{"id":18333,"date":"2016-08-19T11:00:52","date_gmt":"2016-08-19T15:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=18333"},"modified":"2016-08-19T10:58:04","modified_gmt":"2016-08-19T14:58:04","slug":"the-oh-at-the-heart-of-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2016\/08\/the-oh-at-the-heart-of-you\/","title":{"rendered":"The Oh<\/em> at the Heart of You"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"'black<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: “black square sun hypeRReally eclipsed through layers of social housing blocks,” by user “hinkelstone” (Karl-Ludwig Poggemann) on Flickr<\/a>, and used here under a Creative Commons license. (The first capital R in the image name is supposed to display as a Cyrillic “backwards R,” which doesn’t seem to work for me.) Explaining how this image was accomplished, the photographer says, “The black square sun immersing into eastern-bloc-style housing estate facades were meant for a HDRI<\/span> — but instead Photomatrix<\/a> 2.4.1 synthesized a kind of hyperreal sunscape from a pair of location shots that were taken at 18:29:07 and 18:29:44 [local times]: During those 37 seconds the red sun disc had been shifting further downwards and into the northern (‘HyperBorean<\/span>‘) wind direction.” This explanation may very well be more comprehensible to you than to me.]<\/em><\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/a><\/em>:<\/p>\n

To Be Human Is To Sing Your Own Song<\/strong><\/p>\n

Everything I can think of that my parents
\nthought or did I don’t think and I don’t do.
\nI opened windows, they shut them. I pulled
\nopen the curtains, they shut them. If you
\nget my drift. Of course there were some
\nsimilarities—they wanted to be happy
\nand they weren’t. I wanted to be Shelley and I
\nwasn’t. I don’t mean I didn’t have to avoid
\nimitation, the gloom was pretty heavy. But
\nthen, for me, there was the forest, where
\nthey didn’t exist. And the fields. Where I
\nlearned about birds and other sweet tidbits
\nof existence. The song sparrow, for example.<\/p>\n

In the song sparrow’s nest the nestlings,
\nthose who would sing eventually, must listen
\ncarefully to the father bird as he sings
\nand make their own song in imitation of his.
\nI don’t know if any other bird does this (in
\nnature’s way has to do this). But I know a
\nchild doesn’t have to. Doesn’t have to.
\nDoesn’t have to. And I didn’t.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Mary Oliver [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n

You must know that there is nothing higher and stronger and more wholesome and good for life in the future than some good memory, especially a memory of childhood, of home. People talk to you a great deal about your education, but some good, sacred memory, preserved from childhood, is perhaps the best education. If a man carries many such memories with him into life, he is safe to the end of his days, and if one has only one good memory left in one’s heart, even that may sometime be the means of saving us.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Fyodor Dostoevsky [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and<\/a> (italicized lines):<\/p>\n

The Art of Disappearing<\/strong><\/p>\n

When they say Don’t I know you?
\nsay no.<\/p>\n

When they invite you to the party
\nremember what parties are like
\nbefore answering.
\nSomeone telling you in a loud voice
\nthey once wrote a poem.
\nGreasy sausage balls on a paper plate.
\nThen reply.<\/p>\n

If they say We should get together
\nsay why?<\/p>\n

It’s not that you don’t love them anymore.<\/em>
\nYou’re trying to remember something<\/em>
\ntoo important to forget.<\/em>
\nTrees. The monastery bell at twilight.<\/em>
\nTell them you have a new project.<\/em>
\nIt will never be finished.<\/em><\/p>\n

When someone recognizes you in a grocery store
\nnod briefly and become a cabbage.
\nWhen someone you haven’t seen in ten years
\nappears at the door,
\ndon’t start singing him all your new songs.
\nYou will never catch up.<\/p>\n

Walk around feeling like a leaf.
\nKnow you could tumble any second.
\nThen decide what to do with your time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Naomi Shihab Nye [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

As I lay there thinking of my vision, I could see it all again and feel the meaning with a part of me like a strange power glowing in my body; but when the part of me that talks would try to make words for the meaning, it would be like fog and get away from me.<\/p>\n

…It was the pictures I remembered and the words that went with them; for nothing I have ever seen with my eyes was so clear and bright as what my vision showed me; and no words that I have ever heard with my ears were like the words I heard. I did not have to remember these things; they have remembered themselves all these years. It was as I grew older that the meanings came clearer and clearer out of the pictures and the words; and even now I know that more was shown to me than I can tell.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Black Elk [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

“The center of the cosmos” refers to that place where the great birth of the universe happened at the beginning of time, but it also refers to the upwelling of the universe as river, as star, as raven, as you, the universe surging into existence anew. The consciousness that learns it is at the origin point of the universe is itself an origin of the universe. The awareness that bubbles up each moment that we identify as ourselves is rooted in the originating activity of the universe. We are all of us arising together at the center of the cosmos.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Brian Swimme [

source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “black square sun hypeRReally eclipsed through layers of social housing blocks,” by user “hinkelstone” (Karl-Ludwig Poggemann) on Flickr, and used here under a Creative Commons license. (The first capital R in the image name is supposed to display as a Cyrillic “backwards R,” which doesn’t seem to work for me.) Explaining how this image […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Naomi Shihab Nye, Black Elk, et al.: art, prose, and poetry on 'The *Oh* at the Heart of You'","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[247,1393,250,5,36,251,4159],"tags":[595,1172,1580,3062,4382,4383,4384],"class_list":{"0":"post-18333","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ruminations","7":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","8":"category-art","9":"category-06_writing","10":"category-reading","11":"category-poetry-writing_cat","12":"category-essays","13":"tag-mary-oliver","14":"tag-naomi-shihab-nye","15":"tag-fyodor-dostoevsky","16":"tag-black-elk","17":"tag-brian-swimme","18":"tag-susan-stewart","19":"tag-karl-ludwig-poggemann","20":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-4LH","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18333"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18333\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18340,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18333\/revisions\/18340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}