Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Shower Song




---to be read over a cool, funky, beat…(with melismatic soulful vocals weaving in and out)

Have you ever had a cold, sore throat, and congestion
And someone tells you to drink tea or chicken soup?
Well, I sure have….
But the best advice a doctor
ever gave me was to stand beneath a hot shower
and drink, and take big gargles and gulps!
Turn the shower temperature as high as you can
(if it’s too hot for your skin, you can step out of the way
so the water just meets your mouth)
Don’t worry about the pipes being dirty…
The flowing hot water is clean
The force of the flow is more powerful
Than any tea in the most pristine cup.
The hot flowing water is the active healing ingredient.
It can clear the excess mucus, which is the source of many ailments.

Of course, the media will not say this very much—
Nor will most doctors (or licensed health care practitioners,
or “wellness coaches” working for Kaiser Permanente).
They got bottled water, and pills and sugary cough syrup to sell.
And most doctors may fear losing their jobs if they dare say it
But Dr. Matsumura is old school; he spoke to me in my sickness….
A shower’s strength to cleanse is not skin deep.
We can open our mouth to drink the flowing heat, the hot flow
In ways that go beyond the tea and bathtub!

800 years ago, an Asian poet named Rumi wrote:
“A story is like the water/you heat for your bath.
It takes messages between the fire and your skin
It lets them meet, and it cleans you!”
The shower does all this, and more.
The shower’s more like music, more like soul music especially.
It makes the fire and water a friend.
You feel it in your body first.
It puts words in their proper place.
It lets you stand, and even dance
And be both passive and active
And stretch your entire body
And loosen your limping lips, and sing
Like with a congregation in the church
Where many amateurs make a more powerful sound together
Than the proper music pros and their gadgets….

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