"She Who Hears the Cries of the World" by Jennifer Berezan

Mana Youngbear performing White Tara at "Restoring the Balance",
the Muse Community Arts Center, Tucson, AZ (2004)

 Voice of "The Charge of the Goddess": Olympia Dukakis

'Charge of the Goddess' adapted from Doreen Valiente by Star Hawk and Colleagues 1979 Music Courtesy: Jennifer Berezen 'She Carries Me' Source: http://www.EdgeofWonder.com

https://youtu.be/Fnf3nBPs8_o?si=YdyyB8Tvru6D0rD2

Praises for the World: Jennifer Berezon and Drew Dellinger

 

my religion is rain
my religion is stone
my religion reveals itself to me
in sweaty epiphanies

every leaf, every river,
every animal,
your body

(drew dellinger)

I first heard this poem spoken on  Jennifer Berezon's  2005 DVD PRAISES F"OR THE WORLD,  which I bought after seeing her perform it in 2008 at the Kripalu Institute in Massachusetts, where I was privileged to teach a workshop.  Dellinger read as part of an amazing  ritual performance in Oakland, California that featured  Jennifer Berezon, Drew Delinger, Alice Walker, Gloria Steinem, Joanna Macy, and many others, all within the container of Jennifer's exquisite  devotional song.  At the end, all voices rose to join her in its praise.    

Mr. Dellinger's poem, recited at the performance,  has haunted me ever since, especially after I wore the DVD out by playing it, and Ms. Berezon's music,  over and over again. So here is a link to a UTube video in which he recites it live, and I invite anyone reading this to as well to the music of Jennifer Berezon as well. For my own pleasure, I copy the poem below, and I also have copied the only video I could find on UTube of that extraordinary gathering in Oakland.

hymn to the sacred body of the universe

Drew Dellinger

let’s meet
at the confluence
where you flow into me
and one breath
swirls between our lungs

let’s meet
at the confluence
where you flow into me
and one breath
swirls between our lungs

for one instant
to dwell in the presence of the galaxies
for one instant
to live in the truth of the heart
the poet says this entire traveling cosmos is
“the secret One slowly growing a body”

two eagles are mating—
clasping each other’s claws
and turning cartwheels in the sky
grasses are blooming
grandfathers dying
consciousness blinking on and off
all of this is happening at once
all of this, vibrating into existence
out of nothingness

every particle
foaming into existence
transcribing the ineffable

arising and passing away
arising and passing away
23 trillion times per second—
when Buddha saw that,
he smiled

16 million tons of rain are falling every second
on the planet
an ocean
perpetually falling
and every drop
is your body
every motion, every feather, every thought
is your body
time
is your body,
and the infinite
curled inside like
invisible rainbows folded into light

every word of every tongue is love
telling a story to her own ears

let our lives be incense
burning
like a hymn to the sacred
body of the universe
my religion is rain
my religion is stone
my religion reveals itself to me in
sweaty epiphanies

every leaf, every river,
every animal,
your body
every creature trapped in the gears
of corporate nightmares
every species made extinct
was once
your body

10 million people are dreaming
that they’re flying
junipers and violets are blossoming
stars exploding and being born
god
is having
déjà vu
I am one
elaborate
crush
we cry petals
as the void
is singing

you are the dark
that holds the stars
in intimate
distance

that spun the whirling,
whirling,
world
into existence

let’s meet
at the confluence
where you flow into me
and one breath
swirls between our lungs

 

All artwork and text unless otherwise specified is COPYRIGHT Lauren Raine 2024

Jennifer Berezon and Goddess Spirit Rising Conference 2013

I was there...............wonderful Conference.  This montage shows some of the participants,  Lydia Ruhle's wonderful Banners,  Kathy Jones who spoke about Mother World,  and of course Jennifer Berezon's Praises for the World.  Beautiful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzJ0ZdY8Fuc&ab_channel=GoddessSpirirtRising

She Who Hears the Cries of the World

Mana Youngbear as "White Tara" in Restoring the Balance (2004)

SOUND POEM BY LAUREN RAINE (2019)

to listen:  

    https://soundcloud.com/user-972033003/white-tara-by-lauren-raine

White Tara is the manifestation of complete Compassion, She is the Bodlhissatva who will assist the suffering of the world, assist us to move through the suffering to love, and the reealization that we are not alone, that we all belong to the great Circle.  Quon Yin, Tara, Mother Mary.............. all manifestations or archetypes of the Divine Mother, and the expansion of unconditional compassion and love.  I wrote this spoken word poem in 1997, when I was going through  loss of a home/dream/community that eventually led me to create a new life on the other side of the continent.  

