Sunday, July 30, 2017

The Adamantine Perfection of Desire





Nothing more strong
than to be helpless before desire.

No reason,
the simplified heart whispers,
the argument over,
only This.

No longer choosing anything but assent.

Its bowl scraped clean to the bottom,
the skull-bone cup no longer horrifies,
but, rimmed in silver, shines.

A spotted dog follows a bitch in heat.
Gray geese flying past us, crying.
The living cannot help but love the world.





Jane Hirshfield
Photo:  Peter Bowers






Tuesday, July 25, 2017

We are...



We are the mirror as well as the face in it.
We are tasting the taste this minute
of eternity.   We are pain
and what cures pain, both.  We are
the sweet cold water and the jar that pours.





Rumi
Photo:  Peter Bowers





Tuesday, July 11, 2017

what will always be





Again I resume the long
lesson: how small a thing
can be pleasing, how little
in this hard world it takes
to satisfy the mind
and bring it to its rest.

With the ongoing havoc
the woods this morning is
almost unnaturally still.
Through stalled air, unshadowed
light, a few leaves fall
of their own weight.

The sky
is gray. It begins in mist
almost at the ground
and rises forever. The trees
rise in silence almost
natural, but not quite,
almost eternal, but
not quite.

What more did I
think I wanted? Here is
what has always been.
Here is what will always
be. Even in me,
the Maker of all this
returns in rest, even
to the slightest of His works,
a yellow leaf slowly
falling, and is pleased.





Wendell Berry
Sabbaths 1999, VII