Rabindranath Tagore wrote this poem reminding me when we live in the world it is important to take time and encounter that world so we can more clearly hear the sighs and murmurs. Quite often, in the midst of the busyness and noisiness in the world, we need and space to witness the world through all our senses. It almost seems the quietness needed is indulgent, but it is a necessary indulgence.
I ask for a moment’s indulgence to sit by thy side. The works
that I have in hand I will finish afterwards.
Away from the sight of thy face my heart knows no rest nor respite,
and my work becomes an endless toil in a shoreless sea of toil.
Today the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and
the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove.
Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing
dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure.
About ivonprefontaine
In keeping with bell hooks and Noam Chomsky, I consider myself a public and dissident intellectual. Part of my work is to move beyond (transcend) institutional dogmas that bind me to defend freedom, raising my voice to be heard on behalf of those who seek equity and justice in all their forms.
I completed my PhD in Philosophy of Leadership Studies at Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA. My dissertation and research was how teachers experience becoming teachers and their role as leaders.
I focus on leading, communicating, and innovating in organizations. This includes mindfuful servant-leadership, World Cafe events, Appreciative Inquiry, and expressing one's self through creativity. I offer retreats, workshops, and presentations that can be tailored to your organzations specific needs.
I published peer reviewed articles about schools as learning organizations, currere as an ethical pursuit, and hope as an essential element of adult eductaion. I published three poems and am currently preparing my poetry to publish as an anthology of poetry.
I present on mindful leadership, servant leadership, schools as learning organizations, how teachers experience becoming teachers, assessement, and critical thinking. I facilitate mindfulness, hospitality retreats. and World Cafe Events using Appreciative Inquiry.
I am writing and researching about various forms of leadership, how teachers inform and form their identity as a particular teacher, schools as learning organizations, hope, nonviolence and its anticipatory relationship with the future, as essential elements to teaching and learning.
Academic publications can be found at Ivon Gile Prefontaine on ResearchGate
ivonprefontaine
Teacher as Transformer 
Good reminder! Thanks for sharing it here.
You are welcome.
I WILL NOT….be so silent….in praise!
Those are incredible words and actions. Thank you Jonathan.
ORT-ORT. 🙂
Reblogged this on By the Mighty Mumford and commented:
ORT-ORT-ORT-ORT (for its sensitivity and luscious luxury!)
Thank you for the re-blog and the comment Jonathan.
🙂
Loved the poem Ivon… Have a great evening 🙂
Thank you Tina. Take care.