Wednesday, October 14, 2015

wonderful book - 40 years of Gary Snyder's & Wendell Berry's letters

This wonderful collection from Gary Snyder's and Wendell Berry's 40-year friendship is simply a stunning collection of wisdom and insights. Because they lived across the country from one another, visits were relatively few, but these two gifted writers, poets, teachers, and wise cultural figures show their shared concern for the ecological crises we face, their unfolding awareness of current policy and political issues, their deeply-held values - and in many cases, their carefully thought-out differences and disagreements. Through it all, their shared friendship and support of each other shines through.  Very worthwhile!
More at: http://www.counterpointpress.com/dd-product/distant-neighbors/
and: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/wendell-berry/distant-neighbors/

Saturday, October 10, 2015

Up In the Canopy (October)

Up in the canopy, that is where I lift my vision in October.
There's gold up there - and red and orange, of course.
I've been looking up there to be transported, and
to be grounded - at the same time.

Sunday, October 4, 2015

the works of Gary Snyder

I highly recommend these writings; they have deeply affected me:
  • Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems (1969)
  • Regarding Wave (1969)
  • Earth House Hold (1969)
  • Turtle Island (1974)
  • The Old Ways (1977)
  • He Who Hunted Birds in His Father's Village: The Dimensions of a Haida Myth (1979)
  • The Real Work: Interviews & Talks 1964-1979 (1980)
  • Axe Handles (1983)
  • Left Out in the Rain (1988)
  • The Practice of the Wild (1990)
  • No Nature: New and Selected Poems (1992)
  • Mountains and Rivers Without End (1996)
  • The Gary Snyder Reader: Prose, Poetry, and Translations (1999)
  • The High Sierra of California, with Tom Killion (2002)
  • Danger on Peaks (2005)
  • Back on the Fire: Essays (2007)
  • The Etiquette of Freedom, with Jim Harrison (2010) film by Will Hearst with book edited by Paul Ebenkamp
  • Nobody Home: Writing, Buddhism, and Living in Places, with Julia Martin, Trinity University Press (2014).
  • This Present Moment (April 2015)
  • Distant Neighbors: The Selected Letters of Wendell Berry and Gary Snyder (May 2015)

Thursday, August 6, 2015

August - I Used to Say It Was an Unfavorite






















August – I Used to Say it Was An Unfavorite

The flowers are there each evening
Imbibing the water I bring them
My time in the garden (not a gardener) is
(there’s that word) magical
It has rarely rained, thus my need to bring them water.
And the neighborhood birds bring their stories
oh, if only I could really understand them
and, if I stay out there long enough
the fireflies join in
There are so many lessons now
And so few that I yet understand.
Perhaps the flowers, the birds, the fireflies
They are trying to explain
And I am trying to listen.
While I look to the sky.

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Tuesday, June 23, 2015

new issue of The Trumpeter is online

A favorite online journal - for those interested in environmental ethics - The Trumpeter - has a new issue (Volume 30, Number 2, 2014) available:
 http://trumpeter.athabascau.ca/index.php/trumpet/issue/view/116


Saturday, June 13, 2015

a great teaching, from a master teacher

Absolutely wonderful advice from one of the world's great teachers, Pema Chodron:
"Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away." http://www.lionsroar.com/turn-your-thinking-upside-down/#