Kate Vogt's Blog, page 2

SKYSCAPE

It is there
our hearts are set,
In the expanse
of the heavens.

Pawnee Wisdom
Translated by Frances Densmore

As I step outside, I am greeted by a blue expanse.  This is one of my earliest memories that returns to me again and again, particularly in springtime after the air has been cleansed by rainfall.  Still, regardless of the time of the year or stage of my life, this expanse has consistently been anchoring me in the world.   Its immensity grounds me in an inner sense of boundless grace.  Mor...

DEER – moving from within

Keep walking, though there is no place to get to.
Don’t try to see through the distances.
That’s not for human beings.  Move within,
but don’t move in the way fear makes you move.

Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

There was a loud snap outside our front door.   It was early morning, and the world was yet to stir – that is, most of world.  Some other being was also up and moving around.  I paused for a few seconds and listened.  My ears were greeted by peaceful silence, and I felt myself slip int...

LOVE

Love Letter to the Earth 

Dear Earth,

Today is no different than any other day, yet somehow only this day has the name “Earth Day.”   Perhaps it is noteworthy that today thousands upon thousands of two-legged beings pause and utter “Earth” to one another.  It offers some hope that we might humbly remember that without us you would still exist, but without you we would not exist.

I realize in even saying “I,” “you,” and “we,” they imply some separateness that is not there.   Just like yesterday i...

TULIPS – messengers of light

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
world.

Hafiz
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

“Hopeless.”  That is what I overheard in my morning walk as a couple walked by me.  There was a tinge of despair in the voice of the person who uttered this word.  I felt a cloak of sadness settle over both of them as they continued in the opposite direction.  I was a passerby, yet their grief invited me to pause and fee...

DEW – quiet gems of truth

What they undertook to do
They brought to pass;
All things hang like a drop of dew
Upon a blade of grass.

W, B. Yeats

It may be difficult to find hope in the swirl of contemporary events; yet, the rhythms of the seasons and day and night continue.  Here, in northern California, dew magically arrives overnight.  Although tiny and almost imperceptible, dew carries countless messages of hope.

Dew feels like the voice of divine grace.  These ephemeral watery beads are living expressions of the tempo...

SEEDLINGS – models of timeless truth

Life is given.
Nothing is earned,
so learn to serve others,
not your own desire and greed
and ego. They steal your energies,
whereas devotion builds your strength
and protects the intelligent flame
that leads to the truth within.

Lalla
Translated by Coleman Barks

A few weeks ago, I sprinkled some basil seeds into a pot of fresh gardening soil.  The tiny spherical shapes bounced slightly as they landed onto their new home.  Then, like chameleons, they magically disappeared.  As if a precursor to ...

ROUNDNESS

I cannot lose anything in this
place of abundance
I found.

If something my heart cherishes
is taken away,
I just say, “Lord, what
happened?”

And a hundred more
appear.

St. Catherine of Siena
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

 

A few weeks ago, oranges began to mysteriously appear outside our home.  Every morning there would be a couple nestled along the curb, with no obvious clues how they got there.  Their color was bright and shape was still perfectly round.  Yet, they were a bit soft to touch.

Si...

NIGHTTIME – a place of belonging

One night as I sat in quiet,
I seemed on the verge of entering a world inside so vast

I know it is the source of
all of
us.

Mirabai

 

One of my habits is to look out into the night.  Sometimes I simply stand by a window to look out, especially in the colder stretches of winter.  This routine always invites appreciation of the immensity of the unknown and invisible dimensions of life.  It also offers a humbling perspective on the expansiveness of existence, spreading far beyond that of humanity. ...

SNAKE – eternal presence

Then there
crept
A little noiseless noise
among the leaves,
Born of the very sigh
that silence heaves.

John Keats

 

I felt like a dog.  There was a slight rustle in the grasses along the trail.  Something nearby had alerted my attention.  My mind registered that the sound was like a bird trying to quickly hide and become still.   Similar to one of our canine-kin, I paused, and a keen alertness filled my senses.  It even seemed as if the tips of my ears pricked up.  Whatever was there kept movin...

NIGHT SKY – sacred interconnection

This
Sky
Where we live
Is no place to lose your wings.
So love, love,
Love.

Hafiz
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

I’ve fallen in love again.  My heart is newly besotted with a love that is as ageless as love itself – the night sky!

I am not alone in this love, nor do I need to be.  The night sky is so immense that she holds every speck of life that is and ever has been.   All the beauty arises out of her darkness – even the rising of the sun and emergence of new light shimmering on the hillsides...