Tuesday, December 18, 2007

in quietness, & time

ashberries, hanging in the river valley (taken a few weeks ago)
(ice lilies freezing up on the north saskatchewan, taken a few weeks ago)

Something I've been thinking about a lot lately is those moments where everything seems to fall into place & you know that what you are doing right then is exactly what you are supposed to be doing... those moments when everything is flowing, & you don't even really understand why, or how, it all got this way, because maybe there were a lot of tumultous or troublesome things, or even just the most subtle, unnoticable things... but somehow, you got here & you know you are exactly where you are supposed to be, doing exactly what it is you know you should do.

It's about feeling synchronous & connected, because so many things had to come together, an infinite number of things, really, for this to all fall into place. & I suppose this is really how I understand fate, or destiny -- it's not predestination, not a predetermination, as such, but just an understanding of how everything is unified, and connected. & those moments where you know, you feel a sense of visceral connection, are like little enlightenments (as in Buddhism -- being able to see the entire intricate infinitesimal web of things, all at once).

Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in Letters to a Young Poet:

'Destiny itself is like a wonderful wide tapestry in which every thread is guided by an unspeakably tender hand, placed beside another thread, and held and carried by a hundred others'

I don't think that tender hand comes from anything outside of ourselves -- we are the ones who guide ourselves (as much as we are ever ourselves, as part of something greater than us) & weave ourselves in alongside so many other threads... & I just find myself constantly comforted when I experience those clear moments where I realize where I am right now amidst those nets of connections, & those inexpressible little pulls & tugs on the web that ground me, reassure me that I am doing exactly what I should, right here, right now.

Palaces and stormclouds
The rough straggly sage and the smoke
And the way it will all come together
In quietness, and in time...

-- Joanna Newsom, 'En Galop'

Thursday, December 13, 2007

you do not have to be good.


(top: geese flying south over the sturgeon river, mid-november. bottom: sturgeon river half-frozen, sunset)
* * *

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

~Mary Oliver

* * *

This is really very lovely... I can't believe I didn't know much of Mary Oliver's poetry before. It is so honest & comforting... I especially like: You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.