Thought for the Day

This is precisely the time when artists to to work.

There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity,

no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak,

we write [. . .] That is how civilizations heal.

~ Toni Morrison

______________________________________

Quoted from Toni Morrison, "No Place for Self-Pity, No Room for Fear" in The Nation (150th Anniversary Issue), April 6, 2015 (Online)

Toni Morrison (1931 - 2019), American Novelist, Editor; Recipient, Nobel Prize in Literature

New York Times Obituary for Toni Morrison

Thought for the Day

Both emptiness and form are saturated with love.

And our love for each other and for the Earth is

the most natural expression of this one quality.

~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee

________________________________

Quoted from Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, "Unborn and Undying" (Essay) in Emergence Magazine, November 3, 2024 (Online) An audio presentation by Vaughan-Lee also is available at the link.

Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Sufi Teacher, Author, Editor, Lecturer

Thought for the Day

Who would dream for us to be better if it were not

the artist? And who would show us the way if it

were not for the storyteller?

~ Jamaica Osorio

____________________________________

Quoted in Introductory Remarks to "Shifting Landscapes Film Series" in October 6, 2024, Newsletter of Emergence Magazine

See Adam Loften's and Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee's Film "Aloha 'Aina" with Jamaica Osorio

Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio, Ph.D., Native Hawaiian (Kanaka Maoli) Poet; Activist; Author, Remembering our Intimacies (University of Minnesota Press, 2021); Associate Professor of Indigenous and Native Hawaiian Politics, University of Hawai'i at Manoa

Jamaica Osorio Website

Thought for the Day

Home is a notion that only nations of the homeless fully

appreciate and only the uprooted comprehend.

~ Wallace Stegner

______________________________

 

Quoted from Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose (1971, Winner, 1972 Pulitzer Prize; Viking, 2014) (This excerpt also is found in Christian Wiman, Ed., Home: 100 Poems (Yale University Press, 2021), p. 55

Wallace Stegner (February 18, 1909 - April 13, 1933), American Novelist, Environmentalist, and Historian

Thought for the Day

[O]ur eyes are not innocent. But we must hope to make them so.

We must refuse labels and prejudices, just try to see as a child sees.

~ Sister Wendy Beckett 

________________________________

Quoted from "Sr. Wendy on Art," Interview with Bill Moyers (YouTube), 2016

Sister Wendy Beckett (February 25, 1930 - December 26, 2018), Roman Catholic Nun, Art Historian, Art Critic on Television, Writer and Author

Obituary at The New York Times

Thought for the Day

Eighty percent of everything that is true and beautiful can

be experienced on any ten-minute walk. [. . .] On any ten-

minute walk anywhere [. . .] love abounds and abides,

 flirts and weeps with us.

~ AnneLamott

_____________________________

 

Quoted from Anne Lamott, "Overture" in Somehow: Thoughts on Love (Riverhead Books, April 2024), pp. 1, 3

Anne Lamott, Author of Fiction and Nonfiction; Guggenheim Fellowship Recipient; Inductee, California Hall of Fame; Political Activist; Writing Instructor

Thought for the Day

[. . .] we need to look inward into our own pain, our own

loss, our own suffering, and see where we can heal. And

by healing ourselves, then we can truly be who we are,

which I believe is a complete gift to the world. [. . .]

~ Kalyanee Mam

________________________________________

 

Quoted from "Documenting Shifting Landscapes: A Conversation with Kalyanee Mam," Emergence Magazine, September 5, 2024; Online (Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee interviewed Mam at Emergence Magazine's exhibition "Shifting Landscapes." The conversation was recorded live. A transcript is available at the link.)

 

Kalyanee Mam, Cambodian-American Filmmaker

Thought for the Day

[. . .] Prayer is a sweeping of forgetfulness, because it

is an honoring of remembrance. It is an affirmation,

and an affirmation is more powerful than negation.[. . .]

~ Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee

____________________________________

Quoted from "Memory, Praise, and Spirit: A Talk by Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee" (Keynote at Conference on Spiritual Ecology and Peace-Building, St. Ethelburga's Centre for Reconciliation and Peace, London), Emergence Magazine, August 29, 2024; Online (The talk is available at the link as both podcast and transcript.)

Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Sufi Teacher and Filmmaker; Founder and Executive Editor, Emergence Magazine

Thought for the Day

The betrayal of a belief is not the same thing

as ceasing to believe.

~ James Baldwin

_________________________________

Quoted from James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son (Beacon Press,  2012)

James Baldwin (August 2, 1924 - December 1, 1987), American Writer, Novelist, Essayist, Playwright, Poet; Civil Rights Activist

James Baldwin Profiles at Library of America, National Museum of African American History and Culture, New York Public Library, PBS, The Poetry Foundation

Thought for the Day

Getting old is the second-biggest surprise of my life,

but the first, by a mile, is our unceasing need for deep

attachment and intimate love.

~ Roger Angell

__________________________

 

Quoted from "This Old Man" in The New Yorker, February 9, 2014; Online 

Roger Angell (September 19, 1920 - May 20, 2022), American Sports Essayist Specializing in Baseball; Senior Fiction Editor, The New Yorker

 

Roger Angell Obituary at The New York Times

Guide to the Roger Angell Papers, National Baseball Hall of Fame

Thought for the Day

We don't need anniversaries for things

we can never forget.

~ Diane Foley

_________________________________

Quoted from Diane Foley, "Jim Foley's Legacy Helped Change Hostage Policy," Guest Essay/Opinion, The New York Times, August 18, 2024; online

Diane Foley, Mother of American Journalist James Foley; Founder, James Foley Foundation; Co-Author (with Colum McCann) of American Mother

James Foley (October 18, 1973 - August 19, 2014)

Thought for the Day

Receptivity without confrontation leads to a bland neutrality

that serves nobody. Confrontation without receptivity leads

to an oppressive aggression which hurts everybody.

~ Henri J. M. Nouwen

 

__________________________________

 

Quoted from Henri J.M. Nouwen, Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life (Image Books, 1966), p. 99  (This quote also appears in David Brooks, How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen (Random House, 2023), p. 259.)

David Brooks, Writer, Author, Political and Cultural Commentator

Henri J.M. Nouwen, Catholic Priest, Spiritual Writer

Henri Nouwen Society

Thought for the Day

When your instinct is to avoid or deny, you must

not look away.

When you're inclined to false hope or good cheer,

choose sincerity and quiet presence.

When you think you have all the answers,

ask a question.

~ Sharon Brous

____________________________________

Quoted from Sharon Brous, The Amen Effect: Ancient Wisdom to Mend Our Broken Hearts and World (Avery/Penguin Random House, 2024), p. 146

Sharon Brous, Founding and Senior Rabbi, IKAR; Writer

Sharon Brous, "It's Time to Reclaim Religion," 2016 TedTalk

Thought for the Day

Tragedy teaches that no one should die

with a clear conscience.

~ Robert D. Kaplan

_________________________________

Quoted from Robert D. Kaplan, "The Burden of Power Is Overwhelming" (Chapter 9) in The Tragic Mind: Fear, Fate, and the Burden of Power (Yale University Press, 2023), p. 84

Robert D. Kaplan, Robert Strausz-Hupe Chair in Geopolitics, Foreign Policy Research Institute; Reporter, Writer, Author, Essayist, Speechwriter

Thought for the Day

Silence is somehow at the very foundation of all reality.

It is that out of which all being comes and to which all things return.

~ Fr. Richard Rohr

________________________________

 

Quoted from Richard Rohr, "The Gift of Silence" (Daily Meditation: Prayerful Rhythm of Life), July 1, 2024

Fr. Richard Rohr, Franciscan Friar, Ecumenical Teacher; Founder, Center for Action and Contemplation; Author

 

Center for Action and Contemplation

Thought for the Day

Most often the alchemy that produces a poem or a work

of fiction is hidden within the work itself, if not embedded

in the coiling ridges of the mind. [. . .]

