Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Tear: An Assay




A great philosopher is born, walks his lifetime's allotment of footsteps, and dies, but while he is living he has the demeanor and body and voice of a great clown.   Each of his propositions is heard, but met with snorts, guffaws, and the wiping of tears of laughter from the eyes.  Or perhaps it is the reverse: A great comic is born, walks the earth, and dies.  But her demeanor and body and voice are such that people listen gravely, they nod in silence at her words, are moved to weeping by the feelings her thoughts cause to rise.  The composition to tears of laughter and tears of grief is not, it seems, the same, though the tongue cannot tell this.  Different still the tears of outrage, or the tears that come from a misplace dust mote, errant eyelash, of flake of soot.  Each brought to the earth a great if different pleasure.  Each died unsatisfied and angry, though this too is not perceived.   And where does the mistake lie, if a mistake is granted at all?  In the person who refuses an inescapable fate, or in those who shed at his works their tears of subtly erroneous composition?



~ Jane Hirshfield
art by aiden-ivanov
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some wholly communal thing




.

Happy who know that behind all speeches
still the unspeakable lies;
that it's from there that greatness reaches
us in the form we prize!

Trusting not to the diversely fashioned
bridges of difference we outfling:
so that we gaze out of every impassioned
joy at some wholly communal thing.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Youth of Grass


.
Yesterday in the hushed white sunlight 
down along the meadows by the river
through all the bright hours they cut the first hay
of this year to leave it tossed in long rows
leading into the twilight and long evening
while thunderheads grumbled from the horizon
and now the whole valley and the slopes around it 
that look down to the sky in the river
are fragrant with hay as this night comes in
and the owl cries across the new spaces
to the mice suddenly missing their sky
and so the youth of this spring all at once is over 
it has come upon us again taking us
once more by surprise just as we began
to believe that those fields would always be green
.
~ W.S. Merwin

.
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Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Falling



.
Long before daybreak
none of the birds yet awake
rain comes down with the sound
of a huge wind rushing
through the valley trees
it comes down around us
all at the same time
and beyond it there is nothing
it falls without hearing itself
without knowing
there is anyone here 
without seeing where it is
or where it is going
like a moment of great
happiness in our own
that we cannot remember
coasting with the lights off
.
~ W.S. Merwin
from "The Shadow of Sirius"
art by Bertha Lum
.

thought is no longer of worth to me




Thought is no longer of worth to me,
Nor work, nor speech.
Love draws me so high
(Thought is no longer of worth to me)
With her divine gaze,
That I have no intent.
Thought is no longer of worth to me.
Nor work, nor speech.



~ Marguerite Porete
(1260?-1310)

Her book, The Mirror of Simple Souls (or The Mirror of Simple Annihilated Souls, a reference to ecstatic annihilation in God), survived her death and was translated into many European languages, attributed initially to "an unknown French mystic." The book is a collection of poetry and prose that suggests a profound experience of mystical union which resulted in a complete loss of personal identity in which only the Divine remains.

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

The earth is hushed


.
.
The bright moon lights the path
through the gray woods
From the unlit depths of the hollow comes
the soft sound of broken water
A faint brightness, or is it a low cloud
within the eastern sky
The earth is hushed
.
~ Harlan Hubbard

.

a deeper silence


.
.
No writing on the solitary, meditative dimensions of life can say anything 
that has not already been said better by the wind in the pine trees. 
These pages seek nothing more than to echo the silence and peace 
that is “heard” when the rain wanders freely among the hills and forests.
.
But what can the wind say when there is no hearer?
.
 There is then a deeper silence:
 the silence in which the Hearer is No-Hearer. 
That deeper silence must be heard before one can speak truly of solitude.

~ Thomas Merton
.
In a frontispiece poem to The Solitary Life, Merton wrote:
.
Follow my ways and I will lead you
To golden-haired suns,
Logos and music, blameless joys,
Innocent of questions
And beyond answers.
For I, Solitude, am thine own Self:
I, Nothingness, am thy All.
I, Silence, am thy Amen.
.

