In a lovely series of seasonal reflections check in often to enjoy a nuanced and a clock tick range of wisdom from our contributing writers and we're collecting them all at on Being dot org slash seasonal reflections on being is brought to you by the John Templeton Foundation the Templeton Foundation supports academic research and civil dialogue on the deepest most perplexing questions facing humankind who are we why are we here and where are we going to learn more please visit Templeton dot org the Templeton Foundation stay curious. In our show we often find ourselves talking to poets and writers about meaning and mystery and how intertwined these things are with both art and faith so it seemed natural to team up with selected short which nurtures an important truth and we need stories as part of a live selected shorts evening at Symphony Space in New York we were joined by Claire Danes Ellen Burstyn Julie white and now poet laureate Tracy k. Smith I'm Krista Tippett and this is On Being. We need words that simmer and enliven and wake us up and help us heal our 1st story by the imaginative tender and funny writer Amy Bender involves healing the doctor in the rabbi wraps itself around the winds a cool and touching inexplicability of life even spiritual life and the way our deepest selves find their way in our bodies I love the sin the story calls out in one of its early lines the sin of living small something no one can say of its reader the mighty Ellen Burstyn Here's She is with an abridged version of Aimee Bender's the doctor and the rabbi the doctor went to see the rabbi tell me Rabbi please he said about God The rabbi pulled out some books she talked about Jacob wrestling the angel she talked about Heschel and the kernel of wonder as a seed that could grow into all she tugged at it Braden told his city story about how it is said that at the end of your life you will need to apologize to God for the ways you have not live. Not for the usual sin she said for the sin of living small a few months later the rabbi became sick she had a disease of the blood a disease that needed weekly transfusions that she scheduled on Wednesdays so she would be at her best for. The doctor who had come to see her was a doctor of blood a transfusion ist she thought of him as she sat with her husband staring at their and folded hands wondering what to do. That man she said looking at that man who came by a few months ago when the rabbi was in her paper gown she looks smaller of the earth and the doctor did not mind the role reversal I'm so sorry you have to go through this he said the rabbi lay down on the cold table she offered her arm the blood drained from her the blood of another person filled her the doctor stood beside her and reset the instruments in a line the rabbi came for many transfusions and she recovered and a brisk pace filled with the blood of Hindus and Lutherans the treatments went so well she didn't have to visit as often anymore and the doctor missed seeing her at the clinic after a month and gone by he went to her office again where he found her talking to another rabbi massaging the bottom of the stocking foot she hugged him and pressed his hand and thanked him and he said he would like to talk to her again about God she asked I'm not sure he said I don't think so they went to a coffee shop because she could now go no longer than 2 hours without food. I gave you the blood of other religions he blurted. She laughed out loud lifting out the. No problem she said I like what you gave me it's great how did you know. There's a box on the donation for me said an optional box How interesting that it's a box on a form she said chewing I never heard of that before so who did I get she asked now dipping the croissant torso his hands were shaking slightly he put them flat on the table to calm them he wasn't sure why he was so nervous her around her Christians. Of all sorts think looting a Jehovah's Witness. Several Muslims a few Jews well maybe a new route to world peace she said. Transfuse people. And atheists he said tentatively What about them I gave you atheist blood to said. He and visibly She laughed again all the warmth in her laugh like it could embrace someone across the room I don't hate atheists she said I'm an atheist he said a little too loud and he reached out for her hand for a 2nd she held him as his hand was much wider than hers and her hands not usually considered dainty look small and slender next to his. I'm not here to push anything on you she said lots of Jews I know are atheist toots. Your eyes shining he said how do they do that blood she said. He returned to the rabbit's office his mother was not well she had cancer she was in the hospital I have been unable to work very much this week he told the rabbi I took 2 days off make sense she said she was also surrounded by cardboard boxes of donations for a charity drive and I just started sorting I them's into piles a kid clothing pile an adult clothing pile a book pile a toy pile want to help she asked share he took the free seat she had a pile of books in her lap and separating them into kid an adult levels he opened a donation box sweaters the rabbi was divvying up her book piles but he could tell she was listening she divied