coming or going ~ Ryokan (Trans: K tanahashi, Sky Above, Great Wind)
Nikon D750 f/1.8 1/400 35mm 200 ISO
with nothing
to touch, a dead branch
grabs at the sky ~Katsura Nobuko (cited: Trans: M Ueda, Far Beyond the Field)
Nikon D750 f/1.8 1/10s 35mm 200 ISO
Protecting the child
from the cold autumn wind,
the old scarecrow. ~ Issa (cited: Trans: S Hamill, The Spring of My Life)
Nikon D750 f/1.8 1/640s 35mm 200 ISO
Winter wind!
A charcoal peddler all alone
in a small ferry boat ~ Buson (cited: Trans: Y Sawa & E M Shiffert, Haiku Master Buson)
A special thank you to the Lens-Artists Photographers who continue to challenge and inspire. The above images and poetry is submitted in response to Travels and Trifles challenge: distance.
Stay at Home Order … day 3 plus 14 seclusion retreat days
The world is changed.
I feel it in the water.
I feel it in the earth.
I smell it in the air.
Much that once was … is lost
For none now live who remember it.
I begin with …
and then … things that should have been remembered, were lost
Lord of the Ring
Nikon D750 f/1.8 1/320s 35mm 200 ISO
“In this world, the passage of time brings increasing order. Order is the law of nature, the universal trend, the cosmic direction. If time is an arrow, the arrow points toward order. The future is pattern, organization, union, intensification; the past, randomness, confusion, disintegration, dissipation.
“Philosophers have argued that without a trend toward order, time would lack meaning. The future would be indistinguishable from the past. Sequences of events would be just so many random scenes from a thousand novels. History would be indistinct, like the mist slowly gathered by treetops in evening.
” In such a world, people with untidy houses lie in their beds and wait for the forces of nature to jostle the dust from their windowsills and straighten the shoes in their closets. … Gardens need never be pruned, weeds never uprooted. Desks become neat by the end of the day. Clothes on the floor in the evening lie on chairs in the morning. Missing socks reappear.
“If one visits a city in the spring, one sees another wondrous sight. For in springtime the populace become sick of the order in their lives. In spring, people furiously lay waste to their houses. They sweep in dirt, smash chairs, break windows. On Aarbergergasse, or any residential avenue in spring, one hears the sounds of broken glass, shouting, howling, laughter. In spring, people meet at unarranged times, burn their appointment books, throw away their watches, drink through the night. This hysterical abandon continues until summer, when people begin their senses and return to work.” (~Alan Lightman, Einstein’s Dreams. pp. 51-52)
Since we’ve got some time on our hands…let’s wander back to 1986 and listen to the Chambers Brothers, “Time Has Come Today”
“There should have been roses Of the large, pale yellow ones. And they should hang in abundant clusters over the garden-wall, scattering their tender leaves carelessly down into the wagon-tracks on the road: a distinguished glimmer of all the exuberant wealth of flowers within. And they should have the delicate, fleeting fragrance of roses, which cannot be seized and is like that of unknown fruits of which the senses tell legends in their dreams. Or should they have been red, the roses? Perhaps. They might be of the small, round, hardy roses, and they would have to hang down in slender twining branches with smooth leaves, red and fresh, and like a salutation or a kiss thrown to the wanderer, who is walking, tired and dusty, in the middle of the road, glad that he now is only half a mile from Rome. Of what may he be thinking? What may be his life?”
Cited: Project Gutenberg’s Mogens and Other Stories, by Jens Peter Jacobsen
Oh! What A Tangled Web We Weave When First We Practice To Deceive
~Walter Scott, Marmion
Nikon D750 … f/1.8 1/320s 35mm 200 ISO
You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.
~Abraham Lincoln
“… to abstain from false speech is found in the position that people connect with one another within an atmosphere of mutual trust, where each draws upon the belief that the other will speak the truth. It is suggested therefore that families and societies will fall into chaos as one untruth shatters trust, as it is the nature of lies to proliferate through attempts to weave a harmonious tapestry of reality.