 

[. . .] Why do we write? [. . .]

Because we cannot simply live.

~ Patty Smith

_________________________________

 

Quoted from Patti Smith, Devotion ("Why I Write Series"), 2016 Windham-Campbell Lecture (Yale University Press, 2017), pages 27, 93

 

 Patti Smith, Singer-Songwriter, Poet and Author, Painter, Photographer

 

 Windham-Campbell Prizes

Thought for the Day

Nature doesn't disdain what lives only for a day.

It pours the whole of itself into each moment.

~ Tom Stoppard

_________________________________

 

Quoted from Playwright Tom Stoppard's Shipwreck (Part II of The Coast of Utopia), Reprinted by Grove Press, 2003

Tom Stoppard, Playwright and Screenwriter

Thought for the Day

We must take the feeling of being at home into exile.

We must be rooted in the absence of place.

~ Simone Weil

_______________________________

 

Quoted from Simone Weil, Gravity & Grace (Bison, 1997), Trans. Arthur Wills

Simone Weil (1909-1943), French Philosopher, Writer, Political Activist, Religious Mystic

See Simone Weil's Gravity & Grace at The Anarchist Library.

Thought for the Day

The real gift of doing the work is getting to do it alongside

writers you admire, and to share some decoration with them

is an added joyful bonus.

~ Hanif Abdurraqib

_______________________

Quoted from Hanif Abdurraqib's Statement on Being Awarded Campbell-Windam Literature Prize, Nonfiction, 2024

 

Hanif Abdurraqib, American Writer, Essayist, and Poet; Podcaster, "Object of Sound"

Campbell-Windam Prizes

Thought for the Day

[. . .] The shameless shall inherit the earth,

while the blameless grapple with the mess they make of it.

~ Frank Bruni 

_________________________________

Quoted from Frank Bruni, "There is apparently no accountability – ever – for Donald Trump" (Opinion), The New York Times, July 4, 2024

 

Frank Bruni, American Journalist, Author, Contributing Writer for The New York Times

 

Frank Bruni on FaceBook

Thought for the Day

Everything is capable of a once upon a time, [. . .]

Lauren Camp

 

________________________________

Quoted from Lauren Camp, "Lecture on Nothing" in An Eye In Each Square (River River Books, 2023), p. 72

Lauren Camp, Prize-Winning Poet; Poet Laureate of New Mexico; Instructor, Poetry Out Loud New Mexico; Senior Fellow, Black Earth Institute; Visual Artist

Thought for the Day

To reread a beloved book after a long time away is always

a great risk. [. . .] for a book that is more than merely a favorite,

a book that has a hand in creating you, the risk of loss is even

greater. [. . .] if you were to lose that book, you would feel that

you had lost some necessary part of yourself. [. . .]

~ Margaret Renkl

___________________________________

Quoted from Margaret Renkl, "I Reread a Book That Changed My Life, but I'd Changed, Too," The New York Times, June 3, 2024; Online

Margaret Renkl, Prize-Winning Writer and Author; Contributing Opinion Writer, The New York Times; Founding Editor, Chapter 16

Thought for the Day

If I play you a piece of music,

that's when you can truly look inside me.

~ Hans Zimmer

___________________________

 

Quoted from Transcript of Stephen Galloway Interview with Hans Zimmer at The Hollywood Reporter, November 3, 2014; Online. Also see Hans Zimmer Quotes at QuoteFancy.

Hans Zimmer, Prolific and Influential German-born American Composer and Music Producer

Hans Zimmer Website

 

Hans Zimmer Live

Hans Zimmer on FaceBook and  Instagram

Thought for the Day

Flowers are made to seduce the senses: fragrance, form, colour.

If you cannot be seduced by beauty, you cannot learn

the wisdom of ugliness.

~ H.D.

___________________________________

Quoted from H.D., "Notes on Thoughts and Vision" in Visions and Ecstasies (David Zwirner Books, 2019), p. 28

H.D. (1886-1961), American Poet, Novelist, Memoirist, Essayist, Critic, Writer of Children's Books, and Translator

Note: H.D. was the pen name of Hilda Doolittle.

