Sali’s Shakti
(a two-tanka poem)
They say your power
Used to shine…from your bright mind
Now…it’s through your heart
From you…flow Beauty and Grace
Love lights…in your eyes and face
How does this happen…
That I love you even more…
You fulfill my heart…
This force that draws…me…to you
Wants to make…a One…from two
© Ken Chawkin
March 12/13, 2012
Fairfield, Iowa, USA
No one knew the name of this day;
Born quietly from deepest night,
It hid its face in light,
Demanded nothing for itself,
Opened out to offer each of us
A field of brightness that traveled ahead,
Providing in time, ground to hold our footsteps
And the light of thought to show the way.
The mind of the day draws no attention;
It dwells within the silence with elegance
To create a space for all our words,
Drawing us to listen inward and outward.
We seldom notice how each day is a holy place
Where the eucharist of the ordinary happens,
Transforming our broken fragments
Into an eternal continuity that keeps us.
Somewhere in us a dignity presides
That is more gracious than the smallness
That fuels us with fear and force,
A dignity that trusts the form a day takes.
So at the end of this day, we give thanks
For being betrothed to the unknown
And for the secret work
Through which the mind of the day
And wisdom of the soul become one.
— John O’Donohue (1954–2008)
From To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings.
Related: What To Remember When Waking by David Whyte.
Also see For a New Beginning by John O’Donohue.
John O’Donohue was an inspiring Irish philosopher, poet, and mystic who lived in the West of Ireland. His native tongue was Gaelic. His Ph.D. dissertation in the field of philosophical theology developed a new concept of Person through a re-interpretation of Hegel. He insisted in his work on beauty as a human calling and a defining aspect of God, and much of his writing drew from pre-Christian Irish Celtic perspectives. He was well known for his bestselling book Anam Cara. In the year of his death his book of blessings, Benedictus, was published. For a list of his books visit Amazon.com.
Listen to Krista Tippett interview John O’Donohue On Being: The Inner Landscape of Beauty.
Later added: John O’Donohue’s 4 short lines say it all for poets.
— Written and compiled (citing sources) by Ken Chawkin for The Uncarved Blog.
Ever come across a poem that encapsulates what you’ve read lately or thought about in the past? I found one today in a book I was sampling on Amazon, The Drop That Became the Sea: Lyric Poems, a collection of poems written by Yunus Emre, (1240-1321), translated by Kabir Helminski and Refik Algan.
Yunus Emre was the first in a great tradition of Turkish Sufi troubadours who celebrated the Divine Presence as the intimate Beloved and Friend. Called the greatest folk poet in Islam, the songs of this Sufi dervish are still popular today.
He was a contemporary of Rumi, who lived in the same region of Anatolia. Rumi composed his collection of stories and songs for a well-educated urban circle of Sufis, writing primarily in the literary language of Persian. Yunus Emre, on the other hand, traveled and taught among the rural poor, singing his songs in the Turkish language of the common people.
A story is told of a meeting between the two great souls: Rumi asked Yunus Emre what he thought of his great work the Mathnawi. Yunus Emre said, “Excellent, excellent! But I would have done it differently.” Surprised, Rumi asked how. Yunus replied, “I would have written, ‘I came from the eternal, clothed myself in flesh, and took the name Yunus.'” That story perfectly illustrates Yunus Emre’s simple, direct approach that has made him so beloved.
The poem I’m referring to begins, We entered the house of realization. Inside they find the earth and sky, night and day, the planets, the many veils in the body, what the scriptures say, and more. In that realized state, the poet witnesses everything inside the body; the infinite within the finite, the eternal within the temporal. His body is cosmic, an expression of totality.
It reminded me of the work of Maharaja Adhiraj Rajaraam (Professor Tony Nader, MD, PhD), a neuroscientist and Vedic scholar. Under the guidance of His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Professor Nader showed how the individual is cosmic.
The body, he says, is a manifestation of Natural Law—the Veda and Vedic Literature—the underlying blueprint that creates the individual body and the cosmic body, the Universe, a microcosm of the macrocosm. Yatha pinde tatha brahmande. See link to video at end of this article.
