Another old CD coming back to life--Handel's Messiah-- has kept me company driving in the rain this week. Listening and singing along brought me to some kind of intersection-- a Monty Python-esque funny bone, the majestic sweep of harmonies, and a kinship felt in ancient shepherd poetry. Within all the absurdity and vastness, we're not so different after all, so then what? I had not paid as much attention to three passages that stood out this week: "All we like sheep," "Why

Sweet Honey in the Rock introduce their miraculous singing of "Wade in the Water," with this invitation/warning: "If you want change in your life, and you're avoiding the trouble, you can forget it. So Harriet would say, Wade on in the water." The sound system in my car, blessedly, only plays CDs and the radio, so I am visiting decades past, through my CD collection. Singing along to Sweet Honey in the Rock "Beatitudes" and "Peace"-- I found "Wade in the Water" responds to t

Celebrating the craziness of just being yourself, and yet wooing the divine. Celebrating Kabir's kind of craziness. The swan of our inner life or soul will fly away alone some day, says Kabir, so find what's worthwhile to find--woo and marry and celebrate that. Sing it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpWAKSGZZ6A&list=PLYQZAsoWq_KSzBnNKonHDmWCdpgIiFKY4 It's the kind of speech no eye can see Kabir says, Listen to the word spoken in every body ~Kabir (transl. L