Friday, March 31, 2023

Why are we reading, if not in hope of beauty laid bare, life heightened and its deepest mystery probed? ―Annie Dillard

  

 



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For a day, just for one day,
Talk about that which disturbs no one 

And bring some peace into your
Beautiful eyes.


—Hafiz

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Thursday, March 30, 2023

icon(ic






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Some people fleeing some other people.
In some country under the sun
and some clouds.

They leave behind some of their everything,
sown fields, some chickens, dogs,
mirrors in which fire now sees itself reflected.

On their backs are pitchers and bundles,
the emptier, the heavier from one day to the next.

Taking place stealthily is somebody’s stopping,
and in the commotion, somebody’s bread somebody’s snatching
and a dead child somebody’s shaking.

In front of them some still not the right way,
nor the bridge that should be
over a river strangely rosy.
Around them, some gunfire, at times closer, at times farther off,
and, above, a plane circling somewhat.

Some invisibility would come in handy,
some grayish stoniness,
or even better, non-being
for a little or a long while.

Something else is yet to happen, only where and what?
Someone will head toward them, only when and who,
in how many shapes and with what intentions?
Given a choice,
maybe he will choose not to be the enemy and
leave them with some kind of life.


Wislawa Szymborska
Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh version




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this photo changes everything
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this is the Hour

  






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Now is the time for the world to know
That every thought and action is sacred.

This is the time
For you to compute the impossibility
That there is anything
But Grace.

Now is the season to know
That everything you do
Is sacred.


—Hafiz

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You have been telling the people that this is 
the Eleventh Hour.
Now you must go back and tell the people that this is the Hour.

And there are things to be considered:
Where are you living?
What are you doing? 
What are your relationships?
Are you in right relation?

Where is your water?
Know your garden.

It is time to speak your Truth. 
Create your community. 
Be good to each other.
And do not look outside yourself for the leader.

This could be a good time!
There is a river flowing now very fast.
It is so great and swift that there are those 
who will be afraid.

They will try to hold onto the shore.
They will feel they are being torn apart 
and they will suffer greatly.
Know the river has its destination.

The elders say we must let go of the shore, 
push off into the middle of the river, 
keep our eyes open and our heads above the water.
See who is in there with you and celebrate.

At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally.
Least of all, ourselves.
For the moment that we do, 
our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.

The time of the lone wolf is over.
Gather yourselves!
Banish the word struggle from your attitude and your vocabulary.
All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner 
and in celebration.

We are the ones we have been waiting for.


—The Hopi Nation Elders 
of Oraibi, Arizona



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take nothing

  






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The birds don't alter space.
They reveal it. The sky
never fills with any
leftover flying. They leave
nothing to trace. It is our own
astonishment collects
in chill air. Be glad.

They equal their due
moment never begging,
and enter ours
without parting day. See
how three birds in a winter tree
make the tree barer.

Two fly away, and new rooms
open in December.
Give up what you guessed
about a whirring heart, the little
beaks and claws, their constant hunger.
We are the nervous ones.

If even one of our violent number
could be gentle
long enough that one of them
found it safe inside
our finally untroubled and untroubling gaze,
who wouldn't hear
what singing completes us?


—Li-Young Lee
praise them
Book of My Nights

 

 

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In my room, the world is beyond my understanding;

But when I walk I see that it consists of three or four 
hills and a cloud.


—Wallace Stevens
Of the Surface of Things, excerpt




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Wednesday, March 29, 2023

this much is true

  






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You know quite well, deep within you,
that there is only a single magic,

a single power, a single salvation...
and that is called loving.


—Herman Hesse


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For small creatures such as we, 
the vastness is bearable only through love.


—Carl Sagan 




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Tuesday, March 28, 2023

questions








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All day I think about it, then at night I say it.
Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing?
I have no idea.
My soul is from elsewhere, I’m sure of that,
and I intend to end up there.

This drunkenness began in some other tavern.
When I get back around to that place,
I’ll be completely sober. Meanwhile,
I’m like a bird from another continent, sitting in this aviary.
The day is coming when I fly off,
but who is it now in my ear who hears my voice?
Who says words with my mouth?
Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul?
I cannot stop asking.
If I could taste one sip of an answer,
I could break out of this prison for drunks.
I didn’t come here of my own accord, and I can’t leave that way.
Whoever brought me here, will have to take me home.

