The First Church of Whoopie

Winter Solstice Peace Vision: The Posada of Peacemakers

In my dreams, I see a procession
making its way across a wasteland
under the long cold light of the Solstice stars.

It is not an invading army--
they carry no weapons, their hearts are unguarded.
It is not a party of refugees--
they are neither desperate, nor disposessed.
They are neither traders, nor travelers for pleasure,
nor any other type of wayfarers
the world has ever known before.
They are emissaries of peace.

Among their number are people of every color, faith and nation
All ages, all genders, all identities
Both rich and poor, both exalted and humble of station
All bound together and made equals
By love, and by the gravity of their mission.

Their eyes are patient. Their hearts are composed.
Their pace is steady, geared for endurance.
They know their travels will be long and hard.

They are a new Posada, a new journey of the Magi
A new Exodus desert sojourn
Seeking a home for their precious cargo
Seeking receptive minds for their message
A message that transcends all boundaries
That dissolves all ancient enmities

And as they walk together, they sing
The most beautiful song the world has ever known.
And though I have never heard it before,
I find I know every word.

Will this procession, this tribe of peacemakers,
Find the home they seek?

Will they find a community that will open its ears?
Open its hearts and minds?
Take them all in, in all their shapes and colors?
Listen to and learn from their song?

In my dreams, I never receive an answer to those questions.

In my dreams, the tribe of peacemakers is still wandering
Questing across the desert for their Universal promised land
A land without boundaries of Us vs. Them
Where people remember they are all children of the same Mother
And no longer raise up arms against each other

But when I awake, I know the tribe of peacemakes
has found shelter for their journey in my heart

Oh may it be, as our troubled world wheels its way through another Soltice,
That you too receive this Posada of Peacemakers
And give them lodging also,
Till every heart is home to their message
Every voice is raised in their song
Every person become member of their tribe
And the whole world become the Promised Land for All.

Listen. They are on the move now.
You will know them by their song.
The words will come to you if you let them.

I can't play electric guitar so I do spoken word instead

for Mike Keneally, with extreme gratitude

A few weeks ago, I went to hear one of my musician friends play a gig.
And as I sat in front of him and his amp
getting my head cheerfully blown off my shoulders
by his fabulous electric guitarage
I found myself thinking:
Damn, I wish I could do that.

Stand there
with a simple hunk of wood, wires, and electronics in my hands
Intent on producing screaming walls of sound so visceral
They strike people's psyches like tsunami waves

Like a superhero with a secret-weapon raygun
Blasting bolts of energy
straight from one's brain, heart, soul, and crotch
into the universe
And shooting holes of sonic truth
through the very fabric of the cosmos.

But I can't play the electric guitar.
I can play a few baby chords on a nylon-string folk guitar
But somehow that seems so … inadequate.

One thing I can do, though, is what I'm doing right now:
Standing at a mic in front of a roomful of people
And speaking words.

So I started thinking about how I could write a spoken word piece
That would be like an electric guitar:
A blast of sonic truth firing straight out of my brain heart soul crotch
Until it tore the fabric of the universe to shreds.
That would definitely be a fine thing, yes ma'am.

I could always just howl into the microphone.
But that would be so … inarticulate.
Not to mention it being a bit rough on my vocal chords
And your eardrums.
(So don't go running out the door, I ain't gonna do that.
For the moment, anyway.)

And to be sure,
my guitarist friend doesn't do
the musical equivalent of inarticulate howling either.
Quite the opposite, in fact:
his blasts of sonic truth are full of content
Full of melody.
His solos always have a lot to say.

No, I am not a howler.
(For that matter, truth be told,
I make a distressingly, dismally dorky rapper,
which is why I don't attempt that style in public.)
If anything, I am a conversationalist,
An essayist
A memoirist
A story-teller
All quaintly old-fashioned modes
that are rather quieter
than your typical Stratocaster.

But though my tone and style are quiet,
My content can get pretty noisy, if I do say so myself
(Let's see—
how many pieces have I written about orgasm or vaginas
or other female sex-bits, now?)

Perhaps I have been doing
spoken word like an electric guitar all along
and not even realized it

Standing here with a simple sheaf of paper in my hands
Intent on producing screaming walls of words so visceral
They strike people's psyches like tsunami waves

Like a superhero with a secret-weapon verbal raygun
Blasting bolts of energy
straight from my brain, heart, soul,
and, yes, my crotch,
into the universe
And shooting holes of sonic truth
through the very fabric of the cosmos.

I could groove on that.

Plus my eardrums—
and yours—
will probably be the better for it.