the question

When you understand,
Do your muscles relax, sinews limpen and skin soften?
Does your heart race, the bow of your smile quicken and quiver?
Do the tiny hairlings on each limb rise up and test
the breeze rushing between us?
Do you knit your brow with needless bewilderment because you are shocked
You finally see what I see and think what I think and
hope that it will fit always as it does right now?

And what do the words sound like, how harshly do they thump against your cochlea, bump against your own,
as they rise from my mouth, worked up and wound round through my bowels, into my throat without getting caught and then sliding between sharp whittled accented tonguing and even sharper teeth..?
Is the intonation atonal or attuned to yours?
What is the nature of being understood and being understanding if you do not understand?
Will we run to meet, across an acre of cultivated crops or spelunk a river bed with stagnant waters alongside,
Are my thoughts and I
A flock of geese migrating,
a pair of bald eagles mating,
one mosquito with malaria waiting,
For you,
For me and you?

Berry picking

Wendell Berry is one of my favorite writers. Sure, he is white, and a male of the species. But there is a tender fight within him that comes shining through on behalf of land and lovers (two of my favorite inventions). So when a man like that has the opportunity to whisper in the President's ear and takes the opportunity to speak well of a woman's love for tending earth, I wonder at all the good that will come of it.

Say what you will about Obama; he is a politician after all. Though I am qualified to accomplish a great many tasks, I am not qualified to cast the first stone upon hypocrites. Furthermore, I know I run the risk of contradicting my previously admitted distaste for folks who take gardening privileges for granted. But Berry's nuanced love for properly tending our land on a grand scale is more closely akin to my concerns than it might seem at first blush.

At the end of an article describing the awards ceremony to honor other artists alongside Mr. Berry, Obama is quoted as having encouraged us thusly:
“We have to remember that our strength as a people runs deeper than our military might; it runs deeper than our GDP — it’s also about our values and our ideals that each generation is called to uphold, and that each artist helps us better understand.”

and I sounded my barbaric yawp accordingly.

You can read the entire article for yourself if you need some good news for a change.

A list for you.

Have I told you about my self-ish theory? It goes like this: The people I experience as selfish always seem to be acting out of a vague sense of what they want and who they want to be. I see them repeat patterns of behavior that infringe on the rights of others in such a way as to assert the fact that they have a self at the expense of those around them. I figure that if these people really had a solid sense of self to work with, they wouldn't have to impinge, infringe and otherwise cross boundaries in unhealthy ways.
I don't know if it will jive with your experience of the world, but it certainly rings true for me.

So in the interest of understanding where my self ends and another person's self begins, or--even better!--where my self begins and another self ends, I have made a little list of lists that anyone might make in order to get to know the self they have, the self they don't and thus be less self-ish (I'm using the suffix "ish" here to delineate dabbling or unfinished: as in, "it's not really brown, but brownish" or "not really nice, only nice-ish"). I for one would much rather have a reliable self, than be only sort of self-ish.

The following is a list of lists I make, sometimes for my self, sometimes all by myself but usually when I feel most self-ish so I can figure out my real self.

things that hurt me
things that heal me
things I know for sure

think(g)s I believe
things I can't do
things I know I can

things that reflect back to me the love I am and have like trees and ladybugs and good stories. Like Jesus cursing the fig tree, giant pancakes and maybe even you)

people I trust and why I trust some things I think about them

Thin(k)gs I need to say and who I'd like to say them to and lastly
if I will.

promises I should have made, and some I wish I hadn't
promises I could have kept and some I wish I didn't

mistakes I'm glad I made and some I wish I had made
but mostly I like to think on things that wake compassion within me and those I love.

There you have it. It's quite a project to get a self, until then self-ish will have to do because I'm not, at the moment, a huge fan of selfless, even though it is highly respected. In my humble opinion it is not often done well and most of the time it isn't entirely necessary and then there are even the times when it is just a disguise anyway...

more poetry for a good cause

I said I'd be here if you need me... and I meant it.
Come hear poems from everyskinnytree at ...

A Benefit Concert for Jackie Stewart Walstead

Jackie Stewart Walstead was recently diagnosed with breast cancer and is undergoing final treatments for chemotherapy. A student at Mars Hill Graduate School, she is completing her final year in the Counseling-Psychology program.

To help her with medical and personal costs, her friends are hosting a concert and silent auction to raise money on her behalf. Please come out and support her as we celebrate her courage.

7:00p-9:30p, February 11th in the MHGS Commons (aka Student Lounge)
There will be a suggested $5 donation at the door.

We are still creating our set list and gathering items to be auctioned.

If you would like to participate, please contact Catherine Golden (catgold123@gmail.com), Grant Guiley (gguile85@gmail.com) or Colleen Barrows (colleenbarrows@gmail.com) for more information.

Performing... Musicians: Holly Grigsby, Robert Deeble, John Hardt,
Poet: Abigail Vizcarra Perez

Partial list of Items to be auctioned:

Jewelry by Colleen Barrows
Photography by Talitha Bullock
2 tickets to the Intiman Theater
Handmade journal by Mike Menconi
Videography by Eratosthenes Fackenthall
Portrait Session by HMJ Photography
Artwork by Chris Ramsdale
Photography by Josh Longbrake

it's do! do! doo-doo, due, and dude...

I'm feeling "very undude, dude... dude..."

"Where is My Mind?" -pixies...

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
But there's nothing in it
And you'll ask yourself

Where is my mind

Way out in the water
See it swimmin'

I was swimmin' in the Caribbean
Animals were hiding behind the rocks
Except the little fish
But they told me, he swears
Tryin' to talk to me, coy koi.