quietly let me ask you a question said the rabbi balancing the last book in the adult pile you're here to see me why. Because I like seeing you so well at seeing you too but you could go to a friend to a collie I like seeing you the doctor said again well said the rabbi studying the chicken in her lap I ask because I have a rabbi kind of thing to say let's hear it he said you could pray she said either on your own or with us said the doctor not to do that sort of thing why not she said there is no edge to have voice just interest just because I think it's useless he said a little creepy. She laughed Ok said the red chicken Bob dinner last barren off she glanced at the adult clothes pile and he said after a minute shaking out a t. Shirt just to play along you know I I wouldn't want to use up the line space the rabbi leaned in she seemed to have forgotten about the pilots for the moment her eyes were being of like but there's no lying she said How do you know well I don't know she said but you're using an example that doesn't fit an example that is of this daily world you have to think differently the best way I can think to describe it she said is that way when you're driving on the freeway at night how everyone can see the moon in that window every car on the road every car feels the moon is following that car even in the other direction right everyone in that entire hemisphere can see the moon and think it is there for them is following where they go that she said is a little closer to how I imagine it works whether or not you pray has absolutely nothing to do with a person to your left it's like saying you shouldn't get the moon in your window or else the other cars wouldn't get the moon in their windows but everyone gets the moon it's not an option to not have the moon in your window you just see it it's there she better let the wind do in the office screw golden with late afternoon half the world can't see the moon said the Dr. It's not she said that spring her hands together around the giraffe it's not so literal I am literal who said I think literally the moon is also an responsive he wiped his forehead with his sleeve it was hot in her office. And I apologize for being so stubborn you were stubborn she said leaning over and unpeeling the tape on a new box you are actually pretty open in a way in my book we just did it then what. I prayed in a way she said wrestled with why do you say that he sat up taller for some reason the thought made him angry because you're leaning in she said unfolding the box flaps because I am tired in a way that I recognize because you seem to be fighting from under some water into what I don't know into something because we were talking about d.p. She said I could feel it we were having an argument he said he stood up but her office was too small to pace so he turned away and stepped away and found himself going through the door and going down the hall to use the bathroom the space held them alone in this particular to an unused bathroom the glare of fluorescent lights the echo of sync and crimp link paper that tired isolation of one person in an office building alone at night working too late he used up 10 paper towels on his face and neck until he was sufficiently dry he washed his hands carefully in the sink. He took the back exit the rabbi sat in her office for 45 minutes unpacking the last donation boxes to see if he would return but he did not return and so she shouldered her bag and walked the 7 blocks home the doctor found his car in the parking lot one of the last 3 there and join the flow on the street he drove with his air conditioner fan on full blast into traffic as the sun set into dusk with the full moon rising in his rearview mirror almost taunting him with her big presence in his car alone and every car around and none of it being how he'd like to think or was interested in thinking and yet he could feel it just feel it the glimmer of something that he did not understand he would never call it. He would not call it prayer comfort and fear rose together inside him. Like standing in the middle of a meadow. Or No when. I am in Boston performing and abridged version of Amy benders the doctor and the rabbi I'm Krista Tippett and this is On Being we're hearing some stories and poems that were part of a live selected shorts evening I hosted at Symphony Space in New York we're looking at stories and poems about spirituality and faith and some of them touch on age old questions like who is up there who is listening who made it all our next piece is from Elmore Leonard best known as a writer of nearly 50 westerns and crime novels he's admired for writing dialogue like people actually speak though we have to take his word about how the Gabriel and Mary might converse with each other during a college football game his spirituality with or without a prayer is read by Julie white. A treatment of how the 35 percent who prayed with some hope of reward the 45 percent who don't expect their prayers to be answered and the 16 percent who never pray it all manage in a win lose situation. With 6 seconds remaining in the football game. 4th down his team 4 points behind chip the quarterback calls time and jogs over to his coach on the sideline the coach his cat