Kate Vogt's Blog, page 5

GRASSHOPPER

Tenderly, I now touch all
things,
knowing one day we will
part.

St. John of the Cross

 

Oops.  That was the thought I had as my boot began to slide.  My mind had been absorbed in the beauty of the surrounding hillsides.  It seemed that overnight the slopes had transformed from dull to jeweled shades of green.  The “oops” quickly brought my attention back to the trail beneath my feet.  It was a reminder that a slip of awareness could mean a slip in my footing.

I could feel my mind a little disapp...

OAK TREE – loving connections

Look
what happens to the scale
when love
holds
it.

It
stops
working.

Kabir
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

Ancestors.  That was what was on my mind as I gathered oak leaves from our deck.  With each stroke of the broom, I felt reminded that behind every living being is an ancestral story.  Whether known or unknown, the ancestors are present in the continual making of that tale.

It seemed like a mundane task to be sweeping leaves after the recent winds and rains had loosened them from the tree.  Ye...

MUSHROOMS – ancient beings

You’re in my eyes.
How else could I see light?

You’re in my brain.
This wild joy.

If love did not live in matter,
how would any place have
any hold on anyone?

Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

 There was a shift in a neighborhood hillside, resulting from an immense amount of rain over the past few weeks.  With that amount of moisture, I had anticipated the possibility of an alteration.  My mind had imagined a slippage of the soil down the hill, or the unseating of a boulder or tree; however, the ...

SPIRALS – life cycle

For everything there is a season,
and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, a time to die…

Ecclesiastes 3.1

It seems I’ve been traveling quite a bit in the past couple of months.  Between the ups and downs of airplanes, I felt the undulating cycles of life.   The trees and plants are in different stages of emerging and fading, creeks rejuvenate after a stretch of drought, the moon waxes and wanes and the tides rise and fall.

The ancient cultures understood the constant rhythm ...

SEEDS

Self inside self, You are nothing but me.
Self inside self, I am only You.

What we are together will never die.
The why and how of this?

What does it matter?

Lalla
Translated by Coleman Barks

Another calendar year has begun and there is the promise of new beginnings and shedding the old.  Here in the northern hemisphere, nature echoes this sense of hope for release of the past and offering of renewal.  The red-breasted birds referred to as robins have reappeared, and tiny buds are showing on the...

TREES – life’s essence

There’s a tree that existed before the woods,
in age twice as old.
Its roots suffered as the valley changed,
its leaves deformed by wind and frost.
People all laugh at its withered aspect,
caring nothing about the core ’s beauty.
When the bark is all stripped off,
only essence remains.

Hanshan
Translated by Tony Barnstone

 The trees were aglow.  Their leaves and branches glistened and seemed to shine from the inside out.  Occasionally there was a silhouette of a bird perched on a branch offerin...

Cloudlike Nature – Poppy

Observe your life, between two breaths.
Breath is a wind, both coming and going.
On this wind you have built your life —
but how will a castle rest on a cloud?

Avicenna

The clouds were near the earth.  They were soft and frilly with delicate, gentle edges.  If translucence were a hue, then that was theirs.

As I gazed at them, I was captivated by their luminous beauty.  Even though my mind was familiar with the fleeting transience of all life, especially clouds, I felt suspended in their presence...

RIVERS – eternal messengers

losing its name
a river
enters the sea

John Sandbach

Rivers talk.  Even though humans have built grand and quaint bridges and have constructed dams, the rivers continue to tell the story of life.   They fluently converse with the mountains and marshlands, and many feathered, scaley, and furry lifeforms.  The sagas they have lived and continue to tell are archived in the walls of cavernous gorges, subterranean waterways and fossilized riverbeds.

We may not understand the voice of the rivers, but...

NATURE – expressions of light

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

Pawnee Wisdom
Translated by Frances Densmore

 

Large shadows covered the pathway along the road.  I felt as though I was walking through a tapestry of grayness.  The long, slate-colored shapes were delicately held together with a lacey web of pale smoky shades.  Far ahead, there was a ray of light.

The glow ahead seemed to be a quiet reminder for me that shadows are revealers of light.  With this subtle nudge of truth, my pace ...

GEESE – living lightly

If you want money more than anything,
you’ll be bought and sold.
If you have a greed for food,
you’ll be a loaf of bread.
This is a subtle truth:
whatever you love, you are.

Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

It seemed odd that a gaggle of wild Canadian geese was lolling around and grazing by a nearby pond in the late afternoon.  Usually, they fly in early in the morning and leave by mid-afternoon.  But today, they were peacefully moseying around, appearing content to be where they were.

“It’s a f...