simply

 

I'm too alone in the world, yet not alone enough

to make each hour holy

I'm too small in the world, yet not small enough

to be simply in your presence, like a thing-

just as it is.

I want to know my own will

 and to move with it.

And I want, in the hushed moments

when the nameless draws near,

to be among the wise ones-

or alone.

I want to mirror your immensity.

I want never to be too weak or too old

to bear the heavy, lurching image of you.

I want to unfold.

Let no place in me hold itself closed,

for where I am closed, I am false.

I want to stay clear in your sight.

~ Rilke's Book of Hours

The Book of Monastic Life

the way it is with children

.

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

from Rilke's Book of Hours

translation by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy

.

from a place of gratefulness

It is only from such a place of gratefulness 

that we can perform beautiful acts — 

from a place of absolute, ravishing appreciation

 for the sheer wonder of being alive at all, 

each of us an improbable and temporary triumph

 over the staggering odds of nonbeing and nothingness

 inking the ledger of spacetime.

 But because we are human, because we are batted about

 by the violent immediacies of everyday life, 

such gratitude eludes us as a continuous state of being.

 We access it only at moments, 

only when the trance of busyness lifts 

and the blackout curtain of daily demands

 parts to let the radiance in, those delicious moments

 when we find ourselves 

awash in nonspecific gladness,

 grateful not to this person,

 grateful not for this turn of events,

 but grateful at life — a diffuse gratitude

 that irradiates every aspect and atom 

of the world, however small, however unremarkable,

 however coated with the dull patina of habit.

 In those moments, everything sings, 

everything shimmers. 

In those moments, we are most alive.

~ Seneca

from Letters from a Stoic

as if to demonstrate an eclipse

 

I pick an orange from a wicker basket

and place it on the table

to represent the sun.

Then down at the other end

a blue and white marble

becomes the earth

and nearby I lay the little moon of an aspirin.

I get a glass from a cabinet,

open a bottle of wine,

then I sit in a ladder-back chair,

a benevolent god presiding

over a miniature creation myth,

and I begin to sing

a homemade canticle of thanks

for this perfect little arrangement,

for not making the earth too hot or cold

not making it spin too fast or slow

so that the grove of orange trees

and the owl become possible,

not to mention the rolling wave,

the play of clouds, geese in flight,

and the Z of lightning on a dark lake.

Then I fill my glass again

and give thanks for the trout,

the oak, and the yellow feather,

singing the room full of shadows,

as sun and earth and moon

circle one another in their impeccable orbits

and I get more and more cockeyed with gratitude.

~ Billy Collins

from Nine Horses

with thanks to The Marginalian by Maria Popova

image by James McCue/The Virtual Telescope

a great light

 

I saw a great light come down over London,

And buildings and cars and people were still

They were held wherever they were under the sky’s

Clear humming radiance as it descended --

Everywhere, in shops, behind desks and on trains

Everything stopped as the stillness came down

And touched the crown of our heads

As our eyes closed, and the sky filled us

And our minds became the sky --

And everyone, regardless of crime class or creed

Was touched; as slowly we began to stir

Out of this penetrated light-filled sleep

Dizzily as the hand completed its dialing,

And the train lurched forward

And I saw faces looking at one another questioning,

I saw people meeting eye to eye and standing

Half amazed by each other’s presence

I saw their mouths silently shaping the word why

Why didn’t we know this? and yet knowing

They already knew, and without words

We all stood searching for the gesture

That would say it --

As the lights went green, and we drove on.

~ Jay Ramsay

from The Longing in Between: Sacred Poetry from Around the World

(A Poetry Chaikhana Anthology) Edited by Ivan M. Granger

Yes! No!

How necessary it is to have opinions! I think the spotted trout
lilies are satisfied, standing a few inches above the earth. I
think serenity is not something you just find in the world,
like a plum tree, holding up its white petals.

The violets, along the river, are opening their blue faces, like
small dark lanterns.

The green mosses, being so many, are as good as brawny.

How important it is to walk along, not in haste but slowly,
looking at everything and calling out

Yes! No! The

swan, for all his pomp, his robes of grass and petals, wants
only to be allowed to live on the nameless pond. The catbrier
is without fault. The water thrushes, down among the sloppy
rocks, are going crazy with happiness. Imagination is better
than a sharp instrument. To pay attention, this is our endless
and proper work.

 

 

 ~ Mary Oliver

from White Pine: Poems and Prose Poems

with thanks to Poetry Chaikhana

 

 

no word for “war”

Trying to explain it to them

Leaves one feeling ridiculous and obscene.

Their houses, like white bowls,

Sit on a prairie of ancient snowfalls

Caught beyond thaw or the swift changes

Of night and day.

They listen politely, and stride away.

