All life amazes me

At times these days I think of the way the sun would set on the farmland around our small house in the autumn.  A view of the horizon, the entire circle of it, if you turned, the sun setting behind you, the sky in front becoming pink and soft, then slightly blue again, as though it could not stop going on in its beauty, then the land closest to the setting sun would get dark, almost black against the orange line of the horizon, but if you turn around, the land is still available to the eye with such softness, the few trees, the quiet fields of cover crops already turned, and the sky lingering, lingering, then finally dark. As though the soul can be quiet for those moments.

All life amazes me.

– Elizabeth Strout, My Name is Lucy Barton

the unutterable gravity

I find the soul a valuable concept, a statement of the dignity of a human life and of the unutterable gravity of human action and experience.

– Marilynne Robinson, The Givenness of Things

A poem begins as a lump in the throat

“The grand scheme of a life, maybe (just maybe), is not about knowing or not knowing, choosing or not choosing. Perhaps what is truly known can’t be described or articulated by creativity or logic, science or art — but perhaps it can be described by the most authentic and meaningful combination of the two: poetry: As Robert Frost wrote, a poem ‘begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. It is never a thought to begin with.’

I recommend the following course of action for those who are just beginning their careers or for those like me, who may be reconfiguring midway through: heed the words of Robert Frost. Start with a big, fat lump in your throat, start with a profound sense of wrong, a deep homesickness, or a crazy lovesickness, and run with it.”

― Debbie Millman

I found this passage on Rudri’s beautiful blog, which I read every day (and suggest you do too!).