Salvation through Music

You know there’s something for you when a show starts with “Salvation.”

An acoustic solo concert with Citizen Cope last night.  A small amp and his Martin guitar, the stage set for sparseness.  There was no introduction.  Just Cope as he stepped to the stage and began to strum the slow and heavy song featuring a few chords and his strong voice.

courtesy of Wikipedia

His movements are slow, the words flowing from his throat, sweet and fragile.  So vulnerable but thick with experience, it’s almost as if he’s singing a cappella in our theatre of 500.  You could almost be lulled by the beauty of the notes that reach your ears – hear the silence fill the auditorium between his breaths.  But listen closely to the intensity of the lyrics and there is pain weaving clues about the dark places he’s seen.

Well I came down with my Martin blazin’
My voice
It was cutting him up
Now he’s aiming
His first shot grazed my eye
I lost half of my sight
And my firstborn’s life
The second shot grazed off my guitar moon
And it made my guitar kinda play out of tune
But I just kept playing
Like I had nothing to lose
He turned the third on himself
‘Cause the bastard knew
Salvation I’m calling
Salvation

Put the gun down
Put the gun down
Put the gun down
Put the gun down

From the beginning, Citzen Cope disarms us.  For the rest of the evening, he offers familiar songs stripped down to their most essential parts.  Simple strums and his rich voice sing the poetry of human struggle, redemption and healing of the heart.

He has a scar near his right eye.  He rarely speaks between songs but to say thank you and touch his hand to his heart.  He has the air of someone that may have slept in a prison cell and yet he is so delicate and gentle I want to become his bodyguard for life and protect him from all things violent.  He moves deliberately like water on the stage and we, the seated witnesses, fall in love in two acoustic hours.

courtesy of http://www.thewildhoneypie.com

Threads of Time

When I moved to this sweet home, I hung Tibetan prayer flags with hopeful wishes.  I love to see time reflected in the fabric.

Jessica Dofflemyer ~ all rights reserved

Closing a chapter here, I’m moving to a new place and giving thanks for all that this space has offered me.

This morning at sunrise, I’m embracing change.

Scratch-free

Continuing on the thread of the posts from the last two days, I’m still pondering the perspectives of “No Enemy” and “That Which You Resist Persists.”

I’ve also been reflecting on the beautiful word “ease” and thinking about how I want its essence to infuse my life.

If resistance is essentially a frictional “no” then perhaps its antidote is a welcoming “yes.”

Jessica Dofflemyer ~ all rights reserved

Affirmation to the moment at hand.

I used to hike hidden goat trails with friends in remote valleys.  The paths were narrow and usually overgrown with flora, especially the invasive lantana plant, full of thick thorns.  As we made our way through the underbrush someone developed a mantra “no resistance, no scratches.”  

We found that the more we relaxed into walking through the brush without recoiling or fighting the branches, the more we became almost impermeable to getting scratched.  It was an energetic, almost like Tai Chi, where we became ‘one’ with our surroundings and moved in easy coherence with our environment.

Saying “yes” to the moment doesn’t necessarily mean a passive existence.  I believe we can still shape our moments, like a sailor uses a rudder to steer a boat within the current.

To apply these metaphors to the here-and-now, I’ll tell you that Jeb has now woken from his slumber.  He’s hungry and desiring to share with me the record-breaking animals from his Book of World Records.  It’s time to prepare his lunch and make my bed.  Life calls me away from this writing realm here in the Archives.

I could either cling to the banks or simply go with the forces that are now moving me in new directions.

I know I’ve got my symbolism all overlapped.  Brambly bushes on earthen trails and the watery currents of life’s river.  I won’t resist, just accept that it’s a makeshift morning with little time for writing refinement.  Hopefully, you catch my drift.

I’m thinking ease.  I’m envisioning gentle currents with steady steering.  I’m feeling scratch-free.  I’m saying “yes.”