One aspect of the Vedic Literature is Jyotish, Vedic Astrology. Dr. Tony Nader shows a precise one-to-one relationship between the fundamental structures and functions of human physiology (Individual life) and the fundamental structures of Natural Law (Cosmic life). These fundamental structures of Natural Law connect individual intelligence with cosmic intelligence — the basic structures of the human nervous system with their cosmic counterparts. In this chart, the nine Grahas (planets), are shown where they are found in the different aspects of our physiology and their influences.
This first book by Dr. Nader, Human Physiology — Expression of Veda and the Vedic Literature, discusses all 40 aspects of the Vedic Literature and their expressions in the body.
Over a decade in the making, Dr. Nader’s new book, Ramayan in Human Physiology, reveals an understanding of the underlying unity that makes us human — the eternal reality of the Ramayan in the structure and function of the human physiology. Surprisingly, the Ramayan is not just a mythic tale assigned to an ancient culture in a distant past, but a description of the universal transformations continually taking place within our own bodies. Here is a book preview.
Yunus Emre expresses a similar understanding in poem #4, page 20, chapter I, The Dervish Way, in The Drop That Became The Sea.
We entered the house of realization,
we witnessed the body.
The whirling skies, the many-layered earth,
the seventy-thousand veils,
we found in the body.
The night and the day, the planets,
the words inscribed on the Holy Tablets,
the hill that Moses climbed, the Temple,
and Israfil’s trumpet, we observed in the body.
Torah, Psalms, Gospel, Quran—
what these books have to say,
we found in the body.
Everybody says these words of Yunus
are true. Truth is wherever you want it.
We found it all within the body.
A related example was highlighted by Dr. Nader in a press conference when he referenced ‘Abdu’l-Bahá [quoting The Imam Ali], from The Secret of Divine Civilization: “Dost thou think thyself only a puny form, when the universe is folded up within thee?”
Speaking of microcosm-macrocosm, here is an interesting saying from The Conversations (Maqalat) of Shams of Tabriz (Hazret Shams al-Din of Tabriz), Rumi’s master, which gives you a different perspective on the internal life of a saint:
The microcosm is hidden in the creation of man
and the macrocosm is the outer universe.
But for prophets the outer universe is the microcosm
while the inner universe ıs the macrocosm.
These two videos of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi answering questions from the press: As is the cosmic life, so is the individual life, and I am the Self, I am the body, I am the Veda, I am the universe, I am totality, explain the cosmic significance of these Vedic expressions and their practical applications in our daily lives.
See this New Video: Dr. Tony Nader speaks about the Ramayana in Human Physiology, which explains how the whole body is made of Veda, which also structures the cosmic body, the universe, and how the activities described in the Ramayana are a scientific description of the growth and evolution of the human physiology to it’s fully developed enlightened state.
See Sufi poet Hakim Sanai says transcend belief to enter into the mystery.
See Yunus Emre says Wisdom comes from Knowing Oneself — a Singularity that contains the Whole
Sufi poet, Hakim Sanai, best known for The Walled Garden of Truth, is revered as one of the 3 great Sufi teachers, along with Attar and Rumi. He says a lot in these few choice words:
Belief brings me close to You
but only to the door.
It is only by disappearing into
Your mystery
that I will come in.
See What Turkish Sufi poet Yunus Emre realized — everything was found within his cosmic body and Yunus Emre says Wisdom comes from Knowing Oneself — a Singularity that contains the Whole.
Ever looked at a legal document and wondered what the heck you just read? Depending on the way we use language, communication can obfuscate or elucidate, confuse or clarify.
Words can mean different things to different people. The English language uses different words to mean the same thing, and different things use similar sounding words. It can get confusing, especially if English is not your first language. Apparently only Sanskrit has a direct one-to-one relationship between a word and its meaning, between name and form, nama-rupa.
One way to use words to create clarity of mind is in meditation, where the mind, if allowed, can refer to its own essential nature. In the case of Transcendental Meditation, a technique that automatically transcends its own activity, a different kind of word, or thought, is employed—a mantra—a suitable harmonious meaningless sound. With the appropriate mantra, and instructions how to use it properly, the mind can effortlessly transcend words, thinking, its own activity, and arrive at the source of mind, a state of pure awareness, the meditator’s inner Self.
Hope this introduction helps you to better understand this abstract poem I wrote in the late 1980’s. For lack of a better title, I just called it, Words.
