Prayer

The Call to Prayer

/ Daniel Swearingen / 91 Comments

“If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.” – Meister Eckhart

Heed me, need me, call me please me, oh holy.

The call to prayer is my writing. A story not based in my pride. A part of me of which I am revealing, for which in fact, I know not how or know why. It is like a question that was raised to me this morning, as I saw the Colorado Mountains that reached to the sky. The words they came from compassion born from inside me, “If they glorify me above their stature, can you do not the same in word and in rhyme”.

The call to prayer rest inside me. In a place battered by hell. Deep in the valley of spirit and bone, a link to the divine that lives to tell. The story of letters and numbers, of seals and mystical grails. Sometimes uttered as sounds and music, sometimes screams and wails. It is true I have been not a temple, a prophet, or seer of worlds. Still when I pray something happens, the shadows inside me unfurl. Orbital echoes of summoning, that form beyond a divide, that whose names goes unspoken, becomes one with my creature inside. A feeling of fullness eternal, what is cannot be denied, for G_D as she most perpetual, has made me sane while the world goes crazy outside. To pray to bless my creator, the coals of her mercy inside, hallowed be thy creation, your footprint of breath carries my life. Your footprint of breath carries my life.

So here, I am a part of a missive, a call to prayer, let me praise, let me praise. The seals holding the eternal bond within me break when I open to pray. This a part of my union, between she and my life day to day. The call to prayer from the start of the cosmos, on to on goes it on to each day. How does it help to sustain me in the here and the now of this day? The answer is found in a mystery, a word from the ancient of days. “Know me to know you intensely; I am, so you are each day, spoken and born so intimately, am I not worthy of praise. Am I not worthy of praise?”

The call to prayer is my writing. A story not based in my pride. A part of me of which I am revealing, for which in fact, I know not how or know why. It is like a question that was raised to me this morning, as I saw the Colorado Mountains that reached to the sky. The words they came from compassion born from inside me, “If they glorify me above their stature, can you do not the same in word and in rhyme”.

Heed me, need me, call me please me, oh holy. – דָנִיֵּאל – 05.05.2021

The Seventy-Second

/ Daniel Swearingen / 90 Comments

“If I am I because you are you, and you are you because I am I, then I am not I and you are not you. But if I am I because I am I, and you are you because you are you, then I am I and you are you.” – Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk

I stood atop a large stone near Cheyenne, Wyoming, threw seventy-one words into the air. They in turn broke into syllables, light strands born from phonetic care. The Northwest wind found its way from Horse Creek, from its bed on rye grass there, and it picked up the sound of my faltering tongue and helped it climb to heavens stairs. Beneath the arch of a streaked Cirrostratus, I saw the opening of a womb, and even though my eyes were closed on earth, I knew the birth of something would happen soon. Something caused me to quietly stutter, let the seventy-second verb commit, to fly its way onward toward the belly of the skyway to the ledges where angels sit. It was the dawning of a new day dawned, when a secret was paid on rent.

For in the terror of this mind of a boy inside a man, was an image of the prayer of host to sail on the seven winds. And the words they came in brokenness, the sounds from my dry, dry soul, in the sounds of a thousand nights gone by, when I thought myself not whole. With the chanting of all darkness-committed saying unto you, can you see he’s about to fold. It must have looked like danger for something sinister to abound, to see a ragged man of fifty-seven letting loose his vocal sounds. To stand upon the rock of that not known and leave his ego on the ground. To utter something in another tongue to let a craft come unbound. To reach inside the vale of my heart and cut the chords of the seventy-second found.

I stood atop a large stone near Cheyenne, Wyoming, and prayed in verbs without a noun. Prayed for your lonely shadows, that they would connect your mind somehow. Voiced my words for trouble consternation where the evil ebb does flow. I whirled the names into the air, with an unconscious cry, with the atoms of creation lining up by myside. I prayed for my family, a world that I do not know, and the when I stared into the womb of heaven my inward eyes did glow. For falling fast with angels, like lightning before the rain, came the kindness of the ancient one, in the ancient of its days. An energy unto itself with the universe at its display.

