Introlude
(intro- "inward, to the inside" + ludus "a game, play”) Some guiding words to help ground you in your experience of Little Cosmic Missives
On April 21, 2023 I awoke from a dream in which I was powerfully visited by a force informing me that it was time to begin sharing my writing more widely, and more publicly. As it woke me from the dream, the word "Substack" rang out clearly in my head, and I knew that this was to be the platform for my sharing.
For as long as I can remember I have received richly colorful, narrative visions. Similar in character to waking dreams, these visions regularly come with poetic dictations. I have shared these sparsely over the years, keeping them largely to myself. It has only been in the last couple years that they have begun requesting to be offered up to a larger audience.
On this platform I will publish various inspired pieces that ask to be shared with you. And through Substack, you will have the opportunity to receive these immediately to your email—a little treasure to enrich and delighten your day. Many have shared with me the meaningful synchronicities they have found in the visions and poems that are sent through me. While I hesitate to claim particular ownership over these ‘missives’—so often ‘dictated’ word-for-word to me—I do take joyous responsibility for presenting them to the world.
You can expect to receive around one missive a week, sometimes more and sometimes less, and always fresh off the press (while I may share visions/pieces from my personal archives, I will almost exclusively be offering new pieces here). I will share them about as soon after receiving them as I can digitally transcribe them, so that they can be more active participants in whatever collective processes may currently be underway. I warmly invite you to pass along these little missive enchantments to anyone you may feel moved to share them with, who may find the words resonant to and amplifying of their own experience of our ever-evolving present.
About the Name
The name of this publication, ‘Little Cosmic Missives’, arrived in reflections from dear friends and loved ones who have been sent my writings over the years. This language is how they described the experience of receiving my poetic transmissions. The exact arrangement of ‘little cosmic missive(s)’ showed up three times in response to a piece of writing I sent out just before receiving my dream, from three separate, independent readers. When you hear three knocks at the door, you answer—or at least, I always do.
In contemplating these three words, I found myself alive in the playfulness that existed between and within them. To illustrate some of what I saw:
LITTLE: lit-, as in ‘a fire was lit’, as in literary; while -tle brings to mind turtle, myrtle, subtle, gentle, epistle, thistle. A belittled thing is often so-said as to mark its lesser/un-importance (yet, how often do we find that what seems insignificant may, under that façade, be ever so significant?). Something little is something small, but in a funny, endearing sort of way—little one, little sister, little brother, little sibling, little love.
COSMIC: from kosmos, the mysteriously, ‘self-evidently’ ordered reality in which we routinely find ourselves. An acknowledging nod to That Which Orders this itinerant reality, to the ordering infrastructure, to the “implicate order” (of Bohm); the sourceplace of the forceful ‘dictations’ which arrive, so often, to wake me in the early pre-dawn hours and demand I transcribe them. And -mic, like microphone—“I’m your flute / I only drink / from your lips / unless you play me / I have no sound / of my own / if you see me silent / I’m treasuring / your sweetness within” (Rumi, trans. N. Khalili).
MISSIVES: a letter, often quite long (how appropriate for them to then be little, or else ‘little’), sent personally. Miss- like ‘I’ve Missed you’, like Mission, like subMissive—surrendering to the intrinsic will which guides us and moves our ‘hand’, to write, to transmit, to transmute what comes before us, what comes through us.
I offer my deepest gratitude to the generosity and magic of those who have received, reflected, and/or been bemused by my writing over the past decade, who have supported me to this day. May we all find helpful, amusing ‘knocks’ in the little cosmic missives to come, and all-ready here~
Little Cosmic Missives is a reader-supported publication. The various paid subscription tiers are available for those who may feel moved to support my work in this way. Whatever tier you may choose, I am so grateful for your interest in receiving these Little Cosmic Missives—always at timely moments—over the coming days, months, years.