Going

to Nicaragua early next month to take part in an international poetry festival. I can't wait to experience South America again. Went to the Prometo festival in Columbia 1996 and it was the best week of my life:)

More later, got so much to do before i leave. Want to print some books so that i will have something to share.

Join the virtual march for peace

This Saturday, hundreds of thousands of Americans will march on Washington DC to demand peace and justice in Iraq and the Middle East. The global partnership Avaaz is working to raise a worldwide voice of solidarity through an international virtual march. Time is short, so add your voice and join the march today!

http://www.avaaz.org/en/global_peace_march/act.php

Avaaz supporters in Washington have offered to carry real banners and placards at the US demonstration—showing how many internet marchers from all round the world are joining in. We will carry the flag of each country that generates more than 500 internet marchers, so tell your friends!

As American opposition to this war mounts, Avaaz has mobilized over 45,000 people from over 100 countries to join the call to oppose Bush's military escalation and demand a real plan to end this war.

Can we get 75,000—even 100,000 people from round the world to join the march before Saturday?

Click here to join the march:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/global_peace_march/act.php

This could signal the rebirth of the US peace movement. We need to show them the world is on their side. Let's bring our call for peace to the streets of power in Washington. Join the global peace march and tell your friends today!

Sincerely,

–Eli Pariser
MoveOn.org Political Action
January 24th, 2006

"God has no religion."

Gandhi's famous quote. It is so true and indeed we need to remember this now more than ever.

We as humanity are sailing into new era. Times are changing and we are too. We need to take personal repsonisbility for our inner landscape and build tolerance and compassion towards ourself and others. The earth is sinking below the oceans surface because of our conquest over nature. It is really time to stop and think what we can do as individuals to stop this destruction or it will destruct so many fellow humans on this planet.

HaPpY New YEar 2007

Thank you for sharing the past with me
The future is in our hands
Let us make it into something beautiful
Let us move beyond fear

Got this in the mail this morning like I do everyday from my friend Judi titled Daily dose

If we think and act along these lines there is nothing to worry about in the future but each of us has to take responsibility for the internal world, and that will without doubt be reflected in the external world.

with oceans of joy as always
Birgitta

"Always remember that the Great Mystery is good; evil can come only from
ourselves!"

--Grandmother of Charles Eastman. SANTEE SIOUX

The Great Mystery is love, good and principle. He is a guiding Father. He
doesn't play games. He knows only how to love. Sometimes, when things go
wrong, we blame Him or others. Usually, if we are honest, we can see how
decisions or things done in the past put us in a position to be hurt. It
comes back to us. When this happens, it is not something the Creator caused,
but something we, ourselves caused. Most of our problems are of our own
making. When this happens, we should correct what we've done, ask the Great
Spirit for forgiveness and pray for guidance in the future.

My Creator, bless me with Your good.

*<<<=-=>>>*<<<=-=>>>*<<<=-=>>>*<<<=-=>>>*

'THINK on THESE THINGS'
By Joyce Sequichie Hifler

Henry David Thoreau, whose cry was "Simplify! Simplify!" went to great
measures to prove to himself, and perhaps to society, that life could be
lived in the most simple manner and at the least expense. With only a few
dollars he managed to provide for himself the things of absolute necessity
for quite a long period of time.

Not many of us would care to exist on the absolute necessities. We have
become too much accustomed to easier living. Things that were once thought
of as luxuries are now considered necessities. And yet, with all of this,
life is anything but simple. We seem to have the ability to complicate the
best laid plans and find ourselves shadow boxing.

Like many of the trite old adages, "Life is what we make it," is so true. By
our own minds we accept or reject, by ignoring or by searching out the
causes of shadows and removing the cause. It is whatever we elect to do
about our individual lives that makes the difference. But we shall make
great strides when we recognize the supreme excellence in all things of
simplicity.

We don't need to worry about doing without the necessary things in life - if
we have a grateful heart. A grateful heart is not just remembering to write
a few words to someone who has done a kindness, or saying thank you
graciously and at the right moment. A grateful heart is the feeling of great
blessings which precedes that thank you note and that verbal expression.

A grateful heart is one that always knows the fullness of that rich feeling
of first being grateful without cause. And then, all other gratitude and its
expression comes naturally.

Perhaps true gratitude is a grateful though toward heaven that I should be
chosen to fill this spot, do this work, and have been given the strength to
do it.

It was Romaine, the English theologian, who said, "Gratitude to God makes
even a temporal blessing a taste of heaven." We can have so much more heaven
with a grateful heart.

In this winters nest

I rest. Yet I am eager to burst out of the dark days
into warm sun. Working yet again on Conversations with Ghosts. I am shocked to see what I missed during the last round of editing. I believe poetry and every creation for that matter should rest in a deep dark drawer and be pulled out when the vison is sharp and brutally unsentimental. The knifes of literature are becoming way to dull.

