TELLING IT STRAIGHT
In Bahai communities, even during the third epoch and the early years of the forth when communities in the West were mostly small, a pioneer like myself, who was much like a travel teacher, came across an amazing variety of human types. This poem is about one person who represented a type, a type which T.W. Adorno called The Authoritarian Personality. I have come across this type both within and without religious communities. It's the sense that 'I know and you don't' which is at the heart of the problem, among other essential features of the problem.-Ron Price, Pioneering Over Three Epochs, Unpublished Manuscript.
She was a wonderful soul,
one of those who never have
a hairs breadth of deviation
and always reminding you
of the standard, enough moralizing
to make you either afraid or ill.
Looking back I think she frightened
the pants off everyone who came
anywhere near her at Feasts
and deepenings and things.
But she was such an outstanding soul;
they even named buildings after her--
Maybe it doesnt matter
if people are afraid of you.
Maybe her style was just
another form of love.
She was a good looking woman
whom I always tried to avoid,
but couldnt. She was always there
at the meetings , part of the solid core,
like the stuff at the centre of the earth
which is iron like nails, but liquid
with a beauty all its own
and a kind of mystery.
I love her now, when she crosses
my minds eye; no fear lives in my heart
when I see her beauty and hear her talk
about this Cause. I wonder where the fear went.
Is it because I got older and moved on?
Is it because she died and I prayed for her?
Is it simply because she was so beautiful,
the fear softened with the years?
I dont know, but I wonder if
the history books will ever tell the story--
or will everyone be too afraid
to tell it straight, how it was back then,
at least for some of us.
Ron Price
4 January 1998
In Bahai communities, even during the third epoch and the early years of the forth when communities in the West were mostly small, a pioneer like myself, who was much like a travel teacher, came across an amazing variety of human types. This poem is about one person who represented a type, a type which T.W. Adorno called The Authoritarian Personality. I have come across this type both within and without religious communities. It's the sense that 'I know and you don't' which is at the heart of the problem, among other essential features of the problem.-Ron Price, Pioneering Over Three Epochs, Unpublished Manuscript.
She was a wonderful soul,
one of those who never have
a hairs breadth of deviation
and always reminding you
of the standard, enough moralizing
to make you either afraid or ill.
Looking back I think she frightened
the pants off everyone who came
anywhere near her at Feasts
and deepenings and things.
But she was such an outstanding soul;
they even named buildings after her--
Maybe it doesnt matter
if people are afraid of you.
Maybe her style was just
another form of love.
She was a good looking woman
whom I always tried to avoid,
but couldnt. She was always there
at the meetings , part of the solid core,
like the stuff at the centre of the earth
which is iron like nails, but liquid
with a beauty all its own
and a kind of mystery.
I love her now, when she crosses
my minds eye; no fear lives in my heart
when I see her beauty and hear her talk
about this Cause. I wonder where the fear went.
Is it because I got older and moved on?
Is it because she died and I prayed for her?
Is it simply because she was so beautiful,
the fear softened with the years?
I dont know, but I wonder if
the history books will ever tell the story--
or will everyone be too afraid
to tell it straight, how it was back then,
at least for some of us.
Ron Price
4 January 1998
