Whatever it is you’re seeking won’t come in the form you’re expecting.
Haruki Murakami

After the cold and the storms, bright Spring-like days in Ireland for the weekend.
And if you missed a day, there was always the next,
and if you missed a year, it didn’t matter,
the hills weren’t going anywhere,
the thyme and rosemary kept coming back,
the sun kept rising, the bushes kept bearing fruit.
Louise Gluck, Sunrise [extract]
Five hundred of Rumi’s odes conclude with khamush, silence.
Rumi is less interested in language, more attuned to the sources of it.….Rumi has a whole theory of language based on the reed flute (ney). Beneath everything we say, and within each note of the reed flute, lies a nostalgia for the reed bed. Language and music are possible only because we’re empty, hollow, and separated from the source. All language is a longing for home.
Colman Barks, On Silence
It is hard to believe that the practice can be reduced to something so simple, paying direct attention to the present moment – to this breath, this person, this walk, to this washing of the dishes. We imagine it should be something grander. It may be simple; however, it is not easy
One day a man asked Zen master Ikkyu, “Master, will you please write for me some pointers to the highest wisdom?”
Ikkyu immediately took his brush and wrote the word: “Attention.”
“Is that all?” asked the man. “Will you not add something more ?”
Ikkyu then wrote : “Attention. Attention. Attention.”