Category: Visits with God

What Rapture Really Looks Like

Rita Sommers-Flanagan2 Comments

The Holy Intruder just elbowed into my psyche and is taking up precious cognitive space usually reserved for judging others, feeling sorry for myself, nursing grudges and disappointments, or composing acerbic speeches to have ready when forced to engage with stupidity.

“Let it go,” Intruder whispers. “Nothing matters.”

“You’re wrong,” I whisper back. “What about shooters, liars, and war?”

“Exactly,” Intruder nods. “What about them? In the end, they will be Nothing.”

“All that suffering. All those dead. All that fucking shoot-em-up big truck lunacy? You’re wrong. This can’t be the way. It matters.”

“Okay. Fine. It matters. And it doesn’t. The guest list keeps growing. Atoms, neutrinos, critical masses, haters, and innocent wisps of life–I’m building bigger ballrooms all the time. Biggest ballrooms anyone’s ever seen.” Intruder grins.

“NOT FUNNY,” I yell as I run for the river.

In a frenzy, I dig newly exposed rocks out of the cracked riverbed to make higher walls for my labyrinth. Here among brittle, twisted roots and silent spiders, I can scream. Here I can hide and pretend. Here I can beg the Force of Life to get it over with quickly. The great decline is upon us.

Intruder appears with a platter of caramel apples and an entourage of angels and demons.

She says, “To arrive beyond, you must love the contradictions. Swim in the yins and yangs, square pegs, round holes, turning and tipping points, collaboratives, kibbutzim, and killing fields.”

These words threaten to crack me open, but I resist. Like a young Palestinian, all I have is rocks to defend myself. With what’s left of my throwing arm, I pelt her without mercy.

The Holy Intruder kneels, naked. I throw and throw. Welts rise; bruises turn black and purple. She waves a million arms in surrender, bows her head, and closes her many eyes. The demons surround the body and tend to her wounds, but it’s over. The angels and I link arms and dance the Hora. “Hava Nagila,” we shout. “Let us rejoice.”

She awakens into seven Celtic witches of great beauty; their melodies and harmonies take flesh, burning bright and gentle against the coming night.

We are the fatted calves. We are the scapegoats dashing for the wilderness. Burdened by the vile sins of our kind, we run amok. The Holy Intruder runs with us, surrounds us, and turns the stampeding masses toward dawn. We are one ascendent mass of punctured tires and chromosomal abnormalities.

The escape route is circular. We’re in the parade whether we like it or not. The Holy Intruder lifts the baton, and we’re off. It appears to be  another day.

Here and Now

Rita Sommers-Flanagan7 Comments 





In front of me, red curtains, 47 paint brushes, and a few years.

Alongside, turquoise drapes too long for the window wells,
a boiled skull, three wishbones, a pink phone, 
and the idea that I am loved.

Behind me, a life. 

Around me, The Idea loosely wrapped, permissive.
Another fall day. Chilly. Firewood stacked, dry and reassuring,
not necessary yet because

I have added layers. A down vest. Scarves.

If you read these lines and do not take stock
I’ve not reached my intended audience.
This is not uncommon. Perhaps there are too many

double negatives.

Above me, asbestos held in place by sheetrock.
Sky held in place by rain.
Gates flung open, releasing all the promises, broken or not.

I wish them all soft landings, my lips dyed crimson for a final kiss.







			




			
				


	


					
Walking Meditation
		
				

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Last night, I tried to calm my restless body by changing my mental focus from doomscrolling to consciously observing each muscle involved in rolling over. Impossible. There are so many intricacies in even such mundane movements that my mind gave up and wandered back to the terrors facing humanity.





At a silent retreat decades ago, I learned about walking meditation. You progress at a snail’s pace, noticing each miniscule dimension of your body moving forward. As the foot comes up, are the calf and quad engaged? Does the foot adjust its angle, ready to be placed forward on the floor? Is the surface level? What are your eyes doing?





Gradually, the lifted foot glides down, settles, and the process shifts to the other side.





Such deliberate awareness requires concentration, patience, and time. And if a novice sees a daddy long-legs climbing up her jeans, her reflexes will override all that consciousness, and the sequence will be blown to smithereens. Trust me on this.





