~fallingfalling

Pare down your desires. English novelist and playwright Jerome Klapka Jerome caught the spirit of that enterprise when he wrote,
" Let your boat of life be light, packed only with what you need---a
homely home and simplep pleasure, one or two friends, worth the name, someone to love and someon to love you, a cat, a dog and a pipe too, enough to eat and enough to wear and a little more than enough to drink, for thirst is a dangourous thing."


you will never leave me, Amathea, I said. I will respect your sleep and we will sit here together though all uncounted time, I holding you in my arms and you dreaming of the fields of Paradise. Nor shall anything part us, Amathea; you are my cat and I am your human.
Now and onwards into the fullness of peace.

Some people are oppressed by the fear of death. In the young there is a justification for this feeling. Young men who have reason to fear that they will be killed in battle may justifiably feel bitter in the thought that they have been cheated of the best things that life has to offer. But in an old man who has known human joys and sorrows, and has achieved whatever work was in him to do, the fear of death is somewhat abject and ignoble. The best way to over come it --- so at least it seems to me --- is to make your interests gradually wider and more impersonal, until bit bybit the walls of the ego recede, and your life becomes increasingly merged in the universal life.

An individual human existence should be like a river --- small at first, narrowly contained within its banks, and rushing passionately past rocks and over waterfalls. Gradually the river grows wider, the bank recede, the waters flow more quietly, and in the end, without any visible break, they become merged in the sea, and painlessly lose their way, will not suffer from the fear of death, since the things he cares for will continue. And if, with the decay of vitality, weariness increase, the thought of rest will not be unwelcome. I should wish to die while still at work, knowing that others will carry on what i can on longer do, and content in the thought that what was possible has been done.

Every death is a door opening on Creation's mystery. The door opens, but we see only darkness. In that awful moment, we realize how vast the universe is, complexity upon complexity, beyong us. But that is the true gift of simplicity: to accept the world's infinite complication, to accept bewilderment.

And then, especially, we can savor simple things. A face we love, perhaps, eyes brimming with love.

It is the simpliest of things. But it is more than enough.

When love becons to you, follow him, though his ways are hard and steep. And when his wings enfold you, yield to him, though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you. And when he speaks to you,believe in him, though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden. For even as love crowns you,so shall he crucify you. Even as he for your growth, so is he for your prunning. Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun, so shall descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth.

Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself. He threshes you to make you naked. He rifts you to free you from your husks. He grinds you to whiteness. He kneads you until you are pliant; and then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may become sacred bread for God's sacred feast.

All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of life's heart.

But if you fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasure, then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor into the seasonless world where you should laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.

Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself. Love possesses not nor would it be possessed, for love is sufficient unto love.

When you love you should not say:"God is in my heart." But rather, "I am in the heart of the God." And think not you can direct the course of love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course. Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself. But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:

To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.

To know the pain of too much tenderness.

To be wounded by your own understanding of love;

And to bleed willingly and joyfully.

To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of living.

To rest at the noon hour and meditate love's ecstasy;

To return home at eventide with gratitude;

And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.