“When I reflect upon those times in which I experience an intense urge to say other than what I believe is true, I know it is fed by the anxiety intrinsic to uncertainty, and inherent with the aloneness of expulsion. At other times, the drive seems to come from a sense of nothingness that seeks validation through inclusion with others or continuity within mangled and haphazard memories. It feels as though it is an act that preserves or ensures a sense of control, power, or protection.
“What this force blinds me to is the powerlessness that coincides with the telling of an untruth, as well as the emotional separation that overlaps the fear of discovery. It also creates the need for another story to support the one prior. Therefore, the beliefs that compel me to lie are but a layer of lies within a lie. …” (cited: B C Koeford, A Meditative Journey with Saldage.)
Oh hell…let’s just get up and shake out those negative toxins with Fleetwood Mac – “Little Lies” from the 1987 album “Tango In The Night”. The new Fleetwood Mac collection ’50 Years – Don’t Stop
Given that we can live only a small part of what there is in us–what happens with the rest?
Pascal Mercier, Night Train to Lisbon
In this lodging
that no one visits,
where no one comes to call
from the moon in the trees
beans of light come poking in
~Saigyō (cited: Trans: B Watson, Poems of a Mountain Home)
“Of the thousand experiences we have, we find language for one at most and even this one merely by chance and without the care it deserves. Buried under all the mute experiences are those unseen ones that give our life its form, its color, and its melody. Then when we turn to these treasures, as archaeologists of the soul, we discover how confusing they are. The object of contemplation refuses to stand still, the words bounce off the experience and in the end, pure contradictions stand on the paper. For a long time, I thought it was a defect, something to be overcome. Today I think it is different: that recognition of the confusion is the ideal path to understanding these intimate yet enigmatic expertises. That sounds strange, even bizarre, I know. But ever since I have seen the issue in this light I have the feeling of being really awake and alive for the first time.”
~Pascal Mercier, Night Train to Lisbon. pg 17
I think this is a good time to pull away from the computer, close our eyes, and open ourselves to “Clarinet Concerto in A, K. 622: II. Adagio”.
“Even after decades as a successful artist…if I choose an object [to draw], fear becomes a goblin holding me back–fear of failure, of not measuring up, or of just being banal, but mostly fear of my drawing looking weird. Drawing makes me vulnerable. Doubt has a role in holding back the sheer joy of expression … the strongest initial resistance to drawing, for me, comes from the inner critic–the judgmental voice in my head. I imagine I hear people judging my work, devaluing my efforts, or comparing my sketch unfavorably to someone else’s finished work, and I just don’t want to face that!
“The great twentieth-century painter Philip Guston, known to work long hours in the studio, once repeated something the composer and artist John Cage had told him: ‘When you start working, everybody is in your studio–the past, your friends, your enemies, the art world, and above all, your ideas–all are there. But as you continue painting, they start leaving, one by one, and you are left completely alone. Then, if you are lucky, even you leave.’ Guston and Cage before him, were articulating the reality that dealing with internal resistance, with the inner critic, is an integral part of an ongoing creative practice…” (cited: J F Simon, Drawing your own Path)
Let’s take a break, make a cup of tea, and listen to the Colorado Symphony’s Digital Ode to Joy
~Ryokan (cited: K Tanahashi, Sky Above, Great Wind)
It was about 20 years ago when I was first introduced to the word equanimity, grandmother’s calm. Of note, my maternal grandmother was anything but calm. Yet, even to this day I find myself puzzled about that sudden very brief phone call in which she asked if I was pregnant. She in Oregon; I in Colorado. A couple weeks later, a positive pregnancy test. How did she know?
Equanimity is felt within the grandparent who have more than one grandchild; that is, each child is her/his grandchild and each receives love with inclusiveness absent of discrimination.
Sister Dang Nghiem (Mindfulness as Medicine) identities equanimity as an element of true love that contains inclusiveness. Inclusiveness. Yes, I personally am acquainted with the felt sense of inclusiveness — cherished and joy-filled memories gifted with unconditional togetherness (a silent moment of gratitude). Regrettably, I, as so many, am also very aware of exclusion’s uncertain darkness (A silent prayer, may we be free from anxiety).
