Golden Columbine On Mt. Lemmon, July 2022 — Image by kenne
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
Archive for the ‘T. S. Eliot’ Tag
Golden Columbine On Mt. Lemmon 3 comments
Flycatcher Art: The Unattended Moment Leave a comment
Flycatcher in Flight — Photo-Artistry by kenne
For most of us,
There is only the unattended Moment,
The moment in and out of time,
The distraction fit, lost in a shaft of sunlight,
The wild thyme unseen, or the winter lightning
Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply
That it is not heard at all, but you are the music
While the music lasts.
— from Four Quartets, “The Dry Salvages” by T. S. Eliot
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Sullivan Island Beach Scene 1 comment
Sullivan’s Island Beach — Photo-Artistry by kenne
"Let me disclose the gifts reserved for age To set a crown upon your lifetime's effort. First, the cold friction of expiring sense Without enchantment, offering no promise But bitter tastelessness of shadow fruit As body and soul begin to fall asunder. Second, the conscious impotence of rage At human folly, and the laceration Of laughter at what ceases to amuse. And last, the rending pain of re-enactment Of all that you have done, and been; the shame Of motives late revealed, and the awareness Of things ill done and done to others' harm Which once you took for exercise of virtue."
-- T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets
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Marina On The Bay Leave a comment
Marina On the Bay — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Are become unsubstantial, reduced by a wind,
A breath of pine, and the woodsong fog
By this grace dissolved in place
What is this face, less clear and clearer
The pulse in the arm, less strong and stronger —
Given or lent? more distant than stars and nearer than the eye
Whispers and small laughter between leaves and hurrying feet
Under sleep, where all the waters meet.
— from Marina by T. S. Eliot
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Here We Go Round The Prickly Pear 1 comment
Prickly Pear — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o’clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
— from The Hollow Men by T. S. Eliot
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Coyote Fence Corral Leave a comment
Coyote Fence Corral In Doubtful Canyon — Images by kenne
Here is no water but only rock
Rock and no water and the sandy road
The road winding above among the mountains
Which are mountains of rock without water
If there were water we should stop and drink
Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think
Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand
If there were only water amongst the rock
Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit
Here one can neither stand nor lie nor sit
There is not even silence in the mountains
But dry sterile thunder without rain
There is not even solitude in the mountains
But red sullen faces sneer and snarl
From doors of mudcracked houses
If there were water
And no rock
If there were rock
And also water
And water
A spring
A pool among the rock
If there were the sound of water only
Not the cicada
And dry grass singing
But sound of water over a rock
Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees
Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop
But there is no water
— from The Waste Land by T. S. Eliot
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Shore Life 1 comment
Shore Life — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
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January Sunrise, Tanuri Ridge 2 comments
January Sunrise, Tanuri Ridge — Image by kenne
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
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Fallen Leaves Leave a comment
Fallen Leaves On Mt. Lemmon — Photo-Artistry by kenne
In my beginning is my end. Now the light falls
Across the open field, leaving the deep lane
Shuttered with branches, dark in the afternoon,
Where you lean against a bank while a van passes,
And the deep lane insists on the direction
Into the village, in the electric heat
Hypnotised. In a warm haze the sultry light
Is absorbed, not refracted, by grey stone.
The dahlias sleep in the empty silence.
Wait for the early owl.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
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A Tucson Sunset 2 comments
A Tucson Sunset — Image by kenne
In my beginning is my end. Now the light falls
Across the open field, leaving the deep lane
Shuttered with branches, dark in the afternoon,
Where you lean against a bank while a van passes,
And the deep lane insists on the direction
Into the village, in the electric heat
Hypnotised.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
Eliot’s Four Quartets rests on my desk not only because I love his poetic masterpiece
but because my first copy was given to me by my brother, Tom, who wrote
“. . . I’ve become obsessed with it . . . with time . . . with memory . . . with language,
all of which are concentrated in this work. It has become such a part of me.”
Tom went on to write — “To use a few of Eliot’s words; ‘As we grow older the world
becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated . . . ‘ Complications, ambiguities, non sequitur
I keep searching for clarity . . . lucidity, and I know each time I seek that, I’ll
become more entangled. No. I’m not bored—just Scarred. I’m moving toward a sort-of silence . . .
I know what you’re thinking: ‘Bull-shit!’ Since the significant things, I want to say
have the wrong inflections, intonations for most arenas of conversation;
I ramble on into oblivion. A series of non sequitur.” (7/27/84)
I miss Tom.
— kenne
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Old Western Morning 1 comment
Old Western Morning (Sonoran Desert) — Photo-Artistry by kenne
We have taken from the defeated
What they had to leave us — a symbol:
A symbol perfected in death.
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
By the purification of the motive
I the ground of our beseeching.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
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Two-Windows 1 comment
Two-Windows (Tucson Arizona) — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Go, go, go, said the bird: humankind
Cannot bear very much reality.
Time past and time future
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
— from Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot
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Love Is Itself Unmoving 5 comments
Chase Morris — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Love is itself unmoving,
Only the cause and end of movement,
Timeless, and undesiring
Except in the aspect of time
Caught in the form of limitation
Between un-being and being.
— Four Quarters by T.S. Eliot
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Mourning Doves In The Morning Sunlight 1 comment
Mourning Doves In The Morning Sunlight (Sabino Canyon Recreational Area) — Image by kenne
“For most of us, there is only the unattended
Moment, the moment in and out of time,
The distraction fit, lost in a shaft of sunlight,
The wild thyme unseen, or the winter lightning
Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply
That it is not heard at all, but you are the music
While the music lasts.”
— from Four Quartets, by T. S. Eliot
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Esperero Trail In Sabino Canyon 1 comment
Esperero Trail In Sabino Canyon — Panorama by kenne
Becoming is Superior to Being 