With spears and sleds and barking dogs

To hunt for food. The women wait

Chewing on skins or singing songs,

Knowing that they have hours to spend,

That the luck of the hunter is often late.

Later, by fires and boiling bones

In streaming kettles, they welcome me,

Far kin, pale brother,

To share what they have in a hungry time

In a difficult land. While I talk on

Of the southern kingdoms, cannon, armies,

Shifting alliances, airplanes, power,

They chew their bones, and smile at one another.

~ Mary Oliver

the hurt you embrace

The hurt you embrace becomes joy.

Call it to your arms where it can

change.  A silkworm eating leaves

makes a cocoon.  Each of us weaves

a chamber of leaves and sticks.

Silkworms begin to truly exist

as they disappear inside that room.

Without legs, we fly.  When I stop

speaking, this poem will close,

and open its silent wings...

~ Rumi

blessing for the interim time

 

When near the end of day, life has drained

Out of light, and it is too soon

For the mind of night to have darkened things,

No place looks like itself, loss of outline

Makes everything look strangely in-between,

Unsure of what has been, or what might come.

In this wan light, even trees seem groundless.

In a while it will be night, but nothing

Here seems to believe the relief of darkness.

You are in this time of the interim

Where everything seems withheld.

The path you took to get here has washed out;

The way forward is still concealed from you.

The old is not old enough to have died away;

The new is still too young to be born.”

You cannot lay claim to anything;

In this place of dusk,

Your eyes are blurred;

And there is no mirror.

Everyone else has lost sight of your heart

And you can see nowhere to put your trust;

You know you have to make your own way through.

As far as you can, hold your confidence.

Do not allow confusion to squander

This call which is loosening

Your roots in false ground,

That you might come free

From all you have outgrown.

What is being transfigured here in your mind,

And it is difficult and slow to become new.

The more faithfully you can endure here,

The more refined your heart will become

For your arrival in the new dawn.

~ John O’Donohue

from To Bless the Space Between Us

it all moves

 

 

 

 

 

 

At night outside it all moves or
almost moves–trees, grass,
touches of wind. The room you have
in the world is ready to change.
Clouds parade by, and stars in their
configurations. Birds from far
touch the fabric around them–you can
feel their wings move. Somewhere under
the earth it waits, that emanation
of all things. It breathes. It pulls you
slowly out through doors or windows
and you spread in the thin halo of night mist.

 

 

 

 

~ William Stafford 

song of a man who has come through

 

Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me!

A fine wind is blowing the new direction of Time.

If only I let it bear me, carry me, if only it carry me!

If only I am sensitive, subtle, oh, delicate, a winged gift!

If only, most lovely of all, I yield myself and am borrowed

By the fine, fine, wind that takes its course through the chaos of the world

Like a fine, an exquisite chisel, a wedge-blade inserted;

If only I am keen and hard like the sheer tip of a wedge

Driven by invisible blows,

The rock will split, we shall come at the wonder, we shall find the Hesperides.

Oh, for the wonder that bubbles into my soul,

I would be a good fountain, a good well-head,

Would blur no whisper, spoil no expression.

What is the knocking?

What is the knocking at the door in the night?

It is somebody wants to do us harm.

No, no, it is the three strange angels.

Admit them, admit them.

~ D. H. Lawrence

from The Complete Poems of D. H. Lawrence

a brave and startling truth

 

