Obama’s Hope via dipdive.com

Click on the link and see this music video http://www.dipdive.com

Then come back and read this - and share your thoughts.

We are approaching a cultivated tipping point: the sound of a nation being lead to hope.

Whether he becomes president or not Obama is revealing and cultivating - a nation-sized longing - to hope.

Hope is a primal force.

Hope funds dreams.

Hope is a fuel for passion.

Hope shapes destiny.

He is speaking our long-silenced dreams, rekindling hope, and inflaming our youth to believe.

But is it as simple as it sounds?

If someone can speak our dreams - can they also -lead us to those dreams?

Is not ‘falling in love’ also formed in the womb of hope?

America’s founding leaders and followers - were nurtured into the face of life and death decisions - by the passion of hope.

Gratefully, our leaders marshaled hope for the benefit of the people.

Not all leaders who understand the power of leading from hope - can (or want to) lead us to our dream.

Nevertheless we have music videos to depict this rare and beautiful time; this time of the rebirth of hope.

Dipdive.com in this music video captures a taste of the birth of hope.

So new to speaking about hope that we are like children who imitate the words of our parents.

This music video depicts that early stage of indoctrination - of breathing hope into - and drawing breath from - the heart of hope.

Here is a cacophony of voices mimicking “Obama’s Hope” .

I like how it ends.

May we find our voice for hope -

and may the courage to hope - and the will to dream -

thrive - no matter who wins the election.

Do you understand “Ozymandias” by Percy Shelley?

Do you understand the poetry of Percy Shelley?

Ben has always been agile in understanding poetry and philosophy. Because he’s my son, I am always curious about what interests him. A few years ago, Ben gave me a purse-sized journal. Inside the front cover is a poem by Percy Shelley. Ben introduced the poem with these words: “This is my favorite poem.”

Poetry, it seems to me, is like Michelangelo explained his process of finding David in a stand of white marble. I’m taking literary liberty when I suggest that Michelangelo said he simply removed everything that wasn’t the form he was exposing. Sort of “freed” the sculpture of David from the Italian marble. The best poems - seem to free something in the reader too. This poem - that I found in the journal that Ben gave me - a few years ago - has freed something in me today. I wonder what it frees in Ben - and to you too. Why was it his favorite poem a few years ago?

I have several journals ongoing simultaneously. I write in this journal about 8-18 times a year. I think of it as a special moments journal. I’ve only filled the first quarter of the book - in the last few years! I imagine someday Ben will be reading this journal. I wanted to give him something worth spending his precious time reading. It’s not like the journals I use to sort out my thinking, or savor my feelings, or ponder a thought like starlight. No, this journal is my “Turning Points Journal”.

Turning Points: those moments in your life when we see life - as if we’d step out of the flow - and allow the impressions of the moment to shape us. Like a Monterey Pine Tree is shaped into poetic sculpture by the wind and moisture - we are shaped by the natural forces we encounter. Some forces we allow to shape us; some forces shape us unaware.

So today I picked up the Turning Points Journal - and prepared to write in it - and noticed Ben’s writing on the inside cover of the journal. I don’t remember seeing that poem before today. But I must have - and I must have forgotten it - someplace before the last turning point.

I wondered for quite a while - what this poem meant to Ben when he wrote it a few years ago - and what it might mean to him now. It’s a turning point moment for me - so I’ll add that to the turning point that brought me to the journal today.

What does this Percy Shelly poem say to you?

I met a traveller from an antique land who said, Two vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown and wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, tell that it’s sculptor, well those passions read which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things. The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; and on the pedestal these words appear

“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings, look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!”

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, the lone and level sands stretch far away.

September Summer in Monterey

Sweet wind, like a body-sized silk sheet rousing exposed skin. I stand still for a few more seconds - feeling the fullness of the gift. The sun speckling light falling through dancing oak leaves. Wind swirling in song and touch. A swelling sense of joy fills me. Smiling - slowly I step forward - sandals on bricks. The mailbox tucked into pine tree limbs, the siamese cat calls from the driveway across the street. She too is excited about the beautiful moment. “Come touch me too.”  A car comes up the hill. The cat looks at me - and then the car. We wait. The car passes before I walk across the street. She comes down her driveway and prances left and right. Rolling over on her back - then quickly to her feet - trust is being discerned - in the dancing. Finally - a few strokes across her back - and she steadied for just a few seconds. Gentle massage of fingers down her spine. . .a few more…and a few more. Then five feet away, she looked back and churtled a thank you. Spirited like a frolicking colt, up the driveway darting and bucking. That was mid-morning.

The sun sings and sighs and stretches dark brown shadows through the afternoon garden. Leaves and limbs of great California oaks whisper and lean to the whimsy of the wind. The sage is almost a scent. The lavender is on it’s second bloom. The night blooming jasmine is crawling over the head posts of the gate. The sea enters the Monterey Bay - with only a few white caps. Prescott Presidio Hill is home to the elements - of joy.