When we least expect it, life sets us a challenge to test our courage and willingness to change; at such a moment, there is no point in pretending that nothing has happened or in saying that we are not yet ready. The challenge will not wait. Life does not look back.
― Paulo Coelho, The Devil and Miss Prym
![Black-Lion-Flame-Wild-Light-Danger-Candle-Energy-2103456[1].jpg](https://i2.wp.com/synkroniciti.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/black-lion-flame-wild-light-danger-candle-energy-21034561.jpg?resize=676%2C409&ssl=1)
He was sitting in moonlight and candlelight, scratching the head of some beast that looked to Vevay a cross between a lion and a bear. It had black pelt, a flat, broad, fanged face, a powerful bulky body. It seemed to be purring. It cast a smoldering red glance at Vevay then closed it eyes again, leaning heavy against Felan’s knee.
“What on earth is that?” Vevay asked.
“I’ve no idea,” Felan said. “It came out of an old book I was reading once and it never went back in again. It seems harmless and is very obliging: it let the students practice transformation spells on it. It eats strawberries when it can get them.”
― Patricia McKillip, Alphabet of Thorn
There are two kinds of people. One kind, you can just tell by looking at them at what point they congealed into their final selves. It might be a very nice self, but you know you can expect no more surprises from it. Whereas, the other kind keep moving, changing… They are fluid. They keep moving forward and making new trysts with life, and the motion of it keeps them young. In my opinion, they are the only people who are still alive. You must be constantly on your guard against congealing.
It’s creepy, but here we are, the Pilgrims, the crackpots of our time, trying to establish our own alternate reality. To build a world out of rocks and chaos.
What it’s going to be, I don’t know.
Even after all that rushing around, where we’ve ended up is the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night.
And maybe knowing isn’t the point.
Where we’re standing right now, in the ruins in the dark, what we build could be anything.
― Chuck Palahniuk, Choke
An Eagle was soaring through the air when suddenly it heard the whizz of an Arrow, and felt itself wounded to death. Slowly it fluttered down to the earth, with its life-blood pouring out of it. Looking down upon the Arrow with which it had been pierced, it found that the shaft of the Arrow had been feathered with one of its own plumes. “Alas!” it cried, as it died, “We often give our enemies the means for our own destruction.”
from Aesop’s Fables
Last spring I planted camellias in our front flowerbeds, not fully appreciating what a blessing I was giving myself. My husband and I worked the soil, adding amendments to create the acidity needed for the new camellias and azaleas. We went to Maas Nursery, the best place in the Houston area to get camellias, and purchased one Royal Velvet (deep red), one Purple Dawn (purplish pink) and a variety I had never heard of before, Sadaharu Oh (pink and white) named after a baseball player. The Royal Velvet has opened three glorious blooms so far, the Purple Dawn is a week from blooming for the first time, but the Sadaharu Oh has proved unexpectedly prolific. Eighteen blooms have come and gone over the past month and it shows no sign of slowing down. Every time I tried to count the buds I would lose track somewhere between sixty and seventy.
I have been battling a respiratory infection this winter and without the joy my camellias have brought I don’t know how I would have made it through. But there is something about the fleeting nature of the camellia flower that makes one think of mortality and the beauty of life anyway.
These photos were taken in my garden and in my home and inspired the camellia theme for the week. In turn, I was inspired by the haikus of Matsuo Bashō and decided to try my hand at haikus. Staying traditional by keeping the 5-7-5 syllable count in three lines, I also tried to keep a sense of the jarring, unexpected nature of the content. I don’t know how successful I was, but the enjoyment I received from the mental exercise was well worth the time spent. I hope you will love them.
a bowl of petals
this fierce corolla looks up
to contain the sun
a pink and white bloom
adorns the glossy green leaves
crowned by threads of light
a bee drinks deeply
ensconced in choice filaments
briefly imprisoned
the bee roaming freely
high on nectar among petals
is distinctly small
the waxy flower
incapable of flying
makes the bee her slave
in the flower’s bell
a bee hangs like a clapper
that will never ring
after winter rain
shining with damp radiance
blooms have not fallen
a fragile wax bloom
pours out its captured water
cup overflowing
flower petals moist
textured like a infant’s skin
lasting only days
in winter’s darkness
the camellia flowers
bring back the sunlight
blossom beneath leaves
out of reach of wind and rain
afraid of falling
a fallen flower
vibrant colors bathed in tears
is already dead
cradled on pine straw
the flower’s lifeless body
collects dewy tears
like a fallen star
gracing my simple table
bringing nature home
remaining lovely
in a dish splashed with water
bloom cut off from life
like a frilly dress
layers exposed for all eyes
she remains empty
moisture is fickle
too much and the bloom will rot
too little she wilts
each bloom so unique
drops in her time from the plant
nature is wasteful
a fleeting flower
dropping helplessly to earth
evokes our own death
a flower lingers
uncoupled from life and dead
may we do the same
You don’t fall in love like you fall in a hole. You fall like falling through space. It’s like you jump off your own private planet to visit someone else’s planet. And when you get there it all looks different: the flowers, the animals, the colours people wear. It is a big surprise falling in love because you thought you had everything just right on your own planet, and that was true, in a way, but then somebody signalled to you across space and the only way you could visit was to take a giant jump. Away you go, falling into someone else’s orbit and after a while you might decide to pull your two planets together and call it home. And you can bring your dog. Or your cat. Your goldfish, hamster, collection of stones, all your odd socks. (The ones you lost, including the holes, are on the new planet you found.)
And you can bring your friends to visit. And read your favourite stories to each other. And the falling was really the big jump that you had to make to be with someone you don’t want to be without. That’s it.
PS You have to be brave.
―Jeanette Winterson in Big Questions from Little People: And Simple Answers from Great Minds edited by Gemma Elwin Harris
How did you fall in, Eeyore?” asked Rabbit, as he dried him with Piglet’s handkerchief.
“I didn’t,” said Eeyore.
“But how–”
“I was BOUNCED,” said Eeyore.
“Oo,” said Roo excitedly, “did somebody push you?”
“Somebody BOUNCED me. I was just thinking by the side of the river–thinking, if any of you know what that means–when I received a loud BOUNCE.”
“Oh, Eeyore!” said everybody.
“Are you sure you didn’t slip?” asked Rabbit wisely.
“Of course I slipped. If you’re standing on the slippery bank of a river, and somebody BOUNCES you loudly from behind, you slip. What did you think I did?”
―A.A. Milne, The House at Pooh Corner
I have been finding treasures in places I did not want to search. I have been hearing wisdom from tongues I did not want to listen. I have been finding beauty where I did not want to look. And I have learned so much from journeys I did not want to take. Forgive me, O Gracious One; for I have been closing my ears and eyes for too long. I have learned that miracles are called miracles because they are often witnessed by only those who can can see through all of life’s illusions. I am ready to see what really exists on other side, what exists behind the blinds, and taste all the ugly fruit instead of all that looks right, plump and ripe.
―Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem
Snowdrops
Do you know what I was, how I lived? You know
what despair is; then
winter should have meaning for you.
I did not expect to survive,
earth suppressing me. I didn’t expect
to waken again, to feel
in damp earth my body
able to respond again, remembering
after so long how to open again
in the cold light
of earliest spring—
afraid, yes, but among you again
crying yes risk joy
in the raw wind of the new world.
―Louise Glück, Poems 1962-2012