4 July 2023

A Poem by Ramón José Argote y Gorostiza

… this incessant stubborn dying
this living death,
that slays you, oh God,
in your rigorous handiwork,
in the roses, in the stones,
in the indomitable stars
and in the flesh that burns out,
like a bonfire lit by a song,
a dream,
a hue that hits the eye.

… and  you yourself,
perhaps have died eternities of ages out there,
without us knowing about it,
we dregs, crumbs, ashes of you;
you that still are present,
like a star faked by its very light,
an empty light without star
that reaches us;
hiding
its infinite catastrophe.

World of Silence

by Klaus Ferdinand Hempfling

If you seek the great - seek it in the small, in the hidden
Because in the apparent poverty of the moment lies the fulfilment of life
If you want the entirety, then never leave the grace of the apparent nothing
When will you live, if not now

If you want to create something, the new must be formed within yourself
Because new realities first arise in your thoughts
And new thoughts arise in the never ending depth of one single moment

When will you share confidence, if not now?
May dignity in us be completed?
Liberated beauty as a consequence of life?
Genuine form awakened by our inner grace?
Connection and dedication do not exist in tomorrow

When will you be happy if not now?
And when will you be YOU, if not  …

Being Defined

"I became what I am today, at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975. I remember the precise moment, crouching behind a crumbling mud wall, peeking into the alley near the frozen creek. That was a long time ago, but it's wrong what they say about the past, I've learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out. Looking back now, I realize I have been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years."

The Kite Runner by Khalel Hosseimi

A thought by Carl Sagan

Carl Sagan, in Pale Blue Dot, wrote:

How is it that hardly any major religion has looked at science and concluded, 'This is better than we thought! The Universe is much bigger than our prophets said, grander, more subtle, more elegant'? Instead they say, 'No, no, no! My god is a little god, and I want him to stay that way.' A religion, old or new, that stressed the magnifi- cence of the Universe as revealed by modern science might be able to draw forth reserves of reverence and awe hardly tapped by the conventional faiths. 

A Japanese Thought

Ōta Dokan, the great builder of the castle of Tokyo, was pierced through with a spear. His assassin, knowing the poetical predilection of his victim, accompanied his thrust with this couplet—

"Ah! how in moments like these
Our heart doth grudge the light of life."

The expiring hero, not one whit daunted by the mortal wound in his side, added the lines—

"Had not in hours of peace,
It learned to lightly look on life."

The Soul of Japan
Inazo Nitobé