mud stained from having thrown it to the ground several times stares from midfield toward the goal post in his deep south way of speaking he says to his quarterback honey you know what you have to. Throw the Hail Mary Wing it them there and pray it gets caught by one of ours coach who's going to block listen to me Son It's the same situation Doug Flutie faced. Back in 84 even the scores sang Boston College down 45 to 41 the ball's on Miami's 486 seconds left to play a little dug it is room my boy and I'm a general Failon and won the game 47451 it off the shotgun chipper drop back and give your people time to get them there and put it up. I drop back to Chip says I'm throwing the ball 60 yards and I'm getting a rush same as Flutie. And you're bigger than he hands. Coach it's Ryan in the ball this way son floaty had rain missed and a high when. He went back to Mary's own 40 scrambled threw the ball into a 30 mile an hour gale and pulled the game out you know what his coach said he said Mary was definitely listening to us as we share needed that one we actually say a Hail Mary won't hurt you none go on at there. And I'll pray you got the are in the huddle a circle of gold helmets and face guards chin straps hang in a grumble of pain inspired obscenity s. Chip calls the Hail Mary and tells the players let's put our hands in here and we'll say it together 3 of his teammates believers in the efficacy of prayer start right in Hail Mary full of grace Lord is with the less it art thou hold. Out says the one who has never prayed in his life and in going to start now leave me out man pray in a style Chip says to him his running back come on scoot we're a team here what I'm sayin to you chippy I score it's me doing it not some lady showing me the holes have. A voice representing the 5 players who do pray but without hope of reward offers. We can try it. But who says a Hail Mary is gonna work. Even if it does another doubter adds how do we know it was the prayer that made it happen. Yeah like a guy who's dyin all of a sudden gets better and they say it's a miracle what if they didn't pray and he got better anyway man dies it's his Times says he don't if I ain't. There go with the nickel be Fance this is a teammate offering an obstacle be like a jump ball up for grabs Well Chip says right now we've got a 5050 chance of scoring we say the Hail Mary it'll put the odds in our favor. You get the Heisman scout says you want to share it with that lady. Come on Chip says where Weiss in time Hail Mary full of grace what if they're trying to. Get. A whistle blows. They draw a 5 yard penalty for delay of game the coach throws his hat in the mud and stomps on it meanwhile the angel Gabriel. Hears that Mary has been hailed again and. He's checking on it. Another petition. It's a college game a good one and tomorrow you'll have the pros. Yes. But their Hail Marys are all in name only. I understand St Jude has a few of the more hopeless situations. Well that's what he's known for. Mary pauses and looks off as if listening to a distant sound. They're coming out of the huddle their uniforms are blue and gold your favorite color is of it's a Catholic school Mary looks him in the eye you know I don't play favorites. Except the last 5 Hail Mary requests came from Catholic schools and they won they pray for feel co-hosts 3rd town conversions everything but did I change the natural course of events in those games there are those who say you get defensive backs to run into each other not unlike the Flutie Hail Mary. This one the quarterback will have to toss it at least 65 yards and he wants my help bless his heart. Well you know a 3rd of the team would also like your help Gabriel reminds or nearly half of them say they would but don't believe you'll come through Mary nods and we always have those who never pray Gabriel agrees the usual breakdown I shouldn't say this Mary tells him but I don't think much of their coach. If the 2 minute drill works so well why didn't he have them running that earlier in the game. But then it's not a 2 minute drill. And Mary tells him in her quiet manner you shouldn't always take what I say quite so literally. Forgive me. Now he's ruined his cap. Gabriel way it's a moment before saying well the ball's in the air it's your call Mary gives him the smile that inspired Leonardo's imagination and asks. Are you sure chip is blitzed mired in the turf beneath the pair of linebackers he doesn't see the completion though the instant he hears the crowd he knows and has the presence to offer a thank you to the wet mass of Sky hanging over him by the time he gets to his feet grinning about to be mobbed he catches a glimpse of a t.v. Reporter on the sideline shoving a mike at one of his teammates this your 1st hail mary catch scoot skate frowns he says hey oh Mary glancing from side to side I didn't see no lady around I jumped the corner that man still looking for me when I go No I didn't see no lady as I'm taken in that wildly ass over my shoulder region way up and then talking to the end so nobody didn't have a gun go take it away from me you understand what I'm sayin. Yes but barely. The angel Gabriel is thinking now he turns to Mary because he asked to ask you played a favor at that time didn't you not one person in the stadium thought chip would get that pass in the air but somehow he did just as he was hit Mary shows the smile again that can tell you nothing or everything and says. The scooter wasn't bad either wealthy. Julie white performing Elmore Leonard's spirituality with or without a prayer for an evening of on being at selected short we invited a poet I very much admired Tracy k. Smith the poets are storytellers too and in the poem that follows Tracy tells us about life and God and the cosmos Here's she is to read the universe as primal scream. This is a poem called The Universe as primal scream and I think when I wrote the 1st few lines I thought I was writing about the occasional frustration of living in a New York City apartment and then the poem had other ideas. 