Words
the mind is of two minds
one listens to the sounds of words
the other follows their meanings
words help the mind to know things
names are the words for things
things are the forms of names
sounds and meanings of names and forms
things are contained within words
when words become things in themselves
then words get contained within words
sounds and meanings within names and forms
names and forms within sounds and meanings
layers of communication get built up create complex structures
and break down under the weight of their own words
too many words hinder the mind’s ability to know things
the mind cannot know its own mind
. . . . .
when words use themselves
to lose themselves
they allow the mind
to experience itself
experiencing itself
losing itself
to the Self
left to its Self
alone
the silent home
where things and words are one
all one
© Ken Chawkin
so love tanka
“i carry your heart with me(i carry it in my heart)” — e.e. cummings
you quicken our hearts
(and our eyes start to well up)
saying, i LOVE you!
so precious, so mutual,
so open, so deep, so true!
© Ken Chawkin
February 18, 2012
Fairfield, Iowa
For Valentine’s Day: i carry your heart with me by E.E. Cummings
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
“[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in]” Copyright 1952, © 1980, 1991 by the Trustees for the E. E. Cummings Trust, from Complete Poems: 1904-1962 by E. E. Cummings, edited by George J. Firmage. Used by permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation.
Source: Complete Poems: 1904-1962 (Liveright Publishing Corporation, 1991)
E. E. Cummings reads I Carry Your Heart With Me (I Carry It In My Heart) in this video: How E.E. Cummings Writes A Poem.
While this beautiful E.E. Cummings poem is about the intimate unity of the lover for his beloved, Love after Love, by Derek Walcott, resonates deeply when you first acknowledge yourself, the basis for a healthy loving relationship.
I found and bought a version of the poem beautifully sung by Julia Smith with piano accompaniment. Later, no longer available as a single, I discovered it was included as the first of an 8-song album with the same title, I Carry Your Heart, released Aug 30 2010 on Amazon Music. The 25-minute album was posted 5 years later on YouTube, allowing me, in November 2023, to finally embed this moving song, I Carry Your Heart (feat.Julia Smith).
Famous Poets and Poems lists 153 of E.E. Cummings poems. See quotes by e.e. cummings.
This poem, so love tanka, was inspired by e.e. cummings and my muse.
Emily Dickinson succinctly describes the eternal nature of Love in this short but powerful poem.
Paul Bauman of Write Like posts documentaries on authors from the past. Here’s one from Oct 23, 2023: E. E. Cummings documentary. Edward Estlin Cummings (October 14, 1894 – September 3, 1962), often written in all lowercase as e e cummings, was an American poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright. He wrote approximately 2,900 poems, two autobiographical novels, four plays, and several essays. He is often regarded as one of the most important American poets of the 20th century. Cummings is associated with modernist free-form poetry. Much of his work has idiosyncratic syntax and uses lower-case spellings for poetic expression.
— Written and compiled (citing sources) by Ken Chawkin for The Uncarved Blog.
Here is another earlier poem, written sometime in the late 80’s or early 90’s, when I was filling in as an extra Maharishi Ayurvedic health technician during an exclusive weekend for special guests at what is now called the Maharishi Ayurveda Health Center Lancaster in Massachusetts.
In the staff dining room over lunch, I met a former concert violinist who had recently switched careers to become a Maharishi Ayurveda massage therapist. When I asked her why she stopped playing in the symphony she said her arms had been giving her problems. As a result of encountering Maharishi Ayurveda, she took treatments and then felt it would be more nourishing for her to become a therapist and treat others.
We talked about poetry and music, how reading words or notes on paper didn’t really bring a poem or piece of music to life; it had to be recited or played, and appreciated by an audience. That discussion inspired me, and during a quiet moment there, I wrote Better Read Than Dead.
Better Read Than Dead
Better read than dead, better said than read.
Poems are not meant to be just words left for dead on a page.
They’re meant to be read alive instead to an audience from a stage.
The blue print is not the building,
nor is a picture of it,
nor a vision of it.
When two beams of focused light intersect
through a piece of film
they fill the place before them with a form of light
in three-dimensional space.
When two beams of focused attention intersect
through a poet’s words,
speech going through them, silence receiving them,
they fill the space in the heart with a form of feeling.
From the heart, through the mouth, to the ear, into the heart, in here.
