BODYPSALMS

Photos by Wendy Wagner of Rebecca Lux-Parks & Celeste Snowber

Know this is not your home
but you live in-between
the stars, moon and sea
where you resonate
near edges and borders
shore of rocks and waves
land and river
the space with those
you practice love

Home is not a house
condo, villa or studio
but how you dwell
in each place of your life
there are as many spaces
as there are vegetables
and plant species.

Take comfort in unrest
and know we are all made
for something more
between particles and stardust
the living One is within
your chest and breast
and lives in the ache
of your longing to belong.

The world is temporary
but the love you know and feel
for daffodils and dance
children and creativity
friends and fauna
music and manna
endure

Love breaks form
as you were made from dust
You carry the universe
within you
the mark of great longing.

Don’t be fooled
by quenching with false waters
Retire into the life
created from the inside out
an eternal home
a heaven within.

Know the earth
is inside and outside you
here is the space for taking care
of your precious essence.
Make peace with your desire
and be brave
to know you are enough
a home unto  yourself.

Photos by Wendy Wagner

Return to the fragrance
of the interior palace
where a hundred gardenias
live inside your chest

You are not only breathing
but being breathed
by the aroma of sweetness
where petals of sorrow
t r a n s f o r m
to the sounds and smells of
s p a c i o u s n e s s

All along there is another listening
guiding you from within
decongest your hearing
and listen to the inner ear
where a deeper stillness
calls you back
to the garden

where you smell, touch and hear
the pulse of creation
beating within you
and you are named back
to your heartsong
and dare to live
in your own
e x t r a v a g a n c e.

Artwork “Ascension: Twin Veils” by Dobee Snowber

Release to each stroke
as a practice for life
let liquid suspend you
float into time
be renewed
in the water of existence
where floating
is a spiritual practice
and the rhythm of swimming
is the way
of daily baptism
where your concerns lie
in the past
plunge your limbs into the present
speed or slowness
does not matter
in the great pool
you are buoyed by lightness
muscles and joints are working
without strain
here is the metaphor
for traversing your path
with effortlessness
simplicity of backstroke
the sky is your focus
and repetition
is a hymn
to beginnings
of a gliding life
splashing into mystery
the body stretching
to the next moment.

Be dressed in the presence
of Christ within you
however you believe
or articulate your place on earth
and connection to the numinous
may this season of craziness
where everything one values
is turned upside down –
return to what matters

R E T R E A T

into the space

of incarnation
where word became flesh
and dwelt among you
and in you

the light within you
is greater than any shadow
even though you and I as babes
were formed in the dark of the womb
we are born into light

May this season
uncover tiny spaces
to be clothed once again
in the wider knowing
you shine from the inside out
and are held from the inside out

in emptying is fullness
and small gestures of kindness
and your presence
is Christmas gone wild

here is the fierce beauty
romancing you
to peace.

Burst 2 – Behind Closed Door Series  Artwork by Dobee Snowber

 Sip the sweetness

of your own solitude

a communion with yourself

in the season given to you

 a mist sings over your limbs

softening your joints

releasing fluid between your bones

here is the oil to tenderize

demands and responsibilities

 what some may perceieve

as loneliness is the invitation

for a rare union –

 the fragrance of silence

bringing space in the spine

undergirding each turning

in the fall of your life

revealing heart’s yearning.

 Be embraced

through   a l o n e n e s s

the door to the inside

and secret passage

to the Beloved

and entrance to the home

of being loved

& being love.

 Retreat

in the nest

of your inner habitat

and find your deep nature

greeting you.

 

 

Daphne –  Strategies for Surviving Series (2012) by Dobee Snowber

Dare to live in the fruitful dark
where what you know
as wisdom and truth
is still entering  your bones
seeping into your pores
but  monkey mind
prevents the deep release
to accept what is

The fruitful dark
knows no time schedules
has its own winter
where the riotous roots of joy
are being steeped underground
hibernating in the folds of your body

You are more afraid of your projections
than what is truly real
feel each inch of sorrow
make friends with broken dreams
and wait for the larger dream
for your soul’s purpose
to be brought forth

Darkness and light are lovers
companions for the journey
become intimate with the night
and know your only task
is to stay with and
a b i d e
in the fruitful dark.

Release yourself to this new life

Invite in more deeply those you love

Build more community out of those you know

Be sustained by color

Know what you have

Take comfort where it comes for you

Be true to your core

Be at peace – all things work together

Let your angels guide you.

Know you are not alone

Cherish the ones you love

Be all your vibrancy and all your bigness

Live wildly with tenderness

Celebrate your own sensuousness

Drink in oceans of love

Know this is a different country you are coming to

Keep rooting yourself in the earth and reaching for spirit

both run through you

Don’t worry about all the details

Live as the arbutus tree

let your skin shed in its season

and let each season b e

Let the grief pass through you – it will pass

Return each day to your center

and live from the greater LOVE within you.

You have been struggling in the mud

through the soil of your own life

whether it is disappointment, loss, letting go

or the passage of loved ones to the next realm

simultaneously

You are blooming over an eternal season

shooting up from the swamp of circumstance

and petals rising

pristine and clear

from the leaves of your own heart

You keep waiting for the Big Rebirth

but in reality it is a series

of small rebirths

tiny flowers

claiming the space within you

Take note

behold small beauties

of how you glisten

and loosen to what grows

inside your new garden

You are becoming a lotus

in due time

but the lotus cannot see itself

you too cannot always see

the extravagant arising

Take heart

for here in the muck

are the seeds

for your new life.

Bodypsalm for Raw Joy

Don’t look for Easter outside you
it is within you
the outrageous birth of new life
is inside, under the ground
erupting through your body
enlivening your tissues

Resurrection is not a restricted zone
it is the lungs of your life
you are birthed anew each day
Easter celebrates the resurrection of Christ
this is not a one-time event
but breathes inside you each moment
spring asks
to look within and
pay attention to Spirit

Look at the faithfulness of new growth
even in the midst of a world
aching with troubles and tribulations
ecological cries and the haunts of war
the plants and trees still bud
the call to new life
p e r s i s t s

You live in a riparian zone
between the worlds
of earth and heaven
the gift of life in this body
beckons you to
an easter life
where you feed
on raw joy.

 

You are being shaped into a rare color
greens, ultramarines, golds, and ambers
the shards of your own life
are sculpting you through the raw
elements of change, loss, and surprise
you are being tussled for a purpose
being rounded for beauty

Don’t look for symmetry
let asymmetry guide you
only in brokenness does the light
illuminate to brilliance radiating
inside you as alchemy

Look how you love the shapes and hues of
weathered sea glass
and throw back to the sea
ones which are not ready
as wind, water, salt and waves
create new pieces out of broken glass
you are being recreated
for luminosity and lightness

The practice of attending
has its own slowness
and relentless tenderness
softening you from the inside out –
be the compassion
on all the changes you incur
and let the colors of your heart
transform into shades of lavender and green

May creation have its way with you
through all that is unpredictable
and rest in the tides
of a waterway
guiding you to the shoreline
of a new life.