Humans are a bundle of electrical/chemical communication systems, most of which we neither notice nor understand. Our neurotransmitters interact with electrical impulses to give us motion, thoughts, and feelings, some of which are based in reality, some of which are not.





If you imagine a slice of lemon on your tongue, you’ll likely salivate. The salivation is real, but there’s no lemon there. It’s the power of mind over body. But our bodies can send signals that are open to interpretation. The power of body over mind. We’re a jungle of actions, reactions, reasons, biases, and instincts. Though we think we make conscious decisions, somewhere near 95% of the forces that influence what we do, think, and feel are outside our awareness (including the latest evolutionary mutation: algorithms).





“So, am I real?” the Intruder asks in a sly voice.





“You’re a figment. A fragment. An iron fist and a fuzzy notion. There’s definitely something real about you,” I answer, defenses at the ready.





“And do you love me?”





My teeth begin to grind. To love the Other Within runs against the grain of most conscious urges. We’re built to procreate, not sacrifice. We’re a me-first, guilt-ridden species.





“Is that a look of panic on your face?” my Coauthor asks with fake innocence.





I freeze. 





“Relax,” She continues. “We’ve written a little Psalm that may help.”





 What you know may not be true.
You see mostly what you want to see.
Insisting that you’re right is wrong.
Choosing to be loving is like sucking lemons.
But the alternatives are worse.
Trust me on this.





God beams and slugs my shoulder. I flinch a little and slug back. We walk.


			




			
				


	


					
A Fortunate State of Existence
		
				

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In Montana, we have 5.6 million square feet per person, slightly more than the 4.8 million square feet per person for the whole United States. In India, there’s just over 100 square feet per person. That’s smaller than most bedrooms in our middle-class lives. Selah.





This bit of trivia was provided by something called Artificial Intelligence, or AI for short. AI is a voracious information gathering machine, still in its infancy, but rapidly gaining ground. Since I made these inquiries, I’ll be deluged with ads for birth control or real estate.





And if you’re wondering what Selah means, AI will explain it to you, and your ads will have a distinctive Hebrew flavor for a while.





How does it feel to be that well-known? I don’t like it. Sure, it’s helpful to be alerted to a smarter route for our romantic date to Fishtail. (Seriously? Construction delays getting to Fishtail?) AI is market-driven and ostensibly helpful, but there’s a lot more to it than that.





I cross my arms, and do a little Selah-ing myself. Scriptures are always being rewritten under the auspices of the great and powerful Oz. I wonder how the AI algorithms might edit the beatitudes for our times. I think I’ll give it a try.





The Creator crowds into my brain. I push them aside and write my draft:





    

  • Blessed are the wealthy, for they can purchase great swaths of the kingdom and eat what they want while others starve.
    • 




  • Blessed are those who avoid mourning. There is little reason to focus on loss.
    • 




  • Blessed are the aggressive. They will obtain power.
    • 




  • Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for the bodies of the young. If they are rich, they shall have them.
    • 




  • Blessed are those without mercy. They can thus dehumanize the poor and displaced.
    • 




  • Blessed are those who lie to themselves. Their hearts will be darkened, their shame erased.
    • 




  • Blessed are the makers of war. It is the essence of human history.
    • 




  • Blessed are those who deny hard truths. There are alternative facts in abundance.
    • 




  • Blessed are the sadistic. They shall be satisfied.
    • 




  • Blessed are you who deport your neighbors. Who avoid looking in the mirror. Who refuse to forgive. Rejoice in your momentary existence. Assuming the earth survives your terrible ravishing, you will die leaving it tragically damaged.
    • 






The Crowd clears their throats.





“Step away from the keyboard,” they command. A bouquet of holy hands reaches for me.





“No!” I yell. I unplug the charger and dash for the door.





“We have a runner,” they declare gleefully.





I fall down. This is painfully funny. We all laugh. 





“Thanks,” they say as they help me up. “We needed that.”







