The silence is holy and I hate to break it.
The silence is tall like trees
and old like the windows of this house
It stretches out in the morning
It keeps me in my bed
The silence dances on the branches of the pine tree
and falls lightly to the ground
with the oak leaves
The silence moves over the water
of a stream or in a cup
And washes over me when I am still enough
to fall down in the leaves
to do absolutely nothing
Do you know how much protein you need? Divide your weight by 2.2 to get the kilograms. Then you need approximately .8-1.2 grams of protein per kilogram, depending on your level of activity.
I may work all afternoon cooking a nutritionally balanced meal for guests, and then sit down only to hear someone say: where’s the meat?
From the soapbox, signing off…your friendly vegetarian chef
i was afraid
but now i am comforted
the pain is fresh
but i will not dwell there
it’s tempting
but i will not dwell there
someone will come
to understand
not to save
to share
not to control
in the smallest things there is joy
the trees will lose their leaves
all that will be left
their trunks,
naked as they came.
if i write these things,
i will know them
if i hope for…good things,
God, please come, and then
despair can pick itself up
by its own bootstraps
and fly away
a legion of despair
flying away over the horizon,
it’s leaving, the greatest beauty ever known.
I had been dreading it, but the changing of the leaves
I now welcome…The days are crisp now, like the juicy of an apple. The sunlight is precious and early. Awaking with the dawn is pleasant and is more so once I remember the geese:
Wild Geese
by Mary Oliver
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
This poem is about spring, a season of being in between, much like fall. As I walk through these days I feel the chill of the air, the bright sun, and I am thankful for seasons of being-in-between, that is now fall but leaves hope for spring.
I had been dreading it, but the changing of the leaves