Never let go of the fiery sadness called desire — Matsuo Basho
When I have Fears That I May Cease to Be
By John Keats
When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain,
Before high-pilèd books, in charactery,
Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starred face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love—then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.
In the fine tradition of love, found and lost, The County Leitrim Queen:
Her hair was like the sun-kissed gold
Her cheeks a lily hue
No prayer or chisel, brooch or pen
Could express my colleen dubh
The beauty she possessed was rare
Her affection ne’er I seen
In the love that mirrored from the eyes
Of my County Leitrim queen
If you don’t know about Thistleradio, it’s a great way to hear a broad range of Celtic music, new and old, modern and traditional. I’d heard an instrumental version of this tune there and went looking to see what it was about.
Still hot, still hot and humid. Fiddled around a little with the landscape I started last night, removed the masking in the cloud area and added some but honestly I like it the way it is. Note to self – don’t commit to big black clouds on the horizon, even if you mean it, LOL. They’re really dark. Think about that before hand.
Emphasis is mine. Found in an essay about How to Love, by Thich Nhat Hanh on Brain Pickings.
If you pour a handful of salt into a cup of water, the water becomes undrinkable. But if you pour the salt into a river, people can continue to draw the water to cook, wash, and drink. The river is immense, and it has the capacity to receive, embrace, and transform. When our hearts are small, our understanding and compassion are limited, and we suffer. We can’t accept or tolerate others and their shortcomings, and we demand that they change. But when our hearts expand, these same things don’t make us suffer anymore. We have a lot of understanding and compassion and can embrace others. We accept others as they are, and then they have a chance to transform. — Thich Nhat Hanh, How to Love
Choose always the way that seems the best, however rough it may be; custom will soon render it easy and agreeable.
