October 3, 2007
Your Honour, Mr. Chancellor, Mr. President, distinguished guests, graduands, ladies and gentlemen.... I wish to acknowledge the First Nations people on whose traditional territory we are conducting this ceremony.
It is my privilege to offer some words today on the occasion of your convocation at Simon Fraser University. I have chosen to do so by meditating on a short poem by Rainier Maria Rilke as translated by Robert Bly. I shall begin and end with these eight lines entitled…
“Circling for a thousand years”
“I live my life in growing orbits which move out over the things of the world perhaps I can never achieve the last but that will be my attempt.
I am circling around God, around the ancient tower, and I have been circling for a thousand years and I still don't know if I am a falcon, or a storm, or a great song.”
You live in a hall of mirrors. That is to say: everything you experience is in an essential way, an interpretive way, a reflection of yourself. The orbits of the poet are the expanding and subtle interpretations you are able to apply to the events of your life. We at the university through your liberal education are here to say: look beyond the surface of what you see for other meanings. Look beyond the close-in orbits of moon and planets, to orbits of meaning that lie further afield.
Don’t be imprisoned by first impressions, by reflexive responses. Inquire after the meaning you bring to events. Is the event orbiting you? Or are you in orbit around the event? We may apprehend an experience and derive benefit from it, a widening of our orbit, or, captured, we may be caught in its thrall. We ourselves may fall into a spin around the fascination of an experience. We can think of the mirror’s reflection as ourself and in the process lose ourself. We at the university hope to have helped you find your ground, your centre, so that this loss of Self in a hall of mirrors is resisted and your centre holds.
We at the university have sought to grow the orbits open to your observation in range and colour. In tone and mode. In sensitivity and sensibility. You can go forward and reflect on what is before you in multiple ways, taking an active, assertive role in arranging the realm of your perception. Sometimes you will direct by indirection and act through passivity. You will be aggressive by waiting a beat and looking again or imagining that you are the reflection, standing in an outer orbit, thereby gaining another and fresh vantage point.
A few days ago I was walking on a downtown city street, late at night, when the only business taking place was the pursuit of pleasure. Standing in the mouth of an alleyway was a mounted policeman, horse and man impeccably groomed in leather, metal, and twill and poised and they lazily ambled out into the street among the revellers. In this image I could see how one who had never seen a horse, an Aztec, could mistake the two as one super-being, a centaur. I reflected on the tension I felt between fear and awe. Between wariness and wonder as this ponderous man-beast moved along the pavement on its noisy hooves. And in the midst of the postmodern city, with its glorious technology and proud sophistication, this force of nature invited any challenge. Asserted its primal authority and reminded me of the flesh and bones that lie at the source of us.
The next day, during a sunny afternoon, I was headed into an arcade when I heard music. On the sidewalk, under a canopy that led to a tall, enclosed entryway, was a young woman, dressed in cotton, barefoot, playing sentimental songs on a violin. She was an image of vulnerability, aesthetic beauty, and gentility, playing for the dollars dropped by passersby. She had selected her stage such that the stone of the city resonated her melodies and she stood plainly on the pavement feeling her music personally as she played. On the same block, within the same 24 hours I thought of the contrasts that comprise our lives, the challenge of reconciling them, and the exuberance of the journey to do so. She was the antithesis of power and control, she played for free and she stood defenseless among the crowds. Only art and civilization protected her and they did so by welcoming the other in.
May you be able to see that the mirrors reflect the depth and beauty of your spirit. May the orbits ever lead outward without your centre being lost or clung to in excess or obsession. May the reflections recall the joy of childhood and the vitality of youth. May they cause your heart to rise and your mind to celebrate the whorling patterns of Nature from which we come.
Arrange a narrative so that your dreams flood into your waking hours and remind you of the life you wish to have, of the orbit of your imagined Self, your potential Self. Waking life is a dream of the Self.
Arrange a narrative that understands that others are a part of you and you of them. That under the surface of individuality, our roots are interconnected like a great grove of evergreens that grow tall in shallow soil only by mutual interdependence. We feel one another’s joy and pain. The compassion we extend to others awakens our own depth of feeling. Widens our orbit and strengthens our centre.
Let a spirit of hope inspire your work and your life.
“I live my life in growing orbits which move out over the things of the world perhaps I can never achieve the last but that will be my attempt.
I am circling around God, around the ancient tower, and I have been circling for a thousand years and I still don't know if I am a falcon, or a storm, or a great song.” |
| Last Updated October 24, 2007 |  |