Where is my mind

Way out in the water
See it swimmin' ?

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
If there's nothing in it
And you'll ask yourself

Where is my mind

Oh
With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Oh
Try this trick and spin it, yeah

The first Chapbook!

It's almost ready...

I included some of your favorites, some prose, and some pieces that I haven't published online because the formatting ruins the linebreaks. So they'll be new to you!

Each book comes with a CD of readings by yours truly (you asked for it; you got it).

They're for sale: $10 each.
Proceeds from tomorrow night's Free Form sales will benefit
the Free Form Charity of Choice:
Collective Hope.

So bring your dollas--
Hope to see you there!

Mars Hill Graduate School
2501 Elliot Ave.
Seattle WA
11/20/2010 8pm

ordination examination

I just thought you should know this is where I'm at right now.

I easily confuse strengths with weaknesses. So, when my professor asked what I was going to do when—not if—I fail to bring order to chaos, I panicked. I thought that surely failure to order the chaos would be a sign of profound weakness. Then this same professor asked us to describe ourselves from the perspective of a friend. I thought back to the words of one of my more observant and attentive bosses. In my exit interview he told me that when I told him I would be okay, he believed me. He said, “I’ve always known you to be sturdy.” Perhaps I shouldn’t have panicked at the thought of chaos. Perhaps the idea that I may reveal a weakness should not scare me! I have a very high tolerance for both weakness and chaos. I know them intimately and, as a result, I tend to those in my care as though chaos is durable yet endurable.
As I look back on this professor’s class in particular I see that my time under his tutelage has paralleled the trajectory of my seminary education in general. We began by trying to minimize the chaos. We set out to do the work of defining ourselves and have found that we are very confused (and confusing). We have learned that we, the weak and befuddled, do indeed have power and must steward it gently.

Over these last four and a half years I have gained some practical wisdom (summed up by the professor of this class when he said “you will never satisfy all the people all the time… if you are doing your job well”). I also gained some impractical wisdom (e.g.: postmodern or no, leading means you have to land somewhere). And then, just when I think I’ll never remember this wisdom, it always dawns on me (again and again, as sure as a sunrise) that I’m not sure how I learned any of these things because they are not the kind of things that can be taught in the usual ways. Maybe they were in me all along and I just needed someone to help me dismantle all the carefully laid and mortared, well-ordered thoughts that had them entombed.

My time in graduate school has facilitated a re-entry into church leadership as part of a larger process. “Churching” (attending church, potlucking, becoming a member of a church, tithing, voting, singing hymns you like, singing hymns you don’t like, etc., …) is a process. It is a process of discovering how much order, how much chaos is enough for each created thing to thrive and then making a commitment to searching out ways for all to access that amount of whatever is needed. It is a system of exchange: churching is not only giving time, talent and treasure, but a system of exchanging tangibles and intangibles according to our capacity for restraint and justice.
Taking a leading role in the life of the Church requires us to accept only the order that blesses, while allowing for the chaos that edifies and that means we participate in discovery, discernment, and setting boundaries. It doesn’t mean we have to be perfect already—we will be perfected. It doesn’t mean we put an end to all chaos—it means we order the chaos we can and endure the chaos that remains, for the good of all.

There is no disputing that when I accept my Master’s degree in Divinity I am taking a step toward ordination. This degree will set upon me certain rights and responsibilities, one of which is to discern next steps. I have to face the possibility of Ordination and I have discovered that for now I will settle into what I like to think of as one of two very different types of ordination. The way I see it there are two kinds of ordination: 1) Traditional Ordination: This kind of Ordination to the Ministry of Word and Sacrament is offered by the people in power. It usually comes with a title chosen from a short list of jobs. Certain rights and responsibilities are conferred on an individual after s/he has completed certain required tasks. The other kind of ordination is one I like to think of as Discerned Ordination: This ordination is realized through a process of discernment. For example, God has ordained each member of the church to accomplish a different task to the glory of God. This kind of ordination is akin to receiving a vocation that is discovered through a series of struggles and triumphs.

Each member of the body is tested, taught and otherwise prepared to live life according to the powers, rights and responsibilities only God can confer. There is plenty of power to go around but we rarely share it well. The politically inept or disenfranchised may never partake or participate in a way that would allow them to be Ordained as Ministers of Word and Sacrament in a traditional sense. The second definition of ordination, however is a broader use of the concept of ordination and so applies to those who remain socially or politically powerless or outside the narrow sphere of the mainline denominations’ influence.

You see, church is only Church when all the members of the body must come alongside one another in order to create opportunities for leaders to gain and relinquish power, to share and redistribute power for all of God’s people. For church leaders special attention should be paid to specific preparations. This should include fostering an awareness of the language and history of the God we attempt to serve and the people we live with and near—all of them. I work primarily with children who have their own ways of distributing power and so it seems only natural that I am choosing the second type of ordination.

I am choosing to answer the call to order the chaos for which I have already been prepared. Maybe one day I will do more to prepare for Traditional Ordination. But for now I do not see myself participating in the cycle of power distribution that bestows power on the few and neglects the ordination of the many.

This is my call to live in the liminal space, the space in which we may dwell so that someday we will know what to do with relationships that don’t move at the speed of Facebook; when my sense of time is different than yours; or
when industry or denominational changes keep pace with cultural changes that never seem to lead to transformation. These are not Holy Orders, but they have brought holy order to my life and so though this is not the kind of Ordination for which I thought I was preparing, it is nonetheless the orders and order I have been given.