FootprintsintheWind.com

The world is not a problem
Our people nothing to be solved
An agglomeration, a mish-mash, a chop suey
Is just what we need to invent medleys
& symphonies & galaxies & strange newnesses
The world is but possibilities
Our peoples power to be loosed

:- Doug.

Open space creates high performing systems out of an agglomeration of warty people.

:- Doug.

After this life is over I want to spend the first hundred years watching leaves fall from trees in autumn—maple, sycamore, oak, tulip, apple, see them floating down, ride on each leaf as it slides and scoots, dives and floats up on whispers.

The the next hundred years as a cloud, forming, re-forming, shape changing, now cumulus, now cirrus, once in a while stratus, teaming with bacteria and life, now and again nimbus shouting, booming, dark with flashes to wash the earth, feed the plants, & bring people together in hugs.

:- Doug.

Can people meeting
Open to oceans?

Can they say
Impossible things?

:- Doug.

This is major: death might be something to look forward to, not a graduation to another level, but what? Becoming large as G*d! Becoming vistas, panoramas, oceans, universes, black holes, worm holes in the universe to other universes, galaxies, fecund fields, fierce flowers, playgrounds, more, more, touching, heard.

Becoming love!

:- Doug.

When I am hiring a professional,
I am seeking—
Time
Hands
Speed
Skill
Ears
Impartiality
Efficiency
Being heard
Mouth
Wisdom
Larger view
Eyes
Panoramas
Heart

:- Doug.

Riddle, riddle, who’s got the fiddle?

:- Doug.

The ant carries a load
Just bigger than the ant
The elephant pulls up the Big Top
The horses in team pull a heavy Stage
The single mule a plow:

Do what you can
What you can is more
Together

:- Doug.

Walk lightly, and carry a big invitation….

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 901

Hopefully in this coming century we’ll find questions to some of our big answers.

Please pass it on.

© c 2009, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/291-0022, or by e-mail to mailto:Doug AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com

I live in invitation
Or at least I want to
Hearing invitations and accepting
Or not
Being pleased when others accept
Or not
Invitation is all around us
Mostly unseen
What we breathe
Who we might already be

:- Doug.

Of what are you ignorant? I do not know is the only answer: I am ignorant of that of which I am ignorant, but I am not ignorant that I am ignorant. I do not know the ways of quarks and gluons, of mystery and moment, of love and life. Real, unknown: unknowable? The unknown is what calls us forth, makes us possible, offers to us the invitation to invite others.

There is work to be done, and invitations to give. I want to stay here with you, and I want to get moving. Now, Hear, Stay, Play.

:- Doug.

Do we want to keep on floundering around, or do we want to get on with it?

:- Doug.

Peace is the space between Yes and No
The nest in which they nestle

:- Doug.

What’s working in my life right now?

:- Doug.

And see
How life is deeper
Hear for thee
Think in poetry

:- Doug.

Many an
Act of Congress has
—In dis order—
An End, a Beginning,
And a Muddle

:- Doug.

A tax to pay
After all the taxes
On all the income and property
Over all the years
Still the state claims share
Of what is left
When we die

What justice this?
What lobby of dead people
Can oppose?

Why the tax?
Some say Redistribute
Earth’s wealth
Back to all the people

But if the tax be upon
The poor and middle
What justice this?

Quietly you may hear truer:
Because we can
What justice this?

:- Doug.

In a time to which only imagination has the key, perhaps now time, hear time, ever never, our lives truly live among the giants….

:- Doug.

A short story

Diapers—oooo-yuck!
Three children—seven, one, newborn
A little mother with the baby boys
Helping Mom
Mom helping Dad with the business
Keeping house year after year
“Are we there yet?”
Kids squabbling
Put the older one in the middle
Sometimes that works

Decades pass
The house has new neighbors
Not so much in the country anymore
Building a new house next door
Mom and Dad excited

Dad’s health failing
Business doing well with son
Dad still goes in
Reads the news
Watches the birds

Dad has died
All alone, big house
Memories all about
Pictures on the walls
Grandchildren give her pride
Children’s squabble mellower

Gifts she knows they do not need
Each birthday and Christmas
“Will I have enough?”
“Ma, there’s enough”
“I love to give the gifts
I love to give myself”

In my Will my gifts fit each one
And each one has all my heart
How is this possible?

Now Mom is gone
The inheritance tax return
Tells all but tells nothing
It tells a short story
The real wealth is not counted here
And yet, if you listen closely, you hear—

Bedtime stories, books read aloud
Dolls dressed, tea parties attended
Attended well
Ouchies kissed
Laughter, love
Still flowing, flowing

In this brief tax report
All of it echoes
Echoes

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 900

My life is worth the living
Because I have children
Two sons
Poetry
Meetings
Inklings
Divinities
Invitations
Words
Hope
Attention
Love
Children who can bear children

Please pass it on.

© c 2009, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/291-0022, or by e-mail to mailto:Doug AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com

Not a sit-in
Not a buy-in
It’s a join-in

:- Doug.

It takes two hands
—yours and mine—
to make a better Now
This is the rule of two hands

:- Doug.