I Hear the Waters Lapping

              The Bathers – George Russell (AE)

“I will arise and go now
for always night and day
I hear the lake water lapping
With low sounds by the shore.”

From - The Lake Isle of Innisfree
By W. B. Yeats

These lines from the poem Lake Isle of Innisfree are for this Irish storyteller an inspiration. It is told that later in his life the poet W. B. Yeats had certain regrets at having written this poem. I have no such regrets.

These lines are the invitation from the mystic heart – the heart that has glimpsed and wishes to return to the Source.  This is the return to the Source that the writer Marianne Williamson writes about in her book entitled “Return to Love.”

In the opening lines of this Lake Isle of Innisfree poem the hero of this poetic journey makes the commitment when he/she says, “I will arise…”  This is not just a poem about a sentimental attachment to a part of Ireland where the poet had lived. I think that is how many people view this poem and why W.B Yeats came to dislike being associated with it. Yeats didn’t write from sentimentality. He wrote from the consciousness of one connected to the timeless and its glorious invitation.

The phrase, "I will arise" indicates the proper usage of will in the development of raising consciousness and its expansion into the higher realms of timeless Love. This is an arising that is also a deepening into the heart’s core.  Then comes the phrase, "and go now." This relates to the poet’s understanding of the nature of time as a window that frames the timelessness of the present moment – the NOW.

When you look at the nature of time you find that the only time there is, is the present moment – the eternal now. When you think about the past you think about the past in this moment. When you plan the future you plane the future NOW. When the future arrives it arrives in the now. Time is a construct that developed with the clock; the clock came into its own with the advent of railways. In this sense we got more and more tied to clock time and now many of us experience what has been termed ‘time poverty.’

When you make your will the willingness to be a servant of the real  then time becomes a living presence? Are you willing or are you wilful? Are you pushing yourself to become what you have been told you should become in order to achieve what is defined in this world of time as success?

The line, "I will arise and go now," is an affirmation to be the willing servant of Love. This means paying attention to the water lapping. Most of us do not have this luxury. The only water we get close to is the stagnant pond of deep self-interest and the pursuit of what the Master Jesus called ‘the dead burying the dead.’

A soul friend invites you to hear the waters lapping by the shore of the timeless. There you will have some peace. There, for a short time, you will have some peace fill your beautiful eyes and the radiance from those eyes will truly reflect your soul and its Source.

W.B. Yeats was aware of this timeless connection to the shore of the timeless. He heard the water calling always ‘night and day.’ However, to enter the water one needs to move beyond the duality of night and day, light and dark, good and bad. This is why the invitation ‘Judge not that ye be not judged’ is such an important spiritual practice.

The great Islamic mystic poet Jelaluddin Rumi says it this way:

There is a field out beyond
Right doing and wrong doing
I’ll meet you there.

This is the field, the quantum field beyond time and space and form where you can meet and say, “I see you” because you will be one who sees through their beautiful eyes.  You will be a seer with the eyes of a lover reflecting the absolute beauty of Oneness.

To be this willing is to arise and move in the world of time as a manifestation of love in action. "I will arise and go now," requires intention and commitment. In my article "7 Ways to a Wonderful Life," intention and commitment equate with purpose and passion. This willingness is not to be confused with wilfulness, which I liken to pushing the river. What is required is what is a more feminine approach. It is the approach where you allow the dance of Creation to do you rather than you ‘doing’ it. For all our doing we have got ourselves and the planet in the proverbial ‘do-do.

You are a human ‘being.’ The word human translates as ‘the sound of being in form.’ This sound is the sound of Love. You can learn to hear it but to begin to hear it you have to also begin to trust it and allow it to do its creative work through you.

In so allowing you will arise and go into the eternal now and out of this direct experience there is the knowing of the timeless radiance you are. You arrive on the shore beyond the night and day of your life and stand on the solid ground of the shore beyond time.

