The Seventh Chamber

The Faces

The Chair

Gratitude and Connection; Evelyn Berde

Prayers Bodies

It is all here

God's hands are open in Acceptance

Atara

How sweet it is to be loved by you.

The love I give is the love of God.

I share that with you.

Daily, hourly, all you need is to embrace me.

I am always by your side, always have and always will reside within you.

And when you feel my presence waning, all you need to do is pray and I will be there right beside you again.

Pray for me.

Pray for us.

Pray for our collective healing.

And it will come

Like a wave.

Like a victory.

Like All

God you are so beautiful

I fall

I bow down to you

I am humbled by you and blessed by you and in gratitude and in compassion and in love

I seek and find you everywhere

In peace in devotion in commitment

In courage and integrity and in persistence and determination and in passion

I find you in anger and in forgiveness

In pain and in joy

I embrace you in suffering and in grief
In loss and in confusion, in terror and in despondency

I will be your servant forever
until the day i die
my only prayer
is to serve you
to know your ways
to be blessed by your grace
enlightened by your timidity, your humility, your insanity, your agony

i will hold your hand wherever you may be
and i will pray to find you
always
in me

Reside with me, i pray, i clean my temple daily so that there may be room for your light
and how i shine underneath the loving gaze of your beauty

Oh, heal us, heal us from our suffering and from our pain so that we may be your vessels, strong and healthy, seeking your Holy Name Only

In gratitude,

Atara

I lay
underneath your fingertips
It seems that by laying there
underneath your fingertips
I put myself at risk
will i be burnt?
or will i be healed?
will i be further wounded?
or will i find peace?

You hold me
still
there
I relax into trust

And fall

again

from these high and holy places

where the spirit resides

oh, how deep and cutting is the fall

how tender and vulnerable i am underneath your fingertips

what for?
for what higher cause am i putting my self there?

for promises that crack and cackle when they drop?
for dreams that unravel themselves into thin cold air?
for whom do i sacrifice my self there, underneath your body?

Woman, please do not give of yourself that way.
Woman, please do not give of yourself that way.

Woman, collecting your tears is not a past-time that I mind.
For i love you, and I care to understand.

But woman,
be wise
be wise
be wise

Your own wisdom will protect you.

Hold that wisdom close to your heart.

Your own wisdom will protect you.

Hold that wisdom close, close to your warm heart.

Keep the wisdom warm and you will be wise.

I am humbled before you Goddess
For you anoint my eyes with your wisdom
And my soul rises
In song and in prayer
To your beauty and to your Grace
I love you

I have a dream

And this dream will come true

I have a dream

And this dream will come true

I have a dream

And this dream will come true

In this country

On this land

In this language

With this heart, here,

It will come true

I can see the day
I have the vision
I can see the dream
It is my dream
It is our dream

I can see pain clinics sprouting all around the country

I can see my friends saying to me " I am sorry for your pain."

I can see my doctors looking into my eyes with compassion, saying "I can see. I can feel your suffering. We will work together to get you out of suffering."

I can see myself  reaching out to my doctor saying "Thank you. Thank you for seeing me."

I can envision this.

I can dream this.

I have seen this.

I can see pain clinics sprouting all around America.

I can see new and inspired research.

I can see funding and hope and inspiration and talent and growth.

I can see myself walking out of pain and suffering and into hope and gratitude.

I can share this dream with you.

Today I can share this dream with you.

Today I can share this dream with all of you.

I will Shout until I will be heard
I will share it all
Even if you have chosen to close it, to roll it up and push it to the corner of the closet

You must hate me for this
For making you look at everything that you have tucked away so neatly underneath the boards of this floor

This very floor that we all stand on together
this very body that we all inhabit together

Oh, how you ignore me
How your silence speaks
of everything that you have crushed and shoved into glass bottles
They sink those bottles, don't they

They sink

Until I come along and sing them into being
Until I come along and speak them into existence
Until I come along and watch how you ignore me

I cannot pretend that I do not feel hurt
I do