tree in the morning sun
I always have a book near me; whether it's tucked in my purse, sitting on my passenger seat in the car, sitting on a file on my work desk--I am never without some form of reading material. While waiting in the car today, I re-found this gorgeous quote that I had highlighted decades ago at Newbold in Annie Dillard's amazing Pilgrim at Tinker's Creek:
"Thomas Merton wrote, 'There is always a temptation to diddle around in the contemplative life, making itsy-bitsy statues.' There is always an enormous temptation in all of life to diddle around making itsy-bitsy friends and meals and journeys for itsy-bitsy years on end. It is so self-conscious, so apparently moral, simply to step aside from the gaps where the creeks and winds pour down, saying, I never merited this grace, quite rightly, and then to sulk along the rest of your days on the edge of rage. I won't have it. The world is wilder than that in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant and bright. We are making hay when we should be making whoopee; we are raising tomatoes when we should be raising Cain, or Lazarus.
Ezekiel excoriates false prophets as those who have 'not gone up into the gaps.' The gaps are the things. The gaps are the spirit's one home...
Ezekiel excoriates false prophets as those who have 'not gone up into the gaps.' The gaps are the things. The gaps are the spirit's one home...
and by nacht
Hm. I read this and I think, "And yet."
ReplyDeleteAnd yet. There is something to be said for the raising of the tomatoes, for the dailiness of itty bitty detailed lives, of just doing and setting one foot in front of the other.
It's hard to think in terms of setting the world on fire, raising the dead and all, every day...