Saturday, December 8, 2012

Thrills Along the Spine of the Stories!: A Review of BLOOD AND GOLD by Anne Rice




Every time I read one of Anne Rice's books I am seduced and I am pulled through irresistibly…
Not long ago I re-entered the VAMPIRE CHRONICLES via PANDORA, with its 2000-year first-person perspective on the world of Anne Rice’s beloved characters. Pandora has a bittersweet relationship with the half-Keltoi, half Roman Marius.
Despite her inability to live with Marius, it was to his story BLOOD AND GOLD that Pandora brought me, as if by the hand. “His version of things is in its own way as comprehensive as Lestat’s,” I could almost hear her telling me. In first-person terms, it is even more so because Marius is far older. In Lestat’s own accounts it is also Marius who provides much of the older history. Marius tells his own tale including how he first encountered They Who Must Be Kept so long ago and spent many centuries protecting those parents and originals of all vampires in Anne’s mythos.
I’ve so much enjoyed my reunion with Marius, whose account of his own existence forms a kind of common spine of all the CHRONICLES, much as Lestat’s do—and yet in this case from Marius’s own fantastic perspective.
One remarkable thing about Marius story is his brilliant account of the Renaissance, when he lived in Venice as a painter and discovered Amadeo—someone we know later as Armand—whom he liberates from enslavement, where he would have been sold to a brothel. Let me not provide too many SPOILERS to the delicious intricacies of the plot for the uninitiated… however I especially enjoy how the vampiric Marius clearly delights in providing the beautiful red-haired youth Amadeo with erotic pleasures in his own ways. I am moved and touched all over again as Marius bestows the Dark Gift upon Amadeo to save his life. Their involvement with the lovely Bianca is also likewise delicious and totally plausible, and something of a triad.
Towards the end of the novel, Marius himself became a bit long-winded and repetitive, even fussy, for which I would blame Marius de Romanus himself, not Anne! She writes when a story “comes to me like a swarm of bees surrounding my head,” she says, and I’ve also heard her say that at one point she had not intended to write another, but Lestat began to whisper in her ear. Like any great storyteller, her imagination is so strong that the characters come alive, and even take on a life and a distinct voice of their own!
I'm always astounded at the sensory details Anne invokes, the richness of settings and atmosphere and the depth of interaction among the characters, the total immersion in place, times, characters that this she achieves every time!
Now that I’ve finished this remarkable journey again, Marius directs to his fledgling  Amadeo, AKA Armand. I also recall that for me, THE VAMPIRE ARMAND was the most erotic of these novels, as it became even more clear that though Marius did not make love to Armand as a mortal would, he definitely pleasured the young man! Plus I recall that Armand provides his own rich and unique perspectives on everything in these realms.
Oh, what a cunning web Ms. Rice weaves!
Onward…

Friday, November 9, 2012

A Dogma-free Yeshua for Today!



Anne Rice accomplishes something quite audacious, and yet respectful to existing sources, with her two novels concerning the Life of Christ. The second, The Road to Cana, is again a first-person narrative told by Yeshua himself, and this time he's past thirty, on the verge of somewhat reluctantly entering his ministry. His voice seems to me to be his own, not Anne's! Authorial craft, I suppose? In the first book, Out of Egypt, he is a boy whose family living in exile in Alexandria returns to Nazareth upon the news that Herod the Great has died.

We know we're not in Oz as this one begins when the mature Yeshua has apparently had a wet dream about a beautiful woman in his village, wakes up a bit wet and messy and washes his robe. Though none of the specifics are really Biblical up until the marriage at Cana at the end, except for the baptism in the Jordan and a few other moments, every event, every detail and description seems plausible to me. The historical context and background are immaculate. I especially love in these books, the mention of a place on a hillside where Jesus likes to go to simply be alone in Nature.

As with the first of the two books, there are no cheesy miracles, no preaching, no blatant Christian dogma presented, though this is a traditional view that the gospels are quite accurate. Though Anne Rice does not feel quite the same on the subject now, she has not abandoned these novels, any more than she totally rejected her other supernatural creations during her venture back in the arms of Mother Church. Recently she has expressed interest in the film version of Out of Egypt. When these books came out, I remember emailing Anne and telling her that I though they contained some of her finest writing. I still feel that way.

