Hello Music that Makes Community Friends, 

As the current Monday Morning Grounding season comes to a close, we will be taking a break for Holy Week and Easter Monday. The late Spring/Summer season will start again on April 28th. 

Those who show up find that they are fed, filled and grounded for the week ahead, particularly in these turbulent times. You’ll leave with a song to carry you through the week. If you can’t regularly make it to Monday Morning Grounding, we wanted to share the resources from this past season with you. Although they were particular to a day and this season, in some respects, they are timeless and timely songs and poems for the coming days as well.

Monday Morning Grounding Songs We Sang:  January 6-April 7, 2025

Jan. 6, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: If Everything Around Seems Dark by Nancy Willbanks
text by Rumi

- Video on Youtube
- Music on Nancy’s Substack Blo

Text: Blessing by Jan Richardson
from How the Stars Get in Your Bones p. 10

- Poem on Website

Song: Weaving Our Lives by Alexa Sunshine Rose

- Video on YouTube

Jan. 13, 2025

Host: Nancy Willbanks
Leader: Amy Steenson

Song: God bless every step by Ruth Cunningham
text from Celtic chant from the Céile Dé order

- Music on MMC Website
- Included in the Singing in Community Songbook, published by Augsburg Fortress

Texts:
Finding God’s presence by Kate Bowler

- Poem on Website

Wintering by Donna Ashworth
from Life: Poems to Help Navigate Life’s Many Twists & Turns

- Poem on Facebook

Jan. 20, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Don’t Be Pushed Around by Nancy Willbanks
text by Roy T. Bennett

- Music on Nancy’s Substack Blog

Texts:
I Have A Dream excerpt by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

- Speech transcription on NPR

Harlem by Langston Hughes
from Montage of a Dream Deferred

- Poem on Poetry Foundation
- Note: I found this poem last week at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, exhibit on Power of the People: Art and Democracy

Song: Lead with Love by Melanie DeMore

- Video on Youtube

Jan. 27, 2025

Host: Nancy Willbanks
Leader: Amy Steenson

Song: Have a Rest now Honey by Heidi Wilson

- Clip on Youtube

Text: A blessing for being close to pain, too close by Kate Bowler
from The Lives We Actually Have

- Poem on Website

Feb. 3, 2025

Host: Nancy Willbanks
Co-Leaders:  Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Surrounding You by Barbara McAfee

- Video on YouTube

Text: BECAUSE by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
from The Unfolding 

- Poem on Website

Song: Open my heart by Ana Hernandez

- Video on YouTube 

Feb. 10, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Sing Through My Voice by Beautiful Chorus

- Video on YouTube

Texts: 
Winter Hours: Prose, Prose Poems, and Poems by Mary Oliver

- Excerpt on Website

Proverbs 31:8-9 from the Bible

Speak out for those who cannot speak, for the rights of all the destitute.
Speak out, judge righteously, defend the rights of the poor and needy.

Song: Voice Prayer by Samara Jade

- Reel on Facebook
- Reel on Instagram

Feb. 17, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Gather/We Are Not Alone by Joanna Laws Landis

- Audio on Soundcloud

Text: A Poem on Hope by Wendell Berry

- Poem on Website

Song: Hope is a Four Letter Word by Breen Sipes

- Audio on Dropbox
Hope is a four letter word
Hope is a four letter word
When what you need is a four letter word, please remember
Hope is a four letter word
Zip in: Hope, pray, rest, sing, rise……

Feb. 24, 2025

Host: Amy Steenson
Leader: Bird Treacey

Song: Where You Go by Shoshana Jedwab 

- Music on Website
- Note: Can trade out Beloved for: Refugee, Mother, Earth, Children, Ancestors

Text: Godly Play - Story of Ruth

March 3, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Spirit Open My Heart refrain by WILD MOUNTAIN THYME
text by Ruth Duck

- Music on Hymnary

Text: Listen by Steve Garnaas-Holmes
from Unfolding Light

- Poem on Website

Song: Listening by Lea Morris

- Video on YouTube

March 10, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: I Need a Little Patience by Nancy Willbanks

- Music on Nancy’s Substack Blog

Text: Brave Space by Joe Davis
from Remind Me Again: Poems and Practices for Remembering Who We Are

- Link for purchase

Song: Surrounding You by Barbara McAfee

- Video on YouTube

March 17, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Love Stays by Laszlo Slomovits

- Music on Website

Text: WHAT COMES NEXT by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

- Music on Website
- Note: The "cytoplasmic imperative" refers to the idea that the cytoplasm, the fluid within a cell outside the nucleus, plays a crucial role in various cellular processes, including inheritance, and its components are essential for cell function and survival.

March 24, 2025

Host: Amy Steenson
Leader: Bird Treacey

Song: We Shall Be Known by Karisha Longaker of MaMuse

- Music on Website

Text: "Cento Between the Ending and the End" by Cameron Awkward-Rich

- Poem on poets.org

March 31, 2025

Host: Nancy Willbanks
Leader: Edith Troup

Song: No need for fear by Edith Troup
text by Teresa of Avila. 

- Audio on Dropbox

Text: Blessing in the Shape of a Cross by Jan Richardson

- Poem on Website

Song: Standing Stone by Melanie DeMore

- Video on YouTube

April 7, 2025

Co-Leaders: Nancy Willbanks/Amy Steenson

Song: Sing at Dawn, Sing at Dusk by Nancy Willbanks

- Music on Nancy’s Substack Blog

Text: When Women Were Birds by Terry Tempest Williams
from When Women Were Birds: Fifty-four Variations on Voice

- Excerpt on Website

Song: Birds at Dawn and Turkeys Too by Nancy Willbanks

- Audio on Dropbox
- Note: recorded at Nancy’s house the week after she wrote this song

If you have a song to share, or a poem, or both, you are welcome to sign up to lead all or part of our thirty minute gathering, (10 a.m. Eastern, 9 a.m. Central, 8 a.m. Mountain, 7 a.m. Pacific). We ask that you come at least once to get a flavor of the gathering and we’ll put a link to the sign up sheet in the chat on Zoom. We stay on for a time of conversation, check-in and connection, for another 15 minutes.

If you just need to come to be filled, to find comfort, hope, space for laughter, fun and song, you are welcome to come just as you are, and receive.

Sincerely,

Nancy Willbanks and Amy Steenson