We, this people, on a small and lonely planet

Traveling through casual space

Past aloof stars, across the way of indifferent suns

To a destination where all signs tell us

It is possible and imperative that we learn

A brave and startling truth

And when we come to it

To the day of peacemaking

When we release our fingers

From fists of hostility

And allow the pure air to cool our palms

When we come to it

When the curtain falls on the minstrel show of hate

And faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean

When battlefields and coliseum

No longer rake our unique and particular sons and daughters

Up with the bruised and bloody grass

To lie in identical plots in foreign soil

When the rapacious storming of the churches

The screaming racket in the temples have ceased

When the pennants are waving gaily

When the banners of the world tremble

Stoutly in the good, clean breeze

When we come to it

When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders

And children dress their dolls in flags of truce

When land mines of death have been removed

And the aged can walk into evenings of peace

When religious ritual is not perfumed

By the incense of burning flesh

And childhood dreams are not kicked awake

By nightmares of abuse

When we come to it

Then we will confess that not the Pyramids

With their stones set in mysterious perfection

Nor the Gardens of Babylon

Hanging as eternal beauty

In our collective memory

Not the Grand Canyon

Kindled into delicious color

By Western sunsets

Nor the Danube, flowing its blue soul into Europe

Not the sacred peak of Mount Fuji

Stretching to the Rising Sun

Neither Father Amazon nor Mother Mississippi who, without favor,

Nurture all creatures in the depths and on the shores

These are not the only wonders of the world

When we come to it

We, this people, on this minuscule and kithless globe

Who reach daily for the bomb, the blade and the dagger

Yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace

We, this people on this mote of matter

In whose mouths abide cankerous words

Which challenge our very existence

Yet out of those same mouths

Come songs of such exquisite sweetness

That the heart falters in its labor

And the body is quieted into awe

We, this people, on this small and drifting planet

Whose hands can strike with such abandon

That in a twinkling, life is sapped from the living

Yet those same hands can touch with such healing, irresistible tenderness

That the haughty neck is happy to bow

And the proud back is glad to bend

Out of such chaos, of such contradiction

We learn that we are neither devils nor divines

When we come to it

We, this people, on this wayward, floating body

Created on this earth, of this earth

Have the power to fashion for this earth

A climate where every man and every woman

Can live freely without sanctimonious piety

Without crippling fear

When we come to it

We must confess that we are the possible

We are the miraculous, the true wonder of this world

That is when, and only when

We come to it.

~ Maya Angelou

cello

 

 

 

 

 

It rests inside its close-fitting red-velvet-lined case

the way medieval monks slept inside their coffins.

But it doesn't  meditate on death; it has already died,

and barely remembers sunlight, water, the wind among the branches.

It lies there in the dark, feeling all through its graceful curves

the memory of a hundred years of music,

and sometimes dreaming of heaven: the Bach suites.

 

Taken out to be played, it knows that by itself it is nothing,

that it would be incapable of producing a single note

even if it were a Stradivarius.

So it gladly assents to having its strings tightened,

painful though this is; it wants to be perfectly in tune,

stretched to its utmost but not straining.

When it feels ready, it leans back and waits

for the bow to be drawn across,

for the resonance to fill it completely.

 

 

 

 

 

 ~ Stephen Mitchell

from Parables and Portraits

 

 

 

 

no longer sure

 

 

 

 

It has come to this: I'm sitting under a tree
beside a river
on a sunny morning.
It's an insignificant event
and won't go down in history.
It's not battles and pacts,
where motives are scrutinized,
or noteworthy tyrannicides.

And yet I'm sitting by this river, that's a fact.
And since I'm here
I must have come from somewhere,
and before that
I must have turned up in many other places,
exactly like the conquerors of nations
before setting sail.

Even a passing moment has its fertile past,
its Friday before Saturday,
its May before June.
Its horizons are no less real
than those that a marshal's field glasses might scan.

This tree is a poplar that's been rooted here for years.
The river is the Raba; it didn't spring up yesterday.
The path leading through the bushes
wasn't beaten last week.
The wind had to blow the clouds here
before it could blow them away.

And though nothing much is going on nearby,
the world is no poorer in details for that.
It's just as grounded, just as definite
as when migrating races held it captive.

Conspiracies aren't the only things shrouded in silence.
Retinues of reasons don't trail coronations alone.
Anniversaries of revolutions may roll around,
but so do oval pebbles encircling the bay.

The tapestry of circumstance is intricate and dense.
Ants stitching in the grass.
The grass sewn into the ground.
The pattern of a wave being needled by a twig.

So it happens that I am and look.
Above me a white butterfly is fluttering through the air
on wings that are its alone,
and a shadow skims through my hands
that is none other than itself, no one else's but its own.

When I see such things, I'm no longer sure
that what's important
is more important than what's not.

~  Wislawa Szymborska
S. Baranczak and C. Cavanagh translation 

 

 

 

 

slip beyond

...love impels people to service.  If love starts with a downward motion,

 burrowing into the vulnerability of self, exposing nakedness, 

it ends with an active upward motion.  It arouses great energy 

and desire to serve.  The person in love is buying little presents, 

fetching the glass from the next room, bringing a tissue when there's flu,

 driving through traffic to pick the beloved up at the airport.

 Love is waking up night after night to breastfeed, living year after year to nurture.

  It is risking and sacrificing your life for your buddy's in a battle. 

 Love ennobles and transforms. 

 In no other state do people so often live as we want them to live. 

 In no other commitment are people so likely to slip beyond the logic

 of self-interest and unconditional commitments

 that manifest themselves in daily acts of care.

Occasionally you meet someone with a thousand-year heart. 

 The person with the thousand-year heart has made the most of the passionate,

 tumultuous phase of love. Those months or years of passion have engraved 

a deep commitment in their mind.  The person or thing they once loved hotly

 they now love warmly but steadily, happily, unshakably.  

They don't even think of loving their beloved because they want something back...

 They just naturally offer love as a matter of course

 It is gift-love, not reciprocity-love.

~ David Brooks

from The Road to Character