In retrospect, Yeshua is of course, another sort of supernatural, possibly immortal being. She brings him to life in a way I've never experienced before. And yet this always happens with her characters, whether with Louis and Claudia  and Lestat in the Vampire Chronicles, or Mona and Quinn in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches as they merged with the Vampires, or dashing young Reuben of the new Man Wolf series.

Anne always provides moments that raise every hair on my body--SPOILER ALERT, I SUPPOSE--and in this case it involves Yeshua's awareness that there are two kinds so prayer for him--a rote thing learned, and a direct connection when he feels one with his heavenly Father--and he makes a command. In this case, there has been a long drought in Israel and it has to do with a sudden storm, only it's about far more than bringing rainfall…

Got me, Anne, as you always do!

THis woman's writing continues to evolve. In many ways, for example Blood Canticle was the finest wine of all the Vampire and Witch books that intertwined in the last two volumes. An actively practicing artist often only improves with age, and this is certainly the case with Anne Rice. She keeps opening another treasure-chest of literary delight for her fans, time-after-time.

It may seem unlikely, however I'd still love to see the third Christ book, which I believe was referred to as The Kingdom of Heaven. You never know…


Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Passionate, Exquisite Prose for Our Times



Like many of Anne Rice's long-time readers, when I first learned that she had returned to the church, I did not know what to think of it. When her first novel about the life of Christ, CHRIST THE LORD: OUT OF EGYPT was published in 2005, I was probably feeling withdrawal from the regular appearance of Anne's novels, which I had been reading regularly since 1976.

So I have an exquisite hardcover First Edition of this book, which was delivered to me on its publication date, because I paid for Second Day shipping. Though stores cannot put a book out legally before the lay-down date, mail-order book sellers can send books ahead that will ship a couple of days early.

What amazes me about Anne's Christ novels is first, the sheer audacity of depicting the Life of Christ in first-person narrations. Something else amazing here is that the novel is free of dogma, cheesy miracles, or silly special-effects. And though Anne did major amounts of research for authenticity, near the very beginning is an allusion to one of the non-canonical "Childhood Miracle" Gospels of Jesus. Let me not SPOIL any surprises, but this vivid reference near the very beginning of the book refers to clay birds.

I suppose I should post a POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT for anyone who might wish to go into the novel with no idea of things to come. Two remarkably powerful things for me were Anne's description of the animal sacrifices at the Great Temple, a virtual mist of blood, and young Jesus's reaction when he hears the story of King Herod and the male children under age 2 years. This is one of those gripping moments that Anne offers in every book, usually quite a number of them, that really grabs you.

For years I've felt that Anne's publishers honor the class, quality and elegance of her writings with the hardcover First Editions that have deckled edges, gorgeous fonts, classical art on the covers, and sometimes gold. It's the treasure chest of the stories and the language within those lovely covers, however, that really matters. Anne writes in what seems to me a white-hot inferno of activated imagination, in which as she SEES the story, it flows through her fingertips through the keyboard into the novel.

Some people complain about the simplicity of the words in this narrative, as if not recalling that Jesus at the time he tells this story is 7 or 8 years of age. His voice is that of a boy that age, who is also aware that he may be something more than an ordinary boy.

In this book and the followup three years later, Jesus was brought to life as a human person, also divine, as never before for me. I've read the New Testament and the Old, and what I love about this novel of Anne's is that it is not propaganda for a religion. It is the story of a boy talking about his life some two millennia in the past.

Anne has moved on in her personal life, and as I always said to my friends, she's highly intelligent, a good person, and she did not lose her marbles when she went back to the Catholic church. However I'm proud of her because she keeps moving.

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Enter the Portal and Be Seduced All Over Again… A review of PANDORA by Anne Rice