5 pm on the nose they open their mouths and it rolls out high shrill and metallic 1st the boy then his sister occasionally they both let loose at once and I think of putting on my shoes to go up and see whether it is merely an experiment their parents have been conducting upon the good crystal which must surely lie shattered to dust on the floor maybe the mother is still proud of the 4 pink lungs she nursed to such might. Perhaps if they hit the magic Decibels The whole building will lift off and will ride to glory like Elijah. If this is it if this is what their cries are cocked toward let the sky pass from blue to red to molten gold to black let the heaven we inherit approach whether it is our dead in Old Testament robes or a door opening on to the roiling infinity of space whether it will bend down to greet us like a father or swallow us like a furnace. I'm ready to meet what refuses to let us keep anything for long what teases us with blessings Bens us with grief wizard thief the great wind rushing to knock our mirrors to the floor to sweep our short lives clean how mean our racket seems beside it my stereo on shuffle the neighbor chopping onions through a wall all of it just a hick up against what may never come for us and the kids up stairs still at it screaming like the dawn of man as if something they have no name for has begun to insist upon being born. That was Tracy k. Smith reading her poem the universe as primal scream you can listen again to all of the stories and poems featured in the show through our website on being org I'm Krista Tippett on Being continues in a moment support for on being with Krista Tippett comes from the Fetzer Institute helping build the spiritual foundation for a loving world Fetzer envisions a world that embraces love as a guiding principle an animating force for our lives a powerful love that helps us live in sacred relationship with ourselves others and the natural world learn more by visiting Fetzer dot org. I'm Krista Tippett and this is On Being today with stories and poems that were part of a live selected shorts evening I hosted at Symphony Space in New York in our show we often find ourselves talking to poets and writers about meaning and mystery and how intertwined these things are with both art and faith so it seemed natural to team up with selected shorts which nurtures an important truth we need stories we are strange and beautiful and heartbreaking and contradictory through and through I always say I wish for a world free of murder but not free of murder mysteries and certainly not free of brilliant t.v. Storytelling about our contradictions like Homeland which I watch religiously so it makes me especially happy that Claire Danes performed this next story you must be this happy to enter by a Lizabeth crane it's about the playful and perilous edges of us and how hard it can be to tell the difference between them. What happened was I was at yet another dreadful opening when some dude in those kind of architect glasses said to me something like that which doesn't provoke has no meaning. And you know 1st of all who talks like that that to which nobody is who and 2nd of all well. It just it burned to me it's not irrelevant that the show that night was by this artist who does these giant installations of Barbie war scenes with like hundreds of Barbies with their hair all chopped off dressed in camouflage and carrying machine guns they been wounded Barbies all over with their very lifelike guts spilling out and cans tending to the victims dress in those old timey white nurse costumes with the little red crosses on them but wish short pants and cut off sleeves. I've stopped trying to figure out what people like this are even trying to say because I'm not trying to hear it I don't care if you think the only thing worth depicting in your art is a soulless violent war torn world I don't care Mister gallery glasses guy for the long winded the sorest the explanation about why the lone pencil mark Joe grad student left on your wall is a brilliance denouncement of beauty in art. I don't understand why it has to be hard and sad and bad for it to be deep We've all had our hard sad badness is in life and I just thought Would it be so wrong for art to be about something happy. It's a legitimate feeling. So I think you can see that this is where the bells went off for me and right then I decided to do something about it I started my own gallery and I made a giant sculpture to go out