			




			
				


	


					
Advice From The Quilter
		
				

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Use it up
Wear it out
Make it do
Or do without





Everything has an expiration date. All the forethought in the world won’t change that. All the planning, lying, and scheming. All the willful ignorance. Even the highest aspirations.





You can plant and maybe, you’ll harvest. Or maybe before things come to fruition, you’ll be the one planted. What’s fruition anyway?





How dare you make it your business to tell someone how to decorate, alter, or use their own body? Or worse, assume it’s yours to use? Cast those evil urges into the outer darkness. Be nice. Be kind. Be patient and humble as you rip out some of the crooked seams.





If somehow, in your vague longing for the truth, you manage to dislodge pieces of the log in your eye, tell the tale because others might be inclined to lower their own blinding defenses. Either way, keep chipping away at yours. Start a small fire with the splinters. Warm your hands. Invite the neighbors. Even the vicious ones.





It’s fear, baby. Fear. You’ve spent so many days of your life shielded by the wrong armor. Those days aren’t coming back. Bless them as they recede into oblivion. Bless your many selves and your best intentions.





Clean the floors. Contemplate the cobwebs before you brush them down. They were once liquid silk, spun into webbing by those with more eyes than you will ever have.





It is all to be venerated. The warp and woof, the tiny stitches, the walking sticks, the wailing walls. The joints swollen round as crystal balls, the doomed attempts to achieve perfection; it’s all as essential as the broken strands and stolen lands. This is all there is. Make do.





Imagine your face in someone’s hands. Your neck on the line. Your severed limbs pulled from the rubble. Imagine you’re an endangered species or hieroglyphics on papyrus, a contaminated river, or a resilient weed. It’s time to try acquiescence instead of acquisition. Let the bee sting. The dog bark all night. Stand in the gap, arms at your side. Absorb the blows in silence. Loan the victims your voice. 





Behave as if there’s a future, and you want things to be better for the least among you. Become the least among you. Offer what you can. Consume what you must.





Use all you have
And all you know
Try your best
Then let it go







			




			
				


	


					
Give It Up
		
				

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If you were the only Omnipotent Force in the universe, one would hope you’d have a certain sense of humor: the kind without any of the usual mean or sarcastic twists. A good laugh is one thing. Cruel guffaws, another.

If you’ve been born only once, one would hope you’d carve your coordinates into the bark of the nearest tree. Hurry. You will be exiled, left to find your own way home. If you calm yourself, you will realize that you already know.

If you were born accidentally, knowing more than you can handle, you might wish for an easy exit. Instead, you are destined to watch your mountains come down, one by one. There is no safe distance. Even the act of observing changes the outcome.

Those who were born amphibious reproduce in obscure complexities. The permeability of skin, the need to be near still waters; this is where shades of gray form a rainbow. If you are brave enough, you can touch your own inner longings.

Darkness is an absence of bioluminescent beings flitting from branch to branch, swimming from cave to cave. Of course, you once had gills. Your sorrow is justified and holy, but it will drag you down. Peer steadily through the cracks to find the light.

Heat-seeking missiles zero in on warm hearts, but you’ll only bruise yourself trying to escape. Soften your eyes. Clutch the amulet you were given in another life. Make the signs of various crosses and give it up for the godlike being playing the cello.

And give it up for the rising sun and low hanging fruit. And the shivering murmur of laughing hyenas hunting in the neighborhood. Give it up for molds, yeasts, fungi and friendship. Revel in the divine but fleeting salvations of any given day.







			




			
				


	


					
Posting Bail
		
				

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Ignacio Manteca






Humans are being bought and sold this morning. I’ve placed a bid on one, but we’ll have to wait and see how it comes out. I’m having trouble with the messaging systems. 

A voicemail is heard in Ramah — lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel weeping for her children, refusing to be comforted—for her children are gone. I suspect the children of Leah, (Rachel’s sister-wife), and Bilhah and Ziphah, (the handmaidens), are gone as well. 

So damn gone. Pushed down the slick, disgusting slope of vengeful, wrongful incarceration. Deportation. So much money to be made. Phone calls prepaid by the broken.