© Ken Chawkin
Later Updated with these relevant posts: Sometimes Poetry Happens: a poem about the mystery of creativity, and Celebrating Poetry Month with one of my poems, Poetry—The Art of the Voice, and what inspired it. It includes links to interviews from The Diane Rehm Show with Bill Moyers and poets Marge Piercy, Mark Strand, and Jane Hirshfield, who were included in his PBS poetry special: Fooling with Words with Bill Moyers.
“Be patient, listen quietly, the writing will come. The voice of the writing will tell you what to do.” — Donald M. Murray, America’s writing teacher.
I came across a poem my son Nathanael wrote 20 years ago, a month after he turned eleven. A few weeks into the school year, his Grade Six teacher at Maharishi School gave the students a writing assignment. Their homework was to write a poem for class the next day. The pressure was on. I don’t recall much of the details, but I do remember Nathanael saying he had a problem with this. We discussed it. He felt strongly that you couldn’t force a poem into existence; it had to come naturally, from inspiration. I agreed and suggested he express that idea somehow in his poem. He was determined to send his teacher a message. What he wrote blew me away. He was inspired!
INSPIRATION
A poem comes naturally,
Not forced, not assigned, not sought for.
A poem should be inspired,
Not under pressure, surely not, for,
A poem is spontaneous, creative. How?
It is the nature of the poem to slip out.
That’s what you must allow.
So sit back and relax
For you must be patient,
And of course, do not rush.
A poem comes naturally,
Here it comes,
Hush.
© Nathanael Chawkin
September 24, 1991
This idea of allowing, even encouraging writing to come spontaneously reminds me of a poem written by William Stafford—A Course in Creative Writing, in response to educators at a conference expecting writing instructors to clearly spell out how and what their students should write, and by implication, to praise or blame them accordingly. This left no room for students, or their teachers, to express their own creativity, and no guidance to help them find their own voice, something that was not part of their methodology.
Stafford was about process, not necessarily product, and acted more as a facilitator than an instructor. He tried hard to not offer any praise or blame, fearing students would then write to please him and not themselves. He also avoided giving students any grades in his classes. I think they would grade themselves or each other based on their evaluation of their work. You can imagine the frustration this must have caused the administration. He was considered an odd ball, a heretic to the status quo at that time. But that would change. His approach would start a revolution in the teaching of creative writing.
This poem, William Stafford—You and Art, speaks volumes about the writer who is open to “making mistakes” and following his own voice down new paths of expression. It’s a beautiful description of the maturation of an artist and the source of inspiration. You can read more William Stafford poems on my blog.
Another great exponent of teaching writing was Donald M. Murray. A journalist, Murray was invited to teach journalism at the University of New Hampshire. He admittedly knew nothing about teaching, but was obviously an accomplished writer, having won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing in 1954 at the age of 29. So he looked to his own process as a writer and broke it down into the different stages he would go through to end up with a polished piece of writing.
One of Murray’s earliest books, Learning By Teaching, is a selection of articles on writing and teaching. It’s filled with examples of the steps he would go through as a writer, writing and rewriting to gain clarity; the stages of teaching he evolved through, from lecturer, to modeler, to facilitator, to getting out of the way; and quotes about writing by other writers. We used it as our textbook in a workshop to become writing facilitators. We learned how to conduct writing conferences to help students with their writing. The course taught me a lot about the craft of writing, the different stages, from pre-writing, to draft, to rewriting, editing, to final draft, and the teaching of it.
A comprehensive book on Murray and his work was published October 2009 by Heinemann: The Essential Don Murray: Lessons From America’s Greatest Writing Teacher. I love the opening quote from the book’s press release: New book offers lessons from writing teacher Don Murray. It affirms my son’s sentiment: “Be patient, listen quietly, the writing will come. The voice of the writing will tell you what to do.” — Don Murray.
Murray helped Donald Graves with his writing. Graves started a revolution by watching how young children wrote in school. He brought what he had learned from Murray into the classroom and taught teachers how to become writers themselves, then how to apply this approach with their students. Read this excellent article by Kimberly Swick Slover about Graves called The Write Way. It also mentions how Murray turned him into a writer. Same thing in this excellent video interview with Donald H. Graves and Penny Kittle.