front so that you know before you can go in what the deal is I'm primarily a photographer but in this case I wanted something really eye catching to make my point and draw people in remember those little figurines of babies from Spencer Gifts or whatever that said I love you this much with arms wide open Well this statue is like a giant version of that except it says you must be this happy to enter. For the opening I went to great lengths to create work that was as I saw it not about anything besides the true joy of life. In the window I hung a photo I'd taken of this woman totally laughing no doubt because she's eating ice cream but she's super thin and from what I can see rich and she's out shopping and why shouldn't she be happy. Inside I hung many other photos of people being happy on one wall I hung what I call the happy series happy dude happy dude wearing shades happy chick and happy chick with rainbow thinking about you know corns for real you could see the rainbow but I could tell there was another layer to her happiness so I asked her and suggested the longer title. Plus also happy family happy baby numbers one through 6 there are a lot of happy babies out there and I think some of us could take a lesson from them. Plus also happy waving Abraham and Silas 10 months twins who have a very positive outlook in spite of their origin of smallness. On another wall I hung the Love series love rocks love totally rocks love rocks it hard and sheep love that's between sheep it's a photo of sheep board only just now selling in a very loving way. Not people and sheep that is not love that's just a bad website. On a 3rd wall I hung the sunshine series sunshine in the Bronx sunshine in Seattle because people don't think the sun shines there so much but when it does people are exceptionally happy. Sunshine on Division Street sunshine and Dresden and so on the opening got quite a turnout but let me tell you I was sure surprised at what ended up going down there I was discussing my passion for happiness over a glass of wine when suddenly 6 police officers burst in and charged me with. Well. They said I didn't take the photo in the window and that they suspected I had not taken many of the others and they arrested me and took me into the police station and thinker printed mean everything I assured them that I absolutely did take that photo as well as all the others and they said it was impossible for me to have taken the photo in the window which according to them was a very famous photograph taken by some old dude named Gary y. Know something. And they attempted to verify this by pointing out that according to my driver's license I was only 23 years old and therefore not even a thought in my mother's head at the time of the taking of the photo I said. I guess you guys haven't heard of something called time travel. This was funny to them. The police squad laughed That's funny I said I wasn't surprised that there was a similar photograph out there because there had been a number of people taking photos of this woman everyone had agreed she was unusually happy and that it was a moment that should be documented young lady they said clearly under obligation to use phrases like this as policeman. Young lady they said again Time travel is not real when just split right now if it were. Yes I said I just might but I don't have any of my stuff it's not just like Oh I think I'd like to go to 1906 right now poof I mean it's an effort. Oh well of course well here's my cell for you until someone comes from the future to bail you out. They put me in a temporary cell with this guy about my age who did not look like he could be guilty of anything besides being extra greenly Foxy. The foxy dude said to me they bring you in here for being happy to. This is probably the part where most people would say why but where I being me would and did say I think they didn't. Know it's no longer legal in 3 states he said. I bet you didn't know that no way I said we have to move as soon as we get out seriously he said Unfortunately the jail term is open ended you don't get out until you understand the true pain of life again I said nah he said yeah. Why have to fake it I said forget it I'm incapable he shrugged like even jail wasn't gonna make him sad like it was only a minor inconvenience. You can't pretend I said I don't think so he said what if you try thinking of something really sad I can't really think of anything your parents still alive happy and healthy and rich. Married Yeah he said almost sadly Did you ever lose a pet my journal had the sniffles one time we were a little worried but it was fine. What about the state of the world I know that's bad but in my missionary work I found so much beauty among even the poorest people that I can't really muster it up did you know that a lot of disadvantaged people around the world have such a strong faith in God that they really don't feel sorry for themselves I met this one girl in Costa Rica who gave her only pair of broken sandals to an old woman because she had none at all Jesus will carry me she said I kind of thing makes me weep all the time but for sure. He was a missionary a foxy happy young missionary. For sure. I knew right then that I was going to have to find a way to