There are too few places to put my rage. In the back seat of the old, malfunctioning car? At the borders that define us? In the pocket of the officer who lied about the handcuffs? 

It’s easy to be indignant from a distance and then order dessert. Tempting to wash my hands of this murky, oily, filth and focus on harvesting carrots. This evening, we can yuck it up about, oh, I don’t know. Privilege? Wokeness?

And this God Thing. 

Maligned, manipulated, ridiculous. Should we wash our hands of it, too? Would we behave any better if we had no fall guy? No excuse?

“Thing,” I scream. “Are you paying attention?”
“Trying to,” Thing mumbles. “Got a black eye. Dislocated shoulder. Bleeding.”
“Stop bleeding! There’s a cleaning fee.”
“Got no money.”
“They’ll go after your spouse and children.”
“Got no spouse.”
“They’ll beat it out of you.”
“Got no body.”
“Just stop bleeding. The sight of your misery makes us sick.”

Thing raises its piercing eyes to mine. “Don’t stop looking. You’re meant to see.”
“Oh, I see, all right. I see the idolatry of young girls with golden hair.”

Thing sighs.
 I continue.

“Some fucked up stuff is being done in your various names.”
“I have no name.”
“Well, they’ve named you some horrific names.”
“I’m beyond your alphabets.”
“Doesn’t matter. They’re using you to justify war. Cruelty. Wealth.”
“So, I should just disappear? Wrap things up and move my concept along?”
“Yeah, I think so. It would be better.”

Thing shakes its head.

“Then who will suffer with you?”
“We can do that by ourselves.”
“Bad idea. And impossible.”

Thing puts its fractured arms around me.
Splinters slice my flesh.
Tears roll down our cheeks.

We mourn the hatred.
We mourn the debasement.
We mourn the children.

“We have to stop crying,” I say. 
“They’ll see that we’re weak. They’ll hurt us.”

“I know,” Thing says. “Cry anyway.”







			




			
				


	


					
Seeing
		
				

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Once in a while, the dead ask to borrow my eyes, and I almost always welcome them in. Sure, it can be sad and a little frightening, but it’s the least I can do. There’s nothing like the vision enjoyed by the living, and for the living, a briefly expanded view, though jarring, has its benefits.

When the dearly departed share my visual field, unsullied gratitude mingles with that vague longing triggered by the waning of summer.

My dead enjoy viewing fertile fields, mountain peaks, city streets, and tall trees. Some are in awe of babies, but others would rather watch a good football game, especially if their former favorites are playing.

You may wonder how this works. It’s not at all like being possessed. There are no ghosts. 

When I feel the light touch of a soul on my shoulder, I tilt my head ever so slightly and nod. The cataracts of being alive drop away, and the focus becomes eternal. It’s incredible. But such co-mingling must always be consensual.

So, I’m writing to ask a favor. When the time comes, would you consider loaning me a glance at the sunflowers and the cold, clear sky at night? Could I take a quick look at how the planet is doing from your preferred elevation?

In my experience, the dead are polite and cognizant of the demands of being alive. If you agree to my request, I’ll strive to be the same. True, in this life, I can be demanding, selfish, pigheaded, and insensitive. I suspect most of this will drop away as my body rejoins its origins. It is my intention to be thoroughly kind.

And if you want to follow my example and make similar requests while you still can, be my guest. No pressure, though. There are abundant alternatives. 

Older souls often borrow the eyes of donkeys, 
kittens, chickens, lions, puppies, bison, eagles, 
and even the occasional snake or bearded dragon. 

The dead frolic in memories 
and other succulent fictions. 
They are and they aren’t.  
And they don’t seem to mind 
one way or the other.

Even though I’m still temporarily alive, some mornings I touch the Shoulder of the Almighty, and she nods.

Goldfinches glow. 
Dust and ash sparkle. 
Gravity lifts.

We survey the rising hatreds, 
toeholds of courage, 
glimmers of benevolence, 
and black holes of despair. 

We stare into infinity, watching small endings and fragmented resurrections while the raspberries ripen, and a mournful dog howls in the distance.







