washed stones: The longing of no longing

Monday, September 3, 2012

The longing of no longing

All is sand. The way it touches, mirrors and adheres to skin. Crystals clean as winnowed grain. Hot on the surface, cool in the under-dark. Poems distant on the horizon, belly-dancing in liquid heat. This is the longing of no longing. Hearing the far-off soul’s music, with no desire in my hips.

9 comments:

erinSeptember 3, 2012 at 8:39 AM
oh! (and so just moments ago i found this by way of 14th, a great compliment to you, i believe, seeing this shine in the larger world so quickly.)

This is the longing of no longing. i can hardly escape the clarity of this line, ruth. why would i want to? this is enough. it is enough.

xo
erin
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joaop1960@gmail.comSeptember 3, 2012 at 8:44 AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Gy94N_mcWs
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Jean SpitzerSeptember 3, 2012 at 9:07 AM
Lovely.
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Rosaria WilliamsSeptember 3, 2012 at 11:29 AM
Ruth, the contrast is stunning, sand adhering to the skin,poems bellydancing in liquid heat, yet the distance, the distance of not feeling, not being engaged in this universe.
(I don't know the connection Erin speaks of.)

I do sense a longing to be connected.
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Grandmother MarySeptember 3, 2012 at 12:24 PM
I also wrote about sand - mine is mirroring 3 boys, touching their skin, launching the forth. Yours is an elegant reflection on poetry and our own mystery as we change.
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dsSeptember 3, 2012 at 12:42 PM
sand is cleansing, too...
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Amanda SummerSeptember 3, 2012 at 12:46 PM
yes, yes and yes........

i have just returned from the sea and now reading this, i am back there. tootoo beautiful, ruth. (i love the way maria paired your words with her image btw)
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hedgewitchSeptember 3, 2012 at 1:49 PM
That place where longing and no longing become one--a fine and meditative bit of writing here, Ruth--I can imagine using it as a mantra by candlelight.
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temporaryreality (Wendy)September 3, 2012 at 1:55 PM
Recently it was "suggested" (from within) that I consider stone and write about it and I just now realized how connected and synchronous it is that you are making this blog with this impetus. I'm enjoying the differing connotations than those which appeared for me. Also, I hadn't thought of sand... hmmm, I'll have to see where that takes me. :)

ps, no worries about the lost post yesterday (?) it was entirely of my own doing and I recreated it decently :)
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Not Poor

We are not poor. We are just without riches,
we who have no will, no world:
marked with the marks of the latest anxiety,
disfigured, stripped of leaves.

Around us swirls the dust of the cities,
the garbage clings to us.
We are shunned as if contaminated,
thrown away like broken pots, like bones,
like last year’s calendar.

And yet if our Earth needed to
she could weave us together like roses
and make of us a garland.

For each being is cleaner than washed stones
and endlessly yours, and like an animal
who knows already in its first blind moments
its need for one thing only—

to let ourselves be poor like that—as we truly are.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke
The Book of Hours, III, 16

Translated by Anita Barrows & Joanna Macy

the original poem

Sie sind es nicht. Sie sind nur die Nicht-Reichen,
die ohne Willen sind und ohne Welt;
gezeichnet mit der letzten Ängste Zeichen
und überall entblättert und entstellt.

Zu ihnen drängt sich aller Staub der Städte,
und aller Unrat hängt sich an sie an.
Sie sind verrufen wie ein Blatternbette,
wie Scherben fortgeworfen, wie Skelette,
wie ein Kalender, dessen Jahr verrann, -
und doch: wenn deine Erde Nöte hätte:
sie reihte sie an eine Rosenkette und
trüge sie wie einen Talisman.

Denn sie sind reiner als die reinen Steine
und wie das blinde Tier, das erst beginnt,
und voller Einfalt und unendlich Deine
und wollen nichts und brauchen nur das Eine

so arm sein dürfen, wie sie wirklich sind.

Denn Armut ist ein großer Glanz aus Innen...