break out. I asked him one last question I thought was a guarantee Ok look everyone has had their heart broken once at least it's like the doctors just whisper this in your tiny baby ears when they hand you over to your mom all we know for sure is your heart will break and God bless. You have to have had your heart broken Not yet he smiled at me. That sealed it. Listen I said leaning in I can get out of here you time travel before Right no way a man that's dangerous he said No It's only dangerous if you stay somewhere for more than an hour that's when the time space continuum starts to get worked in the future starts changing and weird ways what's the point of time travelling at all if you don't want to change the future I had never thought about that. How I said I guess I didn't want to be responsible what if I set off a volcano somehow and wiped out a whole civilization what if you adopted a crack baby who grew up to be the President good to presidents you added quickly sensing where my mind was going the best president ever could I just do that now I asked Well yeah I think you could he smiled he was looking so who damn foxy right then I just about died but as much as I wanted to raise 16 homeless babies with him I wasn't convinced that raising the presidential crack baby in jail would work out completely well so I said look I need to get a bunch of stuff from home but I'll be back. I started thinking about as many sad things as hard as I could It was very difficult because I really am the kind of person just like him who sees beauty in even the darkest places a lot of my happy photos are from places where you don't expect to see a lot of happiness the Division Street photo was taken during a time when it was just nothing but drunks and bars like if I'd taken it at night it would have been all super Days of Wine and Roses or whatever with the neon sign montage kind of thing going on over the drunks head as he stumbled home trying to remember where or who even was but since I took it during the day I happened to catch a bunch of old guys playing cards on a stoop with the sun shining off the backs of the cards and this one who's who point in his eyes he was laughing so hard and for all I know they could've all been drunk that whole day and every day before it but nevertheless I found it to be of a unique and spectacular beauty. I took the Dresden picture right after the war this little girl had been crying because she just lost her mom I knew this because one of the awesome bonuses of time travel is that you can suddenly speak fluent whatever they speak and dressed and or whatever anyway she found her favorite doll in the rubble of her house and was just giggling when I took the picture not to get sidetracked but I think the reason I'm so personally happy is that I too believe hard in God's will and although I do not have the 1st idea why things happen like they do I find myself generally untroubled knowing that God is looking down on all of us totally all of the time I know that bad bad bad things happen with alarming frequency but I believe that very often good things happen because of bad things and I would almost argue that in my experience more good things happen because of bad things because if things were mostly good all the time why would anyone try very hard to make them better whereas if things are mostly bad I think people are sort of forced to rise up to their best selves I don't know if that makes sense and maybe it's Deepak Chopra or whatever but it's what I think anyway that said I was trying to get us out so I was sitting there thinking about conventionally sad things war and poverty and corporate greed and terrible diseases and hurricanes and all that and trust me I came as near to crying as I ever have when I thought about the president being reelected. But none of it was working until I thought of my future husband the foxy young missionary and what if we had to get married in jail and pee in front of other people for the rest of our lives and raise our babies in there because we were too happy to get out. I started imagining the beautiful lives we never had with no simple ceremony on the beach no cute Al mugs from the seventy's no barbecues in the yard no chocolate chip pancakes on Sunday no new school shoes or a 3 ring binders no taking the kids camping or having a spiritual experience the Grand Canyon No no you may certainly not have Ruby encrusted high tops just because all the kids have them no grounding them when they've snuck out to go see their delinquent boyfriends no Super 8 movies of them graduating from pre-K. We're 8th grade a medical school now wrapping up together and Grandma's love holy Afghan on a freezing night in September already know taking in our parents when they're old and shaky. So nothing normal at all ever even and finally I was crying so hard it felt like I was convulsing with the pain of the whole world and of course as soon as you noticed a policeman came right over and unlocked the door he said I can see you understand the true pain of life now trying not to forget it. I won't I won't wiping my tears and whispering be right back to my new boyfriend. I went home and filled my knapsack with provisions for return I put on my fuzzy slippers