Jeffrey

The moments I still be believe in God
fall into two categories:

1) When something grace-fully takes me by surprise
2) Encountering you, doing anything you do

You are the kind of academic, activist, administrator, christian, father, minister, friend, & mentor that most folks only dream of being. In watching your kindness, hard work and spirit of tireless generosity, I am assured change from within is possible, one person can make a difference, and the institution can't corrupt everyone. For the ways you held me in Asia and the ways you hold this school accountable with love, for your prophecy, poignancy and passion, for your fire, can't-stop-won't-stop ethic of justice, and the way you humble us all: thank you Kah-Jin Kuan, thank you.

Missing

Many, a multitude in fact, show up missing:
feelings, yearnings, memories and ideas of get-togethers sometime soon.
This morning, the meditation went something like this
longing is the core(…)your desire must be disciplined
and so I let them be away from me, in ways
I cannot fathom maintaining much longer than
this day, hour or moment.

What I miss cannot be calculated or concretely named though
I suspect all the ghosts and now remnants fit
inside the same body, the body I quit acknowledging
months ago because simple faith, no longer sensical, went away
with other novelties, delicacies and comforting things.

She is what I miss: her body so beautifully becoming with mine,
though not restricted by my stunts, stops or short-comings, her gracious
g*d-like and God-less rises, her fierce and fiery falls. She used to
breathe into my lungs until I would cry out her name. She used to know
I was looking into her, all of her, and would thank me until I cried myself empty.
Her rivers seeped through the cracks of my toes;
her branches balanced my hanging torso:
back and forth, high and low, all night long.
She reached into me outside a pool in Costa Rica and ferociously pushed me
on a dance floor in downtown San Francisco. She wrote poetry to
me in the hills of Oak Glen and sang soft hymns, lulling me to sleep, in Claremont.

Her people once wrestled with her story in a book.
They wrote “certainly mercy and goodness will follow me
all the days of my life.” I pray they knew what they were talking about,
that I might find her, creeping, laying low, right behind or beneath me.
Then desire and discipline will disappear in each other as we re-unite—
missing no longer maintained.

Financial Aid

This is going to be full of negative whining, so if you're not in the mood, miss me. If on the other hand, you too struggle with financial insecurity, read on and comiserate with your girl.

I just did my 2007-2008 total budget exercises and figured out than when my financial aid arrives next week-ish, after paying all necessary fall semester expenses and my left over summer rent, I'm going to have little or no money left over. This means I am going to have to pay for books and any other supplies (all semester long) out of pocket.

Fuck.
I worked three jobs this summer.

From a different angle, because the intersection of "different" angles inhabits G*d, let me say this: stressing over finances sucks which is why I struggle with economic justice the way I do. I am a single, white, educated, female from privilege and this shit stresses me out. Often when I read the latest financial statement or status of my checking account I experience shortness of breath, and/or minor panic attacks. Can I buy groceries this month? Can I buy my best friend a birthday gift? Can I get quarters to do laundry and still pay my car insurance? These thoughts run through my head a mile a minute. I cannot even imagine what a low-income, differently abled, working womyn of color with kids goes through on a daily basis. Quite aware that the anxieties I experience are minimal compared to most, quite aware that there is NO shortage of capital in this country, quite aware that the distribution of resources is part of the problem, I wonder why people who question the economic infrastructure of this country/global system are STILL labeled communists. Are some people just destined to suffer because the upper echelon of society won't share? If so: hell no.

My mom is helping me this academic year by giving me my father's pension from the presbyterian church, which means I am going to survive. Thank God. I'm glad some institutions take seriously the welfare of their constituents. That's a step in the right direction, for sure. But what about the educational system? In order to "make something for myself," which inevitably meant getting educated, I had to go $70,000 dollars in debt. Surely going to graduate school in a less expensive region of the country would have helped, but cmon, is de facto indebtedness part of the "american dream"? What a way to trip people up before they start running.

What makes everything worse is how that future profit (interest rate revenue) for the government will probably be used. I can't even think about it; it makes me want to cry.

Anti-War Film: spread the Word

Passed on to me by the Rev. Glenda Hope...

PLEASE JOIN US FOR ONE OF THESE FREE BAY AREA SCREENINGS AND HELP US SPREAD THE WORD! THIS AMAZING AND POWERFUL NEW FILM BY PAUL HAGGIS (CRASH) LOOKS AT THE IRAQ WAR
AND ITS EFFECT ON OUR SOLDIERS COMING HOME WITH A POV...WE CAN NO LONGER IGNORE.

IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH!

Directed by Paul Haggis and starring Tommy Lee Jones, Charlize Theron, James Franco and Susan Sarandon. Based on true events, IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH has the power to create dialogue and increase awareness regarding soldiers returning from Iraq with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD.

See the trailer at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3OKyqDGaHo

Please feel free to forward this invitation, and RSVP to: inthevalleyOutreach@gmail.com

SAN FRANCISCO

Wednesday, Aug. 22 at 7:30 PM
Sundance Kabui Cinema
1881 Post St.
San Francisco, CA 94115

Thursday, Sept. 6 at 7:30 PM
Embarcadero Cinema
One Embarcadero Center,
Promenade Level
San Francisco, CA 94111

Tuesday, Sept. 11 at 7:30 PM
Century 9 SF Centre
SF Shopping Center,
845 Market St., 5th Floor,
San Francisco, CA 94103

Thursday, Sept. 13 at 7:30PM
Sundance Kabuki Cinema
1881 Post St.,
San Francisco, CA 94115

In the spirit of peace and struggle for justice,
Ejoye

Artist of the Season

I'd like to give a shout out to this man:

Gustav Klimt.

