Blog Posts

The Way It Is, by William Stafford

8/11/2017

The Way It Is

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.

William Stafford (1914-1993)

The Beauty of the Trees, by Dan George

7/28/2017

The beauty of the trees
The softness of the air
The fragrance of the grass
Speaks to me.

The summit of the mountain
The thunder of the sky
The rhythm of the sea
Speaks to me
And my heart soars.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

5/4/2016

Earth’s crammed with heaven,
and every common bush afire with God;
but only he who sees takes off his shoes,
the rest sit around it and pluck blackberries.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Credentials, by Daniel Berrigan

5/4/2016

I would it were possible to state in so 
few words my errand in the world: quite simply 
forestalling all inquiry, the oak offers his leaves 
largehandedly. And in winter his integral magnificent order 
decrees, says solemnly who he is 
in the great thrusting limbs that are all finally 
one: a return, a permanent river and sea.  

So the rose is its own credential, a certain 
unattainable effortless form: wearing its heart 
visibly, it gives us heart too: bud, fullness and fall.
Daniel Berrigan (1921-2016)
Offered in Poetry Chaikhana <ivan@poetry-chaikhana.com>

A Portrait, Maurice Nicoll

2/27/2016

A Portrait, Maurice Nicoll

In the dead of night,
In the dark of the Moon
I beheld Thy Might
And craved a boon.
Not in thunder nor in storm-wind
Did'st Thou answer
But in the stillness of pure meaning.
Then I knew if the boon were granted
I would die comfortably
The most terrible death of all
Which is spiritual death.
Like a single chord of vast music
Containing all inexpressible divine truth
It entered the limitations of my language.
It became words -- as once before:
'My grace is sufficient for thee
Because my strength is made perfect in thy weakness.'
So I understand that when a man can do nothing
And when he comes to that far knowledge
Only then is Thy divine power recognized
And his soul freed to turn to Thee.

Morning Poem, by Mary Oliver

9/18/2015

Every morning
the world
is created.
Under the orange

sticks of the sun
the heaped
ashes of the night
turn into leaves again

and fasten themselves to the high branches--
and the ponds appear
like black cloth
on which are painted islands

of summer lilies.
If it is your nature
to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails

for hours, your imagination
alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit
carries within it

the thorn
that is heavier than lead--
if it's all you can do
to keep on trudging--

there is stil
somewhere deep within you
a beast shouting that the earth
is exactly what it wanted--

each pond with its blazing lilies
is a prayer heard and answered
lavishly,
every morning,

whether or not
you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not
you have ever dared to pray.

A Secret Life, by Stephen Dunn

9/11/2015

A Secret Life
By Stephen Dunn

Why you need to have one
is not much more mysterious than
why you don't say what you think
at the birth of an ugly baby.
Or, you've just made love
and feel you'd rather have been
in a dark booth where your partner
was nodding, whispering yes, yes,
you're brilliant. The secret life
begins early, is kept alive
by all that's unpopular
in you, all that you know
a Baptist, say, or some other
accountant would object to.
It becomes what you'd most protect
if the government said you can protect
one thing, all else is ours.
When you write last night
it's like a small fire
in a clearing, it's what
radiates and what can hurt
if you get close to it.
It's why your silence is a kind of truth.
Even when you speak to your best friend,
the one who'll never betray you,
you always leave out one thing;
a secret life is that important.

Tread in Solitude, from the German of V. Schoffel

9/7/2015

Tread in solitude your pathway,
Quiet heart and undismayed.
You will know things strange, mysterious,
Which to you no voice has said.

Wile the crowd of petty hustlers
Grasps at vain and meager things,
You will see a great world rising
Where soft sacred music rings.

Leave the dusty road to others,
Spotless keep your soul and bright,
As the radiant ocean’s surface
When the sun is taking flight.

-from the German of V. Schoffel

Desiderata, by Max Ehrmann~

2/17/2014

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment
it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe,
No less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

 Max Ehrmann, Desiderata, Copyright 1952

Beannacht (Irish Blessing), by John O'Donohue

1/2/2014

Beannacht (Irish Blessing)

On the day when
the weight deadens
on your shoulders
and you stumble,
may the clay dance
to balance you.
And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets in to you,
may a flock of colours,
indigo, red, green,
and azure blue
come to awaken in you
a meadow of delight.
When the canvas frays
in the currach of thought
and a stain of ocean
blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters
a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.
And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life.

Beannacht

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Forward>>

Love after Love, by Derek Walcott
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Credentials, by Daniel Berrigan
Morning Poem, by Mary Oliver
A Secret Life, by Stephen
    Dunn
Tread in Solitude, by V.
    Schoffel
Desiderata, by Max Ehrmann
Beannacht, by John
    O'Donohue
The house was quiet and the world was calm, by Wallace
    Stevens
A Garden Beyond Paradise, by
    Rumi
We remember them, from a
    Jewish Book of Prayer
The Summer Day, by Mary
    Oliver
An African Elegy, by Ben Okri
Variation on a Theme by Rilke,
    by Denise Levertov
Love of the World, Charlotte
    Tall Mountain
The Poet's Obligation, Pablo
    Neruda
All True Vows, David Whyte
Sea Fever, John Masefield
The Shortest Day, Jan Sutch
    Pickard
Song for the Open Road, Walt
    Whitman
Keep Walking, Rumi
Fog in the Valley, Paul Zimmer
Bandito, Eleanor Lerman
The Peace of Wild Things,
   Wendell Berry
But the silence in the mind ,
    R.S. Thomas
I Wandered Lonely as a
Cloud, William Wordsworth
A Cloth of Fine Gold,
    Dorothy Walters
Weather, Fleur Adcock
The Blind Old Man, Robert
   Bly
The Three Goals, David
       Budbill
All Roads Lead to Me,
       Anonymous
With that Moon Language,
     Hafiz
The River and Its Waves are
     One Surf, Kabir
What to Remember When
      Waking, David Whyte
Love after Love, Derek
   Wolcott
Last Night As I Was
    Sleeping, Antonio
    Machado (version by
     Robert Bly
where we are, Gerald
    Locklin
Wild Geese, Mary Oliver
Why I Wake Early, Mary
    Oliver
I heard a bird sing, Oliver
     Hereford
I have a house where I go,
   A.A. Milne
Going to Walden, Mary
     Oliver