Written January 20, 2017.

I wrote this morning to a man sitting in some pain and confusion. I feel it also. Maybe this will resonate for you. If you’re a man with some of my out-facing characteristics, it may be easy to feel like a target right now, even with those we care for and who we are actively working for justice and dignity with.

Here’s the thing I’m slowly learning. *I can hold the target without being the target.* This is the martial art that the times demand from me. This is the nonviolent protest of the privileged that this karmic play is asking for.

Shouldering the weight of history, using gifts both earned and unearned, AND shielding our beautiful souls are all parts of the work for men right now. Know who you are. Let what is true land. Experience it. There may be fear, sadness, anger, shame there. (May there also be pride, gratitude, and excitement!) I keep looking in the mirror. Ah yes! I see that in me. And it does not define me. I am a royal flush, white, cis, straight, educated, middle class, able bodied … the list goes on. There is no way for me to experience the subjective reality of my sisters and brothers who were not born with my stacked deck. Don’t argue with reality. Reality wins.

Know that I am not my ancestors, and yet I carry their legacy. Know that I am not a ‘bad guy’ and yet I swim in the same unseen water of culture. I have absorbed the same messages, learned the behaviors, taken the bait more times than I can count. Know that I am not the patriarchy, and yet I am a beneficiary (and an unwilling symbol) of it.

I will never be a perfect ally. Sometimes … I won’t even feel like an ally. (to you or to me) This isn’t going to be pretty or easy. I’ll keep showing up anyway.

Can I hold the container? Can I make space for rage and heart-shattering grief, and BE the rock, be the river, be the soil? Sometimes. Sometimes the weight of it is collapsing me.

The intensity of the heat and the repetition of blows hardens the steel. Now is the time to hone our edges and learn to slice with the precision of dragonfly wings. Cut the people free from the restraints of gangrenous systems. I set down the bludgeon I have used against my brothers and sisters, but first let me plant one stake. This marks the corner of the new temple. Bring your shovels.

I’m not alone. You are not alone. There are many brothers out here feeling this pain, and working together. I stand with HER … the big global her that is emergent. To be part of this emergence, I am asked to dig deep and bring forth the best of HIM — and there is SO MUCH power, compassion, and solidarity there to call forth. I will continue to be what I want to see as much as I can. I will stand with. Sometimes right now that means standing behind. This does not make me second, or less, or sub, or oppressed.

The weight of my legacy of privilege is immense. It is weight that I can use to help move the lever of history.

Updating my calendar

I noticed
our meetings were still active
live occurrences
three times a week

the pop-up
was unerringly clear

You’re deleting an event.

there’s a dialog box
with three choices
two of them I hate
one is impossible

these empty spaces

the next time
someone clicks
my booking link
there will be more options

I’m trying to imagine
some time from now
when that won’t hurt

buddhas
leave a trail
of broken things
on the way
to the bodhi tree

they
step in shit
they get
un, non, mis
anti-transcendent
raging and throwing
tantrums

like children
tied to their
toys
rapt attention
attached

eventually
their purpose served
things that can break
fall away

all the knots unravel

not now
not yet
not this
not ready

there is always
a contraction
a last spasm
before
the look
of astonishment
settles in

child like

here
open this gift
of empty
perfection

simply put
life
can only happen
right
fucking
now

my friend’s
voice deepens
the moment lengthens
and the thread
connects

to the
absolute
present

he is
an invitation
to
the essence
alive in this moment

“I am not my ego
I am awareness
that observes it.”