When the astonishing, elegant, and relentless Anne Rice published THE WOLF GIFT earlier this year, I was transported, as always by her remarkable prose. The new Man Wolf Saga (she tells us the next one comes in 2013) whetted my appetite to return to her magnificent Vampires.
Only where to enter?
PANDORA has become my new entry point. She appears first in THE VAMPIRE LESTAT and QUEEN OF THE DAMNED, as a sometime-companion of Marius, a somewhat sad, unhappy character, though she always intrigued me. In her own story, which she narrates, the novel PANDORA begins as David Talbot (post-BODY THIEF) persuades her to write in a couple of beautiful notebooks. I will try not to give major spoilers, but be forewarned, if you want to go into her story with no idea of its riches. (SPOILER WARNINGS: SORT OF!) Pandora’s words sweep me back two millennia to the Rome of Augustus, an era that comes totally alive. Her first meeting with Marius when she is a prominent Roman’s young daughter and he a tall, handsome “barbarian” dazzles me all over with premonitions.
Originally called Lydia, she narrates this vivid and totally plausible history, both personal and broader. When she purchases a handsome one-legged slave named Flavius, we are enriched with the kind of utterly believable and quirky character Anne frequently creates. Flavius prefers boys, yet Pandora clearly loves and wants him as a lover. Eventually Pandora persuades her first crush, Marius, to give her the Dark Gift, though she soon comes to regret it. They become a perennial couple, in some ways like Louis and Lestat—unable to live together, or to totally disconnect emotionally.
Towards the end of this marvel of characters and scenes, again the Rice magick unfolds a strange and lovely vignette that involves an elderly monk, beehives and a sort of scarecrow—unlike anything a lesser imagination could invoke. It blows me away! The book is profoundly about the need for companionship and how difficult our human nature can make that to sustain.
Now I know I can trust these characters to call to me, and I need not think about where to go. Of course, Marius wants his say, so from here it’s to BLOOD AND GOLD, for his side of things. Plus I already see that his beloved from the Renaissance, Armand, will probably want my attention next. Ah! Amazing how these beings truly live, and yet they are undead!
Bravo all over again, Anne Rice, and much gratitude and love for the riches you gift us with in your tales.

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

WORKSHOP: "Egyptian SOUL"



Dear Friends and Loved Ones:

Some of my local friends don't see me very often since I stopped my little retail day-job, and I'm sort of a hermit writing and painting at home, here in Paradise Garden--so if you've missed me at all (and I KNOW I've missed many of YOU!), here's a chance for us to spend some quality time together. Also please forward this to anyone you know who might be interested...

Imagine immersion in the powerful mythology and imagery of Ancient Egypt, and allowing this to perform a kind of Soul Retrieval for you!

The workshop I offer on SUNDAY, AUGUST 19th, 2012 from 1:00-4:30 PM at ANCIENT MYSTERIES in Austin can awaken what already exists within you--the potent heritage of those ancient people that remained so closely connected with Nature and their environment. Nothing could be more timely in today's rapidly changing world than to make such a connection within yourself!

If you have ever felt drawn to explore Egyptian culture and beliefs, here's your chance to take it to the next level. A beautiful altar will present the Great Family of the Egyptian Goddesses and Gods!

During the workshop you may:

1.) Discover the Seven Sacred Spirits of Your Soul
2.) Reconnect your human nature with Nature itself
3.) Learn the intuitive key to all Egyptian writing and art
4.) Be able to "read" Egyptian culture without further study
5.) Remember who you are on the deepest levels
6.) Allow your Third Eye to open
7.) Connect with Ancestors

You will hear powerful mythic stories and fascinating history, receive a substantial packet of original handouts containing the basic keys to all Egyptian culture, taste Egyptian treats, hear ancient Egyptian music, and the wings of your Ba (the Heart-Bird of your Soul) will spread wide and soar aloft!!! You will return there--then come back to Now!

For more information on “Reclaiming Your Ancient Egyptian SOUL” please visit:http://www.9realities.com/egyptian_soul_workshop.html

Thank you for reading this!

Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
http://www.9realities.com/homepagebooks.html
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
       -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)





