Who is to say what a human being
should take from this world?
This as I sit in a tiny cottage
on a weekend getaway with my husband
on rolling hills, in mist. Ground
growth is green and wet,
cut stubble golden, trees
orange, yellow and tawny.
Farm buildings unpainted, weathered black.
The big lake a mile away, sapphire
at the horizon, turquoise to the sandbar,
silver and clear where waves
fold over the shore’s stones
like tattered lace curtains, blowing.
Enormous summer homes
dwarf the narrow snaking road
through trees along the lake.
They, too, are built from
small stones.
We wonder
at ourselves
and why we don’t live
smaller still than this.
I like the simplicity of this, and it's bookended beautifully.
ReplyDeleteRobert, thank you.
DeleteI feel this says too little ... or too much ... but I needed to start responding to our encounter with a great expanse of beauty, and with the massive consumption that happens in beautiful places that attract tourists. Tourism is one of our state's primary resources for revenue, and so it is important, while it is also troublesome at certain points.
You could be writing about almost any of the roads and paths along the beaches here in RI. Little beach shacks are being torn down to make way for massive buildings
DeleteYes, to amplify, simplicity of word and style, not of thought.
DeleteGail, I don't know whether I'm more sad or disgusted.
DeleteThanks, Robert.
DeleteWhen we allow to contemplate and respond with words, this happens. Your words, stones, building a reflection of both your thoughts and the beauty in those other stones.
ReplyDeleteRosaria, it helps me to think of words as stones. Thank you.
DeleteLovely, Ruth. Your last lines reminded me of something I read last night about the wisdom of living with "unmanageable simplicity," versus "manageable complexity."
ReplyDeleteThanks, George. I'd like to hear more about that.
DeleteTo pare down, live simply (she types on her computer), be aware of nature's lace curtain surf. Yes. Become smaller. Still.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your stillness.
DS, thank you for distilling what I have written [always].
DeleteThis is beautiful, Ruth -- and so true. I have an issue with McMansions in general and particularly in the north. There is one spot near Petoskey where it is its own McMansion village, all fake. All cold. Nothing beautiful except the lake in front... how sad.
ReplyDeleteJeanie, it's a false sale of goods.
DeleteAnd then, on NPR, I heard about the couple, the Arnolds, billionaries who donated $10 million to reopen Headstart in Alabama, which had closed because of the government shutdown. Imagine the effect. 770 children versus, say, five $2 million homes.
Small stones...and surely washed. What more could we ask for, Ruth?
ReplyDeleteExactly, Boots.
DeleteBravo pour ton blog poétique il est remarquable.
ReplyDeleteRoger
Roger, merci beaucoup.
DeleteThis is so beautiful and sounds like a wonderful getaway. I agree with the sentiment. Since 2010 - when we sold our big house - we are facing our third move this coming week - we keep going smaller and smaller - down from about 4000 sq ft now to about 1400 and I'm loving it - I feel much lighter in my mind. I don't miss the space at all. And we get closer and closer to nature with each move.
ReplyDelete