although i live in the dark time of a dark age, although i stumble in the thick black fog of materialism and the tradition of meditation is waning and we are drunk with spiritual pride and this is the time of hell on earth and sadness is always with us and unceasing depression fills our minds, the heretics and bandits of hope and fear are transformed into crazy wisdom
and
i feel joy and wonder and lust for life.


now i recall, i call on the image, of phosphorescent animals lighting in swirling constellations each stroke of my paddle in the dark cove of a small island in western canada. this minute vastness floating constellations, opening, closing, opening eternity.
and i think of the sacred mountain revealed to black elk in a vision from which he woke on the plains and said he was not sad, the mountain is everywhere, and i think it is the same for us, in the city of hard development, our little green space, i think, it's everywhere, and if we don't have that vision, will will continue to lose this space.


thanks rinpoche, jos. campbell, black elk.