Friday, September 3, 2010

I see through my pictures


.
Harlan's studio at Payne Hollow

When I am painting, or have painting in my mind, 
I see more, observe more carefully, am more sensitive... 
I see through my pictures.

I see everything as a painting. I see so much more.

Seeing things as a painter, seeing pictures.  
This is a great happiness.

It brings everything into balance and harmony.

Painting can only be done in some state of exaltation.  
It is a force that breaks through the routine of life, 
that transcends life itself.

It is exciting with boundless possibilities.

I am always painting in my mind.

Just a little solid, creative painting and the day is good.  
It brings us closer to the earth, 
makes the present moment exhilarating, 
the future hopeful.

It is a strange life when I consider it, 
how I endeavor to attain strength and clarity, 
to mold these base materials into forms which will express me, 
and my attitude, my joy and thankfulness.  
I work alone, 
who cares whether I produce anything or not, 
or who appreciates it?  
Yet I believe a good thing will not perish.




~ Harlan Hubbard
from "Harlan Hubbard and the River - A Visionary Life"
by Don Wallis


Thursday, September 2, 2010

their graciousness is an invitation


.
.
 a bell is placed across the river for visitors to ring, 
their graciousness is an invitation
.
"There is a fascination about the distant tones of the bell sounding across the river.  
Who is there, with what news?  
Is it a dear friend long unseen, 
or a stranger whose coming will change the course of our lives?"
.
~ Harlan Hubbard
.
.
.

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

that secret from the river



..


"Have you also learned that secret from the river; 
that there is no such thing as time?"

That the river is everywhere at the same time, at the source and at
the mouth, at the waterfall, at the ferry, at the current, in the
ocean and in the mountains, everywhere and that the present only
exists for it, not the shadow of the past nor the shadow of the
future.



~ Herman Hesse
from "Siddhartha"




I will be watered to my roots






A pale sun burning through the mist, 
the soft clouds barely visible in the gray, blue sky... 
Looking up the river I saw a bolt of lightning, 
an arrow from the sky that pierced the earth.

A soft rain comes down from the gray sky, 
and sullen thunder rolls into the distance.  
My spirit drinks in the rain like the plants do.  
I will be watered to my roots.

It is suddenly full summer.  
We look out from leafy trees.

The fragrance of wild grape and honeysuckle 
flowers drifts through the air.  
You enter and leave currents of it as you go along the paths.

In the leafy woods there is such contrast to the sunlight
 that the shade is like twilight, 
like going down into a deep ravine.  
The pale green of the jewel weed is ghostly... 
Then to hear the thrush singing on the hill above...

I think I saw the first green heron.  
Yes.




~ Harlan Hubbard 
from his journals, taken here from
"Harlan Hubbard and the River - A Visionary Life"
by Don Wallis


Tuesday, August 31, 2010



.
.
Michelangelo spoke of his work as releasing 
"Prisoners in Stone"
.

and we too, 
captured in invisible "stone"
wait for our Michelangelo to free us.  
.

Friday, August 27, 2010

can you find your true identity?



.
.
How arbitrary, the ways in which we identify ourselves.
This fan chart used in genealogy helps demonstrate this fact.
10 generations here, taking us back only to the mid-1600's, 
and in that 10th generation, 512 equal contributors to 
my genetic inheritance.  I derive my identity, and even think of myself
as being related to maybe 2 of those.
That's about 2 tenths of one percent of the total genetic influence.
511 other surnames that could equally well apply.
.
How seriously we sometimes take ourselves.
.


Prayers for the Earth




.
.
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.
Fisherman in the cold sea would not harm whales
...And the man gathering salt would look at his hurt 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 when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive.
.
~ Pablo Neruda
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Wednesday, August 25, 2010

snug harbor



.
.
To achieve more perfect
harmony with the river
and at the same time 
live close to the earth
... I became a shantyboater
.
~ Harlan Hubbard
from Harlan Hubbard and the River - A Visionary Life
by Don Wallis
.