I reflect, as I try to recall the experience from which this poem arose, that the opening of the heart that grief and loss can bring can also be a path into profound evolutionary change, but in my experience, to grow one must first go through it, one must experience the pain and the loss.

Which is something very fearful to do, and can take a long time to do.  Because the heart does not know or reason in sequential time like the intellect does! Having just lost a beloved cat, I am experiencing this right now.  The emotional body, it seems to me, suffers all the losses at once as each loss arises.  And the heart also partakes in a greater  Mystery that somehow knows all beings are One, remembering all experiences of  love and belonging within the Circle dance of life.  Grief can be a great teacher.

 "I went to meet that savage creature I have run from,  lifetime after lifetime,

 the shape within the shadows, huge, a creature of smoke and bared fangs. "

This line arose from a dream I had many times, in which I was being pursued by a vampire.  Always it almost got me, or was a shadowy presence just behind me, and I would wake up. I suppose Jungians would call this the "denial of the shadow" or some such.    I was always too afraid to confront the creature that pursued me in those dreams, because I was sure it would kill me.  Finally I had a dream in which I became tired of running, and a I stopped to face the pursuing monster.   And when, at last, the horror embraced me it turned into a young boy,  vulnerable, with tears in his eyes. 

   

praises for the world

my religion is rain
my religion is stone
my religion reveals itself to me
in sweaty epiphanies

every leaf, every river,
every animal,
your body

(drew dellinger)

Eureka! I Found it.............that poem by Drew Dellinger that I first saw on Jennifer Berezon's DVD PRAISES FOR THE WORLD. This wonderful DVD, which I bought after seeing her perform last year at Kripalu, is of a ritual performance in Oakland that featured the poet Drew Delinger, Alice Walker, Gloria Steinem, Joanna Macy, and many others, all within the container of Jennifer's exquisite  devotional song.

Mr. Dellinger's poem has haunted me, especially after I wore the DVD out by playing it over and over again. So here, with the miracle of blogging, is a link to a UTube video in which he recites it live, and I invite anyone reading this to listen, and to listen to the music of Jennifer Berezon as well. For my own pleasure, I copy the poem below.

hymn to the sacred body of the universe

Drew Dellinger

let’s meet
at the confluence
where you flow into me
and one breath
swirls between our lungs

let’s meet
at the confluence
where you flow into me
and one breath
swirls between our lungs

for one instant
to dwell in the presence of the galaxies
for one instant
to live in the truth of the heart
the poet says this entire traveling cosmos is
“the secret One slowly growing a body”

two eagles are mating—
clasping each other’s claws
and turning cartwheels in the sky
grasses are blooming
grandfathers dying
consciousness blinking on and off
all of this is happening at once
all of this, vibrating into existence
out of nothingness

every particle
foaming into existence
transcribing the ineffable

arising and passing away
arising and passing away
23 trillion times per second—
when Buddha saw that,
he smiled

16 million tons of rain are falling every second
on the planet
an ocean
perpetually falling
and every drop
is your body
every motion, every feather, every thought
is your body
time
is your body,
and the infinite
curled inside like
invisible rainbows folded into light

every word of every tongue is love
telling a story to her own ears

let our lives be incense
burning
like a hymn to the sacred
body of the universe
my religion is rain
my religion is stone
my religion reveals itself to me in
sweaty epiphanies

every leaf, every river,
every animal,
your body
every creature trapped in the gears
of corporate nightmares
every species made extinct
was once
your body

