“The cup of life’s for him that drinks And not for him that sips.” – Robert Louis Stevenson, Away With Funeral Music I read through several poems this morning, finding them all falling flat for me. Same with the books I’m reading. I know I have a few stand-byes I can call up,…
“Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral. But you, children of space, you restless in rest, you shall not be trapped nor tamed. Your house shall be not an anchor but a mast.” – Khalil Gibran, The Prophet “Restless in rest” sums up my…
“Consider the hummingbird for a long moment…. Each one visits a thousand flowers a day. They can dive at sixty miles an hour. They can fly backward. They can fly more than five hundred miles without pausing to rest. But when they rest they come close to death: on frigid nights, or when they are…
“Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all…
“For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons, and to step out of life’s procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission towards the infinite.” – Khalil Gibran, The Prophet I paid a friend to mow my lawn for ten years. I traveled often and didn’t have the time to keep…
This is the absolute truth. This morning I poured myself a glass of water and started writing a post that will have to wait for another day. I’d set the kettle and heard it starting to boil as I was writing, so I took my glass that had been sitting there and walked into the…
A flash of memory and I was suddenly on a 28 foot Islander motoring into the mouth of the Merrimack River late in the night after a long, wonderful evening ’round Isle o Shoals, music playing loud and rum flowing freely. We were lucky that night, reckless as we were, but all highly focused when…
“The opposite of quitting is rededication. The opposite of quitting is an invigorated new strategy designed to break the problem apart.” – Seth Godin “For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.” – T.S. Eliot, East Coker These times challenge all of us, but some more than others. Perseverance seems…
“Let tenderness pour from your eyes The way the Sun gazes warmly on the earth.” – Hafiz, If It Is Not Too Dark There’s enough darkness in the world. Enough anger, accusation and bitterness. Outraged darkness. Indignant darkness. Resentful darkness… it’s not for me. I prefer to share light. Have I been outraged, indignant and…
“Let us also produce some bold act of our own – and join the ranks of the most emulated.” – Seneca I felt the sting immediately. Cold skin, chilled by the steady wind and the unusually cold temperatures, meeting warm air as I came back inside to start the coffee ritual. Hands stiffly assembled the…