Anger

“Anger is a great force. 

If you control it, 

it can be transmuted into a power 

which can move the whole world.”
~ William Shenstone

Have Fun Dillon!

"People are more fun than anyone."

~ Dorothy Parker

Seeking God

"You find God

the moment you realize

that you don't need to seek God."

~Eckhart Tolle

The Inner Body

"Feel the energy of your inner body.

Immediately mental noise slows down or ceases.

Feel it in your hands, your feet, your abdomen, your chest.

Feel the life that you are, the life that animates the body"
~Eckhart Tolle

Haiku Made Easy

I love the way palms blow noisily in the wind outside the window.

or

I love the way palms

blow noisily in the wind

outside the window.

Well.

That was terrible, really.

There's no dash or colon, nor is there a reference to a season.

Bound By The World Outside

"We are contained within our mental boundaries...Many people live bound by the world outside them because they know not of an inside world. In order to bring a sense of stability into their lives, people cling to the outside world to control how they feel. They try to give themselves a sense of love and well-being, and yet it is largely beyond their control because their love is based outside them."

~Ron Rathbun

From Desire And The Importance of Failing

"A window opens.
A curtain pulls back.

The lamp of lovers connect,
not at their ceramic bases,
but in their lightedness.

No lover wants union with the Beloved
without the Beloved also wanting the lover.

Love makes the lover weak,
while the Beloved gets strong.

Lightning from here strikes there.
When you begin to love God, God
is loving you. A clapping sound
does not come from one hand.

A thirsty man calls out, 'Delicious water,
where are you?' while the water moans,
'Where is the water drinker?'

The thirst in our souls is the attraction
put out by the Water itself.

We belong to It,
and It to us.

God's wisdom made us lovers of one another.
In fact, all the particles of the world
are in love and looking for lovers...."

Rumi

From 'Feeling the Shoulder of the Lion'
Translated by Coleman Barks

The Chairs That No One Sits In

The Chairs That No One Sits In 

by Billy Collins

You see them on porches and on lawns

down by the lakeside,

usually arranged in pairs implying a couple

who might sit there and look out

at the water or the big shade trees.

The trouble is you never see anyone

sitting in these forlorn chairs

though at one time it must have seemed

a good place to stop and do nothing for a while.

Sometimes there is a little table

between the chairs where no one

is resting a glass or placing a book facedown.

It might be none of my business,

but it might be a good idea one day

for everyone who placed those vacant chairs

on a veranda or a dock to sit down in them

for the sake of remembering

whatever it was they thought deserved

to be viewed from two chairs

side by side with a table in between.

The clouds are high and massive that day.

The woman looks up from her book.

The man takes a sip of his drink.

Then there is nothing but the sound of their looking,

the lapping of lake water, and a call of one bird

then another, cries of joy or warning—

it passes the time to wonder which.

Billy Collins

Source: Poetry (November 2008) 

(giving credit, where credit is due...)

Numbers

More whole than Two in winter

when summer was Three:
A Beloved One grows strong

Perspective

 

I LOVE this photo. Just sayin'.

What's more, I can point out

at least three separate things

I "shouldn't" have done.

Maybe the rules really are 

meant to be broken every once in awhile.

Home

"I long, as does every human being,

to be at home wherever I find myself."

~Maya Angelou

It's good to be Home.

Healing

Healing is embracing what is most feared;
healing is opening what has been closed, 
softening what has hardened into obstruction
healing is learning to trust life.
~Jeanne Achterberg
 

Buster Keaton

You can find a photo or two of mine hanging at

Infinity Art Gallery

While you're there check out all the artists.

I like Gary Paul Stutler

A Solitary Adventure

To heal is to touch with love

that which we

previously touched with fear.

~Stephen Levine

When you travel with your enemies as your companions,

when you offer them hands well-worn with compassion,

when you shelter them with your wonder,

then who you are and who you might become converge.

~Dawna Markova

Grandmother Storyteller

Here's a vibrant, intelligent, rising new documentary film maker.

Check out the proceedings on her new project at:

Grandmother Storyteller

She's a blast to know, and to photograph.

Flowers

 

The flower offered of itself

And eloquently spoke

Of Gods

In languages of rainbows

Perfumes

And secret silence...

~Phillip Pulfrey, from Love, Abstraction and other Speculations 

Longhorn Defeat

Well... No.

Awwww... nothing like a victory against a team

who loses their QB in the first quarter of the game.

Still.

We had a good time.

There is an apparent expression one must have

when displaying the Horns.

See, this was BEFORE the game.

Because their names rhyme.

Pattern

 

If your friend says of some picture, 

 "Yes, but what does it mean?" 

ask him, what his carpet means 

or the circular patterns on his shoes.

~ Stephen Potter

To understand

is to perceive patterns

~Isaiah Berlin

Exploring The Effect of The Shadow

One deceit needs many others

and so the whole house is built in the air

and must soon come to the ground.

~Baltasar Gracian

Grief

While grief is fresh,

every attempt to divert only irritates.

You must wait til it be digested,

and then amusement

will dissipate the remains of it.

~Samuel Johnson

Give sorrow words.

The grief that does not speak

whispers the o'er fraught heart,

and bids it break."

~ Shakespeare

It's so curious:  one can resist tears and 'behave' very well in the hardest hours of grief.  But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window, or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed, or a letter slips from a drawer... and everything collapses.

~Colette

"Welcome home.  May you find healing, comfort, laughter, love, peace, joy, serenity, safety and above all else, may you find yourself in a space to renew, reclaim, and reawaken." ~ A card I received yesterday.

Happy New Year

White Canvas.

A Clean Slate.

So much let go of in the old year.

There's so much to create in the new.

We spend January 1 walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched.  Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives... not looking for flaws, but for potential. 

~Ellen Goodman