Now creative writing classes are student-centered and process-oriented, with teachers openly modeling their own process as writers, and facilitating students to do the same, allowing and enabling them to become genuine writers, from draft to publication.
Although I never had the opportunity to meet or study with either Murray or Stafford, both were seminal influences. They acted as a guide from the side, not a sage from the stage. They taught about writing as writers and poets in classes, workshops, and through their articles, interviews, books and poems. I thank them for helping me, and thousands of other writers and teachers, to better understand the writing process.
Here is one of my first poems on the subject, Writing—a poem on the writing process. After the poem, I add a short piece about Murray and Stafford. I would share these poems and thoughts with Nathanael. It seemed to have gone deeply into him. Like father, like son.
Other inspiring posts about writing are: Writers on Writing–What Writing Means To Writers, Elizabeth Gilbert—Some Thoughts On Writing, and Words of Wisdom on Writing from Literary Lights. You may also enjoy Burghild Nina Holzer inspires us to write and discover who we are and what we have to say.
Also see A Tanka about my son’s Aikido teacher.
A new post: The perils of praise or blame for young writers. New ways to help students find their own voice.
Some people whistle while they work; I write poems. I wrote a poem on my first day working for the Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation as a paper-picker in Queen Elizabeth Park. It was in the mid-1990’s, during winter, and I remember noticing that berries on trees had turned white.
The regular park attendant left each year to go to California for the winter and he was looking for a temporary replacement. Some friends who had done the job for him the previous year asked me if I was interested. I told them I was and suggested they arrange a meeting.
Turns out he was a poet and a spiritual seeker who had been to India to spend time with his guru. We talked about meditation and shared some of our poetry. I admired his nature poems written from his experiences in the park. They were rhapsodic. I remember him telling me that every tree in the park knew him. He arranged for me to take his job for the winter, and we negotiated my staying in his place, the park facility across the street in Hillsdale Park.
I was very lucky to have gotten that job by referral, by default. That’s what his boss implied since he had to approve me for the position. He wasn’t too happy with the arrangement but went along with it. He said many people were on a waiting list to become a paper-picker or a caretaker in one of the city parks, prized positions that paid well.
When the person I had replaced returned, the Parks Board manager offered me a job for the summer, going to Stanley Park and other city facilities along the public beaches, cleaning up and replacing soap and paper supplies in public washrooms. That was an afternoon job with a lady. We would travel as a team in one of the Park vans.
But the winter job kept me active, walking miles each day, spent mostly in nature, in a beautiful park setting. It was what I needed at the time. And I made more money doing that than my other job teaching kids writing after school at a Sylvan Learning Center in North Vancouver.
As a city employee, I had become a member of the local blue collar union. My responsibilities included cleaning the public washrooms early in the mornings, the gardeners’ facilities on Sundays, and walking the park grounds picking up trash. That wasn’t too bad in the winter compared to the summer when a lot of people used the park for picnics.
In the early mornings, I’d see many Chinese people doing their Tai Chi and walking around. When I’d walk by they’d tell me I had the best job—I was getting my exercise and getting paid! But having to work outside in the often cold, windy, rainy weather was not something I looked forward to. So to help me get through those days, I’d repeat something Maharishi had told us about work: “See the job; do the job; stay out of the misery.”
It was good to just do physical work for a change, be simple, appreciate nature, and compose poems when inspired to do so as I walked around. I kept myself amused that way. Here’s an example. On that first day as I was walking in the park, I thought of how things grow in nature, and their relationships, like those whitened berries, and the birds who ate them. Every time I share this poem with kids, they squeal with delight!
Berries are meant to be eaten by birds
who poop out the seeds contained in their turds
this process prepares seeds to sprout in the spring
’til one day they’re trees and in them birds sing
Here are a few more poems written while working in that Vancouver City Park. I was walking along the park lawn picking up trash when I almost got hit by a falling acorn. I looked up and saw a tall oak tree. That was funny, I thought. Did that tree try to get me? What a sense of humor! I chuckled to myself and wrote this haiku.
I Wonder
Do trees have a say
When to drop anchors away
As ripe acorns fall?
I noticed that crows used to climb on top of the large garbage cans and pull out the trash. Not only did we have to pick up trash dropped by visitors to the park, we also had to contend with the animals, like crows, ducks, geese, seagulls, squirrels, and racoons. Here’s a little poem I made up while walking among the gardens, ponds and lawns. It went something like this.
