Crying for my Mother

The words ring empty, empty, empty,

In the hollow chambers of my soul.

We have a Mother there.

But where?

My body shakes, the tears come fast.

To know the Father is life eternal.

But the Mother: nameless, faceless, and voiceless

Is too sacred, too protected for her daughters to know.

“You just don’t understand”

The answer comes fast,

With a pat on the head by a well-meaning hand.

You’re right. I don’t understand.

I don’t understand a Father

Who forbids a Mother to run to my aid,

Who keeps her in some hidden chamber,

And withholds her very name.

So I wrestle and plead and cry and hunger

For some answer, some balm to soothe

The aching, the longing, the gaping hole

The hole in my soul.

Oh, Mother, where art thou?

And where is the pavilion that covers the place where you hide?

I stand at the door and knock. 

But this veil is like looking through a glass, so dark, so dark.

I sought for you in divine words, scouring the pages,

And couldn’t find your name.

I sought for you in holy places, surely you would be there.

And in those lovely, quiet corridors I was empty and alone.

I am hurt and alone and weak,

Like a child after a bad dream,

Crying for my Mother,

For a glimpse of a divinity that looks like me. 

Poem: Women Who Love

Treasure Cave by Lou Jordan

Manifesto: Let Us Be Women Who Love

by  Idelette McVicker on shelovesmagazine.com

Let us be women who Love.

Let us be women willing to lay down our sword words, our sharp looks, our ignorant silence and towering stance and fill the earth now with extravagant Love.

Let us be women who Love.

Let us be women who make room.

Let us be women who open our arms and invite others into an honest, spacious, glorious embrace.

Let us be women who carry each other.

Let us be women who give from what we have.

Let us be women who leap to do the difficult things, the unexpected things and the necessary things.

Let us be women who live for Peace.

Let us be women who breathe Hope.

Let us be women who create beauty.

Let us be women who Love.

Let us be a sanctuary where God may dwell.

Let us be a garden for tender souls.

Let us be a table where others may feast on the goodness of God.

Let us be a womb for Life to grow.

Let us be women who Love.

Let us rise to the questions of our time.

Let us speak to the injustices in our world.

Let us move the mountains of fear and intimidation.

Let us shout down the walls that separate and divide.

Let us fill the earth with the fragrance of Love.

Let us be women who Love.

Let us listen for those who have been silenced.

Let us honour those who have been devalued.

Let us say, Enough! with abuse, abandonment, diminishing and hiding.

Let us not rest until every person is free and equal.

Let us be women who Love.

Let us be women who are savvy, smart and wise.

Let us be women who shine with the light of God in us.

Let us be women who take courage and sing the song in our hearts.

Let us be women who say, Yes to the beautiful, unique purpose seeded in our souls.

Let us be women who call out the song in another’s heart.

Let us be women who teach our children to do the same.

Let us be women who Love.

Let us be women who Love, in spite of fear.

Let us be women who Love, in spite of our stories.

Let us be women who Love loudly, beautifully, Divinely.

Let us be women who Love.

Mother Mary

Of Dvorak's Mother and Child by Kay Eniem

As a woman and a mother, I am always drawn to Mary's story this time of year. I wonder what she was thinking and feeling. I love this painting as I think it captures her contemplative spirit as well as the holiness of the Christ child.

Others also seem to be thinking of her as well and there were two beautiful posts about Mary this week on Rational Faiths:

A Christmas Search for the Divine Feminine

The Only Gift

Poem: For My Daughter

art by Natasha Milashevich

FOR MY DAUGHTER

By Sarah McMane

“Never grow a wishbone, daughter, where your backbone ought to be.” – Clementine Paddleford

Never play the princess when you can

be the queen:

rule the kingdom, swing a scepter,

wear a crown of gold.

Don’t dance in glass slippers,

crystal carving up your toes --

be a barefoot Amazon instead,

for those shoes will surely shatter on your feet.

Never wear only pink

when you can strut in crimson red,

sweat in heather grey, and

shimmer in sky blue,

claim the golden sun upon your hair.

Colors are for everyone,

boys and girls, men and women --

be a verdant garden, the landscape of Versailles,

not a pale primrose blindly pushed aside.

Chase green dragons and one-eyed zombies,

fierce and fiery toothy monsters,

not merely lazy butterflies,

sweet and slow on summer days.