Happy brightmas and a peaceful new year

Imagine that you are always at the right place at the right time
Imagine that you can extract the best possible outcome from each living moment
Imagine that you do your best at any given moment
now go ahead and do it

here is a poem i wrote this morning for you all = i wish for peace = within + around, it starts within ... where it goes i do not know:) to you i hope
=========

Twirling and twisting
through velvet smooth space

evening star
rises from the nebula

sings with an invisible voice of hope
in my heart
in my heart

floating at the edge of the ozone
she is smiling from the deep
a faint smile

is it real
or a dream

hands touch beyond
eyes weave stories
of the untold

of a humankind
beyond …

imagine
imagine

Yesterday

my six year old son Delphin learned a lesson on his own that most of us adults can't figure out all our lives. He is rebelling a bit a school and did try to flush down the toilet the rules from the mess hall. I being a chronic co-dependent took it quite personally i am not raising him right, i am not good enough mother, blah blah blah and was very annoyed at him when i heard of this. On the way back home i had to go to the post office and i decided to let him stay in the car to think why he would be doing things like that. He has been doing a lot of things that are not making him very popular. I ended up staying a longer at the post office than i had intended because of a massive line of people. When i came back, he said: "I know why i behave this way, i need to control everything, but i am not going to do it anymore, i am just going to let god control me." That is he surrendered to higher power. I am not much of a god person in the christian sense of god. Being a heathen and a buddhist. Yet i am a 12 step person and this does sound a lot like the lesson learned in the first 3 steps. I don't talk much about that sort of stuff to him, only that god is within us and everything around us. that is a part of us. Anyway i thought it was such a brilliant conclusion for such a young person. And remembered that kids are a lot smarter than us adults, because we tend to make things so complicated.

The holy muse of poetry and her literary child

Merry musemas!

MY

political compass

Economic Left/Right: -8.63
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.62

this basically means that i am almost a total anarchist:)

viva online testing of things you already know.....

Was digging up

some old artwork, was going to take some photos of them, but in Iceland daylight is hiding behind the curtains of winter. But as i was digging them up from the basement of this big house, and as i brought them inside, i felt i missed them like old friends and so i stuck them on the walls and every time i look at them, i get the same warm feeling inside as when i see my plants blossom or see my kids sleep.

here are two> rather old > perhaps 10 years old> or older>




i have stopped painting or drainting .... i have done nothing for almost 4 years
and i miss it beyond words

but i am serving the muse of words and i can't desert her now....

in other news>

i got a new job/work, at the office for the left green party. it is a real blessing to be able to direct my energy into matters that really matters for me, such as the environment and the issue of heavy industry and well if you know me you also know i have an opinion about everything. so to be able to work with members of parliament on daily bases and work towards my dream, that is to see left wing, socialist government in power next year, wow, i feel fortunate.

in other news, got raving reviews on my novel that i published last year, trying to find the time to translate it so you my non Icelandic speaking friends can read it....

finished the final proof for the four agreements translation. what an amazing book, wisdom and inspiration.

if you haven't read it, you should.

and next week i am going to talk to "troubled" teens about suicides.

plus i am just drowning in positive things, large and small.

life is beautiful.

there is no need to struggle anymore.



a photo of me and my reclaimed daughter
in klanskyland where the two worlds meet

And a birth

of a damn good looking child of creation to be expected by the Hand and Birgitta

here is one page of the new book soon to be available from lulu

willl keep you posted when it will be available it is called conversations with ghosts
illustrations by the hand and poetry by birgitta

The riches that are not found in our soul do not belong to us.

Demetrius

Time to kill whales again! in Iceland

Kill kill kill, drown, shoot, mountains, whales, reindeer, waterfalls, our history with greed, the real short term greed.

I believe Iceland has been formally renamed to either Shitland or Idiotland, you can choose.

First of all, there is no need for all the destruction we are inflicting on ourselves. NO NEED: we are not starving, we are fat, and we are warm and we are among the five wealthiest nations in the world. NO NEED to kill to destroy in the name of prosperity. But do you know what the worst thing in this all is: Icelanders will without a doubt re-elect the simpletons in power next year.

But hey didn't someone say that it is always darkest before dawn}}}???!!!

A horrible

sad day in the history of our elemental world. In a few minutes the shapeshifters, the doom makers, will start drowing in silth and glacier dirt, a massive landmass at Karahnjukar, in the North-East of Iceland. We have tried so much to stop this. So many people from all walks of life have done so much to stop this disaster. We will not give up though, we will keep on doing our best to save Iceland, because there are many monsters on the drawing table. Aluminum smelters everywhere, indeed we are dam nation.

but as of this moment i am full of grief
and have no words to express it

but i love i love this earth, this dirt, this water that shapes and creates those gems
our home this planet i will make you smile again

Walked along

the crack that divides Iceland between Europe and the American continent. It was indeed paradise. Just me and my kids and hot kisses of the last warm sun before the darkness of winter. Ripe wild berries and deep cracks into the earth. Not a sound but that small waterfall hissing. The symbol of our pride. Oxararfoss. We bathed in the clear mist and walked into a crack. Dwelled in the womb, soft moss under our feet. Filled our hands with crystal clear water and it tasted of the remains of the glaciers, melting so fast. Soon there will be non. Soon there will only be land of fire. No ice. No ice.

