Ruah Bull - Spiritual Director

 I have refused to live locked in the orderly house of reasons and proofs. The world I live in and believe in is wider than that, and anyway, what's wrong with MAYBE? You wouldn't believe what once or twice I have seen. I'll just  tell you this: only if there are angels in your head will you ever, possibly, see one.

 Love, love, love says Percy And run as fast as you can along the shining beach, on the rubble, or the dust. Then, go to sleep. Give up your body heat, your beating heart. Then, trust.

 To live in this world you must be able to  to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it  against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.

 Rumi the poet was a scholar also. But Shams, his friend, was an angel. By which I don't mean anything patient or sweet. When I read how he took Rumi's books and threw them into the duck pond, I shouted for joy. Time to live now, Shams meant. I see him, turning away casually toward the road, Rumi following, the books floating and sinking among the screeching ducks, oh, beautiful book-eating pond!

The god of dirt came up to me many times and said so many wise and delectable things. I lay     on the grass listening     to his dog voice,     crow voice,     frog voice now     he said, and now and never once mentioned forever.     

This morning, at waterside, a sparrow flew to a water rock and landed, by error, on the back of an elder duck; lightly it fluttered off, amused. The duck, too, was not provoked, but, you might say, was laughing. This afternoon a gull sailing over our house was casually scratching its stomach of white feathers with one pink foot as it flew.  Oh Lord, how shining and festive is your gift to us,  if we only look, and see.

I have refused to live locked in the orderly house of reasons and proofs. The world I live in and believe in is wider than that. And anyway, what's wrong with MAYBE? You wouldn't believe what once or twice I have seen. I'll just tell you this: only if there are angels in your head will you ever, possibly, see one.

Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous to be understood. How grass can be nourishing in the mouths of the lambs. How rives and stones are forever in allegiance with gravity while we ourselves dream of rising. How two hands touch and the bonds will never be broken, How people come, from delight or the scars of damage, to the comfort of a poem. Let me keep my distance, always, from those who think they have the answers. Let me keep company with those who say "Look!" and laugh in astonishment, and bow their heads.

No, I'd never been to this country  before. No, I didn't know where the roads would lead me. No, I didn't intend to turn back

Dear Lord, I have swept and I have washed but still nothing is as shining as it should be for you. Under the sink, for example, is an uproar of mice - it is the season of their  many children. What shall I do? And under the eaves and through the walls the squirrels have gnawed their ragged entrances - but it is the season when they need shelter, so what shall I do? And the racoon limps into the kitchen and opens the cupboard while the dog snores, the cat hugs the pillow; what shall I do? Beautiful is the new snow falling in the yard and the fox who is staring boldly up the path, to the door. And still I believe you will come, Lord: you will, when I speak to the fox, the sparrow, the lost dog, the shivering sea-goose, know that really I am speaking to you whenever I say, as I do all morning and afternoon: Come in, Come in.