What Women Know
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Most Zen masters expressly decline to take serious account of dreams, which they look upon as fragments of illusion which must be overcome. Jung, on the other hand, regards dreams as ‘messages from the Self’ which support the way of meditation.
— Marie Louise Von Franz
*
A man crosses the street in rain,
stepping gently, looking two times north and south,
because his son is asleep on his shoulder.
No car must splash him.
No car drive too near to his shadow.
This man carries the world’s most sensitive cargo
but he’s not marked.
Nowhere does his jacket say FRAGILE,
HANDLE WITH CARE.
His ear fills up with breathing.
He hears the hum of a boy’s dream
deep inside him.
We’re not going to be able
to live in this world
if we’re not willing to do what he’s doing
with one another.
The road will only be wide.
The rain will never stop falling.
— Naomi Shihab Nye
*
. The Middle Ages was an especially difficult time for women, yet they gifted us a legacy of wisdom, knowledge and greatness from which we are slowly discovering its depth and importance. Christina of Pizan, Hildegarda of Bingen, Sabine von Steinbach, Jacob Félicie, Beatrice of Day, Mary of France, Matilda of Magdeburg, Catalina of Siena, Brigida of Sweden, Alice Kyteler or Gertrudis of Hefta are some of the protagonists of this journey to the world of cathedrals, at the times of awakening from the cities and the birth of universities in Europe, where commerce began a slow but inexorable advance into the modern world. But it’s a journey made by the hand not of men but of women.
Sandra Ferrer Valero
*
I know I would not survive without a grounded woman at my side because I live in a mental zone disconnected from practicalities, dates and details. I’m focused on the inner world to the deficit of material and practical…