Reflecting on the continuum of inclusion and exclusion, I find that moments of inclusiveness also block connection with others. Is there a clear differentiation between when one is in or out? (May we all love and be loved).
“When the crowded Vietnamese refugee boats met with storms or pirates, if everyone panicked, all would be lost. But if even one person on the boat remained calm and centered, it was enough. It showed the way for everyone to survive.”
–Thich Nhat Hanh
“When I first heard about COVID-19 in January, I knew I’d have to dial up my equanimity mode. Equanimity is an evenness of mind, considered by Buddhists as one of four Brahma Viharas (sublime attitudes, or immeasurable abodes). Equanimity enables us to remain alert for danger while calm – and level-headed in the midst of emergency – all on an even keel.
“Equanimity doesn’t mean indifference. Mindful equanimity is grounded in caring. When I’m open-hearted and present with the suffering within and around me, then I can engage in meaningful compassionate action. Since a person can be a carrier of COVID-19 and remain asymptomatic, when I’ve done all I can to be safe, then I’m glad to know I’m not a vector for the virus to travel on to others.
“Equanimity means inclusivity. It’s interesting to note how this isn’t an epidemic we’re living through but a pandemic. The Greek roots of the word pandemic mean “pertaining to all people; public, common.” It’s vital we not let this pandemic fracture or fragment our commonality. The fact we all could eventually contract this virus is a most strange but very real reminder that we are all one.
“The inclusivity of equanimity means embracing our pain and our joy as one. It also means acknowledging obstacles as well as breakthroughs. While I’m hopeful for breakthroughs, I’d like to point out three common obstacles in our path. With mindfulness, we can stop, breathe, and smile at ourselves before our awareness gets hijacked by our habit energies of denial, anger, and fear.
“It’s a common tendency to shut down, go numb, and ignore any 800-lb gorilla in the room. Our deluded tendency to ignore has two toxic cousins: anger and fear. It’s needful to be aware of anger so we don’t blindly act out from its knee-jerk impulses. If I had tickets for this year’s now-cancelled SXSW festival in Austin, I might feel bummed that it was cancelled, push away my disappointment, then let out my micro-aggression on some innocent passerby. Moreover, other people are now living close to the edge, too, and so my anger can easily trigger their own. Say traffic stalls: rather than honk my horn and set off a chain reaction, I can pause, breathe, and smile at my natural instinct, that of others, refrain from honking back, and remain in equanimity.”
FYI
On Monday, March 23, TED kicks off a free, live and daily conversation series, TED Connects: Community and Hope. As COVID-19 continues to sweep the globe, it’s hard to know where to turn or what to think. Hosted by head of TED Chris Anderson and current affairs curator Whitney Pennington Rodgers, this new program will feature experts whose ideas can help us reflect and work through this time with a sense of responsibility, compassion and wisdom.
We are in this global boat together, please be safe.
comes to call (Saigyō Trans: B Watson, Poems of a Mountain Home)
Nikon D750… f/1.8 1,2000s 38mm 200 ISO
“One can live without coffee and without cigarettes, Liesl said rebelliously, but not without nature, that’s impossible, no one should be allowed to deprive you of that. I said, ‘Think of it as if we’d got to spend a prison sentence here, for a few years perhaps, and learn to look at the couple of trees over there across the road as if they were a forest. …” (Etty Hillesum, Trans: A Pomerans, An Interrupted Life The Diaries of Etty Hillesum 1941-1943. pg. 127)
Nikon D750… f/1.8 1,2000s 38mm 200 ISO
“… Were it possible for us to see further than our own knowledges reaches, and yet a little way beyond the outworks of our divining, perhaps we would endure our sadnesses with greater confidences than our joys. For they are the moments when something new has entered into us, something unknown, our feelings grow more mute in shy perplexity, everything in us withdrawn, a stillness comes, and the new, which no one knows, stands in the midst of it and is silent. …” (Rainer Maria Rilke Trans: M D Herter Norton, Letters to a Young Poet. pg.40
~Buson (cited: Y Sawa & E M Shiffert, Haiku Master Buson
Nikon D750 f/1.8 1/1600 35mm 200 ISO
you just can’t go and ask a tree
“Fall is so wonderful because of the change in the colors of the leaves, and [during the autumn months], the deciduous trees pretty much shed their leaves and become bare—well, most of those trees. …
“The process of shedding leaves is really interesting and shows the intricate evolution of nature as a way to survive through all seasons. When the days grow shorter and the amount of sunshine available to leaves decreases, the process that makes food for the trees ends. Chlorophyll begins to break down, the green color disappears, and we get those splendid colors of the fall before most trees drop their leaves.
