Living from the mountain, with Paris and Ireland and every city park I’ve ever loved, somehow within me now, as I follow the dream of poetry which runs down the mountain into the valley of forgetfulness, where Jesus works. But where we forget the mountain, where we really live.

My middle name means the Mount, because that is where I’m from. I go back often to the mountain to recall my Source. But mostly i live along the stream of poetry running from the mountain. This stream is living word water, and is the brook David wrote of—the one he was lead by-those still waters. Mine are less still, more like a babbling brook, but they are fresh, and carry re-freshment into the valley where we all forget our names.

This week i went again to the top of a mountain (one of my favorites in this case; one which continuums into who i am forever in heaven)—as i love mountains, ridges, and rivers most! Parks maybe next, because all the people are just being themselves in parks.

It’s good to know your repeated or recurring metaphors in life. The places you go, which remind you of your real self.

They also reveal which parts of heaven you already live in.

Noticing your metaphors also helps keep you on your path, the path prepared beforehand to be your way.

I also love the in between—airports, train stations and any place which reminds me of pilgrimage. That’s a big part of my identity. Most of my best poems occur between here and there. Like even this little meditation on knowing your core metaphors in life. Where you meet God, tends to reveal who you really are.
Sometimes God asks me to hang out in places which are less like me, just to be with and get to know His Son more. I don’t mind deserts, but I’m a green mountain myself. But sometimes I learn more about Him in the wilderness spaces. But He always takes me back to the mountain, the high places, the vistas—and rivers ridges and rims are my home!

Great books and real conversations also remind us that the mountain and melody is still there. Everything follows that stream up the mountain. That stream of life which always flows. Find that, and you will be lead up the mountain eventually, or at least, hear its music!

So in the valley of forgetfulness where we mostly all live, it is good to read, to pray, to listen each day to the stream of poetry running down from the top of the mountain! That stream has life, and allows us to re-member our names, and the why’s of life. That stream of His Poetry is alive! And life giving.

But we also sometimes must return up the mountain to remember our names, so that we can bless others in theirs. Too much valley creates despair; too much mountain perhaps so much rarefied ecstasy that we are no longer useful to humanity. There’s a dance, or a climb and then a walk or run down a hillside beside a stream of poetry we offer to others. Or, at least that’s how it is for me!

The mountain’s name, may be Father, the stream Spirit filled with The Word.