This poetry. I never know what I’m going to say.
I don’t plan it.
When I’m outside the saying of it,
I get very quiet and rarely speak at all.



—Rumi
Coleman Barks version



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Monday, March 27, 2023

A Brighter Word Than Bright








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Words are substance strange. Speak one and the air ripples into another's ears. Write one and the eye laps it up. But the sense transmutes, and the spoken word winds through the ear's labyrinth into a sense that is no longer the nerve's realm.

The written word unfolds behind the eye into the world, world's image, and the imagination sees as the eye cannot see - thoughtfully.


—Dan Beachy-Quick



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if you hanker








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If you hanker for
a zenith of felicity
on the bed of the Divine
begin by dusting off
the wings of wonder
on your local pillow

Lift your ineffable
out of the mundane
Aim for airborne
with the eye of the heart
as your sky pilot
and soar to glory


—James Broughton



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image, Laurence Winram
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Thursday, March 23, 2023

appear(ances

 




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The mind creates the abyss, the heart crosses it.
 

—Nisargadatta Maharaj




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The appearance of water in a mirage persists after the fact that it is a mirage has  dawned on us. So it is with the world. 

Though knowing it to be unreal, it continues to manifest - but we do not try to satisfy our thirst with the water of the mirage. 

As soon as one knows that it is a mirage, one gives it up as useless and does not run after it to get water.


—Ramana Maharshi




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Wednesday, March 22, 2023

listen

  





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The flute of the Infinite is played without ceasing,

and its sound is Love.


—Kabir



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Tuesday, March 21, 2023

teacup talk

 






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Love wants to reach out and manhandle us,
Break all our teacup talk of God.

If you had the courage and
Could give the Beloved His choice, some nights,
He would just drag you around the room
By your hair,
Ripping from your grip all those toys in the world
That bring you no joy.

Love sometimes gets tired of speaking sweetly
And wants to rip to shreds
All your erroneous notions of truth
That make you fight within yourself, dear one,
And with others,
Causing the world to weep
On too many fine days.

God wants to manhandle us,
Lock us inside of a tiny room with Himself
And practice His dropkick.

The Beloved sometimes wants
To do us a great favor:
Hold us upside down
And shake all the nonsense out.

But when we hear
He is in such a “playful drunken mood”
Most everyone I know
Quickly packs their bags and hightails it
Out of town.


—Hafiz
Daniel Ladinsky version



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Monday, March 20, 2023

small bird on fire

  







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It was passed from one bird to another,
the whole gift of the day. 


The day went from flute to flute,
went dressed in vegetation,
in flights which opened a tunnel
through which the wind would pass
to where birds were breaking open
the dense blue air -
and there, night came in.

When I returned from so many journeys,
I stayed suspended and green
between sun and geography -
I saw how wings worked,
how perfumes are transmitted
by feathery telegraph,
and from above I saw the path,
the springs and the roof tiles,
the fishermen at their trades,
the trousers of the foam;

I saw it all from my green sky.
I had no more alphabet
than the swallows in their courses,
the tiny, shining water
of the small bird on fire
which dances out of the pollen.


—Pablo Neruda
Ode to the moment


 

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Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still.

For once on the face of the earth
let's not speak in any language,
let's stop for one second,
and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines,
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.

Fishermen in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would look at his wounded hands.

Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victory with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about;
I want no truck with death.

If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.
Perhaps the earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead
and later proves to be alive.

Now I'll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.


—Pablo Neruda
Keeping Quiet



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Friday, March 17, 2023

look deeply

  






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Don't say that I will depart tomorrow— 
even today I am still arriving. 

Look deeply: every second I am arriving 
to be a bud on a Spring branch, 
to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings, 
learning to sing in my new nest, 
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, 
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone. 

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry, 
to fear and to hope. 
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death 
of all that is alive. 

I am a mayfly metamorphosing 
on the surface of the river. 
And I am the bird 
that swoops down to swallow the mayfly. 

I am a frog swimming happily 
in the clear water of a pond. 
And I am the grass-snake 
that silently feeds itself on the frog. 

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones, 
my legs as thin a bamboo sticks. 
And I am the arms merchant, 
selling deadly weapons to Uganda. 

I am the twelve-year-old girl, 
refugee on a small boat, 
who throws herself into the ocean 
after being raped by a sea pirate. 
And I am the pirate, 
my heart not yet capable 
of seeing and loving. 

