I've taught my boy well. He ponders this miracle beside me, in the shadows of the tall skinny pine trees, where his deeper gaze finds an owl's feather nestled among the fields of heart stones. How he saw it right there in front of him I'll never know. More accurately, how I missed it I'll never know. Then he turns to the sky and says "look at all the heart-clouds, Mama. They're all full of love." If you can believe it, this is the same child who just a few months ago stopped me mid-walk-to-the-park and said, "Mama, why do you always talk about love?"
"Because that's all there is, Jude," I said.
"Oh," said he.
Did it take? Can I really teach my boy how to regard the world through loving eyes? Before night-night, we lay in bed singing our "prayers," repeating a single verse of love over and over, each one dedicated to those we want to send love to in the universe. It can be anyone from Grandma Rose to Superman.
Are these prayers? Is "prayer" as interchangeable as "mantra"?
Personally, I did not grow up on prayers and hold only dim somewhat traumatizing memories of perching bedside with my Catholic friends, pleading to have my life spared before I wake. I also remember biking in several circles around the driveway at my friend Kim's up the street and singing over and over "the Lord is good to me! And so I thank the Lord for giving me the things I need..." I believe I later went home to Ma singing the catchy tune and asking her, "Ma, who's the Lord?"
To which she likely replied, "Jesus Christ, Roxanne, we're Jewish for Christ sakes!"
The irony of prayers speaking to me now, let alone having any meaning in my life, let alone having the word show up in any writing attached to my name, is a miracle, perhaps the answer to someone else's prayer. In my previous superficial life, anything having to do with prayers or god or blessings or spirit caused the same "Jesus Christ!" reaction as Ma's. She'd taught me well.Fast forward to post superficial life (born again Bu-Jew?) and I'm a bit more open to this sort of talk. Granted I'm still happily cynical about a lot of things, but I am much more happily open to many more things. I realize this newborn openness every time a student finishes reading something and I say with absolute certainty: "I TELL YOU. THESE ARE THE WORDS WE OUGHT TO BE READING IN OUR PLACES OF WORSHIP."
Like I know what goes on in places of worship. Like I have any clue at all. Certainly I have no idea what is being said really in synagogue. Or the church across the street... But I've heard and read enough stories to assume it a'int so always good. Or a'int so always true. Or a'int so always based first in love.
Usually there are the recognizant nods around the table when I make this decree. You betcha, sister! Right on! Amen! We know when we write from our truth we are imparting wisdom in the form of story, our experiences shared from the heart. And as writers, one of the reasons we write is so those stories will be heard and witnessed. So we can be seen for who we are deeper than the surface presentation of conversation. And, like the oral traditions of yore, we write with perhaps some hope that our wisdom and insight may be of support to another human being, perhaps several. Perhaps over time our stories become prayers, or perhaps prayers answered.
Last night in healing group one of the gals wrote about pulling over and crying in her car due to the chronic, always mounting pain in her poor, innocent, aching feet. Though my feet issues do not compare one tenth to hers (nor does my warrior spirit when it comes to the chronic pain), I relate at prayer level to her story. I suggested last night that we in response to her reading about her aching feet that we "write a prayer to her feet."
It felt right. Earlier in the week a friend suggested he might "say a prayer for my feet" that night and it moved in me something deeply profound. Maybe it was the image the comment evoked— my swollen feet wrapped in a baby blanket tied with a white bow.
A few days ago a wonderful nurturing kirtan friend and talented musician, singer and overall giver of light and love, Pascale of Kirtan Path asked if she could sing a prayer, the Maha Mritunjaya mantra at her next satsang for a friend of mine (and Jude's surrogate/truest Grandma), who is in the final stages of brain cancer. The Maha Mritunjaya mantra, says Pascale, is typically sung either for healing or for transition.
As a newbie to all this prayer talk, I'm still not sure if it is kosher for me to suggest we write prayers during writing class or healing group or whenever... so perhaps if we call them story-prayers or storyers or prayries, we can get away with a little creative writing spirituality and rewrite the book of prayers. And as my new faith reminds me in the sharing of stories in community, methinks our collected "prayries" may write us into a miracle.
Would you, could you, write a prayer for her feet and toes?
Would you, could you, write a prayer for Jude's Grandma Rose?
Or is there another in need of some healing prose?
There's no right or wrong,
just write from your heart
you can make it a simple song
of nonsense or wordart...
It can be in poem or in story
fiction, fact, or fancy fancy lore'y
Whatever you write, please
Prayer-share right here
wherever that may be
knowing your prayries will always be near (you've got my ear) (okay, I know that's corny, but thats' okay. It can be corny. It can be purple. Who cares? Certainly not those tuning into prayers...
Deepest gratitude. Hope to write and prayrie with you soon. Hugs, Rox
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| Grandma Rose with Jude, Thanksgiving 2011 |
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