Tuesday, July 24, 2012

MY Disclosure: Addendum



Dear Friends and Loved Ones:
Among the major opportunities for our evolution as a species that emerge from the current level of awareness we have of the UFO phenomenon, is definitely the chance to de-weaponize our emergence into space as a more mature and less fearful species.
There are plenty of other exciting implications as well, however. Among these is a graceful exit from the toxic fossil fuel paradigm, which continues to endanger our beautiful and beloved Mother Planet. The evil concepts of “endless war” and massive use of questionable energy sources such as oil and radioactive materials within this exquisite bubble of Life we call the biosphere, are both simply outmoded and unsustainable.
From those highly advanced beings—Adamski called them Space Brothers and Carol Rosin and more up-to-date experts tend to call them Cosmos Cultures—we have derived radical new technologies that provide virtually free, limitless and totally non-polluting energy and modes of transportation. Unfortunately, the so-called “powers that be” resist this tooth and nail, kicking and screaming, “Unreal! Not true! Deluded fantasy!” and other falsehoods.
Well, we the People of the Planet now know better. We’re not stupid, clueless, uninformed, or fearful. Those who promote and protect the “blinders-on” attitude of “business as usual” live in the dead paradigm of the Old Earth where evolution is misunderstood as based on competition and survival of the strongest and most ruthless. The media still broadcasts mostly from that dead paradigm of fear and loathing.
Everything is now changing faster and faster! More and more of us realize we already live on the New Earth. Evolution is driven largely by co-operation and yes, “The meek shall inherit the Earth!” This exciting scenario for the future following Dec. 21st, 2012 will possibly involve wide deployment of those advanced technologies that derive energy directly from the “Zero Point Field” and propulsion via antigravity reaction with the mass of the Earth + the transformation of swords into ploughshares.
Yes! Let’s exchange the outmoded, unsustainable Corporate Masters of War mentality that has taken control of all major governments, for a Global Space Program for the benefit of everyone, everywhere. All people of the planet can thus provide for themselves well, starvation can end, and the 500 million orphans find homes. To inherit the stars will relieve population and environmental pressures here on Earth.
All of this and the restoration of the biosphere to a Garden of Paradise can be accomplished basically by the simple re-deployment of all of our major priorities from territorial fear and loathing and a focus on belief in limits and limitations to Love and the awareness that there really are no limits. Nada! Zero!
It’s time for We the People of the Planet to demand accountability from our pathetic governing bodies. Many major governments such as Italy and the UK have released many of their classified UFO files and admitted the truth of this great mystery. So far, the USA is particularly stubborn and resists. The corporate hegemony of war-mongers that now dominates our government has a lot to lose.
We, the People of the Planet have a fantastic future of peace and abundance to gain!
Let us demand what is ours: the truth and full disclosure of everything.
Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
Some excellent resources:

_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
       -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)



Sunday, July 22, 2012

MY Disclosure, Part 3 of 3


Dear Friends and Loved Ones:
Fortunately those of us who have opened our minds and looked at the evidence and figured out what is really going on are far from alone.
On May 9th of 2001 at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, “The Disclosure Project” brought forward the testimony of numerous former high ranking officials including air traffic controllers, ex secret op. officers, commercial pilots, numerous military defense specialists with top secret clearance, people who had access to very sensitive documents, ex commanders in the US Air Force and astronauts. Carol Rosin also testified. Every person who spoke offered to testify under oath before Congress and the Senate about the information they provided. It’s really worth taking the time to watch this:
Among the startling conclusions that emerge from all this is that all the evidence indicates the Cosmos Cultures are not only benign towards humanity, they are far more evolved and technologically advanced, and for the most part bipedal humanoids.  This last bit of information suggests that as scientists have speculated, the emergence of DNA and its evolutionary potentials may be literally quite universal. Perhaps the very structure of atomic matter and molecules tends to lead so similar or parallel evolutions everywhere.
To be totally honest, this is one reason for my early skepticism about Adamski. The folks he met and eventually went traveling with in his second book INSIDE THE SPACESHIPS were quite human in appearance. As an imaginative kid, I might have appreciated tentacles or giant insect more! Only now I also re-evaluate Adamski. In his last few years he may have gone off the deep end and tried to top himself, however I now suspect his early accounts and photos are quite authentic. I feel that despite his limited understanding, he was sincere and had some actual experiences.
Regardless, the recent evidence also indicates that UFOs have appeared over nuclear missile installations and switched off up to ten nuclear weapons at a time! We cannot count on intervention to save us from ourselves, however the intent of such action is obvious. They would like us to make it by evolving!
Another amazing thing emerged from the full account of the Stephenville Sightings, in which the Freedom of Information Act was used to obtain radar evidence from the Air Force. Analysis of this evidence provided physical proof, not only of the reported jets in the area, but a gigantic spaceship of unknown origin.
These things are no longer possibilities—they are facts.
Plus this is coming to a head along with so much else in this remarkable year of 2012. I’m not sure it really has anything to do with Mayan prophecies, however we are reaching a point of critical mass. We might as well make the evolutionary leap required to transform ourselves and return the planet to a Garden of Paradise, its true nature.
Please go to Carol Rosin’s site, look around, and consider making a contribution. In my latest communications with her, she makes it plain that this is the priority now; she’s ready to begin her journey to contact enough world leaders to make her Space Treaty international law. Just nine world leaders need to sign it for this to become a global treaty. It will allow the human race to transform our deadly military forces into unarmed space programs that can benefit everyone on Earth.
Carol has now created a new, concise site that sums up her message, so please watch her latest brief video here:  http://www.peace-treaty.com/
Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
       -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)