Along the path
comes the paper-picking man,
picking up paper
as fast as he can.
Sparrows fly like arrows
among the underbrush,
foraging for food,
they’re always in a rush.
Crows put their nose
into every garbage can,
pulling out the trash
for the paper-picking man.
There were stanzas about ducks quibbling over crackers, and squirrels stashing nuts. You get the idea. That was one way to keep from getting bored on the job. Speaking of geese, having spent years in Iowa, seeing cows grazing in the countryside, the first time I went downtown to Stanley Park, I saw Canada Geese grazing on the park lawns. A very strange sight, to me, at the time. It sparked this haiku.
Canadian Geese
Grazing on the park’s green grass
Downtown city cows.
On one of my walks another day, I was playing with words and came up with this seemingly nonsensical fun poem about transformation.
Bats, Birds, & Words
A Bat is a Rat with Wings
A Bird is a Word that Sings
A Cat eats the Rat
The Bird eats its Word
A Bird is Aword with Wings
I used to go for walks with a friend in Cates Park, located in Deep Cove, a little seaside village situated on the eastern edge of the District of North Vancouver. In that park along the Burrard Inlet there is a walk called the Malcolm Lowry Walk, named after author, Malcolm Lowry, who squatted in the park from 1940-1954 in a shack with his wife Margerie. He wrote much of his classic novel, Under the Volcano (1947), there. John Huston made it into a movie by the same name (1984). This short trail takes you through a forest path, past a children’s play area, then along the waterfront to a nice pebble beach with a view of Indian Arm.
On one walk, I noticed a bunch of smooth rocks along the roadside. I thought it was odd for these water-worn rocks to be by the road instead of on the beach. I began thinking of that childhood tune of sticks and stones breaking bones, and was drawn to one of the rocks. It spoke to me. It cracked me up with it’s cosmic sense of humor; I had to write it down. After I wrote the poem, I picked up the rock and took it home.
Deep Cove River Rock
From the Road
Says its Thing
I’ve been Told
Make No Bones
About This
Of All Stones
I AM ONE!
© Ken Chawkin
These two poems, Being in Nature, and its sequel, trees—a poem about the nature of trees, were a gift from a tree on the edge of the UBC Endowment Lands, another park in Vancouver. I also went to Lynn Canyon Park in Lynn Valley, North Vancouver. Check out the Virtual Tour. I took the Suspension Bridge across the ravine to walk in the rainforest. Along one of the trails I noticed these beautiful small white flowers at the base of a very tall tree, which inspired another haiku, Forest Flowers. It was later published in a group, 13 Ways to Write Haiku: A Poet’s Dozen for The Dryland Fish, and in Five Haiku for This Enduring Gift.
Forest Flowers
tiny white flowers
a constellation of stars
so low yet so high
Since we’re on a favorite topic, trees, see What Do Trees Do? Something to think about, also written when I was living in North Vancouver; and these two more recent poems from Fairfield, Iowa: Willow Tree – a tanka – from a tree’s perspective, and Friendship – another tree tanka, about two trees in front of my house.
More poems were written during my stay in Vancouver and surrounding locales, but we’ll have to leave those for another time, before this post turns into the chapter of a book!
If you plan to visit Vancouver, check out some of these wonderful parks. There’s a reason they call it Super, Natural British Columbia. Watch this 90-second video made for the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, Vancouver 2010: You Gotta Be Here – Super Natural British Columbia, featuring British Columbians Michael J. Fox, Ryan Reynolds, Erick McCormack, Kim Cattrall, Steve Nash, and Sarah McLachlan.
If you’re in Vancouver, BC, a Dec 6, 2023 video created by Canadian travel videographer Les McDonald might inspire you to visit Vancouver Island Canada: What to Do The Ultimate Insider’s Guide. If you’re really feeling adventuresome, see this documentary he made featuring The Real Canadian Rockies: Banff, Jasper, Kootenay, and Yoho National Parks.
Les includes views of the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise. That was the sublime setting for a meditation course I had attended, June 9-14, 1968. It was memorialized in a CBC documentary, Maharishi at Lake Louise.
— Written and compiled (citing sources) by Ken Chawkin for The Uncarved Blog.
The Uncarved Blog 