January 2024 (Vol. XXXVII, No. 1)

Dear Friends ~ I want to stride exuberantly into this new year "full of things that have never been" (Rilke). I'm customarily inclined to seek out those quiet, inward "cracks of silence where breath is connected to spirit" (Karyn Dedar). I need, we all need, silence, as Nan says, "for the Word to be heard." And on a crisp January morn when the air tingles, the tree limbs crack, and the sun slices sharp shadows on the landscape, an invigoration seizes me. I want to stomp around and inhale and shout and gaze about eagerly. I want to move my muscles, sinews, and bones. After all, we are fully embodied human creatures, wonderfully knit together in our mothers' wombs. As the poet David Whyte says, "To be human is to become visible, while carrying what is hidden as a gift to others." Our physical senses open holy gates, and the world pours in. Meanwhile, our body knows things, remembers what our mind cannot, expresses what our words muffle. Honestly, the scattering of quotes in this Letter is mere surface dust on the immense, multifaceted experience of embodied life and the thousands of ways we humans have of grappling with and celebrating our incarnate selfhoods. In 1939, in the midst of the ominous dark of pre-war Europe, Bertolt Brecht, exiled from his native Germany, asked "In the dark times, will there be singing?" and in the same breath, answered his own question, "Yes, there will be singing about the dark times." So, friends, let's claim what we are, bearers of Presence enshrined in the braided body-soul that is our birthright. Stand up. Make big shadows. Stride boldly, sing defiantly, dance! ~ Lindsay