“I don’t know
if the sunflowers
are angels always,
but surely sometimes.
Who, even in heaven,
wouldn’t want to wear,
for awhile,
such a seed-face
and brave spine,
a coat of leaves
with so many pockets—
and who wouldn’t want
to stand, for a summer day,
in the hot fields,
in the lonely country
of the wild-haired corn?
This much I know,
when I see the bright
stars of their faces,
when I’m strolling nearby,
I grow soft in my speech,
and soft in my thoughts,
and I remember how everything will be everything else,
by and by.”-Mary Oliver, from “By the Wild-Haired Corn”, Long Life : Essays and Other Writings
Category Archives: Sweet Breathing
A Friend, A Soul
“When I look into the eyes of an animal, I do not see an animal. I see a living being. I see a friend. I feel a soul.”
-Anthony Douglas Williams
The Winter of Listening
THE WINTER OF LISTENING (by David Whyte)
“No one but me by the fire,
my hands burning
red in the palms while
the night wind carries
everything away outside.All this petty worry
while the great cloak
of the sky grows dark
and intense
round every living thing.What is precious
inside us does not
care to be known
by the mind
in ways that diminish
its presence.What we strive for
in perfection
is not what turns us
into the lit angel
we desire.What disturbs
and then nourishes
has everything
we need.What we hate
in ourselves
is what we cannot know
in ourselves but
what is true to the pattern
does not need
to be explained.Inside everyone
is a great shout of joy
waiting to be born…And
here
in the tumult
of the night
I hear the walnut
above the child’s swing
swaying
its dark limbs
in the wind
and the snow now
come to
beat against my window
and somewhere
in this cold night
of wind and stars
the first whispered
opening of
those hidden
and invisible springs
that uncoil
in the still summer air
each yet
to be imagined
rose.”-David Whyte
Strong, clear and powerful moon on snow at home.
Never Lost
“I am never lost in the mountains, it is where I find myself”
-Lee Hiller
Love is All There Is
“Eventually you will come to understand that love heals everything, and love is all there is”
– Gary Zukav
Center of Our Being
“May we not neglect the silenceprinted in the center of our being.It will not fail us.”-Thomas Merton
Being Pulled by the Stars Again
“I’m restless. Things are calling me away. My hair is being pulled by the stars again.”
-Anais Nin
“We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in one dimension, and not in another; unevenly. We grow partially. We are relative. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past, present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in the present. We are made up of layers, cells, constellations.”
-Anais Nin
Hidden Presence
“May you know that absence is alive with hidden presence, that nothing is ever lost or forgotten.May the absences in your life grow full of eternal echo.May you sense around you the secret Elsewhere where the presences that have left you dwell.”-John O’Donohue
Joy of Inner Belonging
JOURNEY OF THE SOUL (John O’Donohue)
“One of the qualities that you can develop, particularly in your older years, is a sense of great compassion for yourself. When you visit the wounds within the temple of memory, you should not blame yourself for making bad mistakes that you greatly regret. Sometimes you have grown unexpectedly through these mistakes. Frequently, in a journey of the soul, the most precious moments are the mistakes. They have brought you to a place that you would otherwise have always avoided. You should bring a compassionate mindfulness to your mistakes and wounds. Endeavor to inhabit the rhythm you were in at that time. If you visit this configuration of your soul with forgiveness in your heart, it will fall into place itself. When you forgive yourself, the inner wounds begin to heal. You come in out of the exile of hurt into the joy of inner belonging.”
-John O’Donohue
The Earth Remembered Me
I cannot get enough of Mary Oliver right now… her words are buoying me, reminding me of the earth’s deep sustenance and peace.
The earth does remember me and my heart is full of gratitude. I am deeply embedded in her peaceful embrace today with the rain sweetly softening and nourishing…
Softening and nourishing and sweetening everything including me.
“I thought the earth remembered me,she took me back so tenderly,arranging her dark skirts, her pocketsfull of lichens and seeds.I slept as never before, a stone on the river bed,nothing between me and the white fire of the starsbut my thoughts and they floated light as mothsamong the branches of the perfect trees.All night I heard the small kingdomsbreathing around me, the insects,and the birds who do their work in the darkness.All night I rose and fell, as if in water,grappling with a luminous doom. By morningI had vanished at least a dozen times’into something better.”-Mary Oliver