A story - from "Lines in the Sand"

The Singer and the Song

Once in the service of the High King of Elb, there was a musician named Lark. He could play the plekta till its three strings rang like thirty. He could blow the tenor netto till it wailed like a woman in labor. And when he sang, his voice was so pure, it was said that he spoke a hundred truths in a single breath.

Everyone loved Lark, but none more than the young prince of Elb. Whenever he heard Lark sing, the prince would put his small hand in the musician's, look up at him and say, "Oh Lark, you are the fairest and the truest of all the men in my Father's kingdom."

On hearing that, Lark would squat down on his heels so that he could look the boy right in the eye.
"Do not confuse the singer with the song, my prince,"
he would say.

The Prince did not believe him, of course. Princes believe what they will. But many years later, on the day the poor folk of the land rose up against the High King, Lark made a song for their victory. In it he rhymed 'tyrant' in a dozen different ways, which one could in the old tongue.
"I thought you were true," whispered the prince to Lark, when they took the entire royal family out of the dungeon to be hanged.
"I thought you were the fairest in the kingdom," the prince said as the rope was put around his neck.

But Lark did not answer. He only smiled at the prince. For he had never confused the king with the crown, the rope with justice, or the singer with the song.

Cleaning up

Spent 10min this morning cleaning up my desktop. I came accross one of my poems written a while back, and some great Nizlopi lyrics. I thought I would share both as they seem to fit my current mood.

A Mixture of two days
People looked tired today
Working the 9-5
Or is the 9-5 working them?
The veneer is more thin than many would believe

Hopeful dreams
Desperate tears
Of days that embrace purpose, cause
Of a reason to get up

Self medicated
Self taught
Self-help
Self-sufficient

No need for a ear
No need for a elder
No need for an expert
No need for anyone


Homage To Young Men Lyric by Luke Concannon
Verses Alastair McIntosh
Chorus Luke Concannon
Music John Parker

I want to talk to the young men out there. It’s for the women too, but especially the men, cos it’s tough to be a young man in this world. You have to face so much heartbreak and loss. In love and career and life. It’s easy to forget the meaning and give up. To burn up or sell out to addictions, despair or greed. Easy to forget that life’s a journey with a beginning, a middle and an end. It’s about navigating the future, your future. It’s about learning to become a man who’s real, and able to love.

Chorus:
Are you waiting for me? Are your hands down in the dirt? We belong together. I’ve been longing since my birth to be arms around you to be true to who we are, to let all our pain out to be playing in your heart.

So let’s talk about the first stage of life. The departure, when your boat is pushed out on the river. Most of who you are is still your small self. The you your family has made you, your schooling and your friends. You’ve still not found your deep self, your Great Self, cos that’s what the journey’s for. So you set out, full of hope, but with a heavy load. All the baggage of your upbringing. All the love, yes, but the fuckedupness too. Maybe the absent father, or the smothering mother, or the cold indifference of those around you. It’s no wonder you’ve a rough ride coming. It’s gonna get tough and it’s got to. So you can find yourself. So you can become a real man.

Chorus

And that’s when you hit the second stage of life. The initiation in the rapids and the storms. That’s when you find the pain of brokenheartedness. Love affairs that fail, failures in career and all your hopes for what the world might have been. Plenty young men founder grazed on such jagged rocks as these. Bruised and angry in a storm of violence towards self and others. But it doesn’t have to stay like that. No, my friends, not if you push on and open to the inner grace that will bring you courage. The courage to face reality as it is, without lies. The courage to know your wound but to insist on beauty and outgrow it. The courage to open your heart, to hold fast to truth, and to stand each step in your dignity.

Chorus

And that’s the courage that brings your boat to the third stage of life. To see how your small self is held in a greater Self. And that you’re fit to be an elder in your community, able to share the gifts and the blessings. Able to support and inspire what gives life among your people. And to love your beloved; to love and be loved by the Beloved no less, my friends. Because we’re talking here of love in all its meanings. And you can only love with a deepening heart. And that is why you had to grow courage on this journey to the ocean. That’s what your battle wounds on the field of life were all about. That, my dear friends, is what qualifies you to be a man in your community. Capable of loving and able to be loved…. Capable of loving and able to be loved…. Capable of loving and able to be loved

nizlopi