My daughter leapt into the world

After nine months of uterine back flips

(and back pain)

Writing graffiti

on the walls of her womb

Head-first-diving into life

like a supernova.

*

My daughter dove into existence

on a day when all over the world

people were dying before they lived

not paying attention to their wide, wondrous world.

She cried out to them

(I heard her)

Wake up! I am here!

*

My daughter brought forth her world on a day like any other:

the wide, soft earth cried out beneath the suffering of her children

who–some of them–took their blink-of-an-eye existence & danced upon suffering

singing Calliopean songs of rebirth.

Even on the day her father tearfully called his mother

sitting by his brother’s deathbed.

We needed some good news, she said.

*

My daughter brought forth an entire universe

from her speck-of-dust soul–

We had waited so long for her:

Since the day I saw her mother,

on that porch,

drinking homemade wine

So many years ago

*

Since the day when I watched my own little brother

(my daughter will do better than I did)

come home from the hospital

Since the days when the ancestors wandered over seas and mountains

to lose themselves

and to find

Each other.

*

Still longer, we have waited:

Since the days when the entire universe was written

in a single book

–the original speck-of-dust–

& danced its dance, sang its song

& wrote its new poem: stars pressed across the sky

(is this what you painted on the walls of your womb?)

*

& now, you are here:

Like the rest, you will get only a blink of an eye

(I cannot lie)

but we’ve waited for you so long

to sing your Calliopean song.

We needed some good news:

& you are it.

September 18, 2013

From the website of a student of Brian Swimme’s; https://theodorerichards.com/http:/theodorerichards/the-day-my-daughter-was-born-part-ii-a-gestational-epic

10^-40,000

A poem by Kathe L. Palka, used with permission, from her book “Miracle of the Wine”. Her website is https://kathepalka.com/

~ Fred Hoyle’s calculation of the probability of the spontaneous origin of the 2000 proteins of 200 amino acids needed for the creation of life.

for Joe

But here we are, there’s no denying it —
the spontaneous or willed act
of a mysterial universe set in motion ages past
then watched or tweaked along
by small miracles pushing probabilities — humans,
the end of a string of not so random events.

Imagine life’s beginnings — enzymes, proteins —
genes sequencing like so many pairs
of star-crossed lovers who miss each other endlessly
at some enormous dance where the band plays on and on
under the twinkling spheres and hope springs eternal
until each pair meets, brought together by
the omnipotent band leader tirelessly nudging things along.

Think of all the pairings needed after the creation
of that primordial soup, before our pairing,
just 20 years ago. But here we are,
while our children sleep inside the house,
still dancing by starlight on the lawn in the lilac-scented air,
here amid the world’s wondrous improbabilities,
nothing less than stardust ourselves —
all of this, all of us, brought together by love.

www.youtube.com/watch

Published on April 29, 2012 by thegreatstory (Connie and Michael)

One of the last videos made of Thomas Berry (1914 – 2009) speaking to an audience (Asheville, North Carolina). This performance captures the artistic, playful side of a beloved and influential leader in “Earth literacy” and a deeply meaningful celebration of an evolutionary understanding of this ancient cosmos and of the human journey within it. Filmed by Lou Niznik (1932 – 2011).

Here are the time stops below to instantly access that portion of the video:

00:45 – “Awaken to a Youth”

02:24 – “We are all children of the forest”

06:00 – “The Quiet Hills of Carolina”

10:05 – “Valentine Season” (“The Great Red Oak”)

14:40 – “Earth’s Desire”

18:05 – Late Summer in Carolina

20:52 – (story of his family and especially of his mother)

24:23 – “The Old House” (“There were lilies in the field”)

33:03 – “A Solstice Poem” (winter celebration at Cathedral St. John the Divine)

43:53 – “An Appalachian Wedding”

Listen to short excerpts of Thomas Berry reciting from his book “The Great Work”
https://thegreatstory.org/tb-audio.html

Other websites on Thomas Berry:
https://www.earth-community.org/
https://www.thomasberry.org/

“We have a new story of the universe. Our own presence to the universe depends on our human identity with the entire cosmic process. In its human expression, the universe and the entire range of earthly and heavenly phenomena celebrate themselves and the ultimate mystery of their existence in a special exaltation. Science has given us a new revelatory experience. It is now giving us a new intimacy with the Earth.” — Thomas Berry, “The Dream of the Earth” 1988.