When I was still taking care of the girls, the twins, there was a point at which the younger girl was in hospital, and each night her sister would wake up about 4am, lonely. And I'd read her back to sleep with one of two poems:
Kindness | Naomi Shihab Nye
Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth. What you held in your hand, what you counted and carefully saved, all this must go so you know how desolate the landscape can be between the regions of kindness. How you ride and ride thinking the bus will never stop, the passengers eating maize and chicken will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness, you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho lies dead by the side of the road. You must see how this could be you, how he too was someone who journeyed through the night with plans and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside, you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing. You must wake up with sorrow. You must speak to it till your voice catches the thread of all sorrows and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore, only kindness that ties your shoes and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread, only kindness that raises its head from the crowd of the world to say it is I you have been looking for, and then goes with you every where like a shadow or a friend.
and
Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Leaves of Grass. 1900.
3. In Cabin’d Ships at Sea
1
IN cabin’d ships, at sea, The boundless blue on every side expanding, With whistling winds and music of the waves—the large imperious waves—In such, Or some lone bark, buoy’d on the dense marine, Where, joyous, full of faith, spreading white sails, She cleaves the ether, mid the sparkle and the foam of day, or under many a star at night, By sailors young and old, haply will I, a reminiscence of the land, be read, In full rapport at last.
2
Here are our thoughts—voyagers’ thoughts, Here not the land, firm land, alone appears, may then by them be said; The sky o’erarches here—we feel the undulating deck beneath our feet, We feel the long pulsation—ebb and flow of endless motion; The tones of unseen mystery—the vague and vast suggestions of the briny world—the liquid-flowing syllables, The perfume, the faint creaking of the cordage, the melancholy rhythm, The boundless vista, and the horizon far and dim, are all here, And this is Ocean’s poem.
3
Then falter not, O book! fulfil your destiny! You, not a reminiscence of the land alone, You too, as a lone bark, cleaving the ether—purpos’d I know not whither—yet ever full of faith, Consort to every ship that sails—sail you! Bear forth to them, folded, my love—(Dear mariners! for you I fold it here, in every leaf;) Speed on, my Book! spread your white sails, my little bark, athwart the imperious waves! Chant on—sail on—bear o’er the boundless blue, from me, to every shore, This song for mariners and all their ships.
I have no GIFs, or words of wisdom, only my appreciation of you and all your parts. I am loving the effort of earning enough money to get ahead enough to be confident that I can take all 10 9-day sessions of Anat Baniel's Practitioner level course [www.anatbanielmethod.com, abmethod on youtube], even though it's a fuckton of work and I fall into my lesser habits of shame and doubt and woe and worry and that's like stepping in dogshit and kind of takes the fun out of it for a while. But *shrug* I'm washable. My shoes are washable. And the walk is worth it.
Much much xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo, darlin'. Hang in there.
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no subject
Date: 2010-10-27 06:58 am (UTC)Kindness | Naomi Shihab Nye
Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you every where
like a shadow or a friend.
and
Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Leaves of Grass. 1900.
3. In Cabin’d Ships at Sea
1
IN cabin’d ships, at sea,
The boundless blue on every side expanding,
With whistling winds and music of the waves—the large imperious waves—In such,
Or some lone bark, buoy’d on the dense marine,
Where, joyous, full of faith, spreading white sails,
She cleaves the ether, mid the sparkle and the foam of day, or under many a star at night,
By sailors young and old, haply will I, a reminiscence of the land, be read,
In full rapport at last.
2
Here are our thoughts—voyagers’ thoughts,
Here not the land, firm land, alone appears, may then by them be said;
The sky o’erarches here—we feel the undulating deck beneath our feet,
We feel the long pulsation—ebb and flow of endless motion;
The tones of unseen mystery—the vague and vast suggestions of the briny world—the liquid-flowing syllables,
The perfume, the faint creaking of the cordage, the melancholy rhythm,
The boundless vista, and the horizon far and dim, are all here,
And this is Ocean’s poem.
3
Then falter not, O book! fulfil your destiny!
You, not a reminiscence of the land alone,
You too, as a lone bark, cleaving the ether—purpos’d I know
not whither—yet ever full of faith,
Consort to every ship that sails—sail you!
Bear forth to them, folded, my love—(Dear mariners! for you I fold it here, in every leaf;)
Speed on, my Book! spread your white sails, my little bark, athwart the imperious waves!
Chant on—sail on—bear o’er the boundless blue, from me, to every shore,
This song for mariners and all their ships.
I have no GIFs, or words of wisdom, only my appreciation of you and all your parts. I am loving the effort of earning enough money to get ahead enough to be confident that I can take all 10 9-day sessions of Anat Baniel's Practitioner level course [www.anatbanielmethod.com, abmethod on youtube], even though it's a fuckton of work and I fall into my lesser habits of shame and doubt and woe and worry and that's like stepping in dogshit and kind of takes the fun out of it for a while. But *shrug* I'm washable. My shoes are washable. And the walk is worth it.
Much much xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo, darlin'. Hang in there.