Posts with the tag “attention”

During the years of my formal schooling and up into my 30s, I did not understand why I could not get access to Poetry; why it would not open to me. My parents taught all of us Ganz children to read, and to read all the time, barring access to the TV that we might grow in affection for books. They taught us well, doing that teaching in the most compelling way by themselves reading all the time. Yet, I could not figure out why Poetry was a locked box to me, the key to which was never placed into my hands. What was such a key?...  Read More

Dear Peregrinus: As I begin to write to you, the Sun, having made most of its transit today through a cloudy sky, is now propelling itself (though it seems to fall) toward the west, dropping behind a stand of hundred-year-old Douglas firs, which are rooted over there some fifty yards beyond my windows. For all the glorious light that the Sun gave today to the world, I wonder if it ever finds itself preoccupied with the shadows that its effulgence...  Read More

Dear Peregrinus: Blessing to you in this month of November, the last of the four months to have thirty days – “Thirty days has September, April, June, and November”. In Anglo-Saxon (i.e., “Old English”), this month was called Blōtmōnaþ, the month when the Anglo-Saxons sacrificed cattle to their gods. The root “blōt- “means “blood sacrifice”...  Read More

Dear Peregrinus: Happy new year to you, old friend, by which I do not mean from January 1st onwards, but rather according to what our Christian tradition instructs. Our new year, each year, begins with the first Sunday of Advent. Consequently our “new year” happened on 3 December 2017, when we heard read from Mark's Gospel these words: "Be watchful! Be Alert! ...  Read More

Dear Peregrinus: Good to hear from you, and thank you for sharing with me some of what you are feeling as you have watched on the TV what they call “news” concerning which a prophet once wrote – “More tortuous than anything is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9) I have felt the same as you, but possibly I have been disturbed by all of this to a degree more than you let yourself be ...  Read More