Any person who can create this kind of beauty...



deserves praise on a Sunday morning.
:)

Maria

white shirt, darker-than-tan khakis and black flip flops
stroll up the stairs to meet and greet the differently aged womyn
occupying couches in the corner.
they have been drinking coffee and tea,
eating yogurt and scones,
talking about their men (and womyn),
gossiping--a little--about the people they see at the places they share and
it's been three hours since their arrival.
he comes and sits beside the younger one, who though
excited to see him won't be the first to extend a loving touch.
the matriarch looks at the couple hoping
a semblance of long term survival exists for them
but
she doubts a man and womyn can do anything in the long term, anything but regret, that is.

he has come from 2 miles down the road, probably 17 blocks in all, to recount for
them what the first day of law school was like. the 2 mile/17 block spread
includes a city change. the apprehensive girl, who is a theology student, flanks the
lawyer-to-be caring not about cities or blocks between them, but the truly divisive things: disparate languages,
incompatible world views and years of accumulated student loan debt.
after (quietly) boasting about his first "right answer" when first called upon by his first
professor of property law, he reaches across the couch and places his hand
on her knee. with all his firsts, she considers the possibility of lasts and moves
into his intimate gesture.

the container of wisdom sitting across the way, gazes at this melancholy, age old tug-of-war
while breathing through her teeth. she is at once smiling upon his ambition,
empathizing with her female companions fear,
and forgiving herself for all the ways she fell in love so young and so stupid.

2 Things

Upon leaving southern california I have 2 things to say:

1. Most womyn put on a clown suit before exiting the house.
2. The New Testament is a story about frat boys.

Thank you and good day.
Ejoye

An Interesting Discussion of Anger & War

Hey: I wrote a section synopsis/commentary on "Multitude," which is featured on the SEW Sow Peace site. It has started an interesting discussion about the intersection of anger & healing in both the personal and political arenas. All you on the spiritual & activist path should check it out and give us your thoughts--especially those of you working in social service.

http://sewpeace.wordpress.com/multitude/

The more time I spend on the planet the more aware I become that the wars "out there" look strinkingly similar to the wars I experience "in here." As I protest one, I reinforce the other. As I criminalize one, I justify the other. This work, the work of cleaning house, accepting responsibility and letting go of the need to be right...is the hardest work of all. I need all the patience, forgiveness and nurture I can get from every person I encounter in this work. I assume y'all might need the same. That's what I'm trying to cultivate today: a never-ending supply of agape for us all. Dear God, may it be so.

The Consequences and Trade Offs of Panentheism

Oh to look back and see something other than stupidity.
Let me say this: I am humbled, today, by memories of and present moments with
my inability to be the things my mind can imagine but my person cannot always accomplish: grace, forgiveness, nurture, honesty, peace.
I wish I still believed in God in a way that would set me free of regret. Perhaps days like these and feelings like this help people construct the idea of an all powerful savior who cleanses his followers of their sins and makes them whiter than snow. Unfortunately I don't buy it. Therefore I get to sit with yucky feelings. The trade off is that when something terrible happens or something unbelievably beautiful happens, I cannot claim it was solely my or God's fault.
All in it together now. Aren't we?

From Generation to Generation

Who will speak for the man
who
though old and resourceful cannot utter a word
who
though patient and kind in hours of need
cannot calm the storms in his own chest cavity where
years and years of miss-steps and acerbic, tawdry ties
linger out loud?
Who?

Who will speak for the man
who
though lost and afraid cannot put down his false aegis
who
though strong and myopic in a multitude of ways
cannot extend an opening, even for a second, for fear
of seismic (and somehow familiar) betrayals?
Who?

Who will speak for their women
who
though compassionate to the end cannot keep the fridge door closed
who
though competent and care-full in salvific proportion
cannot save themselves from diseases of self-destruction and
the never-ending satisfactions of stress?
Who?

And who, oh who
will speak for their children
who
though they swallow whole and see transparently
cannot undo the ancestral ties that bind
who
though they weep behind closed doors and resolve to place the patterns down
cannot help following the primordial map "home"?

Following the Happy Trail Down South

Hey everyone:
I'll be in the Upland/Claremont/Redlands/Riverside area for the next week. Though I plan to relax a majority of the time, I will be stopping by some old stompin grounds. So...if I haven't seen or talked to you in a while, hit me up (909) 921-8787. And if you're in the mood to hear about storage being the number two growing industry (second only to military defense) in this country, come to Riverside First Congregational Church @ 9am this Sunday morning where I will be preaching on "The Parable of the Rich Fool" from the Gospel of Luke (12:13-21).
Bay Area by choice; IE by origin.
Power to the peaceful!
Ejoye

Mom

I remember that time you told me
"Love is touching souls."
Surely you've touched mine
cause part of you pours out of me
in these lines from time to time.

You're in my blood like holy wine--today
and forever more.




I love you.