The Spider and the Sage

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 17, 2018
Posted in: Inspiration, Music, Nature, Photography. Tagged: , , , , , , , .

My niece recently read this to her yoga class.  It’s from Mark Nepo’s The Book of Awakening.

The Spider and the Sage 

“I would rather be fooled than not believe.” 

In India, there is a story about a kind, quiet man who would pray in the Ganges River every morning. One day after praying, he saw a poisonous spider struggling in the water and cupped his hands to carry it ashore. As he placed the spider on the ground, it stung him. Unknowingly, his prayers for the world diluted the poison.

The next day the same thing happened. On the third day, the kind man was knee deep in the river, and sure enough, there was the spider, legs frantic in the water. As the man went to lift the creature yet again, the spider said, “Why do you keep lifting me? Can’t you see I will sting you every time, because that is what I do.” And the kind man cupped his hands about the spider, replying, “Because that is what I do.”

There are many reasons to be kind, but perhaps none is as compelling as the spiritual fact that it is what we do. It is how the inner organ of being keeps pumping. Spiders sting. Wolves howl. Ants build small hills that no one sees. And human beings lift each other, no matter the consequence. Even when other beings sting.

Some say this makes us a sorry lot that never learns, but to me it holds the same beauty as berries breaking through ice and snow every spring. It is what quietly feeds the world. After all, the berries do not have any sense of purpose or charity. They are not altruistic, or self-sacrificing. They simply grow to be delicious because that is what they do.

As for us, if things fail, we will reach for them. If things break, we will try to put them together. If loved ones cry, we will try to soothe them – because that is what we do. I have often reached out, and sometimes it feels like a mistake.

Sometimes, like the quiet man lifting the spider, I have been stung. But it doesn’t matter, because that is what I do. That is what we do. It is the reaching out that is more important than the sting. In truth, I’d rather be fooled than not believe.  🕷

Endangered Species

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 16, 2018
Posted in: Flowers, Music, Nature, Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , , , , .

Endangered Species
Dan Beachy-Quick

Even this
brief thought is endless. A
man speaks as if unaware of the
erotic life of the ampersand. In the
isolate field he comes to count one by
one the rare butterflies as they
die. He says witness is to say what
you mean as if you mean it. So many
of them are the color of the leaves
they feed on, he calls sympathy a fact, a
word by which he means to make a claim
about grace. I have in my

life said many things I did not
exactly mean. Walk
graceless through the field. Graceless so
the insects leap up into the blank
page where the margins fill
with numbers that speak diminishment.
Absence as it nears also offers astonishment.
Absence riddles even this
briefest thought, here
is your introduction to desire, time’s
underneath where the roots root down
into nothing like loose threads
hanging from the weaving’s underside.
No one seeing the roots
can guess

at the field above. Green
equation that ends in yellow
occasions. Theory is
insubstantial. The eye latches on
to the butterflies as they fly
and the quick heart follows, not
a root in nothing but a thread across
abstraction. They fly away.
What in us follows we do not name.
What the butterflies pull out us
as in battle horses pull
chariot, we do not

name. But there is none, no battle,
no surge, no retreat, a field
full not of danger, but the endangered,
where dust-wings pull from us
what we thought we lost, what theory
denies, where in us ideas go to die,
and thought with the quaking grass quakes.
Some call it breath but I’m still breathing.
So empty I know I’m not any emptier.
On slim threads they pull it out me,
disperse—no
one takes notes—disappear, &

🔸

Venus Comforting Cupid

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 14, 2018
Posted in: Art, Music, Photography. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

Venus Comforting Cupid
Benjamin West

“Benjamin West painted many versions of this tender scene recalling an ode by the ancient Greek poet Anacreon. Here, Venus comforts her son, Cupid, after he suffers a bee sting. This painting reflects the noble ideals and elevated sentiments of the history painting genre, for which West became a key representative.

The American-born West left for Italy in 1760 to expand his artistic repertoire. There he saw the increasing influence of classical antiquity on artistic style and taste. He learned sophisticated glazing techniques that differed from the painting methods he learned in Pennsylvania. After three years in Italy, he permanently settled in England.”   — Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art …….. ❤

Go, Lovely Rose

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 13, 2018
Posted in: Flowers, Music, Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , , , , , , .

Go, Lovely Rose
by Edmund Waller

     Go, lovely Rose,—
Tell her that wastes her time and me,
     That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.

     Tell her that’s young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
     That hadst thou sprung
In deserts where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.

     Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retir’d:
     Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desir’d,
And not blush so to be admir’d.

     Then die, that she
The common fate of all things rare
     May read in thee;
How small a part of time they share,
That are so wondrous sweet and fair.

🌹

Anne Rutledge / Lincoln

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 12, 2018
Posted in: Music, Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , .


The President and the Empress
Statue by Kwan Wu

Anne Rutledge
Edgar Lee Masters

Out of me unworthy and unknown
The vibrations of deathless music;
“With malice toward none, with charity for all.”
Out of me the forgiveness of millions toward millions,
And the beneficent face of a nation
Shining with justice and truth.
I am Anne Rutledge who sleep beneath these weeds,
Beloved in life of Abraham Lincoln,
Wedded to him, not through union,
But through separation.
Bloom forever, O Republic,
From the dust of my bosom!

🎩

Lincoln Love Letter

How Calmly Does the Olive Branch (Nonno’s Poem)

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 10, 2018
Posted in: Music, Nature, Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , , .

How Calmly Does the Olive Branch (Nonno’s Poem)
Tennessee Williams‘ poem from “Night of the Iguana“

How calmly does the olive branch
Observe the sky begin to blanch
Without a cry, without a prayer
With no betrayal of despair

Some time while light obscures the tree
The zenith of its life will be
Gone past forever
And from thence
A second history will commence

A chronicle no longer gold
A bargaining with mist and mold
And finally the broken stem
The plummeting to earth, and then

An intercourse not well designed
For beings of a golden kind
Whose native green must arch above
The earth’s obscene corrupting love

And still the ripe fruit and the branch
Observe the sky begin to blanch
Without a cry, without a prayer
With no betrayal of despair

Oh courage! Could you not as well
Select a second place to dwell
Not only in that golden tree
But in the frightened heart of me?

Love’s Horse Will Carry You Home

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 9, 2018
Posted in: Music, Nature, Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , , , , , .


Love’s Horse Will Carry You Home

The whole world could be choked with thorns
A Lover’s heart will stay a rose garden. 🌹
The wheel of heaven could wind to a halt
The world of Lovers will go on turning.
Even if every being grew sad, a Lover’s soul
Will stay fresh, vibrant, light.
Are all the candles out? Hand them to a Lover –
A lover shoots out a thousand fires. 🔥
A Lover may be solitary, but he is never alone:
For companion he has always the hidden Beloved.
The drunkeness of Lovers comes from the Soul,
And Love’s companion stays hidden in secret.
Love cannot be deceived by a hundred promises;
It knows how innumerable the ploys of sedducers are.
Wherever you find a Lover on a bed of pain
You find the Beloved right by his side.  💕
Mount the stallion of Love and do not fear the path –
Love’s stallion knows the way exactly.
With one leap, Love’s horse will carry you home
However black with obstacles the way may be.
🔸 Rumi 🔸

WPC: Tour Guide

Posted by Maverick ~ on February 8, 2018
Posted in: Music, Photography, Weekly Photo Challenge. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , .

I live near Powell Gardens which is a 970-acre (3.9 km2) botanical garden about 30 miles east of Kansas City, Missouri. This is where I enjoy my weekend nature walks amongst the flowers.

Kansas City Union Station is one of the icons of downtown Kansas City, Missouri, having opened in 1914. Once a booming rail station and also noted for the Kansas City Massacre, it still serves public transportation as an Amtrak station while also hosting theaters, museum exhibits, and other attractions. As a small child I unintentionally let go of my helium balloon and watched it float to the top of the 95 foot ceiling. Click on the photo for other views of downtown Kansas City posted previously.


And this is the place I’ll be most evenings working on blog, photos, and mischief.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Tour Guide