Michaelmas: Traditionally in Ireland the day to mark the end of harvest The traditional greeting – “May Michaelmas féinín on you.” – wished for an abundant harvest
The feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, Archangels. Those sent to help or guide us.
Where is the angel
to wrestle with me and wound
not my thigh but my throat,
so curses and blessings flow storming out
and the glass shatters, and the iron sunders?
Denise Levertov, Where is the Angel [extract]
In nature, nothing is perfect and everything is perfect.
Trees can be contorted, bent in weird ways,
and they’re still beautiful
Alice Walker
Grace is the word for what it takes to lay down your armour.
To stop protecting yourself long enough to be touched by something beyond your own strategies
Padraig O’Tuama, In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World
As we grow we tend to increasingly live in the future, and what “may” happen.
A baby smiles between fifty and seventy times a day
and a toddler six hundred times, according to research.
I’m sure some of us have asked ourselves where that smile goes.
What robs us of it?
Goldie Hawn, 10 Mindful Minutes
I don’t know anything about consciousness.
I just try to teach my students to hear the birds sing.
Shunryu Suzuki.
What you need,
what we all need, is silence,
Stop the noise in your mind,
in order for the wondrous sounds of life to be heard
Thich Nhat Hahn
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