			




			
				


	


					
The Ducks
		
				

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The ducklings escaped. We were gone and it was raining. Most likely, they waddled to the river and floated downstream. They may not have taken their size into account. They were too small to buck the current and make their way back to their shelter and the humans who dug them tasty worms. With their underdeveloped wings, flying home would not be an option. They launched into the wild unknown, and they will not be returning.





Hermann Hesse wrote, “The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Who would be born must first destroy a world. The bird flies to God.” Hesse went on to name God Abraxas. God is always named or unnamed according to our needs and agendas. For my purposes today, I’ll call them Water.





Here’s why: Without water, we would not exist. But I don’t worship water. It neither wants nor appreciates worship. When you’re that powerful, you can afford to be humble. Perhaps you don’t even mind being polluted. Hidden. Transformed. Evaporated.  To you, the flow of suffering is all in a day’s work.





If you are God, you just are.





Death has meaning only for mortals. We cling to our shells and boundaries even as they thin and weaken. It’s unlikely that anyone enjoys being pushed out of the womb, and when the time comes, the work of breaking the shell from within appears to be exhausting and perilous. But inevitable.





So, sure. Run to the river, you traitorous ducks. Your easy food will go to the chickens. I’ll siphon the poopy water out of your plastic pool, and your nice straw bedding will become mulch. I don’t mind transitions. Or aging. Or abandonment. Not at all. Run, ducks, run.





God is chuckling from the corner. “Yes, indeed! Denial is always an option. Consciousness is as hard to handle as birthing.”





“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say, even as I move closer to the banks of the river. The current is swift. Water bursts into vapor as it hits stone, and the ancestors shimmer in the misty veil.





My mind is a whirlpool of images. Ice cracks across the lakes of winter, and steam rises from the center of the fractures in Yellowstone Park. Earthquakes are an ever-present danger. The risk of liquefaction looms on the crest of the clay-footed hills. Our bodies are more than half water, and the rain has begun to fall again. I am too weak to swim upstream.





“Just get in the boat.” God cuts the engine and pats the cushioned seat nearby. “You make us very tired some days.”


			




			
				


	


					
Angles of Repose and Other Non Sequiturs
		
				

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What do you suppose the angle of repose would be for those pyramids of dead bodies we’ve seen in the news over the years? (The angle of repose is the steepest angle at which a sloping surface formed of a particular loose material is stable.)





Syria. Tuam. Viet Nam. The Sudan. Gaza. The victims of Covid in Brazil. In these places, they would know.





Mass graves are frowned upon here in our modern and stolen country, so most of us will not witness haphazard heaps of people firsthand. We have refrigeration and waiting lists. We prefer to deport or enslave rather than outright slaughter.





Most mornings, I either cry or paint something. Some days, it’s yellow. Others, dark blue. Or a swirling medley of colors interacting aggressively with each other. Sometimes, I glue broken bits of mirror into new shapes. It can get messy.





“What would you like to cover today?” I ask Royal Blue. Before Royal Blue can respond, Blood Red shoves Royal Blue aside, and a firing squad tosses the sanctity of life into the air and takes aim.





“Knock it off right now,” I yell at Blood Red. “I MEAN IT.”





Blood Red shrugs. “Fine. But you know I’ll be back.”





Something ends. Something begins. Breakage and destruction are part of rebirth. A long time ago, at the end of an especially magical youth camp, I considered smashing my guitar so I could give everyone a splinter. I had the odd notion that this would keep us together. But smashing my guitar seemed a bit extreme. Instead, I pulled apart a pheasant feather that had traveled in my guitar case for years and handed the astonished circle bits of pheasant down.





 Now, most days, I wonder if I have something I could dismember to express my outrage and despair. To break hope open. To keep us together.





“Heroics come in many guises,” the Paint Brush whispers. “You do you. No need to come apart just yet.”





“That’s nice of you to say, Paint Brush,” I shake my head. “But I’m no longer flexible enough to kick myself in the butt.”





“Who cares?” Paint Brush scoffs. “Bruises aren’t the best motivators. How about a cookie?”





“Not hungry,” I mumble. 





“Oh, honey,” Paint Brush says gently. “You have no idea how hungry you are.”