And it turned the seventy-second word the name of its command, burned itself into my soul from where the water from its hand ran. Came a knowledge that though I was dead in resurrection here I AM, came a small voice from deep inside me whispering from dusk to resurrection here I AM. – 04.23.2018 – דָּנִיֵּאל

Sunrise with Georgia (de Chaco)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 75 Comments

“I’ve been absolutely terrified every moment of my life – and I’ve never let it keep me from doing a single thing I wanted to do”. – Georgia O’Keeffe

“When there’s nothing left to do I pray for sunrise”. – Scott Stapp

The shades of desert night are birthed before the dawn, with a shard of red that beckons on, and on, and I think I’m in de Chaco, in my bare feet, without grace, and my heart withdrawn. I cannot see the reason why, but still, I think it’s my way of life. And to my right O’Keeffe she smiles, “I’m putting touches with my paint, let’s watch it dry”, her voice like a sound of lightning, “let’s let it dry. “there’s a lesson son in dreams to those who wait”. “Some terrified in moments before they see the paint”.

It could have been the pizza, of just the night before, but chills just don’t seem suited, to this vision, what is it for? The silence in the statues of the rocks where the dark angels died, the ark of the holy covenant rises fire from the eastern sky. It is such a mystery, mystery, with the ruins, gone by. My G_D to thee this morning when I’m born to die, is in a dream that you look me in the eye.

“It is a duty to paint her face”, says a dreamlike “Georgia” turning the brush like my fate. Those hands were pictures, I start to say, but it’s not important when you’re in this place. “Oh G_D you’re an element, in this dream, before the canyons and my dried streams, of hopes and thoughts about where I’ve been, from the top of a mountain, to the taste of sin. “A turn of her shoulder brings a certain pink”, says Georgia, whispering, as between her teeth. I haven’t thought to question, for my mind is a whirl, why G_D has chosen a dead painters world. But back to the silence of the morning that is, with de Chaco moving in my soul somewhere within. “The rising of the child is what you want to see”, suddenly Georgia’s voice is distant outside of me. For the walls of nature rise and arc and stand, before creation’s first thought of first man.

“No dark valley”, Georgia whispers to me, and I turn, and she’s gone, instead there’s just a pinon tree, but I turn again, and what I love the most, is “Adonai” that brought me shining down his ghost. Unto you all my whispers, and all my errant dreams, you of blended cells of mystery, that makes a child of me. For here in de Chaco in the sunrise of the worlds, all suddenly O’Keeffe’s words come into my heart and swirl. “I’m putting touches with my paint” a voice rumbles in my dream, it’s been drying in the desert while you walk in your sleep. I brought you to my birthplace here, the land an inward sea. And though I think I am asleep, the day awakens me from my keep, and all I hated has gone away, the black and white of my mistakes. A sunrise color like Georgia makes, has painted me with the coat of many colors for my destiny, the coat of many colors for my destiny! – 02.18.2018 – דָּנִיֵּאל

Integrity (Orlando)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 34 Comments

It seems the nights upon us, far past what was morn, when gunshots rang out, and now the mother’s morn. And I would not be so crass to say what is left or right, but for this dark, this oh so dark, I will pray with all my might, for integrity.

Integrity it finds a soul in not what is new or bold. Across the electrical currents of media, it’s not bound up and sold. And if you think that it is found in left or right your political goals, your deluded in your ideology stop reading go back to your soul. I ask myself a question, when I pray at night, do I say please protect me, from my enemies I think aren’t right. Or is a better prayer said, Oh HaShem you are as is, from back beyond primordial to the time of future tense. Would now as all the world swims round me everything so tense, where there is both good and bad, and there is ego spent. Will you come down to this desert, life that’s ever spent. Will you fall like reigning fire and right the spirit bent? Will now oh legend all who worships, dark and light, crescent. Arced upon the grave and life the world that we pervade. Will you in all the storms of tatters, liars, norms and depths, in deathly faces.  Will you for those who think wrong and right, stifle their mad matter, let them think with insight, in integrity.

A warrior, you said, a warrior makes right, here in hard deserts where the wind blows with right, and all around me caters to wolves and the sheep, all around me fortresses of thought and deceit. And G_d of many ancients, Adonai oh Ruach of leads, Shekinah of  my dreams, you who with your breath makes Orion and the seven stars, come so still, bring them now still.  Come unto the willing, those in pain without creed, those who here tonight, care not of ideology. Make now a potion, of your right and left, send now a matter to those with no heart left. Fill now a prayer not against enemies, take this spell higher to integrity. When this all is over, make death even less, make no one with thought, think their right or left.