nothing is broken
just different

Here I am
now
recipient of this gift
when so long
I thought
I was the giver

thank you
friend
I love you

that’s where I
should have started

I’ve buried the lead
following the thread
that doesn’t change

like Stafford’s The Way It Is

now you
friend
take a ride
through the hills
leaning into the curves

and take a walk
with the one you love
hold hands and kiss

sit yourself down
unwind
under thick branches
among the roots
of a live oak

drop me a line
when you arrive

for Michael Russer
my friend

Dear New Dad,

Your fear is welcome
here is a place where
you can lay it down

just for these few lines

that pain you feel in your chest
is a new kind of love
it is here to open you

there is no way
to resist it reframe it divert it avoid it
stop
don’t run
remember

let it transform you
and shine
magnified through the tears
in your eyes

let it penetrate
and unsettle in you
all that needs
to be shaken awake

to free it more
to burn away
what is dry and ready to go

let it unfold you
in those places where
you are creased and hidden
a seed splitting
in dark soil

let it reveal
in you
something unseen
a latent magic
made for this time

let it set the table
with community
gathering
within and without
green sprouts
and manna
to sustain you

you have a bounty
within you
let this love
bring the feast

Dear New Dad

there is fear
laid aside
just there

but this love
can hold it
let it

©2022 Boysen Hodgson

Congratulations to Brandon, Christine, and Bindi Rose Clift — born November 7, 2022.

a Gift Received and Offered

In about 3 weeks I will be on staff for a ManKind Project men’s weekend for the first time since 2013. I stopped staffing shortly before my wife and I became adoptive parents. Now … the kids are older and more regularly stable, and our family can handle separation and transition with more ease.

This will be the 12th time I’ve had this opportunity and responsibility. And it’s a serious responsibility. Hundreds of hours of effort by dozens of men across New England.

It was 2004 when I attended this training. It’s changed some since then. It keeps changing. And what continues to amaze me is that I can still feel and remember that weekend in April 2004 in my whole body. The feeling of aliveness, exhaustion, and connection.

I’m sitting with excitement, serious intention, and a healthy dose of fear. There will be men there, like me, who have been hiding out, disconnected, suffering, alone. There will be men there, like me, who are looking for more meaning, passion, and purpose in their lives. There will be men there, like me, who have believed they’ve found all the answers in the books they’ve read and the podcasts they’ve listened to and the accomplishments they’ve recorded. I honor that work.

And I also know what it’s like to be in a living breathing sacred space with men. It’s not only about our physical bodies. Our bodies come in a range of different configurations of parts and hormones, genes and neurons. It’s not only about our socialization. Our socialization looks all kinds of ways. It’s not only about the shared experiences and identities. I know men who have experiences that I can’t even imagine, and identities radically different than mine.

We hold an intention to learn through adventure and experience together what each of us has struggled to learn on our own. And somehow it works. Somehow a kind of magic is created.

I didn’t know that other men felt as I did. Now I believe that every man I meet shares some of the shadows and gold that I carry within. I didn’t know that there are men who can be trusted to hold the grief, anger, regret, shame, and fear of other men … along with joy, gratitude, tranquility, and wonder! Now I know because I have seen it and created space for it.

I didn’t know that there is a way of being with men that is supportive and purpose-filled … that builds each man up and helps him see more clearly the goodness, power, and responsibility he is gifted with in this life.

I didn’t know the joy of connecting and getting to know men so very different than me, and yet the same. Each man’s journey is unique. And that is part of the gift.

We can lessen the burden we carry and we can lessen the harm we inflict. We can forgive and find mercy. We can love better and communicate more fully. We can empower the best in one another, through our bodies, minds, hearts, and spirits.

Doing this has made possible the best things in my life — my relationships with my wife and my children.

That’s why I’ll give a significant amount of time to make this happen. That’s why I’ll be there and assist the men coming as participants.

It was a gift that other men created for me, without ever having met me.

