Contemplify NonRequired Reading List for August 31, 2021
August NonRequired Reading List
Contemplative,
There is a hermit tradition I admire in Taoism and Buddhism. A layperson or monk sheds the skin of their old city life to become a hermit. The hermit then moves to a mountain, finds a quiet spot to plant a garden, meditate, and push a little poetry onto paper. It is a direct life.
The hermit builds a shelter and even adopts the name of the mountain as their own. This particular breed of mountain poet drops individual distinction for the dynamic exchange between person and place. It is a belonging, being, and becoming rooted in the physicality of the world. Which begs the question, since the mountain holds the hermit who holds the pen who writes the poetry...who is to say the mountain should not be collecting royalty checks or winning poetry awards?*
In dynasties past, Chinese emperors and politicos would seek out the counsel of these mountain hermits, occasionally coaxing them down the mountain and into an official position. Imagine if the Biden Administration sought out mountain hermits to fill a cabinet position or for a fresh take on a climate change policy. The mountain hermit usually declines a position of such powerful busyness to tend to their practice and garden.
These hermit poets were far from the red dust of the cities, but wrote of contemplative breakthroughs and offered prophetic words against the seductive pulls of power, prestige, and possessions. Much like Jesus in the desert (and the desert mothers and fathers that would follow), these hermits had to face the formless temptations before falling into the givenness of things. Rumor is there are still hundreds (maybe thousands) of mountain hermits in the Zhongnan mountains in the Shaanxi Province in China^. I pray that is true. They are post holders keeping the earth on its axis.
In the Christian tradition their are similar practices that poeticize my soul; solitude, contemplative prayer, and connaturality with Christ to name a few. They clean the lens of my embodied interiority so I can see out from oneness. This is one of the gifts of contemplative practice. Christianity wobbles when it tries to bring the hammer of dominion rather than the humor of communion. We are in the embrace of the Christ-soaked world that holds our lives as we collaborate on the poem of each day. We go about our business without the felt knowledge of being held or sharpening our craft. We get busy. We get important. We forget to become the mountain. “For truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.”`
Become a mountain that moves others mountains.
*This is a riff off David Budbill’s version of this idea. Read about it in this interview with Tricycle.
^Check out Road to Heaven: Conversations with Chinese Hermits by Bill Porter
`Matthew 17:20
August NonRequired Reading List
Wild Woman: A Footnote, the Desert, and My Quest for an Elusive Saint by Amy Frykholm (Get it the Public Library or Bookshop)
“Die and Become. Until you have learned this, you are but a dull guest on this dark planet.” This Goethe quote sweeps in early to behold the gaze of the Wild Woman. Pretty sure it dislodged the speck in my third eye. In Wild Woman Amy Frykholm crosses time and space to “die and become”, to search out and follow the hidden tracks of St. Mary of Egypt (344 - 421 A.D.). The tradition tells us that St. Mary of Egypt left home at thirteen, became a prostitute, had a conversion of heart and rushed into the desert for a total transformation. Father Zosimas, on his own journey, was led into the desert to find a holier monk than himself. He was shocked to discover that this monk was St. Mary of Egypt. Was St. Mary of Egypt a myth? A legend of repentance? Was Mary a victim of misogynistic storytelling? Amy Frykholm has written a gripping spiritual memoir of pilgrimage in resonance with a revisioned version of the Life of St. Mary of Egypt.
Wild Woman is for any reader likely to kick off their city collar and run towards the desert to test the timbre of their heart.
Sparrow Envy: Field Guide to Birds and Lesser Beasts by J. Drew Lanham (Get it the Public Library or Bookshop)
Lines of poetry spring, hop, and finally rest on the branches of my consciousness. Ornithologist and cultural conservationist Dr. J. Drew Lanham has written a book of poetry as unique as each bird that he studies. The evocative renderings of the individual bird, playful seriousness in the rules for being a Black birder, his endless praise of wildness in all forms, and the angles of attention a reader must cock their head to see beauty resting on branch almost out of view. Lanham brings you into the birding experience -- which is really the practice of deep attention, no? The poetic phrase of his that is currently sticking in my ear is “The Gospel According to Decay. Everything is wet or dead--or will soon be.” (in “On Finding Swamp Religion”). Each time I empty the compost I am preaching the Gospel of Decay.
I recommend Sparrow Envy to poetry readers in love with the wildness of this world, birds, and lesser beasts.
Guigo II: Ladder of Monks and Twelve Meditations translated by Edmund Colledge, OSA and James Walsh, SJ (Get it the Public Library or Bookshop)
I like to call Guigo II, Guigo the Sequel. I have read this book a couple of times. It is one of those foundational texts for James Finley, one of my teachers. A lot of wisdom can be found in reading the books that inspired your teachers (and to read them more than once). In this brief text Guigo is teaching lectio divina, the holy movement of reading, meditation, prayer, and contemplation. Guigo effortlessly teaches the way each movement yields to the next, “Reading seeks for the sweetness of a blessed life, meditation perceives it, prayer asks for it, contemplation tastes.” (p. 68 - 69). This edition of Ladder of Monks includes an accessible introduction that prepares a reader for the context and metaphors of a 12th century Carthusian monk. This short book will take an afternoon to read but will guide your approach to mystical reading for the rest of your life.
Ladder of Monks is for practitioners not put off by a healthy wrestling match with an ancient text to hear the soft breath of Mystery whispering in their ear while grappling.
Contemplify Update
The four most recent episodes on Contemplify…
Scott Ballew on Talking to Mountains & the Sublimity of Sad Songs
Tending to the Spiritual Interior of Language with Lia Purpura
These episodes are available from Contemplify through these fine outlets: iTunes, Stitcher, Podbean, or Overcast
Arts & Articles
“Where Does the Good Go?” by Tegan and Sara (YouTube): This tune reminds me of an ocean breaking.
Wendell Berry’s Long Obedience by Gracy Olmstead (Plough): My brother tipped me to this article and one segment in particular. I am glad he did. It highlights my resonance with Wendell Berry. “Instead of being at odds with his conscience, he is at odds with his times,” David Skinner said of Berry at the time of his 2012 Jefferson Lecture. “Cheerful in dissent, he writes to document and defend what is being lost to the forces of modernization, and to explain how he lives and what he thinks. He is the sum of his beliefs.” Read this whole article to grasp Berry's long obedience on being a particular human person.
“We Are Not Machines” by a whole crew of beautiful artists (Contemplify Musings): An invocation. A reminder. "We are not machines. We are a unity of purpose."
Stray Dogs by Del Barber (delbarber.com): My pal and a top shelf songwriter, Del Barber, looks out from the Canadian prairies to sing a few songs to rally our unsettled hearts. Take Stray Dogs for a spin and buy it for a friend. You can listen to my conversation from 2018 with Ol Buzzkill Barber here.
May the mountain hold you
as you become the mountain
that moves.
May the wild woman, birds, and lesser beasts
draw your attention
to seek,
perceive,
ask &
taste.
Turning in early,
Paul
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