It seems the nights upon us, far past what was morn, when gunshots rang out, and now the mother’s morn. And I would not be so crass to say what is left or right, but for this dark, this oh so dark, I will pray with all my might for integrity.

Psalms 25:21 – 06.13.2016 – דָּנִיֵּאל

GHOST (Feathers)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 39 Comments


“Feathers”

A step into technology, a moment without truth, the brilliance of a time and age, wasted on the youth. A time a dream, apostles, they moved around a fire, and settled in painted sand, and bled under the stars. In ghost they moved onward, by whatever they did see, intuitive religion, a prayer held by their deeds. A haunted way of virtue, the things that we can’t see, the foot that moves without a print, needs no technology. Come down from that steep mesa, the one that paints the night, with tears of all the fallen warriors, they did not die from fright. And look into the desert, where tombs you cannot see, alone with your I pads or wireless, electricity outside belief.

“Feathers”

There are feathers falling, laying like carpet in the split of my soul. Indigenous in it, a creature cries, oh what a sound. Pureness, no plastic needed, no wires to be ground., Now, now in this great spirit, crows flying, I would turn seeking, how wonderful to pray and disappear without a sound. Knowing that as you flew, your past met your future unbound. And like a ghost who staked no claim, to heaven, or hells entitlements to a spirit’s claim. Like a floating feather, I will rise all around you, my daily prayer, and forever proclamation understanding divination I’ll be there. No one can fight a ghost prayer.

“Feathers”

It was a dream, at least my Grammy said so, her strawberry bonnet lying lazily on her head. Your glimmer is the Cherokee, but your Jewish so she said. It’s embedded, it’s really something you can’t shed. I turn to her could be I’m grown, I know I’m just like her, could be I’m not yet dead, and she says it’s a dance. And no one knows the reason in these modern times, with holograms, and Instagram’s, those seconds how they fly. But Ghost they last a lifetime, and then on by design, our prayers in needing, they float on till they find. A basic need in its detriment, a painted face, near earth, can’t forget. That Ghost prayers hold the answer, whisper alleluias after, no mission church can fill our answers, like the air under feathers, they float on. They float on.

“Feathers” – 05.15.2016 – דָּנִיֵּאל

The Unbelievable (Angel Vespers)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 2 Comments


A million prayers I prayed to heaven, for myself upon bloody knees, in times of crisis when the skies turned dusk to red, falling sunset leaves. And in the time of lost battles when in self I turned to need, a million times the call of heaven returned no answer upon my pleas. A solo call I wrote in darkness, Dante’s smile scribed in my need, a tune, a soul, a shave of whisker, turn my cheek, a bit deceived. The unbelievable comes calling, the answer what I can’t receive, better now you pray for angels, your neighbor’s soul is now in grief. For there in times upon cold winters when your heart is warmed and fed. The cold eyes stare therein no fortune, vespers are for those in need, vespers are for those in need.

The unbelievable of asking, when the battle is your own, angel’s vespers are not lasting, turn the world, the selfish own. Compassion strikes the light in heartache, though it’s blind to what’s not owned, the pure of heart, of G-Ds own choosing, a million prayers answered from those unatoned. So now in silence stand I asking for those of others, for not my own, will you turn now, to all and answer, the unbelievable a world so cold. Will you turn now, to all and answer, the unbelievable a world so cold.

A million prayers spun unto heaven, upon Shabbat, for what’s not known, the unbelievable I’m asking, not for me, but those unknown. For this you turn in tides it’s given, angel’s vespers, they can’t believe, you turn an eye and it’s forgiven, the beggar’s heart for unbelief. A million prayers, I pray in the darkness, for myself on bloody knees, you give them back all unanswered, but for one, that’s not for me. The unbelievable is given, when it’s for this world in need, the angel’s vespers are written, when a prayer is for my neighbor in need. Bless you my holy righteous neighbor who is in need. – 12.19.2015 – דָּנִיֵּאל

Nederland (The Prayer)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 6 Comments


Were in Nederland, the sun has started its track to the west side of Long’s peak, resting for a short time between Meeker and Long’s, giving a parting shot before the whole of the world becomes darkness. “Dad, I have to pray, its sundown”. “Now”? I look over at Ryan, his brown eyes wide, reflecting the high thin fading light, so far, so high. “It’s a commandment you know”, he’s grinning, but serious. “Well I guess if it’s a commandment then”, I’m grinning but serious. “Can I just drive while you pray”, I say. “Sure I think so, I think it will be okay this time”, he says. “Yeah it’s probably okay this time”.

