Today’s Gratitude
A yogini-friend asked me to study Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras with her. And so we shall…
Author: Mark J. Chmiel
DJs
Dear Zosia, I was playing some Dylan a while ago as I was trying to get my study in some semblance of order. Then I picked his Chronicles off the shelf and opened to the section when…
Morning on the Central Park Lake by Alex Gaynor
Amidst the thunder of the pulsing city, here is a refuge The lake like glass, caressed by the kiss of the gentle breeze Robins chatter above and around, playfully inviting others to this sacred space …
Our Cup Runneth Over
Sunday night 8 May 2022 Dear Mona, I thought I was done sending you poetry after that April Poetry Month binge. But I can’t resist! The following is from Robert Di Yanni’s book, You Are…
So, Which Is It?
My friend Andrew Wimmer texted me the following two lines… [Paul] Street’s dementia: “the Kremlin [is] in the grip of a megalomaniacal neofascist…” Stephen F. Cohen on accusations of fascism leveled against Putin: “absurd.” Street…
“Nhat Hanh Is My Brother”
Dear Friends, I invite you to a second “Merton Hour” to consider Thomas Merton’s short intervention on behalf of Thich Nhat Hanh in 1966. We will read together “Nhat Hanh Is My Brother,” discuss in…
Reckoning with Russia, War, and Ourselves: A Spring-Summer Class
War presented itself to him only as a matter of subjecting himself to danger, to the possibility of death, and thereby earning awards, and the respect of his comrades here and of his friends in…
Su Tung P’o, Traveling at Night and Looking at the Stars (NPM, 4.25.22)
Heaven high above, the night air chill,ranged stars crowd the sky, all in proper places,big stars darting rays back and forth little stars busy as boiling water.Heaven and humans don’t meddle with one another —what does…
“Up to Me” (National Poetry Month, 4.22.22)
Dear Vanessa, It took me a few weeks to work in the 2016 Nobel Laureate of Literature in these NPM missives to you. Is he a poet? He’d say “song-writer.” This is one of my…
Anne, Allen, You, Me
National Poetry Month This Day of April 21, 2022Today’s poem: Anne Waldman, Notes on Sitting Beside a Noble Corpse Where would I be without Anne Waldman and Allen Ginsberg? In my own Shimmelstoy way, I…