Additional profiles are found at American Academy of Poets, New Directions Publishing, and Yale University Modernism Lab.

Thought for the Day

We look at the world once, in childhood. /

The rest is memory.

~ Louise Gluck

____________________________

Quoted from Louise Gluck, "Nostos" in Meadowlands (Ecco/HarperCollins, 1996), p. 43

Louise Gluck (1943-2023), American Poet and Essayist; Winner, 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature; U.S. Poet Laureate, 2003-2004

Profile at The Noble Prize

Resource Guide at Library of Congress

Obituary at The New York Times

Thought for the Day

You change the world and yourself by changing

your thoughts. And first, you change yourself. And

then maybe you change the world. And then maybe

you help somebody else in their moment of great

despair – or their moment of great joy.

~ Jane Hirshfield

__________________________________

Quoted from "Ezra Klein Interviews Jane Hirshfield: What a Poetic Mind Can Teach Us About How to Live" (Online Transcript from The Ezra Klein Show at The New York Times), March 3, 2023

Jane Hirshfield, Poet, Essayist, Translator

Jane Hirshfield Profiles at Academy of American Poets and Poetry Foundation

Jane Hirshfield on FaceBook

I'm seeing humanity as at the mouth

of a very long dark tunnel, and right

at the end is a little star – that's hope.

~ Jane Goodall 

_____________________________

Quoted from Ralph Blumenthal, "What's Next for Jane Goodall? An Immersive Spectacle in Tanzania" at The New York Times, April 9, 2024; Online (Subscription Required)

Jane Goodall (1934 – ), Primatologist, Environmental Activist; Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire; United Nations Messenger of Peace; "Dr. Jane's Dream" at Arusha Cultural Heritage Center, Tanzania

Jane Goodall Institute

Roots & Shoots (for Youth)

Thought for the Day

Sunrise [. . .] is a state of the heart.

Sunrise is the space where nighttime fears

move aside for hope, where we feel peace

about our mortality in the scope of the universal

truth that love abides.

~ Becca Stevens

 

___________________________

 

Quoted from Becca Stevens, Letters from the Farm: A Simple Path for a Deeper Spiritual Life (New York: Morehouse Publishing, 2015), pp. 24-25, 29

 

Becca Stevens, Priest; Author; Social Entrepreneur; Founder, Thistle Farms

Thought for the Day

History says, don't hope / On  this side of the grave. /

But then, once in a lifetime / The longed-for tidal wave /

Of justice can rise up, / And hope and history rhyme.

~ Seamus Heaney

_______________________

Quoted from Seamus Heaney, The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles' Philoctetes (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1991 (Reprint Ed.)

Seamus Heaney (1939-2013), Irish Poet, Playwright; Recipient, Nobel Prize in Literature, 1995

Biography at The Nobel Prize

Thought for the Day

We need art to explore the darkest recesses of our lives and minds.

But we also need art to tell us why this world is

worth loving, and therefore saving.

~ Christian Wiman

___________________________

Quoted from Christian Wiman, "The Poet of Light" (Essay) in The New York Times, January 12, 2018 (Online)

Christian Wiman, Poet, Essayist, Translator, Editor, Author; Clement-Muehl Professor of Communication Arts, Yale Divinity School; Former Editor, Poetry Magazine

Christian Wiman Profiles at Academy of American Poets, Macmillan Publishers, and Poetry Foundation

Thought for the Day

What songs are audible when the wind stops?

What has been kept alive in the time snatched from work

and sheltered from ongoing destruction – what moments

of recognition, what ways of relating, what other

imagined worlds, what other selves? 

What other kinds of time?

~ Jenny Odell on 'Vertical' Time

__________________________________

Quoted from Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, "Another Kind of Time: An Interview with Jenny Odell" at Emergence Magazine (Online Transcript), April 25, 2023

Jenny Odell, Multidisciplinary Artist, Writer, and Educator. Odell's most recent books are Saving Time: Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock (2023), Inhabiting the Negative Space (2021), and How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy (2019).

Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Filmmaker, Naqshbandi Sufi Teacher, Spiritual Ecologist; Founder, Podcast Host, and Executive Editor, Emergence Magazine

Thought for the Day

When we see the smoke and flames on the horizon

are we seeing not just a fire but a reflection

of our own voracious appetites and desire

to consume until we're finally extinguished?

~ Jeffrey T. Manuel on John Vaillant's 'Fire Weather'

__________________________________

Quoted from Jeffrey T. Manuel, "Our Neighbo(u)rs to the North, Aflame: On John Vaillant's 'Fire Weather'," in Cleveland Review of Books, March 12, 2024

John Vaillant, American-Canadian Nonfiction Writer, Journalist, and Novelist

 

Jeffrey T. Manuel, Historian on Energy, Technology, and the Environment; Professor of History, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville; Writer and Author

Thought for the Day

The most practical thing you can do,

even in hard times, is to lead with curiosity,

lead with respect, work hard to understand

the people you might be taught to detest.

~ David Brooks

__________________________________

David Brooks, "How to Stay Sane in Brutalizing Times," The New York Times, November 2, 2023

David Brooks, Author and New York Times Opinion Columnist on Politics, Culture, and the Social Sciences

Thought for the Day

Nobody will give you freedom . . .

you have to take it.

~ Meret Oppenheim 

______________________________________

Quoted from Meret Oppenheim, Acceptance Speech, City of Basel Art Award, 1975

Meret Oppenheim (1913-1975), Swiss Artist, Photographer, Poet

Note: See The Loveliest Vowel Empties: Collected Poems of Meret Oppenheim, trans. Kathleen Heil (World Poetry Books, February 2023).

Thought for the Day

Love is convinced that it is the source of life,

and life is convinced that without it, love is

nothing. And in fact, nonhuman life on Earth,

which is most life, has no need for love. Love

is necessary for humans, because without it 

we are destroyers of worlds, and with it, we

still struggle not to be destroyers.

~ Fady Joudah

__________________________________

Quoted from Aria Aber, "Fady Joudah: The poet on the war in Gaza changed his work" in The Yale Review, February 28, 2024 (Online)

Fady Joudah, Award-Winning Palestinian-American Poet, Writer, Translator, Co-Founder/Co-Editor, Etel Adnan Poetry Prize, Physician in Internal Medicine

Fady Joudah Profiles at Academy of American Poets, Jewish Currents, and Poetry Foundation

Flour Massacre (Poem)

 Flour Massacre

        This bag of flour [. . .] it's

            the most expensive food ever made.

            ~ Mohammed al-Simry, father of four

On Leap Year Day, aid trucks at last

arrive, and the crowd, having gathered

in al-Rashid Street the night before,

makes for the goods.

 

 

Once, what came before the trucks

with their sacks of flour, 

before the bread to be baked

and then heaped with hummus,  

 

before the fattoush salad,

the soups of lentils and fava beans,

the eggs or chicken,

the copper pitchers of sous,

 

was the anticipation of taste,

the clarity of a satisfied stomach,

eyes delighting at the sight

of knafeh and date-filled ma'mool. 

It is four forty-five a.m.,

the morning of February 29,

and the trucks arrive.

So, too, do the soldiers.

Look: they are anywhere,

even everywhere, 

the aid trucks are.

But these soldiers,

they make no exceptions

for the food-deprived.

They feel the hunger.

Dropped sacks of flour

dust the heads  

of hundreds, there

in al-Rashid Street.

No one clamors now

for bread. 

No bread

will be made this day.

_______________________________________

For articles on the event that has come to be known as the "Flour Massacre," see Zaina Arafat's essay "Fasting for Ramadan While Gaza Goes Hungry" (The New Yorker, March 11, 2024) and Simon Speakman Cordall, Mohammed R Mhawish, and Mat Nashed's reporting, "When Israeli Soldiers Shot at Hungry Palestinians" (Aljazeera News, March 5, 2024).

