Not in Vain

I couldn't have said it better.

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain:
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

-- Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

i carry your heart with me

This wowed me. Why reinvent the wheel?

I carry your heart with me

e.e. cummings

I carry your heart with me (I carry it in my heart) I am never without it (anywhere I go you go, my dear; and whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling) I fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet ) I want no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true) and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you here is the deepest secret nobody knows (here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows higher than soul can hope or mind can hide) and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart I carry your heart (I carry it in my heart)

Smooth Talker

There and not there

In the space where I thought I had met you,

I have found a pebble.

All my love reduced to a pebble.

Unlike some people, I refuse to talk to a pebble.

Sometimes I see shadows moving,

hear voices whispering,

and think, My rescuers have come.

With tools and spectacles, they study the pebble,

which I insist is not mine, and they leave.

I have memories in chaos.

Words, songs, scenes, moments:

All mishandled; best forgotten.

I look for recognition, and ask

If you have left the key with me.

You made me see beyond this space and time,

Challenged me to reach,

Encouraged me to leap,

And left me in the air.

I should not be so surprised.

With teetering faith and questions upon questions,

I walk back and forth.

Your pebble is a smooth pendant I hang on my neck,

A rock weighing me down,

The universe outside of me.

I am at once a feeling being,

Exposed for the world to see,

And I am free.

What can a pebble do to me?

Nothing.

The Marriage of True Minds

I'm drinking more coffee and reading more poetry.  I'm glad they exist to help me live more fully.

In this blog, I'm moving from Beethoven to Shakespeare. There is greatness to drink in and greatness to contain. But greatness to express? I don't know. It remains to be seen.

I have loved this sonnet since high school.  Its cadence is perfect.  Its words are classic, almost biblical.  You should here it read out loud.  I cannot find a link that works tonight (perhaps because it's close to 1 a.m.) but you may want to look up the soundtrack of the TV show Beauty and the Beast: Of Love and Hope, where great poems that became my favorites are featured.

I will not attempt to interpret this.  I should go back to school to be able to do that.  Well, someday who knows I just might stop dreaming and start living.  That's what my RDL is for - discernment.  Again.

I will stop because I don't want to write about a retreat that I'm not fully taking yet.  Let's go back to the sonnet, and end with these words:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds (Sonnet CXVI)

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments.
Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove: 

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark 

That looks on tempests and is never shaken; 

It is the star to every wandering bark, 

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. 

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 

Within his bending sickle's compass come: 

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 

But bears it out even to the edge of doom. 

If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

-- William Shakespeare

Blast from the Past

I came across this poem again after several decades.  It used to be a favorite among my friends in high school.  Life is a drama, even for teenagers.  Or maybe especially for teenagers.

It turns out we memorized the wrong version.  The author, Charles Finn, a former Jesuit seminarian, did not write his name on the copies of the poem that he gave away to friends.  The poem spread across the globe, appropriated by some to be their own, and even abbreviated.  Through the website she put up, Charles' wife decided to document the poem's journey and also to let us, readers, plagiarists, and pilgrims, know the poet behind such words that mirrored our thoughts so clearly.  

I am happier with the original version, which is new to me.  It fits me where I am now, just as the old poem fit me when I was 15.

Please visit the website of Charles C. Finn, http://www.poetrybycharlescfinn.com. 

Please Hear What I'm Not Saying

               Don't be fooled by me.

               Don't be fooled by the face I wear

               for I wear a mask, a thousand masks,

               masks that I'm afraid to take off,

               and none of them is me.

               Pretending is an art that's second nature with me,

               but don't be fooled,

               for God's sake don't be fooled.

               I give you the impression that I'm secure,

               that all is sunny and unruffled with me, within as well

                    as without,

               that confidence is my name and coolness my game,

               that the water's calm and I'm in command

               and that I need no one,

               but don't believe me.

               My surface may seem smooth but my surface is my mask,

               ever-varying and ever-concealing.

               Beneath lies no complacence.

               Beneath lies confusion, and fear, and aloneness.

               But I hide this.  I don't want anybody to know it.

               I panic at the thought of my weakness exposed.

               That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind,

               a nonchalant sophisticated facade,

               to help me pretend,

               to shield me from the glance that knows.