10 million people are dreaming
that they’re flying
junipers and violets are blossoming
stars exploding and being born
god
is having
déjà vu
I am one
elaborate
crush
we cry petals
as the void
is singing

you are the dark
that holds the stars
in intimate
distance

that spun the whirling,
whirling,
world
into existence

let’s meet
at the confluence
where you flow into me
and one breath
swirls between our lungs

Workshop at the Kripalu Institute

Life can make you bitter, life can turn you cold

It seems I've spent most of my own  just trying to crack the code

But if I die tomorrow may the last words that I know
Be praises, praises for the world

Some predict the rapture where we all will leave this place
The chosen ones will pack their bags for somewhere out in space
But the holiest words I've ever read or thought or sung or prayed
Were praises, praises for the world

by Jennifer Berezon

VIDEO:  https://jenniferberezan.com/praises-for-the-world-video

Just completed the three day workshop for women I taught at the Kripalu Institute here in the beautiful Berkshires - its second year, and the class this year was twice the size of the previous.

Challenging to organize a "guerrilla art studio" overnight in a hall that was built to practice yoga in, but somehow I always manage, if I don't mind patting myself on the back. Like the previous year, I leave feeling enormous gratitude to the Institute, to those who participated, and the Goddess, whose presence has been felt throughout the experience. Frankly, whenever I do this, I always leave awed by the collective vision that arises.

Speaking of little miracles - all the music I brought was by the Bay Area singer and composer JENNIFER BEREZON, whose “She Carries Me” I have used to open several ritual performance events. Last year I purchased “Returning” for the group, a collective piece that she created in the ancient Temple at Malta. When I arrived on Saturday, I learned that she was here, had been teaching a workshop, and was to give a concert! Here by the way is a video of a huge Concert she gave with others called PRAISES FOR THE WORLD


It was beautiful, and so good to hear her in person after all these years. And the following day the class met in the room she and her group had just vacated! I was able to buy a dvd of “Praises for the World”, the concert/ritual she organized in Oakland that includes some 50 musicians, dancers, poets, spiritual leaders, and activists for the earth (including Joanna Macy and Alice Walker) It was an extra gift to be able to share it with my class.

I love to teach! I wait for some of the writings, and photos of masks, from the participants.

One of the participants in the workshop is going to Spain this summer, to spend a month walking the Camino. The Camino is the ancient pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela, a 10th century Romanesque and Gothic cathedral that houses a black madonna, as well as (and most significant to most pilgrims I suppose) the supposed bones of St. James, a Christian martyr of the middle ages.

I'm fascinated with the Black Madonna, myself, and quote Jay Weidner's comments about the Great Dark Mother, and "composting". He writes:

"There was once a vast pilgrimage that took place in Europe. Pilgrims made their way towards the town of Compostela in Spain, where an ancient effigy of the BLACK MADONNA is housed. The word Compostela comes from the same root word as compost. COMPOST is the living, black material that is made from rotting fruits, grains and other organic matter. From this compost -- life and light will emerge. When the pilgrims came to the Cathedral at Compostela they were being 'composted' in a sense. After emergence from the dark confines of the cathedral and the spirit -- they were ready to flower, they were ready to return home with their spirits lightened."

Speaking with the woman who is on her way to this extraordinary adventure, the hair on my arm (actually, both of our arms) rose, and I thought of my own longing to make a pilgrimage. Maybe, I'll walk the Camino! Certainly I've been writing about Pilgrimage, and the "composting" process enough in the past 6 months........how strange, provident, and magical, to meet someone who is doing it literally. Back in November I wrote,

"I think the pace of our lives has taken away the time needed, the cyclical time reflected in all organic systems...........to "compost". To fall apart, re-turn into the dark, re-form, be re-formed by the organic, collective forces we are woven into in the cycles of the planet, and our souls."

Exploring the metaphor, to me, the beautiful idea of the "Camino", the "road to Compostela" embodies the pilgrimage to the Black Madonna, spiritually, perhaps a journey to ward the formless dark of the deep rich earth and the grace of re-birth as I enter my 6th decade.