A slip of light stays

Even in the dark of winter we get reminders of colour and light

Three times my life has opened.
Once, into darkness and rain.
Once, into what the body carries at all times within it and
starts to remember each time it enters the act of love.
Once, to the fire that holds all.

These three were not different.
You will recognize what I am saying or you will not.


But outside my window all day a maple has stepped
from her leaves like a woman in love with winter, dropping
the colored silks.
Neither are we different in what we know.
There is a door. It opens. Then it is closed. But a slip of
light stays, like a scrap of unreadable paper left on the floor,
or the one red leaf the snow releases in March.

Jane Hirshfield, The Lives of the Heart: Poems

Not wasting a day

Continuous practice, day after day, is the most appropriate way of expressing gratitude.

This means that you practice continuously, without wasting a single day of your life, without using it for your own sake.

Why is it so? Your life is a fortunate outcome of the continuous practice of the past. You should express your gratitude immediately.

Dogen quoted in Kazuaki Tanahashi,  Enlightenment Unfolds Kazuaki Tanahashi

A choice

Past and present join

in the winter solstice.

The days will stretch and we survive.

with losses, yes, and lessons too

to reap the honey of the hive

of history. The yield of what is given

insists a choice – to live; to thrive

Peter Fallon, 1951 – Irish Poet, A Winter Solstice

Slowing down

I live by the truth that “No” is a complete sentence.

I rest as a spiritual act.

Anne Lamott, Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

Different weathers, different times

Colder weather, higher fuel and food costs and the presence of a cruel war…

Times of scarcity need to be met with generosity,

times of fear with comfort,

times of uncertainty with presence.

Thomas Hübl

Float

I saw the leaf leave the branch and float down to the soil, dancing joyfully,

because as it floated it saw itself already there in the tree.

It was so happy. I bowed my head,

and I knew that we have a lot to learn from the leaf

because it was not afraid;

it knew that nothing can be born and nothing can die.

Thich Nhat Hanh