Fattoush is a type of Middle Eastern (Lebanese) chopped salad that uses, among other ingredients, pomegranate molasses, sumac and other herbs, mixed greens and vegetables, and toasted pita chips.

Sous, or erk sous, is a licorice drink typically imbibed during Ramadan.

Knafeh is a cheese-filled sweet made with filo dough and ma'mool are sweet cookies, often stuffed with dates.

Thought for the Day

I think self-promotion is a really bad idea for

a couple of reasons – the greatest of which is 

that you start thinking that public attention is

how you know your work is good. Applause and acclaim

 are not how you know something has quality.

~ Scott Cairns

_____________________________

Quoted from Ben Palpant, "A Conversation with Scott Cairns" (Online), The Rabbit Room, February 26, 2024

Scott Cairns, Poet, Spiritual Writer and Memoirist; Professor of English and Director, M.F.A. in Creative Writing, Seattle University; Blogger and Podcaster

Scott Cairns on Facebook

Thought for the Day

[. . .] We must learn how to be surprised,

not to adjust ourselves. [. . .]

~ Abraham Joshua Heschel

____________________________

Quoted in Tali Sharot and Cass R. Sunstein, "Why People Fail to Notice Horrors Around Them" (Guest Essay), The New York Times, February 25, 2024

Dr. Tali Sharot, Neuroscientist, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London and Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Cass R. Sunstein, Law Professor, Harvard University; Founder and Director, Program on Behavioral Economics and Public Policy, Harvard Law School

Affective Brain Lab

Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), Jewish Theologian and Philosopher; Author

Arnold Eisen, "The Spiritual Audacity of Abraham Joshua Heschel" at On Being, September 21,  1917

Thought for the Day

The correct response to uncertainty is mythmaking.

~ Martin Shaw

_______________________________

Quoted from Martin Shaw, "Navigating the Mysteries," Emergence, May 12, 2022

Dr. Martin Shaw, Mythologist and Storyteller; Author, Translator and Poet

School of Myth and Story

 

Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, "Mud and Antler Bone: An Interview with Martin Shaw," Emergence, June 4, 2018

The Children / We See (Poem)

 The Children / We See

            What childhood does /

            a destroyed childhood beget?

                    ~ Fady Joudah

 

We see them –

the children

rummaging through the fallen

fortress that once was Gaza

 

Their urge –

to eat, sleep, play

to wake as if free

like the kites

they fly in hope

their dreams

of so many seeds

their grandfathers sowed

when the land was theirs

to harvest

and they could

taste the white cucumbers

the figs and the olives

Battiri eggplant, gourds

with necks like swans'

These children –

we see them

what they've become

ghost-eaters

dirt-diggers

what they would give

for a taste of khubeezeh

a drink of cold water

a wash in the Red Sea

They push their steel pots

their plastic bowls

to the front lines

their eyes on those

with the stronger arms

the longer reach

the elbows out and ready

 

They are children –

we see them

know what they teach us

what war does

how power takes

on a life of its own

delivering back

their small bodies

into the arms of their fathers

borne too early of their mothers

denied them

__________________________

The epigraph is from Fady Joudah's poem "[. . .]."

Khubeezeh, as locally known in Gaza, is cheeseweed. It has become, according to the United Nations, a major food source for Gazans. A plant, it typically has been used in recipes for side dishes.

Thought for the Day

Hope is a song in a weary throat.

~ Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray

_____________________________

Quoted from Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray, Verse 8, Dark Testament and Other Poems (Liveright Publishing Corp./W.W. Norton, 2018)

Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray (1910-1985), Lawyer/Legal Scholar,  Poet, Episcopal Priest, Civil Rights Activist

 

Pauli Murray Center, Durham, North Carolina 

Pauli Murray Resources

Note: On February 22, 2024, the U.S. Mint released the new Pauli Murray quarter. (See American Women Quarters Program.)

Listen to Murray's Dark Testament, Verse 8 at SoundCloud.

Thought for the Day

We ask of writers what we ask of our friends,

to help us mediate and interpret the world.