Saturday, July 21, 2012

MY Disclosure, Part 2 of 3



Dear Friends and Loved Ones:
In the first part of this essay, I described my own UFO sightings over a period of some forty years, and the fact that I met Carol Rosin at the “2012 Women’s UFO Symposium in Glen Rose, Texas. Carol’s keynote speech, “A Call to Action: Ban Weapons in Space,” moved me profoundly. During the weekend many other speakers also testified to their experiences.
The presentations included a panel on the famous “Stephenville Sightings” that occurred not far from the symposium site. A variety of people and their presentations convinced me, both via intuition and reason that much of what we were seeing and hearing about is absolutely, actually happening! I’m not gullible, or easily fooled. My conclusion is that a closed mind, or denial is far more irrational than what the whole thing added up to.
Here’s the general story as I’ve put it together. Clearly what we call UFOs have been appearing in the skies of this planet for millennia, at the very least. It seems that what serious UFO students call “Cosmic Cultures” have been visiting Earth for a long, long time. However the pattern radically changed around the time we first bounced radar signals off the Moon and soon after tested the first atomic weapons. Obviously in 1947 a spaceship crashed near Roswell, New Mexico, as the Air Force reported, and then switched its story the following day.
Fortunately for seekers of truth, a massive trail of evidence indicates that not only were alien bodies retrieved, at least one or two living aliens, as well. Whatever the rationale, the US government and others around the world have hastened to deny the truth of this and other crashes and multiple sightings, as well as credible witnesses who testify to contact.
Of course not every account or photo is credible, in fact quite a few definitely are not. Still, there is a solid core of sober, responsible people, like those at the symposium, who probably have more to lose than to gain by their open and honest testimony. Unfortunately the US government is the most recalcitrant, and yet the reason is clear. From the crash debris and living aliens, it seems that extremely advanced technology has been “reverse-engineered.”
This includes how to tap “Zero Point Energy” which would provide free energy to everyone, plus totally non-polluting propulsion systems that seem to be based on what we would call anti-gravity. As sci-fi as this sounds, there is plenty of evidence that this is being withheld to perpetuate the fossil fuel industry and the War Machine of the military industrial complex. Those advanced technologies would end the corporate hegemony that has taken control of all major Earth governments and endangers the planet’s survival.
Corporate governments no longer represent the interests of citizens—rather, they view people, along with everything else, as resources to be exploited.
Likewise it’s clear that, though some folks are terrified by their contact experiences, what is often called an “abduction” is most likely the reaction of someone unprepared to accept any such reality. The real aliens seem to be wise and advanced, often largely telepathic, and capable of much that seems “indistinguishable from magic” to our primate brains. In fact, there is no serious evidence of evil, hostile aliens, though there may be some varieties that are not so sympathetic to us as what Adamski called the “Space Brothers.”
It seems that much of what humans traditionally described as heavenly gods, angels, elves, fairies and so on, were of what we now call Cosmic Cultures.
Further, even more startling and inspiring conclusions in the next installment!
Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
       -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)



