Category: Life

Just for the joy of it

Live & Learn16 Comments

bird-chicadee-branch-jpg

What is worth singing about? What if the song is too small? Books will tell you that birds sing for a number of reasons— to call to each other, to warn of predators, to navigate, to attract mates. But I wasn’t so much interested in what the books believed. I wanted to know what the musician believed. “Why do birds sing?” So, at the end of our first bird walk together, I asked. I wanted him to say they sing because they have to, because they must, because it is part of their very essence, an irrepressible need. […]

Slowly the musician nodded his head. Finally, he said, “Okay. It’s possible that birds may sing just for the joy of it.” I don’t know why his response made me so happy but it did.

~ Kyo Maclear, Birds Art Life: A Year of Observation 

 

Notes:

Miracle. All of it.

Live & Learn9 Comments

turtle-eggs

 An olive ridley turtle lays her eggs in the sand at Rushikulya Beach, nearly 100 miles southwest of Bhubaneswar, on Thursday. Thousands of olive ridley sea turtles started to come ashore in the past few days from the Bay of Bengal to lay their eggs on the beach, which is one of the turtles’ three mass nesting sites in the Indian coastal state of Orissa. (Asit Kumar, Agence France Presse, via wsj.com)

And don’t miss one of the 2017 Underwater photographs of the Year:

Continue reading “Miracle. All of it.” →

Dinner! Let’s eat together…

Live & Learn36 Comments

Stick with this to the finish…

Thank you Susan

Lightly child, lightly.

Live & Learn5 Comments

sun-light-dress-back-jpg

Awake —
What are these quick shots of warmth,
Fractals of forests
That wind through my limbs?

~ Alan Lightman, from Song of Two Worlds

Notes:

  • Photo: via Mennyfox55. Lightman quote: Brainpickings
  • Prior “Lightly child, lightly” Posts? Connect here.
  • Post Title & Inspiration: Aldous Huxley: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.”

Miracle. All of it.

Live & Learn9 Comments

apple-fall-night

1.

Through the night
the apples
outside my window
one by one let go
their branches and
drop to the lawn.
I can’t see, but hear
the stem-snap, the plummet
through leaves, then
the final thump against the ground.
Sometimes two at once, or one
right after another.
During long moments of silence
I wait
and wonder about the bruised bodies,
the terror of diving through air, and
think I’ll go tomorrow
to find the newly fallen, but they
all look alike lying there
dewsoaked, disappearing before me.

2.
I lie beneath my window listening
to the sound of apples dropping in
the yard, a syncopated code I long to know,
which continues even as I sleep, and dream I know
the meaning of what I hear, each dull
thud of unseen apple-
body, the earth
falling to earth
once and forever, over
and over.

~ Li-Young Lee, “Falling: The Code” from Rose

Notes:

  • Source: Photo: MilaMai Photography – Why do stars and apples fall?  Li-Young Lee Poem: Thank you Beth @ Alive on All Channels.
  • Inspired by Albert Einstein’s quote: “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
  • Related Posts: Miracle. All of it.