Everything
just as it is,
as it is,
as is.
Flowers in bloom.
Nothing to add.
– Robert Aitken, Roshi
“What you encounter, recognize or discover depends to a large degree on the quality of your approach. Many of the ancient cultures practiced careful rituals of approach. An encounter of depth and spirit was preceded by careful preparation.
When we approach with reverence, great things decide to approach us. Our real life comes to the surface and its light awakens the concealed beauty in things. When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us. The rushed heart and arrogant mind lack the gentleness and patience to enter that embrace.” ― John O’Donohue, Beauty: The Invisible Embrace
“Don’t be ashamed to weep; ’tis right to grieve. Tears are only water, and flowers, trees, and fruit cannot grow without water. But there must be sunlight also. A wounded heart will heal in time, and when it does, the memory and love of our lost ones is sealed inside to comfort us.” ― Brian Jacques
The flower invites the butterfly with no-mind;
The butterfly visits the flower with no-mind.
The flower opens, the butterfly comes;
The butterfly comes, the flower opens.
I don’t know others,
Others don’t know me.
By not-knowing we follow nature’s course.
Ryōkan
Found
By Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832)
I WANDERED lonely
Beneath the trees,
And sought for nothing,
But strolled at ease.
There in the shadows
A flower grew,
Like starlight beaming,
Like eyes so blue.
I sought to break it,
But heard it say:
“Shall I be broken
To fade away?”
I dug it out then
With roots and all,
And bore it home to
My garden small.
Again it’s planted
And finds repose;
And now as ever
It blooms and grows.
To know someone here or there with whom you can feel there is understanding
in spite of distances or thoughts expressed. That can make life a garden.
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
“A work of arte; and yet no arte of man,
Can worke, this worke, these little creatures can”
– Geffrey Whitney, 1586.
You find a flower half-buried in leaves,
And in your eye its very fate resides.
Loving beauty, you caress the bloom;
Soon enough, you’ll sweep petals from the floor.
Terrible to love the lovely so,
To count your own years, to say “I’m old,”
To see a flower half-buried in leaves
And come face to face with what you are.
– Hanshan
Maverick Mist 