Ancient Trees

Photo: Heather Williams, Fort Ben State Park, Indianapolis, IN

Again and again, however we know the landscape of love
and the little churchyard there, with its sorrowing names,
and the frighteningly silent abyss into which the others
fall: again and again the two of us walk out together
under the ancient trees, lie down again and again

   among the flowers, face to face with the sky.  

~Rainer Maria Rilke                       

Desiderata

 Photo: Heather Williams, Indianapolis, IN

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 to 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 perennial as the grass.

Take kindly to 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 in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.

Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

~Max Ehrmann

To a brightness

Photo: Heather Williams, Holliday Park, Indianapolis, IN

Life is not hurrying

on to a receding future nor hankering after

an imagined past. It is the turning 

aside like Moses to the miracle of the lit bush.

To a brightness

that seems as transitory as your youth

once, but is the eternity that awaits you.

~R.S. Thomas

A feast he does not comprehend

Photo: Heather Williams, Fort Ben State Park, Indianapolis, IN

I would prefer to be able to say: "I am satiated,

What is given to taste in this life, I have tasted."

But I am like someone in a window who draws aside a

curtain

To look at a feast he does not comprehend.

~Czeslaw Milosz

Rhythm of the universe

Photo: Heather Williams, Fort Ben State Park, Indianapolis,IN

May you recognize in your life the presence, power, and light

of your soul.

May you realize that you are never alone,

that your soul in its brightness and belonging connects you

intimately with the rhythm of the universe.

May you have respect for your own individuality and

difference.

May you realize that the shape of your soul is unique, that

you have a special destiny here,

that behind the façade of your life that there is something

beautiful, good, and eternal happening.

~John O'Donohue 

On such a perfect day

Photo: Heather Williams, Indianapolis,IN

Linger awhile, for you are so beautiful.

~Faust

In your light

Photo: Heather Williams, Fort Ben State Park, Indianapolis, IN

In your light I learn how to love.

In your beauty, how to make poems.

You dance inside my chest,

where no one sees you.

but sometimes I do, and that

sight becomes this art.

~Rumi

My heart has become a bird

Photo: Heather Williams, Holliday Park, Indianapolis, IN

Looking for Love

A strange passion is moving in my head.

My heart has become a bird

which searches in the sky.

Every part of me goes in different directions.

Is it really so

that the one I Love is everywhere?

~Rumi

Into the Mystic

Photo: Heather Williams, Indianapolis, IN

.....When that fog horn blows
You know I will be coming home
And when that fog horn whistle blows
I gotta hear it
I don't have to fear it

And I wanna rock your gypsy soul
Just like way back in the days of old
And together we will float
Into the mystic....

~Van Morrison

Nothingness

Photo: Heather Williams: White River State Park, Indianapolis, IN

Nothing more nothing less.

Plant Pattern

Photo: Heather Williams: Madison, IN

"Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance."

~Coco Channel

In a handful of ocen water

Photo: Heather Williams, Sanibel Island, FL

Poetry reveals that there is no empty space.

When your truth forsakes its shyness,
When your fears surrender to your strengths,
You will begin to experience

That all existence
Is a teeming sea of infinite life.

In a handful of ocean water
You could not count all the finely tuned
Musicians

Who are acting stoned
For very intelligent and sane reasons

And of course are becoming extremely sweet
And wild.

In a handful of the sky and earth,
In a handful of God,

We cannot count
All the ecstatic lovers who are dancing there
Behind the mysterious veil.

True art reveals there is no void
Or darkness.

There is no loneliness to the clear-eyed mystic
In this luminous, brimming
Playful world.

~Hafiz

Dancing Eyes

Photo: Heather Williams (Eagle Creek Park, Indianapolis, IN)

This

Union you want

With the earth and sky,

This union we all need with love,

A golden wing from God's heart just

Touched the ground,

Now

Step upon it

With your brave sun-vows

and help our eyes

to

Dance!

~ Hafiz

Sunset Bliss

Photo: Heather Williams, Eagle Creek Park


Even
After
All this time
the Sun never says to the earth,
"You owe me."
Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole
Sky.


~Hafiz