World as Lover
The glow of two days camping in the Sierra Mountains is still with me as if I had spent a weekend with a lover. Every vista, Every bend in the road, Every stream, Every aspen, Every brilliant star, Every squirel chatter, and every blustery breeze filling my soul with peace and gratitude.
Joanna Macy’s book “World as Lover World as Self” is easy to read and inspiring. It “teaches us to consider our world and its creatures as nothing less than an extension of ourselves.”
In it she quotes Vietnamese Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh.
Being rock, being gas, being mist, being Mind,
Being the mesons traveling among galexies with the speed of light,
You have come here, my loved on…
You have menifested yourself as trees, as gress, as butter flies, as singeld-celled beinings, and as chrysanthemums;
but the eyes with which you looked at me this morning tell me youhave never died.
4 Responses to “World as Lover”
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1. October 2009
Thank you for this post ,how did you know i needed this ?
Love
claus
1. October 2009
I guess I needed it too. We all do.
2. October 2009
Sooooo nice.
I love that poem too.
And all the conversation that we shared.
Sharon
2. October 2009
HI Vin
I love this sacred place project as much as I can understand it. I’m not that proficient at keeping the many internet portals straight. (facebook, email, blog, website) But I try.
I will look for the book you quoted from today.
Sun pours in the window of my study this morning. IN a way it has not since I moved here 29 years ago. We took town a massive pine tree (two actually) and immediately regretted it. Who were we to do that? And yet, the light streaming in the window, the chance to have a vegetable garden, the hope of less mold in the house are all compelling reasons.
I am getting used to it, I like being able to see the moon at night, the sky in the day.
A lesson in impermanence.
All things change. We move on to the next present moment.
love.