Imaginal Journal
Imagination is Medicine
Run Sister Run by Cass McCombs
"Run Sister Run" by Cass McCombs from the album 'Mangy Love'
Director: Rachael Pony Cassells
Run Sister Run director’s statement:
"The video for Run Sister Run was made in collaboration with young Indigenous leader, activist and athlete Tracie Léost and her family. Run Sister Run brought to my mind thoughts of great female athletes ¬ their discipline, strength and accomplishment, the ritual of preparation before a race. Running can be a powerful political act and tool for change. I remember Australian Aboriginal runner Cathy Freeman’s 2000 Olympic win and victory lap carrying both the Australian and Aboriginal flag and how much impact that one run had (and the great controversy that ensued questioning her right to carry the Aboriginal flag at The Olympics which only recognized the Australian national flag.) Listening to Run Sister Run, I remembered reading an article a friend had forwarded me about Tracie’s solo 115km Journey of Hope run for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in Canada last year. Her run was a rally cry against then Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s repeated denial of a proposed public inquiry into MMIW in Canada. She was to me the embodiment of the archetype of the runner as messenger and therefore as protector. Her strength and determination is very inspiring. I remembered reading about Tracie’s feet being shredded from blisters on the first day of her run and how she kept going by running a day in traditional moccasins to allow her blisters to heal. I contacted her and asked if I she would re¬trace her run’s path for the Run Sister Run video. She agreed and is such a natural leader, she also became my location producer, enlisting her whole family to help. We filmed her from her mom’s truck with her mom driving. Her grandfather built a perfect rig to further steady my camera from hay bales and blankets and rode along in the car while we filmed. We stayed at her grandparents house for the first leg of filming, the Métis flag featured in the video was in their yard. Tracie’s father joined us for the Winnipeg leg of the filming so we had almost all of her original Journey of Hope support and logistics crew involved in helping me re¬create her journey for the video. The history of women running in film contains so many images of women filmed from behind, running in fear filmed from the p.o.v of an attacker. It was important to me to not add to the visual history of women running in fear and only film Tracie running forward towards the camera looking forward, her body fearlessly re¬claiming public space."
Below
In response to this time in our social-political climate, I am diving into the night, pooling energy, feeling the collective and intimate pulse that is below.
I am ready to move forward and do all I can to support healing and awareness in this world. And when I say I am with Her, I mean the planet, and the Her in every human being that carries the secret hurt in their feminine nature felt sense/intuition/body/emotion, that has been subjugated by a culture of patriarchal distorted values and immature polarized thinking. Since a majority of our collective psyche has chosen to face the shadow of consumerism/greed, narcissism, sexism/misogyny, racism, classism, religious intolerance, homophobia, and xenophobia in this leader, I welcome this temporary guest to show us what it truly means to uprise for the otherness in ourselves and integrate what we have long rejected within and projected onto others. We have been initiated to see how every American feels marginalized and deepen into that compassion and complexity to write a new mythology that supports global responsibility and unity for the human narrative of truth, hope, justice, and equality to thrive.
Making Conscious
“There is no coming to consciousness without pain. People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own soul. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”
We the People by A Tribe Called Quest
Chappelle and A Tribe Called Quest nailing a moment in time.
Mr. Cohen, Thank You
In my life, I have been cynical about many a great deal of people but never Leonard Cohen. His charisma, wit, and voice are singular. His sincerity and poetic resonance gave me a sense of how I am valuable in this world just by being true without an egoic agenda or persona. His music and lyrics touch the depths of my heart, unlike any other artist. To me, he was and will always remain a soul ambassador. Thank you, Mr. Cohen, you are my man.
If you want a lover
I'll do anything you ask me to
And if you want another kind of love
I'll wear a mask for you
If you want a partner, take my hand, or
If you want to strike me down in anger
Here I stand
I'm your man
If you want a boxer
I will step into the ring for you
And if you want a doctor
I'll examine every inch of you
If you want a driver, climb inside
Or if you want to take me for a ride
You know you can
I'm your man
Ah, the moon's too bright
The chain's too tight
The beast won't go to sleep
I've been running through these promises to you
That I made and I could not keep
Ah, but a man never got a woman back
Not by begging on his knees
Or I'd crawl to you baby and I'd fall at your feet
And I'd howl at your beauty like a dog in heat
And I'd claw at your heart, and I'd tear at your sheet
I'd say please (please)
I'm your man
And if you've got to sleep a moment on the road
I will steer for you
And if you want to work the street alone
I'll disappear for you
If you want a father for your child
Or only want to walk with me a while across the sand
I'm your man
If you want a lover
I'll do anything you ask me to
And if you want another kind of love
I'll wear a mask for you
The Invitation
The Invitation
It doesn't interest me what you do for a living.
I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.
It doesn't interest me how old you are.
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.
It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon.
I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain!
I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it.
I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true.
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.
I want to know if you can see beauty even when it's not pretty, every day, and if you can source your own life from its presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, "Yes!"
It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up, after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done to feed the children.
It doesn't interest me who you know or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.
It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.
by Oriah Mountain Dreamer