Weekend Meditation

Plato’s “The Republic”:

[…] “I will tell you, Socrates, he said, what my own feeling is. Men of my age flock together; we are birds of a feather, as the old proverb says; and at our meetings the tale of my acquaintance commonly is–I cannot eat, I cannot drink; the pleasures of youth and love are fled away: there was a good time once, but now that is gone, and life is no longer life. Some complain of the slights which are put upon them by relations, and they will tell you sadly of how many evils their old age is the cause. But to me, Socrates, these complainers seem to blame that which is not really in fault. For if old age were the cause, I too being old, and every other old man, would have felt as they do. But this is not my own experience, nor that of others whom I have known. How well I remember the aged poet Sophocles, when in answer to the question, How does love suit with age, Sophocles,–are you still the man you were? Peace, he replied; most gladly have I escaped the thing of which you speak; I feel as if I had escaped from a mad and furious master. His words have often occurred to my mind since, and they seem as good to me now as at the time when he uttered them. For certainly old age has a great sense of calm and freedom; when the passions relax their hold, then, as Sophocles says, we are freed from the grasp not of one mad master only, but of many. The truth is, Socrates, that these regrets, and also the complaints about relations, are to be attributed to the same cause, which is not old age, but men’s characters and tempers; for he who is of a calm and happy nature will hardly feel the pressure of age, but to him who is of an opposite disposition youth and age are equally a burden.

I listened in admiration, and wanting to draw him out, that he might go on–Yes, Cephalus, I said: but I rather suspect that people in general are not convinced by you when you speak thus; they think that old age sits lightly upon you, not because of your happy disposition, but because you are rich, and wealth is well known to be a great comforter.”[…] (Plato’s The Republic)

evils of old age
creep in stripping away
the pleasures of youth

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

youth and old age
character and temper
determine happiness

Red River Gorge

Carpe Diem Weekend Meditation #60 The Quest For A Masterpiece goes on … journey

Red River Gorge

Deep in the woods surrounded by sandstone walls. The damp smell of decaying autumn leaves mingles with pine. The only sound the cascading leaves as the bounce off other branches and the occasional rustling of your shoes. We hike past the cathedral windows carefully picking our way along a narrow ledge. I peer over the edge and take a step back. The path disappearing in the undergrowth. We hike further then we feel anyone has gone. Reaching for a rough ledge I pull myself up, only to make a realization that many have been here before and left their mark.

RedRiver cairnIMG_2712.JPG

deep in the woods
totems decorate an outcrop
honoring the gods

November 30, 2018 0

Weekend Meditation #56 Crossroads (2)

Carpe Diem Weekend Meditation #56 Crossroads

Fussion Haiku

the winter river;
down it come floating
flowers offered to Buddha

just outside the gate
the road slopes downward
winter trees

flowers of autumn
captured in the winter river
gated until spring

October 30, 2018 0

Weekend Meditation # 56 Crossroads

Carpe Diem Weekend Meditation #56 Crossroads

Fussion Haiku

a strange flower
for birds and butterflies
the autumn sky © Basho

the pheasant cries
as if it just noticed
the mountain © Issa

autumn skies
the pheasant’s cry
kisses the mountain

October 30, 2018 0

Endless Time

Carpe Diem’s Weekend Meditation #51 Tagore’s “Endless Time”

Endless Time
Time is endless in thy hands, my lord.
There is none to count thy minutes.

Days and nights pass and ages bloom and fade like flowers.
Thou knowest how to wait.

Thy centuries follow each other perfecting a small wild flower.

We have no time to lose,
and having no time we must scramble for a chance.
We are too poor to be late.

And thus it is that time goes by
while I give it to every querulous man who claims it,
and thine altar is empty of all offerings to the last.

At the end of the day I hasten in fear lest thy gate be shut;
but I find that yet there is time.

we hurl through space
at breakneck speeds lost
forgetting how to breath
through the eons you wait for
your stiff-necked people to change

September 27, 2018 2

Weekend Meditation #48 Tagore’s Gitanjali

Carpe Diem Weekend Meditation #48 Tagore’s Gitanjali

The time that my journey takes is long and the way of it long.
I came out on the chariot of the first gleam of light,
and pursued my voyage through the wildernesses of worlds
leaving my track on many a star and planet.
It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself,
and that training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.
The traveller has to knock at every alien door to come to his own,
and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach
the innermost shrine at the end.
My eyes strayed far and wide before
I shut them and said `Here art thou!’
The question and the cry `Oh, where?’ melt into tears of a thousand streams
and deluge the world with the flood of the assurance `I am!’