And that is not enough. Not enough. The waters are rising. The dry silth. Suffocating smooth sand. Green lush waterbanks, dry. Rapture my ass. We need to stop. But we are a snowball. We are melting. And the sun and the hole and the rays. Not enough. We are melting. We are burning. Enough! Not enough. We take shelter in paperhouses and the hummer and the hummer black as tar.

Should i hope for halt. For people to wake up. Is it not too late!! Is it possible to turn around and around. The massive shockwave when the kiss of death will suck the life out of millions. Is it the darkages creeping into the modern paperhouses. Paper moon, paper hearts. Do we care to care to care. Howl at the moon and eat it with greed. Give birth to mutant thoughts. We don't care to care. We consumer therefor we are.

And

now, just now, my dear friends, that i have reclaimed my life back after months of intense work
i will start my ever so beloved task of being in touch with you all
and my mailbox will be for a short time
a living flowing entity of me writing back... to all those words of kindness and beyond

I am back....
quite pale
but I am back
quite exhausted
but hey i am back
and i shall play with my kids this weekend
all the Lego's have been tracked in various boxes
and we shall build and build
and feast on chocolate, and joy

tomorrow i will go see Nick Cave life
haven't been to a gig with him for 16 years
i wonder if he is still as intense
i hope even more so>>>>>>

IMPACTT

wish i could see this... if you are anywhere close to NY = you should go and tell me how it was:)

>>>>>>>www.impactfestival.org<<<<<<<
Iraq: Speaking Of War


Created by Karen Malpede;
original music by Milos Raickovich; Iraqi Maqam & santur by Amir ElSaffar;
percussion: Johnny Farraj; harp: Nina Kellman;
featuring: George Bartenieff, Dalia Basiouny, Kathleen Chalfant,
Peter Francis James, Judith Malina, Hanon Reznikov,
Najla Said, Amneh Taye, Maysoon Zayid, Waleed Zuaiter,

Sep. 28th – 7:00 PM – Shinbone Alley @ 45 Below
The Culture Project, 45 Bleecker St., NY, NY


A cast of political theater pioneers and luminaries who have won awards in land-mark
productions from “The Brig” (1963) to “Stuff Happens” (2006) will perform the ritual
docu-drama with original and traditional Iraqi music “Iraq: Speaking of War,” created
and directed by Karen Malpede, at the Culture Project, Thursday, Sept. 28, at 7 p.m.
as part of the IMPACT Festival. “Litany,” with the voice of Dalia Basiouny, and “B-A-G-
D-A-D,” both composed by Milos Raickovich, will be played on harp by Nina
Kellman. The music of Amir ElSaffar, traditional Iraqi Maqam singer and santur player,
and percussionist Johnny Farraj will be featured through-out the piece.

These actors will tell the untold story of the first two years of the Iraq war in the words of
Iraqi civilians, American soldiers and independent journalists. Amneh Taye and Dalia
Basiouny will speak the names of Iraqi children murdered by the war. Greek
historian Thucydides provides commentary.

$20, tickets available at http://www.ovationtix.com/trs/pr/1915/

busy busy busy

my work day is not 9-5, but 5-9 and until the end of this month it will remain so, or at least until i am done translating the book on my desk, so forgive me if i don't write back or if i seem invisible or lost, i will return with time on my hands, rise from the ashes of this computer.... but i felt compelled to write this yesterday inspired by the book i am translating and the world around me...

fresh from that digital ioioio typewriter
writing into space
when i should be translating words of hope for the entire human race
next chapter titled A new civilisation
love
b
///////

despair
rivers of despair
wounds
oceans of pain

patriarch
matriarch
ism
ism
ism

means nothing to me
nothing at all

flesh blood earth dirt
gravel sand and that flower on the highland hearth
drowned in silt and pure waters of greed

this time the times are changing
into a dream of universal
universal please
don't look the other way

we are the same
i feel the pain
i feel the hope
the eternal ethnic bond
with each grain of sand
each grain of blood
infusion
please let me be you
i move with her breath
what are we
aliens on this earth
acting like a parasite
are we controlled by the external or internal parasite
who chose this hell
who can undo what has been done
but you

Cry from the heart II

I feel your pain
I feel your pain
I feel your pain

bombs, limbs, blood, tears, death, grief, anxiety, hatred, revenge, bullets, spit, split, tormented, crippled, infested, pain

I feel your pain
I feel your pain
I feel your pain

in the marrow