A brave and startling truth, Mary Angelou

A BRAVE AND STARTLING TRUTH

We, this people, on a small and lonely planet
Traveling through casual space
Past aloof stars, across the way of indifferent suns
To a destination where all signs tell us
It is possible and imperative that we learn
A brave and startling truth

And when we come to it
To the day of peacemaking
When we release our fingers
From fists of hostility
And allow the pure air to cool our palms

When we come to it
When the curtain falls on the minstrel show of hate
And faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean
When battlefields and coliseum
No longer rake our unique and particular sons and daughters
Up with the bruised and bloody grass
To lie in identical plots in foreign soil

When the rapacious storming of the churches
The screaming racket in the temples have ceased
When the pennants are waving gaily
When the banners of the world tremble
Stoutly in the good, clean breeze

When we come to it
When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders
And children dress their dolls in flags of truce
When land mines of death have been removed
And the aged can walk into evenings of peace
When religious ritual is not perfumed
By the incense of burning flesh
And childhood dreams are not kicked awake
By nightmares of abuse

When we come to it
Then we will confess that not the Pyramids
With their stones set in mysterious perfection
Nor the Gardens of Babylon
Hanging as eternal beauty
In our collective memory
Not the Grand Canyon
Kindled into delicious color
By Western sunsets

Nor the Danube, flowing its blue soul into Europe
Not the sacred peak of Mount Fuji
Stretching to the Rising Sun
Neither Father Amazon nor Mother Mississippi who, without favor,
Nurture all creatures in the depths and on the shores
These are not the only wonders of the world

When we come to it
We, this people, on this minuscule and kithless globe
Who reach daily for the bomb, the blade and the dagger
Yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace
We, this people on this mote of matter
In whose mouths abide cankerous words
Which challenge our very existence
Yet out of those same mouths
Come songs of such exquisite sweetness
That the heart falters in its labor
And the body is quieted into awe

We, this people, on this small and drifting planet
Whose hands can strike with such abandon
That in a twinkling, life is sapped from the living
Yet those same hands can touch with such healing, irresistible tenderness
That the haughty neck is happy to bow
And the proud back is glad to bend
Out of such chaos, of such contradiction
We learn that we are neither devils nor divines

When we come to it
We, this people, on this wayward, floating body
Created on this earth, of this earth
Have the power to fashion for this earth
A climate where every man and every woman
Can live freely without sanctimonious piety
Without crippling fear

When we come to it
We must confess that we are the possible
We are the miraculous, the true wonder of this world
That is when, and only when
We come to it.

D. Cimarosa, Sonata in La Minore

Cimarosa, Concerto for 2 flutes, Galway, Pelleg, Voxmusicorum

The Tao Te Ching, excerpts

The Tao Te Ching
A Translation by Stan Rosenthal

 1. THE EMBODIMENT OF TAO 

Even the finest teaching is not the Tao itself.
Even the finest name is insufficient to define it.
Without words, the Tao can be experienced,
and without a name, it can be known.

To conduct one's life according to the Tao,
is to conduct one's life without regrets;
to realize that potential within oneself
which is of benefit to all.

Though words or names are not required
to live one's life this way,
to describe it, words and names are used,
that we might better clarify the way of which we speak,
without confusing it with other ways
in which an individual might choose to live.

Through knowledge, intellectual thought and words,
the manifestations of the Tao are known,
but without such intellectual intent
we might experience the Tao itself.

Both knowledge and experience are real,
but reality has many forms,
which seem to cause complexity.
By using the means appropriate,
we extend ourselves beyond the barriers of such complexity,
and so experience the Tao.

9. WITHOUT EXTREMES

The cup is easier to hold
when not filled to overflowing.
The blade is more effective
if not tempered beyond its mettle.

Gold and jade are easier to protect
if possessed in moderation.
He who seeks titles,
 invites his own downfall.

The sage works quietly,
seeking neither praise nor fame;
completing what he does with natural ease,
and then retiring.
This is the way and nature of Tao.

10. CLEANING THE DARK MIRROR

Maintaining unity is virtuous,
for the inner world of thought is one
with the external world
of action and of things.

The sage avoids their separation,
by breathing as the sleeping babe,
and thus maintaining harmony.
He cleans the dark mirror of his mind,
so that it reflects without intent.

He conducts himself without contriving,
loving the people, and not interfering.
He cultivates without possessing,
thus providing nourishment,

he remains receptive to changing needs,
and creates without desire.
By leading from behind,
attending to that which must be done,
he is said to have attained the mystic state.


Tao Te Ching

sometimes

sometimes if not more often
i do not only feel that i am an illusion
but that all what i do and feel is an illusion
and that even  acts of love are as useless as all,
words are anyway.
poems are drops in the sand.
blood turns like milk, sour.
the flesh falls off.
the skin shrinks.
the world shrinks.
all flow concentrates in a swirl
and drowns in a maelstrom,
each step is blocked,
i don't know where to go.
me, soul, we long for peace and harmony.

D. Cimarosa , Concerto per 2 flauti e orchestra

CIMAROSA , Concerto for Oboe, C Moll (Arthur Benjamin )