How about you? Is this a gift you would like to receive?

https://newengland.mkpusa.org

maybe there is nothing new
that can be said
about a haunted house

all men
have one

maybe it’s not the house
but the man

spirits
in spite of best efforts
stick around

maybe it’s worth noting
that when the haunted
thing arrives
unbidden

mostly it wants nothing
but to be noticed

a man
will burn down the block
to not occupy space
with the spirit

when he
did not call it

and so it stretches
up into the smoke
and spreads itself out
pervasive

in every soft fingertip
of ashes
maybe it’s quieter
for a moment or two

in the blackened field
of the razed neighborhood
momentary
relief

then the sirens

what a man
refuses to see
will grow

it’s not the house
it’s worth noting
it’s quieter

when
he turns
and looks at it
the spirit

the thing haunting him

and grieves
and acknowledges
head bowed

usually
a soft rain can wash
the streaks
of ashes

from his face

5/12/2022

I remember
when I was ten
or eleven

being in my room
not mine really
I shared with two of my brothers

there were three mattresses
on the floor
and two battered dressers
and a closet

it was on the second floor
up the narrow steep stairs

the ceilings were
low on either side
sloped under the roof
covered in ancient wall paper

crooked farm house

anyway,
I remember

crying
wailing

I want to die
I want to die
I want to die

and thudding my head
against the glass

I think my Mom
had told me
we were moving

again

I don’t remember
motivations
were plentiful

the window looked out
over the front yard
there were maple trees

shading the whole front lawn
150 years old
planted when the house was new

I do remember
the glass in that window
there were ripples
in the surface

I didn’t know then
glass is still a liquid
even if it feels solid
slowly, so slowly
it changes

I didn’t hit it
hard enough to break it

I’m 51 now
and the maple tree in our yard
is 7 years old

What is the ‘Something’ that I should be doing? I see thousands of miles in every direction without moving or turning my head. There’s clear water in the Maldives. Bali is beautiful. And the graduates look stunning. Schooled. I see into the end game with every new tab opened and paragraph half read. I feel lost to follow-up and get back to and circle around to close the loops left open left and right and right. Now. There’s a massive die-off of farmed schools of salmon in New Zealand.

2000 tons of fresh fish in landfills. The soils of the Midwest are dying like school children, neglected and over-processed, largely ignored but for the corn-syrup saccharine platitudes, soy-bean snake-oil salesmen selling long-passed American dreams, and the amber waves of grain-fed cattle off-gassing in my timeline. You see the price of gas? Shocking. Elon heads to the bank to purchase free speech. Another break in Antarctic sheets.

It’s 105 degrees in Spain and 5 people I know are planning to walk the camino de Santiago this year. Insta wandering, I’m wondering. Is that doing something? Scientists in places far from here are screaming but their end is near sandwich boards cannot get attention over the din of separation. Division accusations multiply from god-fearing people peddling terror of transgender athletes ruining the gospel. It’s competitive sports cut down to what’s in your shorts. He and She and They and Them. All God! Damn! It doesn’t matter when winning and losing are both offensive to everything dying defenseless this minute.

Horrified Gene Roddenberry is sitting with Langston Hughes and the two of them can’t stop weeping. For the kids who die, uniforms red, exploring this strange new world. Malcolm and Moses are fighting again and nothing MLK can say will get them to let up and let their people go peacefully. Shop hopping Gandhi is looking for one thing home spun but the spinning wheels are running on an algorithm and all that’s woven is a narrative of numbing. Us. We keep saying … we need to do something. But the Edmund Pettus bridge is built to nowhere and we are all in bad trouble.

Thoughts and prayers. Future despair denied. More children just died. I pray for the families of the dead. We are all covid-coughing and sputtering our way to the grave. I pray that a new epic zombie limited series set in the near future will take me away. Thy will be done with one to the head. And post apocalypse say us all. The fight for Life for a monthly subscription. Church of the streaming service where all worshippers are welcome. The sons are here. The fathers are gone and we are surrounded by ghosts.

