curtain – Live & Learn

Lightly child, lightly

August 8, 2019 by Live & Learn 14 Comments

The curtain

In the August quietude and the silence

Of the tranquil morning,

Moves gently in the wandering air . . .

Beautiful moment.

–Juan Ramón Jiménez, from “Lightness” in The Selected Writings of Juan Ramon

Notes:

Poem – via violentwavesofemotion. Photo: takemeaway
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.”

Filed Under: Books, Inspire, Quotes Tagged With: August, curtain, Inspirational, Juan Ramon Jimenez, light, moments, Peace, Photography, Poem, Poetry, quiet, Quote, still, summer

Sunday Morning

May 13, 2018 by Live & Learn 34 Comments

I have found such joy in simple things;
A plain, clean room, a nut-brown loaf of bread,
A cup of milk, a kettle as it sings,
The shelter of a roof above my head.
And in a leaf-laced square along the floor,
Where yellow sunlight glimmers through the door.

I have found such joy in things that fill
My quiet days: a curtain’s blowing grace,
A potted plant upon my windowsill,
A rose, fresh-cut and placed within a vase;
A table cleared, a lamp beside a chair,
And books I long have loved beside me there.

~ Grace Noll Crowell, from I Have Found Such Joy

Notes:

Photo: Nicola Davison Reed
Grace Noll Crowell (October 31, 1877 – March 31, 1969) was an American poet, author of 36 books of inspirational verse and 5,000 poems.
Poem via Liquid Light and Running Trees.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: awareness, curtain, grace noll crowell, Gratitude, inspiration, ordinary, Photography, Poem, Poetry, Wind

Event of the Thread

January 23, 2013 by Live & Learn 19 Comments

I’m sorry I missed it…An excerpt of the review from the NY Times: “Anyone who liked swings as a child — and that should include quite a few of us — will probably feel a surprisingly visceral attraction to Ann Hamilton’s installation “the event of a thread” at the Park Avenue Armory in New York City…The swings are there for us, to swing on. The piece has other components, about which more in a minute, but if people are not using the swings, “the event of a thread” does not fully exist. When they are in action, the immense, diaphanous white curtain, made of a lightweight silk twill, rises and dips, and the air is stirred, causing further billowing and fluttering. And in the middle of it all, the curtain, which resembles a low-cost indoor version of Christo and Jean-Claude’s 1972 land art piece “Valley Curtain,” was doing its silent, discombobulated dance. In addition, if you paused in your swinging, you could feel the rest of the interconnected system pulse and gyrate, a momentary demonstration — at once silly and profound — that we are, indeed, all connected.”

Here’s a short and wonderful video clip that makes it all come alive…