               But such a glance is precisely my salvation, my only hope,

               and I know it.

               That is, if it's followed by acceptance,

               if it's followed by love.

               It's the only thing that can liberate me from myself,

               from my own self-built prison walls,

               from the barriers I so painstakingly erect.

               It's the only thing that will assure me

               of what I can't assure myself,

               that I'm really worth something.

               But I don't tell you this.  I don't dare to, I'm afraid to.

               I'm afraid your glance will not be followed by acceptance,

               will not be followed by love.

               I'm afraid you'll think less of me,

               that you'll laugh, and your laugh would kill me.

               I'm afraid that deep-down I'm nothing

               and that you will see this and reject me.

               So I play my game, my desperate pretending game,

               with a facade of assurance without

               and a trembling child within.

               So begins the glittering but empty parade of masks,

               and my life becomes a front.

                     I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.

               I tell you everything that's really nothing,

               and nothing of what's everything,

               of what's crying within me.

               So when I'm going through my routine

               do not be fooled by what I'm saying.

               Please listen carefully and try to hear what I'm not saying,

               what I'd like to be able to say,

               what for survival I need to say,

               but what I can't say.

               I don't like hiding.

               I don't like playing superficial phony games.

               I want to stop playing them.

               I want to be genuine and spontaneous and me

               but you've got to help me.

               You've got to hold out your hand

               even when that's the last thing I seem to want.

               Only you can wipe away from my eyes

               the blank stare of the breathing dead.

               Only you can call me into aliveness.

               Each time you're kind, and gentle, and encouraging,

               each time you try to understand because you really care,

               my heart begins to grow wings--

               very small wings,

               very feeble wings,

               but wings!

               With your power to touch me into feeling

               you can breathe life into me.

               I want you to know that.

               I want you to know how important you are to me,

               how you can be a creator--an honest-to-God creator--

               of the person that is me

               if you choose to.

               You alone can break down the wall behind which I tremble,

               you alone can remove my mask,

               you alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic,

               from my lonely prison,

               if you choose to.

               Please choose to.

               Do not pass me by.

               It will not be easy for you.

               A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.

               The nearer you approach to me

               the blinder I may strike back.

               It's irrational, but despite what the books say about man

               often I am irrational.

               I fight against the very thing I cry out for.

               But I am told that love is stronger than strong walls

               and in this lies my hope.

               Please try to beat down those walls

               with firm hands but with gentle hands

               for a child is very sensitive.

               Who am I, you may wonder?

               I am someone you know very well.

               For I am every man you meet

               and I am every woman you meet.

                                                                     Charles C. Finn

                                                                          September 1966

P.S.  Arvin, Mhel, I'm sure you remember this.  

A Sonnet from Shakespeare

XXVII

Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;
But then begins a journey in my head
To work my mind, when body's work's expired:
For then my thoughts--from far where I abide--
Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,
And keep my drooping eyelids open wide,
Looking on darkness which the blind do see:
Save that my soul's imaginary sight
Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,
Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night,
Makes black night beauteous, and her old face new.
Lo! thus, by day my limbs, by night my mind,
For thee, and for myself, no quiet find.

It's a good day to read poetry.

Advice from a Tree

I learned it while walking around the redwood forest at Muir Woods in San Francisco. I take it with me as I start a new journey tomorrow.

Advice from a Tree
By Ilan Shamir

Dear Friend,

Stand Tall and Proud
Sink your roots deeply into the Earth
Reflect the light of a greater source
Think long term
Go out on a limb
Remember your place among all living beings
Embrace with joy the changing seasons
For each yields its own abundance
The Energy and Birth of Spring
The Growth and Contentment of Summer
The Wisdom to let go of leaves in the Fall
The Rest and Quiet Renewal of Winter

Feel the wind and the sun
And delight in their presence
Look up at the moon that shines down upon you
And the mystery of the stars at night.
Seek nourishment from the good things in life
Simple pleasures
Earth, fresh air, light

Be content with your natural beauty
Drink plenty of water
Let your limbs sway and dance in the breezes
Be flexible
Remember your roots

Enjoy the view!

Copyright 1993-2003 Your True Nature, Inc. For Advice from a Tree books, journals, posters and other nature products, visit www.YourTrueNature.com or call 800-992-4769.