“The process of leaf drop is also a neat little trick of nature. At the base of their stem (referred to as the petiole), leaves have a zone called the abscission layer, located near the branch to which they are attached.
“The word abscission (sounds like scissors) comes from the Latin ‘to cut away’. The abscission zone has special cells that act like scissors, cutting the leaf off from the main part of the tree in autumn. The part of the leaf stem, or petiole, nearer the leaf contains a separation layer of thin-walled cells that break readily, allowing the leaf to drop. On the branch or twig side of the petiole, there’s another special layer of cells that have a corky structure, which forms a protective layer on the tree, neatly closing up the break to prevent injury or disease. So, the cold of winter gets sealed out, while precious water that the tree continues to use through the winter is sealed in. When spring finally arrives, the return to rapid growth from the trees limbs makes leaf buds expand and swell, and the old leaves finally break off if they haven’t already. Nature is so cool!
“Most, but not all, deciduous trees go through the abscission process. But there are a number of species that exhibit marcescence, or the retention of their leaves, to some degree through the winter months. That’s what you may see when you walk through the forest in the winter. Marcescence is most common by far in the beech, followed by many species of oak as well as hornbeam
“Scientists have not established the exact reason why certain trees exhibit marcescence—you just can’t go and ask a tree. However, there are some common theories. A few of those theories are based on the observation that marcescent leaves are found most often on younger or smaller trees or on the lower limbs of bigger trees.
“One theory suggests trees may keep their leaves to deter deer and other browsing animals from eating the nutrient-rich twigs. The leaves may conceal sumptuous new buds. In fact, researchers have found that the dried leaves are less nutritious than the twigs, and that characteristic might keep the animal from trying to munch on the lower twigs of trees.
Nikon D750 f/1.8 1/1600 35mm 200 ISO
“Researchers suggest another possibility for trees holding their leaves through the winter. It relates to the availability of nutrients for trees as they head into the growing season in the spring. When leaves drop in the fall, the nutrients from those leaves that accumulate on the forest floor are pretty much gone by the next spring when the tree needs food to kick off the growing season. This mulch layer would also hold in precious moisture for the trees. If the tree holds its leaves until spring, then releases them to the ground below, they may act as quick-start nutrients as the growing season begins, and this is most important for the smaller trees under much of the canopy from larger trees.
“On a related note, in some years, rapid onset of early frosts or freezes may halt the abscission process and cause many other deciduous trees to hold their leaves into part of the winter season. This would include varieties of maples and other species, but as the winter wears on most of these trees finally do lose their leaves.
“There’s no debate that the muted browns and yellows of marcescent leaves provide a beautiful backdrop in the bare forests of the winter. In addition, one benefit of trees like the beech, which keep most of their leaf canopy during the winter, is for birds who can seek shelter from the cold winter temperatures and winds among those clumps of leaves.
“For those who choose to take that wonderful saunter through a forest path during the winter, you now know why there are trees who choose “not to go naked” during the season, but wait to complete a quick change as nature’s spring fashion season swings into full gear.”
cited: Weather Underground,Tom Niziol. Marcescence: why some trees keep their leaves in winter, January 22, 2020
“Life may be brimming over with experiences, but somewhere, deep inside, all of us carry a vast and fruitful loneliness wherever we go. And sometimes the most important thing in a whole day is the rest we take between two deep breaths, or the turning inwards in prayer for five short minutes.”
~ Etty Hilleson, Trans: A Pomerans, In Interrupted Life The Diaries of Etty Hillesum. pg. 78
a meditative journey 
You must be logged in to post a comment.