“Thomas Merton wrote, “There is always a temptation to diddle around in the contemplative life, making itsy-bitsy statues.” There is always an enormous temptation in all of life to diddle around making itsy-bitsy friends and meals and journeys for itsy-bitsy years on end. It is so self-conscious, so apparently moral, simply to step aside from the gaps where the creeks and winds pour down, saying, I never merited this grace, quite rightly, and then to sulk along the rest of your days on the edge of rage. I won’t have it. The world is wilder than that in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant and bright.”
—Annie Dillard, The Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (via invisibleforeigner)
June 2013
“Not to be in love with you—I can’t remember what it was like. It must have been lousy.”
—James Schuyler, from “The Elizabethans Called it Dying” (via liquidlightandrunningtrees)
October by James Schuyler
Books litter the bed,
leaves the lawn. It
lightly rains. Fall has
come: unpatterned, in
the shedding leaves.
The maples ripen. Apples
come home crisp in bags.
This pear tastes good.
It rains lightly on the
random leaf patterns.
The nimbus is spread
above our island. Rain
lightly patters on un-
shed leaves. The books
of fall litter the bed.
“We do not err because truth is difficult to see. It is visible at a glance. We err because this is more comfortable.”
—Alexander Solzhenitsyn (via heartbloodspirit)
What thou lovest well remains,
the rest is dross
What thou lov’st well shall not be reft from thee
What thou lov’st well is thy true heritage
—Canto LXXXI
- Ezra Pound
“It’s not that the sacred is here and the profane is over there. Everything is profane if you live on the surface of it, and everything is sacred if you go into the depths of it - even your sin.”
—Richard Rohr. (via revdak)
“They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.” —
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.” —
Dylan Thomas, from ‘And Death Shall Have No Dominion’.
(via caveofhypnos)
“I don’t think man was meant to attain happiness so easily. Happiness is like those palaces in fairy tales whose gates are guarded by dragons: we must fight in order to conquer it.”
—The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexander Dumas (via mycolorbook)
“Ever since a certain Byzantine historian of the sixth century noted that the island of
England consists of two parts - one with rivers and cities and bridges, the other inhabited
by snakes and ghosts - relations between England and the Other World have
been celebrated and cordial.” —
England consists of two parts - one with rivers and cities and bridges, the other inhabited
by snakes and ghosts - relations between England and the Other World have
been celebrated and cordial.” —
Jorge Luis Borges fragment, from Herbert Pfostl’s ‘To Die No More’.
(via caveofhypnos)
“
By day I praised you
And never knew it.
By night I stayed with you
And never knew it.
I always thought that I was me – but no,
I was you
and never knew it!
Rumi
Version by Jonathan Star and Shahram Shiva
A Garden Beyond Paradise
Bantam Books, 1992
(via mycolorbook)