the dark hole of the head.

The window is starless still; the clock ticks,

The page is printed.

8 Comments

Posted in Education, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments, Sabbath and tagged creativity, education, Mindful Practice, nature, poetry, teacher as transformer, Ted Hughes, The Thought-Fox. Bookmark the permalink.

What Have I Learned

Posted on August 14, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

I engaged in several virtual and face-to-face conversations over the past week about what learning and education should look like today. Gary Snyder summarized some of this in this thoughtful poem. I believe we need to focus more on the tools children need than the content. That is not to say content is not important. It must stretch, challenge, and allow growth.

Curriculum has narrowed, become content, and the use of tools. It does not always focus on the proper use of tools and development of habits, skills, attitudes, practices, dispositions, etc. What role does discernment play in today’s schools? What eloquent questions, with no presumption of answers, are teachers and students alike asked? Content, in the form of knowledge and information, becomes the currency of the realm and wise application is often pushed aside. 21st Century education requires a mindful approach. An approach that recognizes the changing of the flowers in each moment.

What have I learned but

the proper use for several tools?

The moments

between hard pleasant tasks

To sit silent, drink wine,

and think my own kind

of crusty dry thoughts.

–the first Calochortus flowers

and in all the land,

it’s spring.

I point them out:

the yellow petals, the golden hairs,

to Gen.

Seeing in silence:

never the same twice,

but when you get it right,

you pass it on.

19 Comments

Posted in 21st Century Education, Education, Leadership, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments and tagged 21st Century Education, creativity, education, eloquent questions, Gary Snyder, leadership, Mindful Practice, poetry, stewardship, teacher as transformer, What Have I Learned. Bookmark the permalink.

I Believe in All That Has Never Yet Been Spoken

Posted on August 10, 2013 by ivonprefontaine

I am getting back into a groove after my first full week home. I let things flow a bit this week. Rilke suggested letting go or not contriving in this poem. When I don’t over plan, I find I am more open and accept the flow of things much like the beginner’s mind of a child. Watching children engrossed in play is a reminder that can happen for me as an adult and, as it does, the river widens and flows in every widening channels. Life becomes somehow larger, but not in an explainable way.

Posting images of our trip through Glacier National Park is believing in all that has never yet been spoken. Nature allows me to speak without using words. It is a palette of creation which speaks without speaking and shares without words. It just is and teaches through its presence.

The role of sabbath is to rest on the swelling and ebbing currents and rest in each moment. Perhaps, as I do, I take an expanded mind and soul into next week.

I believe in all that has never been spoken.

I want to free what waits within me

so that what no one has dared to wish for

may for once spring clear

without my contriving.

If this is arrogant, God, forgive me,

but this is what I need to say.

May what I do flow from me like a river,

no forcing and no holding back,

the way it is with children.

Then in those swelling and ebbing currents,

these deepening tides moving out, returning,