Kate Vogt's Blog, page 9

VINES – voices of interconnectivity

Sometimes afraid of reunion, sometimes
of separation: You and I, so fond of the notion
of a you and an I, should live
as though we ’d never heard those pronouns.

Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

 

On first glimpse, the weather seems normal in our neighborhood.  There are the usual patterns of morning and evening fog cover.  The deciduous trees have large, green crowns and the midday sky is a clear blue.  Yet a closer look shows troubling signs of drought, such as shallow water in the creeks and ...

OAKS – mighty beings

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
Trans. by Tony Barnstone

 

Rustle. Rustle. Rustle.  I turned around expecting to see another walker on the path, but there was no one there.  No person. No squirrel.  No sign of a moving being.  Perhaps I ...

Dappled Light

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

 

A delicate pattern of lacy forms covered the pathway.  Wavy lines of all thicknesses connected varying sizes of triangles, hearts, and rectangles.  As a breeze picked up, these shapes shifted and moved as though they were dancing across the earthy floor.

Had I gone for my walk at my usual time early in t...

GROUND

You are the sky and the ground.
You alone the day, the night air.

You are the meal that’s being brought,
the sandal knot, flowers and their watering.

You are all this.
What could I possibly bring You!

Lalla
Translated by Coleman Barks

 

The early morning seemed oblivious of the weather prediction of uncomfortably high temperatures and winds later in the day.  Instead, everywhere seemed awash with messages of loving comfort and peacefulness.

Overhead the clouds still carried faint traces of lave...

Waterfall

Since I was cut from the reed bed
I have made
this crying sound. Anyone
separated from someone he loves
understands what I say:
            Anyone pulled
           from a source
          longs to go back.

Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

The morning light was intense.  Its radiance blurred the usual distinctive outlines of the trees and pathways.  In the near absence of these visual cues, I felt the soundscape pour into my awareness.

A swoosh passed overhead, reminding me of the crows along...

WILDFIRE – opening into inter-beingness

God blooms from the shoulder of the
elephant who becomes courteous
to the ant.

Hafiz
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

 

In driving through an area where there had been devastated by wildfires two years earlier, I had expected to see an ashy and charred expanse.  Instead, there was an abundance of new life showing up in a variety of stages of regeneration, ranging from wildflower meadows and grasslands to vibrant shrubbery sporting every hue of green.

Had I slowed down and tuned into the even subtle...

The Natural Commons

God is a pure no-thing,
concealed in now and here:
the less you reach for him,
the more he will appear.

Angelus Silesius

 

A recent visit to a nearby beach brought a welcome pause from the war that humanity seems to be having with itself in so many realms.  This wasn’t the usual beach hiatus, with a feeling of getting away from reality.  Instead, it was a mini-immersion in the true fullness of life.

Being a public beach, it had a sense of wildness, with logs and seaweed strewn across the sand.  ...

SHADOWS – inviting wholeness

If God
invited you to a party and
said, “Everyone in the ballroom tonight will
be my special
how would you then treat them when you arrived?
Indeed, indeed!
And Hafiz knows that there is no one in
this world who is not standing upon
His jeweled dance
floor.

Hafiz
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

It was an early Spring morning.  The sun was still low in the sky, yet had already begun to bring warmth into the neighborhood.  A steamy mist was rising off the sidewalks and rooftops, and the few people w...

New Moon – renewed perspective

I was delighted with myself,
having offered everything that I had;
my heart, my faith, my work.

“And who are you,” you said,
“to think you have so much to offer?
It seems you have forgotten
where you’ve come from.”

Rumi
Trans. by Coleman Barks

“Moon.”  It was simple one-word exclamation.  Yet, to be sure that I understood her latest discovery, my youngest neighbor – a toddler named Natalia – reached her arm toward the sunny afternoon sky and pointed.  She repeated, “moon?,” although this time wi...

Grace of Dew

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 tem...