~ Hosam Zowa in My Friends

___________________________________

Quoted from Hisham Matar, My Friends (Random House, 2024)

Hisham Matar, Award-Winning Novelist, Memoirist, and Essayist; Fellow, Royal Society of Literature; Associate Professor, Professional Practice in Comparative Literature, Asia and Middle East Cultures, and English, Barnard College, Columbia University

Hisham Matar Website

Thought for the Day

What is the worth of defending our lives

if we do not seek to protect the lives of others?

~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

__________________________________

Quoted from Viet Thanh Nguyen, "Palestine Is in Asia: An Asian American Argument for Solidarity" in The Nation, January 29, 2024

Viet Thanh Nguyen, Professor of English, American Studies and Ethnicity, and Comparative Literature, University of Southern California; Novelist; Fiction and Nonfiction Writer; Editor; Winner, 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

Thought for the Day

[. . .] the truest thing about being human

– the thing deepest down in us –

is not sin but the divine image.

~ Barbara Brown Taylor

_____________________________

Quoted from Isaac Anderson, "A Conversation with Barbara Brown Taylor" in Image, Issue 97; Online Archive

Barbara Brown Taylor, Episcopal Priest, Teacher, Writer and Author

Barbara Brown Taylor on FaceBook

Thought for the Day

Finding time for anything that matters

will always be a challenge. [. . .] 

~ Margaret Renkl

______________________________________

Quoted from Margaret Renkl, "The Nicest New Year's Resolution I Ever Made," The New York Times, November 21, 2021

Margaret Renkl, Writer, Author, Essayist, Contributing Opinion Writer for The New York Times; Founding Editor, Chapter 16, Humanities Tennessee

Thought for the Day

[. . .] How lovely 

it would be to become something

that cannot be contained; to become

something so present, yet so far out

of reach that no man even thinks of trying

to lay his hands on it.

~ Tariq Luthun

_____________________________

Quoted from Tariq Luthun, "I Felt Nothing" in How the Water Holds Me (Bull City Press, 2019), p. 25

Tariq Luthun, Detroit, Michigan-born Poet; Kresge Arts in Detroit Fellow; Community Organizer, Data Consultant

Thought for the Day

[...] what is more generous than a window?

~ Pat Schneider

 

_______________________________

 

Quoted from "The Patience of Ordinary Things" by Pat Schneider in Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems, Phyllis Cole-Dai and Ruby R. Wilson, Eds. (Grayson Books, 2017), p. 33

 

Pat Schneider (1934-2020), American Poet and Writer

 

Susan Bruns Rowe, "A Profile of Pat Schneider" at Literary Mama, March/April 2021

 

Gaza Funeral (Poem)

 

The lucky are those who have someone

        to bury them when they die.

            ~ Doctor in Gaza 

The too-short truce was all the time

they had to bury the dead boy lying

 

in their rubbled apartment. Already

they'd waited four days, the body

 

of their 10-year-old wrapped in

a blanket providing no warmth,

 

his last rites un-mouthed, never

to be heard amid the later bombings.

 

On the fifth day, hurrying past

the broken skeletons of neighbors'

 

burned buildings, the father spied

the guava tree that children used

 

to climb for its juicy, sweet fruits.

In the sand, giving way to the fallen

 

harvest, the father dug a shallow

grave and left his boy to sleep.

 

________________________________

 

The epigraph and some details for this poem come from Raja Abdulrahim's article, "As Gaza Losses Mount Under Strikes, Dignified Burials Are Another Casualty" in The New York Times, January 6, 2024.

Thought for the Day

[. . .] Light needs such quiet, gentle work.

~ Benjamin Cutler

__________________________

Quoted from Benjamin Cutler, "An Invitation to Light" (This is the concluding line of Cutler's poem, which was published in The Shore in 2019, and, more recently, included in the Advent Project, Day 15, December 15, 2023, of Biola University's Center for Christianity, Culture &  the Arts.)

Benjamin Cutler, Poet; English Instructor, Swain County High School, North Carolina