The poem at the link is a wonderful description of poetry as a sixth sense.
Poetry is like a sense which brings all the other senses alive and into sharper focus. We are able to read the words and enjoy their fuller meaning in the spaces between each word, each line, and each stanza.
We relive poetry over and over in new ways and embody the meaning in who we are and who we are becoming.
Mary Oliver, one of my many favourite poets, speaks often of our relationship both to and in nature. We are not separate from nature, but a part of it and relate to all its elements, sentient and non-sentient. We relate to nature and all its elements as a participant and not an external, passive observer.
Our observations are not something we can full grasp and write down. The closest we come is expressing what we feel in writing poetry and sharing photography.
Quite often, we are dumb to what happens around us. Other moments, we awake and soak it in through all our senses, embodying what the fox tells us and feeling so close to what we experience in those moments.
Listen says fox it is music to run
over the hills to lick
dew from the leaves to nose along
the edges of the ponds to smell the fat
ducks in their bright feathers but
far out, safe in their rafts of
sleep. It is like
music to visit the orchard, to find
the vole sucking the sweet of the apple, or the
rabbit with his fast-beating heart. Death itself
is a music. Nobody has ever come close to
writing it down, awake or in a dream. It cannot
be told. It is flesh and bones
changing shape and with good cause, mercy
is a little child beside such an invention. It is
music to wander the black back roads
outside of town no one awake or wondering
if anything miraculous is ever going to
happen, totally dumb to the fact of every
moment’s miracle. Don’t think I haven’t
peeked into windows. I see you in all your seasons
making love, arguing, talking about God
as if he were an idea instead of the grass,
instead of the stars, the rabbit caught
in one good teeth-whacking hit and brought
home to the den. What I am, and I know it, is
responsible, joyful, thankful. I would not
give my life for a thousand of yours.
RUMI.
As Rumi suggested, perhaps we look in the wrong places. When we pause and take time, we can sense where we are being called to look.
It is like an old country song which suggested we are looking in all the wrong places.
There is always a dogmatic mind and dogma that influences the way we see the world and speak about it.
When we let go of our opinions, perhaps we improve our vision. We can never see clearly, but we can see more clearly as we let go and allow the sediment to settle.
When we look at a tree, is it just a tree? Or, is there more to that tree? It is likely the home to birds and other animals. Perhaps, rather than a home, it is a resting place during the day or seasons that pass. It is a place of shelter provides food, offers shade, and many other things that are overlooked in our daily passing of the tree. What story does it tell? We only know when we stop, close our eyes, and listen to the tree.
We don’t own a cat. We did once and she was special. I think Charles Bukowski gets it right that when we have a pet they are our teachers. I always tell people who cat really owned us. We have opportunities to learn from whatever appears in our world and space. When we stop and sense closely, deeply, it is a learning experience that sometimes only reveals itself much later.
I know. I know.
they are limited, have different
needs and
concerns.
but I watch and learn from them.
I like the little they know,
which is so
much.
they complain but never
worry,
they walk with a surprising dignity.
they sleep with a direct simplicity that
humans just can’t
understand.
their eyes are more
beautiful than our eyes.
and they can sleep 20 hours
a day
without
hesitation or
remorse.
when I am feeling
low
all I have to do is
watch my cats
and my
courage
returns.
I study these
creatures.
they are my
teachers.
Noelle Kocot wrote about being contented as a human. I find my space not in the competition and busyness of living, but being human is in the never being done.
There is a sense of wonder in stepping back and accepting what the moment offers. It is about the awe that wandering with an open heart and mind allows me to have. I stay open to the world and to myself when I remember living is not competition. I cooperate with everything I meet and experience.
If I claim I was a terrible, horrible,
Evil no-good person,
It would be a lie, and it would be
Wanting always to be the best or the worst.
So now I’m destined to wander,
My bag full of pride a lot lighter,
And if I say I am done
With whatever ails me,
That would also be a lie.
I am not done, will never be done
Till the day I die,
But I am content to be human,
Naked and shaking with love
At the moment, and the next moment,
I just can’t say.
John O’Donohue wrote many of his poems as blessings and prayers to living. He included a deeply spiritual aspect in his writing reminding us to be mindful and attentive in living our lives.
Each day has a history that we cannot know in advance and only recall incompletely. Life becomes a mystery except when we are living each moment in its completeness. It is here, on the sacred ground of the present, that the past and future continuously mingle becoming one. It is here the eucharist of the ordinary happens and we join together living in community.
The word present reminds that each moment, each day, we should not take the gift for granted and lightly. Living it fully, responsibly, and richly is the gift we return.
No one knew the name of this day;
Born quietly from deepest night,
It hid its face in light,
Demanded nothing for itself,
Opened out to offer each of us
A field of brightness that traveled ahead,
Providing in time, ground to hold our footsteps
And the light of thought to show the way.
The mind of the day draws no attention;
It dwells within the silence with elegance
To create a space for all our words,
Drawing us to listen inward and outward.
We seldom notice how each day is a holy place
Where the eucharist of the ordinary happens,
Transforming our broken fragments
Into an eternal continuity that keeps us.
Somewhere in us a dignity presides
That is more gracious than the smallness
That fuels us with fear and force,
A dignity that trusts the form a day takes.
So at the end of this day, we give thanks
For being betrothed to the unknown
And for the secret work
Through which the mind of the day
And wisdom of the soul become one.
Rilke suggested we live the questions now and someday we might live our way into the answers. This poem raises the question about what he meant by the Machine. He capitalized it suggesting it has been given a privileged place in the world.
Does the Machine eat away at our humanness and humanity? Mindfulness allows us to be present, living in the moment, and possibly living our way to answers. Perhaps, this gives us our humanness and humanity even when we do not have the words to express the mystery involved.
The Machine endangers all we have made.
We allow it to rule instead of obey.
To build a house, cut the stone sharp and fast:
the carver’s hand takes too long to feel its way.
The Machine never hesitates, or we might escape
and its factories subside into silence.
It thinks it’s alive and does everything better.
With equal resolve it creates and destroys.
But life holds mystery for us yet. In a hundred places
we can still sense the source: a play of pure powers
that — when you feel it — brings you to your knees.
There are yet words that come near the unsayable,
and, from crumbling stones, a new music
to make a sacred dwelling in a place we cannot own.
Teacher as Transformer 