Special Comment on A Little Bit of Everything

We used to want everything for everybody, everywhere, all the time, & now.

Tonight, we’re scaling back from everything—to a little bit of everything.

I come from the league of impossible dreamers; it’s just that some of our fellow dreamers had militant dreams & now inhabit prisons where the prison-guards of the possible still hold impossible keys.

Me, my cell got locked on the inside, & I only had to clean the room to find the key. It was high time to tidy the altar, polish the pebbles, scour the seashells, shake the dust from the feather.

The deities of drink & drug, they didn’t serve me anymore. That’s some of the everything that got discarded, that we poured down the drain. Recovered from personal pain, we’re learning how to dream again.

We’re pitching tents for camping trips, climbing inside waterfalls. We don’t care how old we are. Every day’s dawn delights. Every moonbeam romances every night.

She, she’s dancing on the kitchen floor, twirling a mop on top of an epiphany. Yesterday has had enough of yesterday. We’ve enough love to survive elections & apocalypses & keep watering the garden & waiting for rain.

I’ve studied with the Buddha, flowed with the Tao. So many times asked “Why?” when I should be asking “How?” Too many times wondering “When?” while the only correct answer is “Now!”

We’ve got Jesus on the dashboard, Mumfords on the stereo, sunsets behind us, futures cracking kindling to start a fire inside all of us.

Poet & cartographer (that’s me), chef & scientist (that’s her). Preacher & bum, mother & son, a church basement filled with sober drunks acting like mystics. The affinity group has changed. The base camp got moved. But the rivers to paddle & mountains to climb remain real & metaphorical, radical & magical.

Backpacks full of communion, picnics to feed the thousands & burning inside to banish sin. Lightning bolt ascensions, postmodern Pentecosts, internet Holy Ghost revivals, hybrid unschooled priests, & paraphrased scriptures by blogging prophets.

The shock of sharing, the stock market of spirit, unilateral & universal disarmament of the dogma, unchecked unencumbered unlimited grace. It’s all happiness happening. Everything. But this time it’s just a morsel that we take. The pantry is bare because we’re giving away gift baskets on the front lawn. It’s the yard sale to end all yard sales, except everything is free. It’s like a soup kitchen except we’re serving up a wild green salad & homemade pizza instead.

I’m not asking for everything, just a little bit of everything. The sampler platter has been curated & culled. No shame in having eclectic tastes, not apologizing for electric pace, putting everything in its right place.

If everyone in this room downsized his or her desires just a notch, we’ll have more leftover for others, more fuel to start more fires to feed more folks.

We’ve left the world of duty & greed. In this new collective, we don’t need eachother as much as we want to spend time with eachother for the sake of our common joy. This Love Feast lacks a guest list or security check or cover charge. Greed gave us so many systems of mismanagement & mistrust & obligation—when what we really wanted was hugs & love & a good meal. No fancy fake artificially-flavored libation, just a family of authentic mutuality & liberation.

No secret handshakes, no complicated entrance exams. Some choose a mantra, others a Zen koan. Some say the Jesus prayer, others answer an altar call. Some read political theory, others raise poultry.

Back in 2005, “COEXIST” provided a profound prayer & template for tolerance when a worldwide culture war seemed poised to punish us all. But time’s come for more than tolerance, for transformation & transcendence. Don’t just COEXIST but—COLLABORATE & COHABITATE, COENERGIZE & COREALIZE!