To find out more about how to arise and go now register you interest in our Deep Heart’s Core Workshop, which includes singing, ‘around the fire’ storytelling, drumming, dancing and community contact

Tony Cuckson
storyteller@tonycuckson.com

or

Debbie Beirne at
ruachrhythms@gmail

Our Children have Wings

You were born with potentialYou were born with goodness and trustYou were born with ideals and dreams

You were born with greatness

You were born with wings

You were not meant for crawling so don't You have wings Learn to use them and fly

-Rumi

At the beginning of many of our storytelling sessions with children we begin with this poem by the mystic poet Jellaludun Rumi. When my partner Bee stands up and begins to recite the above poem sometimes there is giggling when she says the first line. That is until she begins to point to individual children.

When she points directly to a child and says, "You were born with goodness and trust" it is as if they have been suddenly woken up. In the room there is silence and the children begin to pay rapt attention. This is a short story with deep power and vision. It is an invitation and an invocation for our children to remember who they are and why they are.

We have a culture that educates our children by filling them full of information that we say is necessary for them to live full and productive lives. The emphasis, however, tends to be on the productive rather than the full. The emphasis tends to be on the more the better rather than the fullness of living. Rumi invites the children into the fullness of what is potential within them without judgement.

This is the role of a storyteller. It is remind children and others that at the heart of who they are is the ability to fly. What is needed is imagination and the building of confidence in the potential that they as children have arrived with in this world. To invite this confidence to take wing is the true role of a teacher. A teacher is not the same as an educator. A teacher unfolds. An educator often binds the wings so that the child can be safe and not go flying.

Another storyteller who invites such remembrance is the wonderful singer songwriter David Grey when he writes and sings in his song entitled Silver Lining

.

You were born with eyes wide open

so alive outspoken,

Tell me why, down in the darkest deep

Know there`s a light don`t sleep.

In this world where we hear stories of violence, disaster, dispair and fear it is important to remind our children what is at the core of human existance. This is not some fairy tale notion that we find in tales of old. This is the story and language of the heart that is known within all cultures and all traditions which education is supposed to "bring out" rather than to blot out with more and more information that keeps us in form and earth bound unable to take wing.

Close to it All or Any Song will Do

Birdsong brings relief
To my longing.
I am just as ecstatic as they are
But with nothing to say!
Please, universal soul, practice
Some song or something, through me.

Rumi – Birdsong
Translated by Coleman Barks

The singer songwriter Melanie (who is probably best known for the Bicycle song – I rode my bicycle to your window last night, I skated to your door at daylight) sings a song called Close to it All. It includes the words,

If I had my dream I would fill a hall
And tell all the people tear down the wall
That keeps them from being apart of it all
Cause you gotta get close to it all.

If I had my dream I would build halls and have people sing heart songs each morning in circles ranging from twenty and more. I would then prescribe this as an antidote to depression, loneliness, hopelessness and many other experiences of emotional distance that keep us from being apart of it all.

Many of us feel powerless. We feel what we have to say is of little value. We have no energy to say what we value. We have little or no time to find out what it is we value. Thus the universal soul of Love cannot practice some song, or something through us. The result is that we are left to do our life and lose our ability to be Life living as Love.

Even if you cannot go to a hall to sing you can choose to begin each morning with some practice, some something that invites the heart to sing. This does not mean that you choose to sing a song although you might choose to do this. Begin your day with the intention that you will value your unique heart song. Make this a silent invocation. You might not know what that is. Simply begin to invite and trust that you will receive intimations of what is to be sung through you.

Do not immediately rush into the day. Do not turn on the news that invites you into fear, powerlessness and armours you sensitivity to life and to the pain and sorrow in the world. Heartsong will open up your heart. Without your ability to feel heart centred life is lived without the experience of joy. Joy is your birthright. It is felt when anything of the universal soul is sung through you.

Find out what inspires you and aspire to express that feeling. Risk what it takes so that this feeling of inspiration expands and invites others to expand. Expansion is the nature of the Universal song. Do not be afraid to become so expansive that time disappears and all that is left is the singing. This is the direct experience of Love.

You might spend ten minutes in silence; you might put on a CD of music that moves you to dance or to tears. You might read poetry that changes you life. You might pray a prayer for yourself and others. You might practice mystic seeing. You might play a musical instrument. You might sit in your garden and say, “Thank You.”

There are, as Rumi says, hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground. What Rumi is saying and asking, “When was the last time you felt like throwing yourself to the ground because you couldn’t believe the wonder of who you are.” This is the invitation to the song of your heart. Make it real for you.