Friday, July 20, 2012

MY Disclosure, Part 1 of 3


Dear Friends and Loved Ones:
I’m fearlessly coming out of the UFO closet here because I feel it is necessary and timely, as the rate of change we experience now goes exponential!
As a boy living in Bangkok, Thailand, during the mid 1960s I recall reading a book called FLYING SAUCERS HAVE LANDED, in which a man named George Adamski told of his many sightings of spaceships. He even claimed that he had met a man from outer space who emerged from a landed saucer in the California desert. The book included saucer photos he took, which were amazingly clear and close-up. I was not sure I believed the account or that the photos were authentic, but I kept an open mind.
Not many years later, when I lived in Berkeley, California, I joined my older brother on the upstairs back porch of our house late one afternoon. We gazed out over San Francisco Bay towards the Golden Gate Bridge. I’d been there less than a minute when something far to our left caught my eye moving in the sky. I pointed and just said, “Look!”
We both saw six (or he thought maybe seven) silvery saucers in a V formation cross from above Palo Alto to over Mount Tamalpais in a matter of two or three seconds at the most. The formation stacked itself in a vertical line; the top saucer moved up, and then all of them disappeared in the blink of an eye. The next evening we went over to the City and the Avalon Ballroom for a Jefferson Airplane concert.
Paul Kantner announced that the first song was a new one he had just written called, “Have You Seen the Saucers?” My brother and I exchanged significant glances…
Quite a few years later, while living in Estes Park, Colorado, with three friends I drove up into Rocky Mountain National Park to hear the elk bugling. Before it was fully dark, across a gentle open slope we spied some lights adrift above the treetops. No copter or plane, clearly, for as they moved, the lights changed colors, appeared and disappeared. Whatever carried the lights seemed to morph and shape-shift.
We actually drove much closer and watched this “object” from maybe only a hundred yards or less. It continued to silently self-transform for maybe ten or fifteen minutes before it drifted from sight behind the trees…
Far more recently, just a few years ago driving home from work in Wimberley, as I crossed the Blanco River Bridge I spied a white light moving horizontally through a major thundercloud. Amid flashes of dramatic lighting, the white light reached a thin spot in the cloud and briefly revealed itself as a silvery saucer shape before it returned into the cloud as a white lozenge moving in a straight line…
I cannot claim these were spaceships. They were UFOs, precisely what the acronym means. A mystery, yet I know what I saw. Rather than fear, I felt elated at their beauty and I sensed that in some sense, rather than solid devices, these were living things or even beings. Or possibly machines so advanced they are almost alive? Who knows?
Not until this year when Tomàs and I attended the “2012 Women’s UFO Symposium” in Glen Rose, Texas, did it all finally begin to make a lot more sense.
The keynote speaker was a remarkable woman named Carol Rosin, with whom I immediately felt a connection. Here is a brief statement by Carol:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuHyRyDRKhE&feature=player_embedded
In the next part of this I’ll put together what I sincerely feel is going on.
Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
       -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)



Thursday, July 19, 2012

Invitation to Co-Create…



…Planetary Peace with Carol Rosin!

Dear Friends and Loved Ones:
I’m beginning a special series of newsletters and blogs titled “MY Disclosure” in which I come out of the UFO closet in a big way. Not that I’m a major witness, or contactee, though these kinds of experiences have now become amazingly common. Surely there are now millions on Earth who have seen UFOs and many who have had some kind of contact.
MY disclosures are not so remarkable, actually, not compared with many far more dramatic accounts I’ve come to feel are authentic. My reason for the title is to echo the actual “Disclosure Project” of 2001 when numerous credentialed, responsible, dignified individuals stepped forward to testify to what they had experienced, to what they know about UFOs, crashed spaceships, and alien contact.
This is no longer the province of speculation. The evidence is too massive now, to be denied or ignored. Such avoidance now seems irresponsible, when the matter of UFOs has become entwined with the immediate future and the survival of our species and planet.
Most likely Gaia would persist without us—however, at this point we cannot survive without Gaia, and without making peace with Nature and our own nature.
My new friend Carol Rosin has put it all together brilliantly, since she met Werner von Braun in the 1970s and he predicted precisely what is happening now. He gave her a mandate to prevent the weaponization of outer space, which he saw coming. It is now almost upon us, unless we, the Children of Gaia, object and choose otherwise.
She proposes a Space Treaty that makes it possible to transform our armed military machines on Earth into unarmed space programs. Right now she’s preparing to undertake her journey to present “The Outer Space Security & Development Treaty” to various world leaders.
Please check our Carol’s site: http://peaceinspace.com/ and don’t forget to visit her DONATE button.
Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
       -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)