For you can tame the most brutish beasts

with your wily wits and charm,

and lizard scales feel just as smooth

as gossamer insect wings.

Tramp muddy through the house in

a purple tutu and cowboy boots.

Have a tea party in your overalls.

Build a fort of birch branches,

a zoo of Legos, a rocketship of

Queen Anne chairs and coverlets,

first stop on the moon.

Dream of dinosaurs and baby dolls,

bold brontosaurus and bookish Belle,

not Barbie on the runway or

Disney damsels in distress --

you are much too strong to play

the simpering waif.

Don a baseball cap, dance with Daddy,

paint your toenails, climb a cottonwood.

Learn to speak with both your mind and heart.

For the ground beneath will hold you, dear --

know that you are free.

And never grow a wishbone, daughter,

where your backbone ought to be.

Willing to be Dazzled

Still, what I want in my life

is to be willing

to be dazzled—

to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even

to float a little

above this difficult world.

I want to believe I am looking

into the white fire of a great mystery.

I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing—

that the light is everything—that it is more than the sum 

of each flawed blossom rising and fading. And I do.

–Mary Oliver, from “The Ponds”

Motherhood

Motherhood: A Prose Poem
By Christianna Reed Maas

My willingness to carry life is the revenge, the antidote, the great rebuttal of every murder, every abortion, and every genocide. I sustain humanity. Deep inside of me, life grows.

I am death’s opposition.

I have pushed back the hand of darkness today. I have caused there to be a weakening tremor among the ranks of those set on earth’s destruction. Today a vibration that calls angels to attention echoed throughout time. Our laughter threatened hell today.

I dined with the greats of God’s army. I made their meals, and tied their shoes. Today, I walked with greatness, and when they were tired I carried them. I have poured myself out for the cause today.

It is finally quiet, but life stirs inside of me. Gaining strength, the pulse of life sends a constant reminder to both good and evil that I have yielded myself to Heaven and now carry its dream. No angel has ever had such a privilege, nor any man. I am humbled by the honor.

I am great with destiny.

I birth the freedom fighters. In the great war, I am a leader of the underground resistance. I smile at the disguise of my troops, surrounded by a host of warriors, destiny swirling, invisible yet tangible, and the anointing to alter history. Our footsteps marking land for conquest, we move undetected through the common places.

Today I was the barrier between evil and innocence. I was the gate-keeper, watching over the hope of mankind, and no intruder trespassed. There is not an hour of day or night when I turn from my post. The fierceness of my love is unmatched on earth.

And because I smiled instead of frowned, the world will know the power of grace. Hope has feet, and it will run to the corners of earth, because I stood up against destruction.

I am a woman. I am a mother. I am the keeper and sustainer of life here on earth. Heaven stands in honor of my mission. No one else can carry my call. I am the daughter of Eve. Eve has been redeemed. I am the opposition of death. I am woman.

http://podcasts.ibethel.org/en/podcasts/the-original-women-s-liberation-movement

Woman

Woman is the first to know sorrow and pain, last to be paid for her labor.

First in self-sacrifice, last to obtain justice, or even a favor.

First to greet lovingly man at his birth, last to forsake him when dying,

First to make sunshine around his hearth, last to lose heart and cease trying.
Last at the cross of her crucified Lord, first to behold him when risen,

First, to proclaim him to life restored, bursting from death's gloomy prison. 

First to seek knowledge, the God-like prize, last to gain credit for knowing.

First to call children a gift from the skies, last to enjoy their bestowing.

First to fall under the censure of God, last to receive a full pardon.

First to kiss meekly the chastening rod, thrust from her beautiful garden.

First to be sold for the wages of sin, last to be sought and forgiven.

First in the scorn of her dear brother, man, last in the kingdom of heaven.

So, a day cometh, glorious day, early perfection restoring.
Sin and its burdens shall be swept away, and love flow like rivers outpouring. 

Then woman who loves, through sorrow and shame, the crown of a queen will be wearing. And love, freed from lust, a divine pure flame, shall save our sad earth from despairing. 
That latter-day work is already begun, the good from the evil to sever.
The word has gone forth that when all is done, 

The last shall be first, forever.

"Woman," Woman's Exponent, 21 15 January 1893. By Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton

http://www.daltondatabank.org/Chronicles/Sarah_Lucinda_Lee_Dalton.htm