There are a baker’s dozen places to buy a gun within minutes of where I sit. Still. Around here in this every town rounds are easy to come buy. Stop by and see what’s new in recreational fun target shooting machinery of mass safety self-delusion. 2A rights, right? Hell yes! We the people say. Open late Friday. Get ready for the long weekend. Yes we can. A baker’s dozen, 13. Thirteenth amendment long overdue. Be proud and see red, white, and blue, clearly these rights to life and liberty are not for you. You already knew. The kids who die.

But what should I do?

5/28/2022
by Boysen Hodgson

He cleans up after himself.
He cleans up the planet.
He is a role model for young men.
He is rigorously honest and fiercely optimistic.

He holds himself accountable.
He knows what he feels.
He knows how to cry and he lets it go.
He knows how to rage without hurting others.
He knows how to fear and how to keep moving.
He seeks self-mastery.

He’s let go of childish shame.
He feels guilty when he’s done something wrong.
He is kind to men, kind to women, kind to children.
He teaches others how to be kind.
He says he’s sorry.

He stopped blaming women or his parents or men for his pain years ago.
He stopped letting his defenses ruin his relationships.
He stopped letting his penis run his life.
He has enough self respect to tell the truth.
He creates intimacy and trust with his actions.
He has men that he trusts and that he turns to for support.
He knows how to roll with it.
He knows how to make it happen.
He is disciplined when he needs to be.
He is flexible when he needs to be.
He knows how to listen from the core of his being.

He’s not afraid to get dirty.
He’s ready to confront his own limitations.
He has high expectations for himself and for those he connects with.
He looks for ways to serve others.
He knows he is an individual.
He knows that we are all one.
He knows he is an animal and a part of nature.
He knows his spirit and his connection to something greater.

He knows future generations are watching his actions.
He builds communities where people are respected and valued.
He takes responsibility for himself.
In times of need, he will be his brother’s keeper.

He knows his higher purpose.
He loves with fierceness.
He laughs with abandon, because he gets the joke.

This is a picture of mature masculine, of healthy masculinity — it is one redefinition of masculinity for the 21st century. By no means is this list complete. You are welcome to come and add your gifts to this community. www.mkp.org

©2010 Boysen Hodgson. All rights reserved.
Used with permission by the ManKind Project.

I hear you.

But how about we wait until you’ve had a chance to smell a box full of kittens.

How about we wait until you’ve been in the ocean again, holding for that big wave to catch you off guard and knock the wind out of you.

And what about one more time screaming in the rain as your clothes get soaked and you spin as the drops smack down on the pavement.
Streets washed clean in rivers of spring.

What if we waited until you actually hit that one note you’ve been working on in the shower for these past months.
It’s right there.
I hear they’re coming to NYC in July.

We could take the train.

Maybe until you’ve been in love.
Maybe until you’ve had your heart broken in love.

I don’t want you to miss that longing pounding crying pain.

And loved again.

What if we waited until you’ve made your first full turkey-day dinner.
Held hands awkwardly at the table.
And meant what you said.

Oh and there’s this time, to buy wine on your own,
The confounding abundance of it.
Maybe wait until you’ve ordered your first drink at the bar.

There’s something to be said for that first hangover as well

I think we all need a story about throwing up on someone we love.

What if we hold off until you’ve met someone.
What if we hold off until you’ve experienced god.

And the ocean — did I mention the ocean already?
It changes every time. It’s never the same. Not even once.

What if we waited until you saw the sun rise on one side of the island and set on the other side?

I’ll drive.

What if we spent a day just looking for one shell.
Not that one. That’s almost the one, but I think we should keep looking.

What if we waited until you’ve just watched your children open presents for their 8th Christmas.
Or 9th. That’s the one I think. It just, I don’t know it’s hard to describe … sparkles.

I almost forgot. Sledding.
You really can’t miss that.

And then some time later that year, we can go to the beach.
I’ll keep an eye on the blankets and you can go down to the water.
Have a race with your kids to see who can go under first.

Ocean water and tears have something in them.
I think the salt might change things.

How about we wait until after that some time.

We’ll talk.