awakening<\/a>. That is even as we are passing things composed of many things, we emerge in this world a miracle. And there is a saving insight that is accessible to us all with which dukkha becomes something different.<\/p>\nI note that it was on this day, the 27th of January, in 1967 that during a test of the Apollo 1 a cabin fire killed Command pilot Gus Grissom, and his co-pilots Ed White and Robert Chaffee. Beyond the personal tragedies it was a major setback in the American space program.<\/p>\n
Me, I was nineteen at the time. Like most all children in the country I followed the space program avidly from the announcement of Sputnik when I was nine years old, to sitting with friends and watching a snowy black and white television broadcasting Neil Armstrong\u2019s first step onto the moon\u2019s surface two years after Gus, Ed, and Robert\u2019s terrible deaths.<\/p>\n
I continue to be interested in the exploration of space. And, in some visceral way I hope the stars are our destiny.\u00a0Probably not. I believe it more likely we will kill ourselves off before we have the ability to reach out to the stars. We are such a bloody minded species.<\/p>\n
But. Or, maybe it is and.\u00a0Maybe part of why I like Star Trek a bit more than Star Wars. There is something beautiful in that reaching out. Just that reaching out.<\/p>\n
Yes, there is an important admonishment on the Zen way about letting the ten thousand things advance to you rather than going out to the ten thousand things. A critical practice point. And, at the same time there is something as natural as breathing in reaching out. And if our hearts are open in a moment we can lose our sense of who is reaching out to whom.<\/p>\n
The magic of the open heart, the miracle of the wide open mind. When we forget our certainties, who is reaching out to whom?<\/p>\n
Then there is simply that reaching. At the same time it contains within it so much.<\/p>\n
As\u00a0I noticed this anniversary I found myself thinking of two things. First, when Ronald Regan, not my favorite politician, but, following another tragedy of the space program did what a president should do. He reached out a hand and offered a healing word. In that moment, which I find echoed in my heart today, he recited John Gillespie Magee\u2019s sonnet High Flight<\/em>.<\/p>\nOh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,<\/em>
\n And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;<\/em>
\n Sunward I\u2019ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth<\/em>
\n Of sun-split clouds, \u2013and done a hundred things<\/em>
\n You have not dreamed of \u2013Wheeled and soared and swung<\/em>
\n High in the sunlit silence. Hov\u2019ring there<\/em>
\n I\u2019ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung<\/em>
\n My eager craft through footless halls of air\u2026<\/em>
\n Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue<\/em>
\n I\u2019ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace<\/em>
\n Where never lark or even eagle flew \u2014<\/em>
\n And, while with silent lifting mind I\u2019ve trod<\/em>
\n The high untrespassed sanctity of space,<\/em>
\n Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.<\/em><\/p>\nHumans. The worst of animals. The most beautiful of animals.<\/p>\n
What a piece of work\u2026<\/p>\n
As William Shakespeare sang and has been reusing so many times<\/p>\n
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