Tag: vastness

SIMULTANEOUSLY

WORDS LIKE LIGHT

Monday, September 12, 2022

         Today, like all days, the universe will live simultaneously. I and all people and sliding snakes and well-prepared breakfasts and little yellow flowers will be existing in the present moment, at one and the same time. At the exact identical instant, several billion people, including me, will take in a new breath. Thoughts will flow in unison – kind ones and confused ones – in every nation, and feelings will roll along shoulder-to-shoulder everywhere, at the very same time. Whether we want to or not, we earth-dwellers live as a synchronized family. The universe is a vast and harmonious chorus, and today, as always, whether we know it or not, its song will be sung simultaneously, by one and all.  


HARMONY

Harmony helps us breathe,
brings the sky its newness,
and knows how sorrows sing
with well-balanced wisdom.
Old trees harmonize 
with the freshest sunshine,
and the youngest houses
help winter’s days
seem beautifully arranged. 
There are magnificent designs 
In breezes and noisy storms, 
and also in the clumsiness 
of our mistakes
and the occasional zigzagginess
of our days. 

Harmony will always
 quietly come to us
if we quietly ask.
“Harmony”, oil on panel by Ans Debije

MAGNITUDE

­­WORDS LIKE LIGHT 

Tuesday, June 28, 2022 

         This morning, I am hoping I will be able to recognize and appreciate the magnitude of the coming day – of each moment of the coming day. There will be immensity in everything that happens today. Even every breath I take will have greatness within it, and all the flashes of sunlight in the forest as we’re bike-riding on the rail trail will be brilliant beyond belief. There will be a marvelous radiance inside every thought, and all the feelings that flow through me will have a hugeness that I hope I can be aware of. Every turn of my head and all the ways papers and books and notes sit on my desk will be of serious significance. The soft, sheer curtains that hang beside our windows will have a special kind of importance, and my hand will occasionally rest on the top of my desk with dignity and prominence. Like all days, this will be a day of grand magnitude. Historic events will occur –  someone in New Zealand suddenly understanding something, a small child in Tennessee taking its first steps, my hands and fingers coming together in friendship. How lucky I will be to be present at so many momentous proceedings on such a prominent and illustrious day!    

Below, a quiet scene at the start of our 22-mile bike ride this morning with two friends on the Kingston (RI) rail trail …

WORDS LIKE LIGHT 

Thursday, September 9, 2021

IMAGINATIVE

         I am lucky to be part of a very imaginative universe. Indeed, it’s impossible to comprehend the magnitude and vastness of  its inventiveness. Each moment today – for every person, animal, object, and action – will be an ingenious and brand-new creation.  Winds will blow in original ways, sunshine will show its glories in unconventional ways, and breath will enter my lungs in always whimsical ways. Every step I take with my 79-year-old legs will be an act of absolute brilliance, as artistic as the first toddling steps of a child. Flowers in Delycia’s garden today will wave and bend with finesse, as always, and squirrels will bounce and skip across trees with astuteness. It will be a day of originality for stars and planets and schools and meadows and old, retired teachers, one of whom just turned his head with absolute resourcefulness. 


WORKING SONGS

He's a construction worker,
but he's also a serious song writer.
He writes songs because songs are stored
inside his modest life
and spring out unannounced.
His jobs are not easy at the sites,
but he knows his life
is actually a cushion to rest on,
even when the work is the hardest.
As he measures and fastens,
he settles back on his thoughts
and the songs start
launching themselves superbly,
his flourishing melodies that love to fly.
His tools seem to loosen up
in his hands as he's working.
A whimsical screwdriver twists
like its listening to something.
A saw sings as the harmonious house arises.

WORDS THAT AWAKEN 

Thursday , June 17, 2021

BIG

            ‘Big’ is not a fancy word, not one of those multi-syllabic words that can make a sentence sound smooth and sophisticated, and yet it is a word that says a lot about life, about today, and about every single moment. Life itself is big – very big. There’s no way that the vastness of life could ever be measured. I, and all of us, live in a universe of colossal size, and our individual lives are just as immense, spreading out endlessly in all directions. To myself, I usually seem fairly small and trivial, but when I step back and see the ‘big picture’, I see a life called ‘Hamilton Salsich’ that’s as spacious as the boundless sky. Today, too, will be huge, ‘a big day’, a stupendous unfolding of major miracles. I probably won’t notice many of the miracles, but they’ll be there, always unrolling in their almighty way. Every breath I take will be a marvel, and every thought that throws itself across my life will be stupendous in some special way. Each person I see today will be somehow significant, both for me and for the universe, and all the passing moments will be consequential and far-reaching. Today, life will be a ‘big shot’. Each moment, if I listen carefully, will ‘talk big’ to me, and will ‘think big’, as well. Life will carry a very ‘big stick’ today, and I hope I can pay attention as it swaggers around, almost – but not quite – ‘too big for its britches’.   

NOW

Right now
there are pencils and pens on desks,
and there are thoughts 
throwing themselves across the skies of lives, 
and there are moments made of miracles, 
blossoming and prospering. 
Right now, 
no one is normal,
everyone is bizarre
in the best way. 
Right now, 
never take your eyes off 
right now.