Generation to Generation

Rilke.

I would rather sense you

as the earth senses you.

In my ripening 

ripens

what you are.

 

No miracles, please.

Just let your laws

become clearer

from generation to generation.

❧

Thomas Merton.

You train your eye, and your vision lusts after color. You train your ear, and you long for delightful sounds. You delight in doing good, and your natural kindest is blown out of shape. You delight in righteousness, and you become righteous beyond all reason. You overdo liturgy, and you turn into a ham actor. Overdo your love of music, and you play corn. Love of wisdom leads to wise contriving. Love of knowledge leads to faultfinding.

When the delights become a religion, how can you control them?

Chuang Tzu, who wrote in the fourth and third centuries B.C., is the chief authentic historical spokesman for Taoism.