Sunday, July 15, 2012

Memories of the Future



Dear Friends and Loved Ones:
The wonderful woman called our “planetary midwife,” Barbara Marx Hubbard, has noted that another way to look at the crisis that Planet Earth faces due to human behavior is to view this as the birth of a new humanity. It’s an evolutionary leap, a renewal into a new level of collective species maturity. Or perhaps as the great sci-fi visionary Arthur C. Clarke put it, “Childhood’s End.”
Exciting stuff, compared with the gloomsday doom-drums of the mainstream media—only remember, that the corporate propaganda machine broadcasts from a dead paradigm, from the Old Earth that is already over. As Yoko Ono and John Lennon often said, “War is over, if you want it.” Well, our species is pretty much fed up with the dangerous place our so-called leaders have brought us to.
We’re over it! And a major part of this is accepting full responsibility for your own reality as its co-creator. No, it’s presumptuous to say you literally “create your own reality,” as we all participate in a grand Universe of which everyone and everything is part. Moving from ego-to-essence, we “REAL” eyes and envision a New Earth.
Not too many years ago, Tom and I were in Berkeley where I revisited the famous “People’s Park.” There a slogan was painted: “OPEN UP YOUR REAL EYES AND REALIZE THE REAL LIES.” Indeed, we’re no longer fooled into thinking that politicians or anyone else can save us. We all must take our own initiative.
Precisely the same is true on the individual, spiritual level. In order to enter the New Reality, you may wish to retrieve ancient aspects of yourself that worked well long ago, even thousands of years ago. For example, this August 19th, from 1-4:30 PM at “Ancient Mysteries” in Austin Texas I offer a workshop “Reclaiming Your Ancient Egyptian SOUL.”
To fruitfully move forward, we need to know where we came from. The Egyptians of long ago never lost touch with the sacredness of everything, the Divine in all things, the total holiness of Nature and the environment. They knew that life and death are not opposites, rather aspects of a whole mystery of the Living Universe.
I invite you to join me and other wise seekers for several hours of eye-opening wonder, fun, enlightenment, mystery and beauty. For details and how to participate, please see: http://www.9realities.com/egyptian_soul_workshop.html
Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
      -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)


Friday, June 15, 2012

Unfathomable Mystery (a photographic poem)

Feel the mysterious power


from invisible depths to invisible heights


that makes from nothing this visible flower


and touches your own stardust in the process


it cannot be known and yet it can be seen


as this handsome Lord of Fragrances emerges


from measureless green…


Peace,
Bruce

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Approaching Perfection…?



I’ve come outside the house sometime after 4:00 AM to admire the Full Moon. I listen to the chattering, clattering choruses of the katydids sprinkled all through the woodlands around the garden, the hills and the canyons and the ravine below. That wonderful echoing, reverberating sound speaks to something deep in my cells.
I stand on the rock pathway that meanders through the middle of the yard, and I pause before the Moonflower Gate. I can see that from the Ravine Bench, the lunar disk will be obscured by foliage, so from the path I admire what now appears to be a perfect disk of bleached bone-white. Yet somehow I have enough clarity (perhaps from my inner cleaning?) to SEE that it’s not quite perfectly round… not quite yet!
Of course, “perfection” as such is really only an idea, a human concept. You can make a case for the fact that in Nature there’s no such thing, except perhaps the wonderful Japanese esthetic of “perfect imperfection.” Maybe that’s closer to reality anyway! Well, there’s also the fact that on a high level of awareness, everyone and everything is already perfect exactly as IS.
Now on the meandering path beneath the almost-Full Moon, I recall that in astronomical terms the Full phase is immanent but not-quite-here. After I moon bathe for a spell, back inside I confirm that it will occur at 6:12 AM according to NASA.
Speaking of approaching perfection and taking your time to get there, I suspect that many of you recall a marvelous, powerful book called BE HERE NOW by Ram Dass. It came at the end of the 1960s and set many of us on the long and winding road to embrace THE POWER OF NOW by Ekhart Tolle a lot more recently.
After all these years—about 40 years in fact!—Ram Dass has a new, even greater gift that approaches closer to perfection: BE LOVE NOW: THE PATH OF THE HEART. This may be the best book I’ve ever read, bar none! Seriously and joyously. At least for me, personally, this seems the most important book I could possibly read as we accelerate into the Star+Gate of 2012.
Highly recommended.
To BE LOVE NOW is always the best thing you can do!
It’s as close to perfection as anyone needs to be.

Thursday, May 17, 2012

The Stardust Tarot?



Dear Friends & Loved Ones:

I often get up quietly sometime between midnight and dawn and come downstairs to start my first cup of green tea and read for a while before I boot up the iMac. Something curious that I’ve noticed is the fact that in the bathroom where I often read it seems that the light takes a while to become bright enough to read by. It’s an incandescent bulb at present, though we’re trying out some LEDs now—however I’m quite sure the bulb itself does not get measurably brighter after the first few moments.

What it SEEMS like, which is not good physics, is that the photons that pour out of the bulb take a while to fill up the room and accumulate, something like the water level rising in a container until it’s full. Of course, this is nonsense from a scientific viewpoint, and yet I trust my own experience more than I trust physics OR metaphysics for that matter!

While I don’t insist on my explanation, I know from experience that it takes a few minutes for the room to fill up with enough photons so that I can comfortably read! You might imagine that my eyes are adjusting—and maybe that’s part of it. Who knows?

