#by j marion brown

“You just have to live and life will give you pictures.” ~Henri Cartier Bresson

“Admire as much as you can. Most people do not admire enough.” ~ Vincent van Gogh

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” ~Leonardo da Vinci

Easter gets its name from the Teutonic goddess of spring and the dawn, whose name is spelled Oestre or Eastre (the origin of the word “east” comes from various Germanic, Austro-Hungarian words for dawn that share the root for the word “aurora” which means “ to shine”). Her chief symbols were the rabbit for fertility and the egg representing the cosmic egg of creation.  This is where the customs of Easter Eggs and the Easter bunny originated.

Blessed Be in the Season of Spring! Go Forth and Flower!

“Where flowers bloom, so does hope.”  ~ Lady Bird Johnson

“Cultivate wonder in your life. It is the way to bliss.”  ~ Helen Russell 

 “People often ask me what is the most effective technique for transforming their life. It is a little embarrassing that after years and years of research and experimentation, I have to say that the best answer is - just be a little kinder.”

~ Aldous Huxley 

“Just before the green begins there is the hint of green
a blush of color, and the red buds thicken
the ends of the maple’s branches and everything
is poised before the start of a new world,
which is really the same world
just moving forward from bud
to flower to blossom to fruit
to harvest to sweet sleep, and the roots
await the next signal, every signal
every call a miracle and the switchboard
is lighting up and the operators are
standing by in the pledge drive we’ve
all been listening to: Go make the call.”
~
“April Prayer” by Stuart Kestenbaum from Prayers and Run-on Sentences. © Deerbrook Editions, 2007

“Take a walk outside - it will serve you far more than pacing around in your mind.”  ~ Rasheed Ogunlaru 

“Deep in their roots all flowers keep the light.”  ― Theodore Roethke

“Be the celebrators, celebrate! Already there is too much - the flowers have bloomed, the birds are singing, the sun is there in the sky - celebrate it! You are breathing and you are alive and you have consciousness, celebrate it!” ~Osho

 “Pay attention to whatever inspires you, for it is ‘spirit’ trying to communicate with you, that’s why it’s called ‘inspiration’ as in ‘in-spirit’. Listen to it, believe it, and act on it.”  ~ Author Unknown

“Did you ever wonder if the person in the puddle is real, and you’re just a reflection of him?” ~Bill Watterson

“And the wind upon its way whispered the boughs of May, And touched the nodding peony flowers to bid them waken.” ~ Siegfried Sassoon

“We who live in quiet places have the opportunity to become acquainted with ourselves, to think our own thoughts and live our own lives in a way that is not possible for those keeping up with the crowd.”

~Laura Ingalls Wilder

Let me keep my distance, always, from those
who think they have the answers.

Let me keep company always with those who say
“Look!” and laugh in astonishment,
and bow their heads.

~ Mary Oliver

“Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement. Get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Begin each day with a grateful heart. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.”  ~Abraham Herschel

“Intuition literally means ‘learn from within’. Most of us were not taught how to use this sense, but all of us know that ‘gut’ feeling. Learn to trust your inner feeling and it will become stronger. Avoid going against your better judgment or being talked it into things that just don’t feel right.” ~ Doe Zantamata

“It is a strange thing that most of the feeling we call religious, most of the mystical outcrying which is one of the most prized and used and desired reactions of our species, is really the understanding and the attempt to say that man is related to the whole thing, related inextricably to all reality, known and unknowable. This is a simple thing to say, but the profound feeling of it made a Jesus…a Charles Darwin, and an Einstein. Each of them in his own tempo and with his own voice discovered and reaffirmed with astonishment the knowledge that all things are one thing and that one thing is all things—plankton, a shimmering phosphorescence on the sea and the spinning planets and an expanding universe, all bound together by the elastic string of time.” ~John Steinbeck

“The teachers are everywhere. What is wanted is a learner.”  ~ Wendell Berry

“I was in darkness, but I took three steps and found myself in paradise. The first step was a good thought, the second, a good word; and the third, a good deed.” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

“No occupation is so delightful to me as the culture of the earth, and no culture comparable to that of the garden…But though an old man, I am but a young gardener.”   ~Thomas Jefferson

 “If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.” ~Leo Tolstoy

 “Uninvited guests seldom meet a welcome.”  ~Aesop

Aesop was a Greek storyteller credited with a number of fables now collectively known as Aesop’s Fables. Although his existence remains unclear and no writings by him survive, numerous tales credited to him were gathered across the centuries and in many languages in a storytelling tradition that continues to this day. Many of the tales associated with him are characterized by anthropomorphic animal characters.

“Life is a moving, breathing thing. We have to be willing to constantly evolve. Perfection is constant transformation.”~Nia Peeples

“In solitude is healing. Speak to your soul. Listen to your heart. Sometimes in the absence of noise we find the answers.”  ~Dodinsky 

cherry blossom

“The hummingbirds have arrived,
beating their invisible wings beyond the window
where buds are beginning to break.
They come bearing the light of Panama,
Colombia, Costa Rica, the red fire of the tropics…
I go out among them, in my red coat,
hoping they will mistake me for a flower.
They buzz close, hovering before my face.
If only one of them would touch me, I would
sprout feathers and take to the air, my wings
tracing infinity, my throat turning to rubies.”

by José A. Alcántara in ‘The Bitten World’

https://gwarlingo.com/2022/archilochus-colubris-by-jose-a-alcantara/