“Perhaps you’re hidden in plain sight, in this shadow or in that light, that ours down on the trail of sky to Nederland. A molecule that parts our hair, from ancient days, in this thin air, your purpose sanctifies and cares our naked minds. If you are real or just as is, beyond knowledge of all we wish, we are here, from day to day anyway. Instant death is not surprise, longer life we ask from skies, but anyway, both are blessings that we pray. Perhaps you wish our gratitude, just like the area, the fire forsook, that place near Nederland, the other day. We think we wish and that’s an art, but what we ask for is so stark, of things to buy, not life sparks, and that’s a shame.

Perhaps right here in Nederland, a place you gifted, and I’m glad, for right here, I think I found my way today. Some visions start right out of time, but what I’ve seen starts in rhyme, this mountain vale, this mountain high, has scared my fear away. Perhaps you planned it from the start, designation of loves pure part, to raise me up, to strike my heart this day. You strike my heart this day.

Perhaps this wind in Nederland, that binds this car, as we descend, teaches us to never ever be afraid. Indigo, or reddish blue, we see you paint a higher hue, of spirits rushing and falling fast, as if to bade, us to be safe. We are scents from what you are, the very essence in this car, the smell of days of sunshine rays, where wonder plays. Perhaps were farther from the truth, but well okay, for when we look, you’re above us and behind in Nederland. A gift before us all our days. All our days.

Perhaps right here in Nederland, a place you gifted, and I’m glad, for right here, I think I found my way today. Some visions start right out of time, but what I’ve seen starts in rhyme, this mountain vale, this mountain high, has scared my fear away. Perhaps you planned it from the start, designation of loves pure part, to raise me up, to strike my heart this day. You strike my heart this day”.

It’s dark, the headlights from the car, pick up the glassy eyes of a coyote moving swiftly near a sharp curve in the road. “I wouldn’t mind living in Nederland”, I say looking quickly over at Ryan and then back at the mountain road. “How about you”, I ask? Out of the corner of my eye, I can see my son grinning when he replies, his hand held up to his heart, “I already do dad”, he says, “I already do”. 6-7-2015 – דָּנִיֵּאל

I Said, He Said

/ Daniel Swearingen / 4 Comments

A healthy planet I said.

Frank’s Red Hot Cayenne Pepper Sauce he said.

Ying than yang I said.

Judgment than compassion he said.

The full moon is bright I said.

The beggars eyes are light he said.

It is a cute puppy I said.

You are blessed with breath and children he said.

The blessing of music I said.

Led Zeppelin, he said.

War and bitterness I said.

All is vanity he said.

To know virtue I said.

There is hunger he said.

To fly like a bird I said.

747, he said.

To know peace I said.

Is there one honest man, he said.

To see your face I said.

Meet your neighbor, he said.

My faith is weak I said.

Reality is not of the spirit he said.

So many in need I said.

A sadness to talk of he said.

So many rebels I said.

They become tyrants he said.

To love myself then others, I said.

Narcissism, he said.

To find the true path I said.

It forks many times he said.

To make it to heaven I said.

You live in Colorado, he said.

To have prayers answered I said.

To not ask he said.

To study and teach I said.

To do in silence, he said.

To not worry, I said.

Tomorrow I made too, he said.

To be left alone I said.

Six feet under, with garlic, he said.

I want to care for others I said.

I want you to not care what others think, he said.

To walk in Torah, I said.

To live Torah, he said.

To take care of my body as your temple, I said.

Again, Frank’s Red Hot Cayenne Pepper Sauce he said.

To live my days for you, I said.

To live, he said. – 02.01.2015 – דָּנִיֵּאל