Solo

“Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away… and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast.

Be happy about your growth, in which of course you can’t take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind; be confident and calm in front of them and don’t torment them with your doubts and don’t frighten them with your faith or joy, which they wouldn’t be able to comprehend.

Seek out some simple and true feeling of what you have in common with them, which doesn’t necessarily have to alter when you yourself change again and again; when you see them, love life in a form that is not your own and be indulgent toward those who are growing old, who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust.

And don’t expect any understanding; but believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it."         

~~Rainer Maria  

Earth Day 22 April 2013

A beautiful Buddhist Earth Prayer I would like to share to celebrate Earth day:

"We gently caress you, the Earth, our planet and our home.

Our vision has brought us closer to you, making us aware of the harm we have done to the life-network upon which we ourselves depend.

We are reminded that we have poisoned your waters, your lands, your air.

We have filled you with the bones of our dead from war and greed.

Your pain is our pain.

Touching you gently, we pray that we may become peace-bringers and life-bringers so that our home in its journey around the Sun not become a sterile and lonely place.

May this Prayer and its power last forever."

                                                  - Sensei Ulrich, Manitoba Buddhist -

..... Mother .....

There were no warnings Mother

only signs

Begging for one more day

to say

how much I've missed you

since you went

away

I feel your skin, thin with age

the shape of your fingernails

your love

your smell

to hear your Voice

to look into your Eyes

and see you looking back

Are you proud of who I am?

I crave

your love

not a child anymore

but still

scared

Alone

these broken days

when I want to hide

because it is you I miss

hoping somebody will

pick me up

and carry me away

from this

Help me understand

Mountains now rocks

Ocean now a drop

                                /////////////

- Love ... -

It - "Love" - is not a word,

nor a single action

In truth, it can never be wrong

          Like the sunrise, perfect in every possible way

It is many things and yet it must exist

in the small space of the heart

Once found it can bloom,

endlessly, with no cease

It can choke one's throat, bring

one to tears ....

          But it never hides in shadows
          or in darkness
          It never feeds itself on deception
          It grows with trust, honesty and compassion

Nothing less, always more

- "Unknown"- 

Light

Because of the way

the Light 

finds and holds you

transparent

I want to move

into the places of who

I am

Makes me

want to feel better

Makes me 

want to forever

be part of 

something else's greatness

and feed my own promise of 

contentment

- Free -

Birds and sky,

both

free

I want to fly like them, 

no tension, no woes, 

just me

with my wings and the sky 

-  Henry David Thoreau -

Photographs of birds in flight taken over the Atlantic Ocean at Paternoster, South Africa - November 2011

Dandelion Thinking ...

I took this photo a few days ago ...  it reminded me of this beautiful poem -

Dandelion Thinking

- Monica Cromhout - 

Dandelions
don't care

that nobody cares

to cultivate dandelions.

Dandelions
 don't know

that everyone knows -

they grow everywhere.

Underfoot. In cracks.
 Extravagantly.
-----

The Journey

The Journey 

- Mary Oliver -

One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice-

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen branches and 

stones.

but little by little,

as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do 

the only thing you could do

determined to save

the only life you could save