On this Saturday morning, as many before,
I spend time reading poetry and listening to music —
a time to refuel my outward being
with my inter soul.
In doing so I remind myself;
I write, therefore I am a writer;
I photograph, therefore I am a photographer –
it’s just that simple, no more.
“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 Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet
“And the world cannot be discovered by a journey of miles,
no matter how long and far-reaching,
but only by a spiritual journey,
a journey of inch by inch,
on the inside,
very arduous and humbling and joyful,
by which we arrive at the ground underneath our own feet,
where we learn to be fully at home.”
“When we spend time in nature we become so engaged in doing things to achieve purposes of outer value
that we forget that the inner value, the rapture that is associated with the being alive, is what it’s all about.”
— Vairocana
*****
“He who thinks he knows, doesn’t know.
He who knows that he doesn’t know, knows.
For in this context, to know is not to know.
And not to know is to know.”
— Joseph Campbell
*****
To see life as a poem
participating in the poem
is what life does for you.
When I read a poem,
I am in awe
of the mystery of it all.
“Every man with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds…
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed
by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.
So throw off the bowlines.
Sail away from the safe harbor.
Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore.
Dream.
Discover.” – Mark Twain (1835-1910)
On this Saturday morning, as many before,