ate 3 drakes fruit pies clapped 4 times and said county jail cell block 1 May 25th 200474533 pm You can't take chances with the time thing for obvious reasons 3 seconds off and you might find yourself in a cell block with some kind of violent criminal instead of your hot missionary. Anyway so I went back to the jail only to encounter a new problem he didn't want to go. I didn't figure we had a long time for discussion about it with the police guards right there he said he was too happy I named a whole bunch of other times and places where he could be even happier I said we could go all the way back to even if you wanted to and I promised to stay away from Apple. He said he was happy enough and that he thought he could do some good right where he was I was getting really discouraged and then he finally said I think God put me here for a reason you know I couldn't argue with that so I said Well do you think that God put me here too and he said I for sure do you think that I knew then that he was my soulmate and that homeless babies are not we just have to rise up. Claire Danes performing Elizabeth cranes you must be this happy to enter I'm Krista Tippett and this is on we're hearing some stories and poems that were part of a live selected shorts evening I hosted at Symphony Space in New York. Time. This time by David White when we had David on on being in 2016 I asked him as I always asked poets how he understands what poetry works and us he said poetry is language against which we have no defense I've been pondering this a lot in a cultural political moment David's poem everything is waiting for you is read by white. Everything is waiting for you. Your great mistake is to act the drama as if you were alone as if why for a progressive and coming crime with no witness to the tiny hidden transgressions to feel abandoned is to did not I the intimacy of your surroundings Surely even you know at times I have felt the grand or a the swelling presence and the chorus crowding out your solo voice you must know. The way the soap dish enables you. Or the widow lash grants you freedom alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity the stair are your mentor of things to come the door is have always been there to frighten you and invite you and the tiny speaker in the phone it is your dream the latter to divinity put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into the conversation the kettle is singing even as it pours she would drink the cooking pots have left their arrogant aloofness and seen the good in you at last. All the birds and the creatures of the world are on other ugly themselves everything is waiting for you. It's really quite performing everything is waiting for you by David White who despite their last names are not related to one another we weren't able to feature all of the stories from our selected short evening in New York City including a reading of the strength of God concerning the Reverend Curtis Hartman by Sherwood Anderson read by actor James not or the full version of Amy benders the Dr and the rabbi read by Ellen Burstyn you can find the stories and more in the selected short podcast. On being is Chris Percy Helgason Maya Tarot. Fenyvesi feral. At all. And. Special thanks to our wonderful partners at selected shorts who made this show and our fabulous night at Symphony Space possible they include Jennifer Brown and Sarah Montague miles b. Smith and Matthew love also our deep gratitude to be incredible performers who made these stories sing Tracy k. Smith James Julie white Claire Danes and Ellen Burstyn our lovely theme music is provided and composed by Zoe Keating and the last voice you hear singing our final credits in each show is hip hop artist. On piano was created at American Public Media a funding partners include the Fetzer Institute helping to build the spiritual foundation for a loving world. Find them at Fetzer dot org Callia pay a foundation working to create a future where universal spiritual values form the foundation of how we care for our common home the Henry Luce foundation in support of public the reimagined the Osprey Foundation a catalyst for empowered healthy and fulfilled lives and the Lilly Endowment Indianapolis based private family foundation dedicated to its founders interests in religion community development and education. It's debate it. Public Radio Exchange and does it Krista Tippett public production. You're listening to k.l. Me see l p one o 5 point one f.m. You Kaya Mendocino environmental center also on the web at k m e c radio dot org. The snow. Cave the sky at times. From. The snow. To. My beloved legend denied loved and was. An. Odd love. 2 song. On using the be done. While your eyes spawns bad sound like the time you read me. See the board heard by retired support. A child some very stern. Concern the stuff I'm pretty sure there are heavier seeds. Planted there for a. War we moved to tears. From . Her dance no home. From. The kids it's no. No harm no sleep talk. Month buses. Pull West St Dog. Run. By the same margaritas and bar. Was brought. Into play. The game. On the. 2 bus was. Given to one. Man came to get the most. Pain pay back. The same song. On my blog. Slate dot. Keeping to. The c. . One o $5.00 at. The. Corner .