I am a member of the politburo, 
with plenty of power in my hands. 
And I am the man who has to pay 
his "debt of blood" to my people, 
dying slowly in a forced labor camp. 

My joy is like Spring, so warm 
it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth. 
My pain is like a river of tears, 
so vast it fills the four oceans. 

Please call me by my true names, 
so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once, 
so I can see that my joy and pain are one. 
Please call me by my true names, 
so I can wake up 
and the door of my heart 
could be left open, 

the door of compassion.


—Thich Nhat Hanh
Please Call Me By My True Name





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between I am and you are

  



  



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By itself nothing has existence. 
Everything needs its own absence. 

To be is to be distinguishable, to be here and not there,
to be now and not then, to be thus and not otherwise. 

Like water is shaped by the container, so is everything 
determined by conditions (gunas).


—Nisargadatta Maharaj




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Between now and now
between I am and you are
the word bridge

Entering it
you enter yourself;
the world connects and closes like a ring.

From one bank to another
there is always a body stretched:
a rainbow.
I'll sleep between its arches.


—Octavio Paz



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Tuesday, March 14, 2023

one is the other and is neither







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The water hollowed the stone,
the wind dispersed the water,
the stone stopped the wind.
Water and wind and stone.

The wind sculpted the stone,
the stone is a cup of water,
The water runs off and is wind.
Stone and wind and water.

The wind sings in its turnings,
the water murmurs as it goes,
the motionless stone is quiet.
Wind and water and stone.

One is the other and is neither:
among their empty names
they pass and disappear,
water and stone and wind.


—Octavio Paz 


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Monday, March 13, 2023

blossoming tree image

 













listen

 





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I said to the almond tree, ‘Sister, speak to me of God.’

And the almond tree blossomed.


—Nikos Kazantzakis 



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Friday, March 10, 2023

the seed never sees the flower —Zen Proverb












A famous thorny issue in philosophy is the so-called infinite regress problem. For example, if we say that the properties of a diamond can be explained by the properties and arrangements of its carbon atoms, that the properties of a carbon atom can be explained by the properties and arrangements of its protons, neutrons and electrons, that the properties of a proton can be explained by the properties and arrangements of its quarks, and so on, then it seems that we're doomed to go on forever trying to explain the properties of the constituent parts. 

The Mathematical Universe Hypothesis offers a radical solution to this problem: at the bottom level, reality is a mathematical structure, so its parts have no intrinsic properties at all! In other words, the Mathematical Universe Hypothesis implies that we live in a relational reality, in the sense that the properties of the world around us stem not from properties of its ultimate building blocks, but from the relations between these building blocks.
 
The external physical reality is therefore more than the sum of its parts, in the sense that it can have many interesting properties while its parts have no intrinsic properties at all.

 

—Max Tegmark (1967 - )
Our Mathematical Universe




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You're water. We're the millstone.
You're wind. We're dust blown up into shapes.
You're spirit. We're the opening and closing
of our hands. You're the clarity.
We're the language that tries to say it.
You're joy. We're all the different kinds of laughing.


—Rumi (1207 - 1273) 


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Wednesday, March 8, 2023

y(our body is a divine stream

 









Your body is a divine stream,
as is your spirit. 

When your two great rivers merge, one voice is found 
and the earth applauds 
in excitement. 
 

Shrines are erected to those songs 
the hand and heart have sung 
as they serve 
the world 
with a love, a love 
we cherish.


—St. John of the Cross



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Wednesday, March 1, 2023

may what I do flow from me like a river

 






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I have many brothers in the South
who move, handsome in their vestments,
through cloister gardens.
The Madonnas they make are so human,
and I dream often of their Titians,
where God becomes an ardent flame.

But when I lean over the chasm of myself –
it seems
my God is dark
and like a web: a hundred roots
silently drinking.

This is the ferment I grow out of.

More I don't know, because my branches
rest in deep silence, stirred only by the wind.



—Rainer Maria Rilke
from The Book of Monastic Life, I,3



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I believe in all that has never yet been spoken.
I want to free what waits within me
so that what no one has dared to wish for
may for once spring clear
without my contriving. 
If this is arrogant, God, forgive me,
but this is what I need to say.
May what I do flow from me like a river,
no forcing and no holding back,
the way it is with children.

Then in these swelling and ebbing currents,
these deepening tides moving out, returning,
I will sing you as no one ever has,
streaming through widening channels
into the open sea.


—Rainer Maria Rilke
Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy version




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