Sublime

Soon this short verse sprang free from renga and began to articulate aesthetic qualities, such as a sense of beautiful aloneness (sabishisa) and restrained elegance (furyu).

This haiku is a deep reflection on the truth of reality, which is by nature transient and fleeting. When we are unable to accept this truth we become distressed. However, recognition of this truth could at least bring a sense of poignancy to all of us human beings, who inevitably experience and witness it. There is even an aesthetic of this recogni

I thought often and seriously of picking huckleberries; that surely I could do, and its small profits might suffice—for my greatest skill has been to want but little—so little capital it required, so little distraction from my wonted moods, I foolishly thought. While my acquaintances went unhesitatingly into trade or the professions, I contemplated

Remember that you should behave in life as you do at a banquet. Something is being passed around and arrives in front of you: reach out your hand and take your share politely. It passes: don’t try to hold it back. It has yet to reach you: don’t project your desire towards it, but wait until it arrives in front of you. So act likewise with regard to

I would love to live like a river flows

carried by the surprise of its own unfolding

— John O’Donohue