The Sunlit Hill

ALREADY MY GAZE IS UPON THE HILL, THE SUNLIT ONE. THE WAY TO IT, BARELY BEGUN, LIES AHEAD. SO WE ARE GRASPED BY WHAT WE HAVE NOT GRASPED, FULL OF PROMISE, SHINING IN THE DISTANCE. IT CHANGES US, EVEN IF WE DO NOT REACH IT, INTO SOMETHING WE BARELY SENSE, BUT ARE; A MOVEMENT BECKONS, ANSWERING OUR MOVEMENT . . . BUT WE JUST FEEL THE WIND AGAINST US. ~ RAINER MARIA RILKE

Brave Endeavors

My friend, Ruth, over at Synch-ro-ni-zing wrote a thought provoking post about living in the face of death, despair and fear. In her wise way she turned to poetry, bits of poems, she called a "found poem" to provide an important juxtaposition.
After reading it, the following quotes that I've collected because they spoke to me came together in a whole new way. They illuminate our work as writers and offer encouragement for this brave endeavor.



I don't think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones in the right order, you might nudge the world a little or make a poem that children will speak for you when you are dead. 
- Tom Stoppard


It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.
~Frederick Douglass

So don't be frightened, dear friend, if a sadness confronts you larger than any you have ever known, casting its shadow over all you do. You must think that something is happening within you, and remember that life has not forgotten you; it holds you in its hand and will not let you fall. Why would you want to exclude from your life any uneasiness, any pain, any depression, since you don't know what work they are accomplishing within you? 

-Rilke

One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these-to be fierce and to show mercy toward others; both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity.
-Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Steve Jobs, Rilke, Monet

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.
And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

                                            Steve Jobs, 
                                                    Stanford University Commencement address, 2005

You carry within you the capacity to imagine and give shape to your world. It is a pure and blessed way of living. Train yourself to this, but also trust whatever comes. If it comes from your desire, from some inner need, accept that and hate nothing.

Worpswede, July 16, 1903

Letters to a Young Poet

Rilke

Monet

Evening

Slowly evening takes on the garments held for it by a line of ancient trees. You look, and the world recedes from you. Part of it moves heavenward, the rest falls away.

And you are left, belonging to neither fully, not quite so dark as the silent house, not quite so sure of eternity as that shining now in the night sky, a point of light. You are left, for reasons you can't explain, with a life that is anxious and huge, so that, at times confined, at times expanding, 

it becomes in you now stone, now star.

Book of Images

Rilke

Because at times we are confined and at times expanding, 

now stone, now star.

Photos from our next door neighbors' balcony two nights ago 

(thanks Lucia).

Poetry from "A Year With Rilke" kindly hosted by Ruth and Lorenzo.

Act with Beauty and Courage

Let us not forget the ancient myths at the outset of humanity's journey, the myths about dragons that at the last moment transform into princesses. Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act just once with beauty and courage. Perhaps every terror is, in its deepest essence, something that needs our recognition or help.

Borgeby gärd, Sweden, August 12, 1904

Letters to a Young Poet
Rilke

in The Luxembourg Garden

Excerpt taken from: A Year With Rilke, a wonderful blog by Lorenzo and Ruth, in their July 11 post on Transforming Dragons. Check it out. You'll be glad you did.

"Remembering"

To celebrate National Poetry month


Remembering


And you wait. You wait for the one thing
that will change your life,
make it more than it is--
something wonderful, exceptional,
stones awakening, depths opening to you.

In the dusky bookstalls
old books glimmer gold and brown.
You think of lands you journeyed through,
of paintings and a dress once worn
by a woman you never found again.

And suddenly you know: that was enough.
You rise and there appears before you
in all its longings and hesitations
the shape of what you lived.



Rilke




This wise poem by Rilke reminds me to be grateful for my life just as it is. It is already exceptional; stones awaken and depths open to me in the family and friends with whom I have the great honor to be in relationship. On this journey through remarkable lands, I've discovered treasures, and one of them is me "in all my longings and hesitations". I have enough. I am enough. 

For more inspiration by Rilke, give yourself the gift of  "A Year With Rilke" generously posted by Lorenzo and Ruth.