FRIDAY, JULY 3, 2015* Meditation in Motion
with a focus on Walking
Facilitated by Jacqueline Gens
*Normally we meet on the first Saturday of every month
Facilitated by Jacqueline Gens
*Normally we meet on the first Saturday of every month
MEETING LOCATION: Shelburne Falls (Contact Jacqueline). PLEASE NOTE that for July and August we will meet in Western Mass, then return to Gullford, VT first Saturday of every month. TBA
TIME: 11:00 AM-2:00 PM
Jacqueline’s cell: 413-522-1125 & Email: jacqueline.gens@gmail.com
Next door is a traditonal Labyrinth where we will engage in
walking meditation after discussion/sharing followed by lunch. Another great
walking space is the Bridge of Flowers if the presence of people won’t bother
you.
OPTIONAL: 2:00 PM Field
trip to Buckland retreat land (Khandroling) for a demonstration of sacred dance
I. RESOURSES TO
CONSIDER
A Guide to Walking Meditation by Thich Nat Hanh
History of Labyrinth in the Christian Contemplative
Tradition
NAVAJO Walk in Beauty excerpt the Navajo Night way ceremony
In beauty, may I walk.
All day long, may I
walk.
Through the returning seasons, may I walk.
Beautifully I will possess
again.
Beautifully birds…
Beautifully joyful birds…
On the trail marked with pollen, may I
walk.
With grasshoppers about my feet, may I walk.
With dew about my feet, may
I walk.
With beauty, may I walk.
With beauty before
me, may I walk.
With beauty behind me, may I walk.
With beauty above me, may I
walk.
With beauty all around me, may I walk.
In old age, wandering on a trail of
beauty,
lively, may I walk.
In old age, wandering on a trail of beauty,
living
again, may I walk.
It is finished in beauty.
It is finished in
beauty.
- Excerpt from the Navajo Night Way Ceremony
Experience Walking
Explore this poem for yourself…embark on a mindful walking
meditation, full of awareness of your interconnection with all around you. With
each step, remain aware of your breath…how your weight shifts as you walk…from
heel to toe and from one foot to the other, your shifting weight moving you
forward.
Listen to the sounds around you, whether from nature or
human-made…for you are part of each. Let your senses heighten, catch the smell
of the wind around you, feel the warmth or coolness on your face, allow your
senses to relax so you can naturally take in the vividness of life and color
about you.
You are connected to the bird winging by, the tree standing
firmly rooted, the vast sky above and the rich, solid earth beneath your feet.
Allow yourself to take each step feeling the shifting weight of your body upon
the earth…in heightened appreciation of all that is around you…in the harmony
of our co-existence.
We are each reflections of ourselves, each other and all that
surrounds us…and with each step we can walk in harmonious and loving balance
with all we see, both without and within.
Navajo material reprinted from http://www.asacredfool.com/soul-poems/walking-in-beauty/
II. Some Walking Poems to
Consider:
Pablo Neruda – Walking
Around
Leslie Scalapino –Walking
Person who has Sky Flowing
Interview with Mary Oliver
Allen Ginsberg – Kaddish
Frank O’Hara –The Day Lady
Died
III. Writing Exercises
Exercise 1: Try cataloging both inner and outer images as they
emerge. Don’t force a narrative but simply let the flow of images trigger
memories, thoughts, sounds, vivid perceptions and see what happens. Analyze
some of the walking poem samples for structure especially opening lines of
Ginsberg’s famous eulogy for his mother - Kaddish which
alternates inner memories with the outer details of his walk through his
mother’s life with Ginsberg’s present.
Exercise 2: Regard
your walking ‘poem’ as an entre into a different reality, as a kind of window
or gateway like Frank O’Hara’s walking poem—The Day Lady Died, another famous
eulogy for Billie Holiday which conveys great immediacy. Look carefully at
O’Hara’s verb forms.
Exercise 3:Write your own “Walk in Beauty”
****If you bring work to share with others
please make multiple
copies****
Years ago I attended a workshop in Patzcuaro, Mexico with Anne Waldman which I organized for the Great River Arts Institute called “Luminous Details”. Here are her directives prior to a walking poetics from notes I took at the time:
1) Act of Observation/Attention – Compassionate engagement with
other
2) Act of Observation/Notation –Entre into sacred world as pure
perception
(3) Act of Notation/Articulation –Generosity of spirit
4) Poetic Notation– a dot in the continuity of poets past and
present
5) Poetic Articultation – Mingle with the world
6) YES - Lineage to
sing “in the teeth of impossibility”
7) Lokapala ----Local guardians, bio-region, Place—the bigger picture.
Coming Soon - August 1, 2015 meeting will take place at the Dickinson/Evergreen homesteads in Amherst with Chard deNiord, a great scholar of Dickinson’s life and work.
Coming Soon - August 1, 2015 meeting will take place at the Dickinson/Evergreen homesteads in Amherst with Chard deNiord, a great scholar of Dickinson’s life and work.