Anyway, I’m always learning and I try to always keep an open mind. For example, I’ve recently realized that I did a poor job of naming my new workshop coming up on SUNDAY, MAY 27TH AT HEART OF TEXAS YOGA, IN CHARMING WIMBERLEY FROM 1:30-4 PM. Should have been called THE STARDUST TAROT! Seems many folks are intimidated or confused by the fancy name I.N.T. (Interstellar NeuroGenetic Tarot) and think it must be difficult, hard to understand, or just plain strange.

NOT! Actually it’s about the fact that we’re all made of 90% stardust and this fact alone can help you to comprehend yourself and your place in the Universe better. I’ve prepared for this workshop for about 45 years now. Plus the beautiful STARDUST TAROT I created for it is not even a deck of cards; it’s more like a fascinating, full-color PERIODIC TABLE OF EVOLUTION… a key to the Game of Life that we all play.

There I go again. Big words? Not really. Look in the mirror, please; trust your own inner wisdom. I’d love to have more folks sign up for the workshop in the next week. (Don’t worry, Bev, I’ll be there come heck or high water!) The workshop will happen no matter what and we’ll have a grand time.

WHAT WILL YOU GET OUT OF THE WORKSHOP? Mind-tingling fun—a deeper sense of belonging in this Universe and on this planet, connection with all your Ancestors and Descendants, and a clearer idea of what is REALLY going on aboard Spaceship Earth. Probably major new insights into the nature of existence? + 2 11X17 full-color posters of the gorgeous and fascinating STARDUST TAROT that I’ve spent 45 years creating. A lengthy scroll that explains everything in existence according to the Octave-Wave structure of our spacetime realities.

Check it out, Okay? Here: http://www.9realities.com/int_workshop.html

If the spirit moves you, let me know and sign up! It’s not too late.

I love all you beautiful Stardust Children!!!

Peace & (((HUGS)))
Bruce
http://www.9realities.com/homepagebooks.html
_________________________
Nada Te Turbe*
      -- Theresa of Avila
*(Let Nothing Disturb You)



Friday, May 11, 2012

Truth from Within!



Tomás and I walked around these hills where we live this morning after a night of deluge—blessed rainfall of 2-3/10ths inches! The stream in the ravine still runs vigorously, the waterfalls roar wonderfully! Paradise Garden has never looked greener or more lush. All sorts of things bloom now—plus my new Egyptian Blue Lotus, which has put out its 3rd leaf will likely a blossom soon.
At any rate, as we walked the sun came in and out from passing clouds, birds chirped, and a gorgeous day unfolded around us.
We talked about my friend Nils Taranger, and his upcoming feature film, A Blue Flower, which depicts his amazing personal odyssey of self-acceptance and expanding conscious awareness, and also offers deeper universal wisdom for anyone who watches it.
“I like the fact that Nils learns things from many sources,” I said “but he seems to primarily trust his own experience. He continues to ground himself in his own experience, his life, his body, and he tests what he perceives in the world around him against the reflection of what’s within him.”
“That’s where it all comes from,” Tomás said. “The truth, I mean. It comes from within you. Not out there.” He gestured broadly and smiled, as we paused to catch our breath on an extremely steep bit of the road, as vertical as it is horizontal, and we enjoyed the splendid view.
“That’s what makes a story true,” I said. “whether it’s fiction or not. When a writer is truly inspired, just following imagination, not thinking but recording it as fast as you can write. Anne Rice writes like that, ‘white hot inspiration,’ I think she’s called it. In that sense her stories are true.”
“You can feel the essential truth, even if it’s not literally true. Not the surface details, so much as the core of it is true.”
“Anne’s latest, The Wolf Gift, is as good as anything she ever wrote for that reason. It’s totally inspired. It’s so vivid, it’s already like a movie.”
“Your stories are the same, Bruce.*”
“Well, I don’t compare myself with her. But it’s true that I don’t think about my stories until final revisions, I just follow the imaginative flow of inspiration.”
Tomás grinned. “Like you always say, ‘Human beings are just animals that tell themselves stories.’ ”
“Yeah, that could be the only thing that distinguishes us from other animals. It’s a two-edged sword, of course. Sometimes wonderful, other times it’s limiting. Stories are Real Magick!”

*Attached is a photo of the recently completed painting I did as cover art for my 3rd novel, Moontusk: The Return of Othis, due from Lethe Press later this year.

See also Nils's site: http://www.ablueflower.com/