Golden Heart

 Confucius said:

“Wisdom, compassion, and courage are the three universally recognized moral qualities of men.

These qualities are all essential to humanity and peace. These virtues lead each if us to have a golden heart.
The 14th Dalai Lama and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 also spoke about compassion:
"From my own limited experience I have found that the greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion. 
     The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater our own sense of well-being becomes. Cultivating a close, warm-hearted feeling for others automatically puts the mind at ease. This helps remove whatever fears or insecurities we may have and gives us the strength to cope with any obstacles we encounter. It is the ultimate source of success in life."
  Giving another person the gift of love is as precious as gold. It is the way to obtain a golden heart.

Listen to the Dalai Lama's speech on Human Compassion at William & Mary College.















   The music by Mark Knopfler captures the essence of the golden heart, especially in the song      
Darlin' Pretty.

Heal me with a smile, darling pretty
Heal me with a smile and a heart of gold
Carry me awhile, my darling pretty
Heal my aching heart and soul

The Love of Morning

The Love of Morning

It is hard sometimes to drag ourselves
back to the love of morning
after we've lain in the dark crying out
O God, save us from the horror . . . .

God has saved the world one more day
even with its leaden burden of human evil;
we wake to birdsong.
And if sunlight's gossamer lifts in its net
the weight of all that is solid,
our hearts, too, are lifted,
swung like laughing infants;

 but on gray mornings,
all incident - our own hunger,
the dear tasks of continuance,
the footsteps before us in the earth's
beloved dust, leading the way - all,
is hard to love again
for we resent a summons
that disregards our sloth, and this
calls us, calls us.

                                    ~ Denise Levertov 

The bittersweet symphony of life keeps playing every morning. It calls us to start our day and be willing to ignore the violence that surrounds us,  the human evil that tries to destroy our spirit, and tries to awaken us to the beauty of birdsong. Each day we must accept who we are, but try to change for the better. There is something special about the sunlight of morning that lifts our mood and summons us to love. This is our task in life, to walk through the gray mornings, make our footsteps strong and  seek the path to love again.

The Verve -"Bittersweet Symphony"

I have decided to love

"And I say to you, I have also decided to stick to love. For I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind's problems. And I'm going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know it isn't popular to talk about it in some circles today. I'm not talking about emotional bosh when I talk about love, I'm talking about a strong, demanding love. And I have seen too much hate. I've seen too much hate on the faces of sheriffs in the South. I've seen hate on the faces of too many Klansmen and too many White Citizens Councilors in the South to want to hate myself, because every time I see it, I know that it does something to their faces and their personalities and I say to myself that hate is too great a burden to bear. I have decided to love. If you are seeking the highest good, I think you can find it through love. And the beautiful thing is that we are moving against wrong when we do it..,  he who has love has the key that unlocks the door to the meaning of ultimate reality."
~Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967  ( from book by Martin Luther King, Jr.)

"I have decided to love. If you are seeking the highest good, I think you can find it through love." ~MLK

Martin Luther King, Jr had a thousand reasons to let  hate control his life: discrimination, incarceration, beatings, imprisonment, mental abuse, violence and threats of violence. Still he chose  to love.

   Let us follow his message. Love is the highest good.

The Lloyd Tenn photograph of civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr (right) with Ernest Smatt (centre) and Don Bardowell, former Arawak Hotel manager, taken in Ocho Rios in the 1960s. It was here in Ocho Rios, Jamaica,while resting and reflecting in that beautiful climate,  that  MLK, Jr. wrote the book Where Do We Go From Here:Chaos or Community?

Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/lifestyle/King-s-Jamaican-Connection_9462967#ixzz2IXs9TyWp

Bright Star

Bright Star Movie

 

 One of the interesting thing about reading old love letters, written before the computer age [before the days of instant-messaging and e-mail] is re- discovering the passion with which they were written. The poet John Keats loved his neighbor Fanny Brawne and wrote brilliant letters of intense longing to her. In the early part of their relationship, he called her his Bright Star. The star was a symbol to Keats of something that was constant and everlasting.          
   "Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art-- 
   Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
   And watching, with eternal lids apart.."

   John Keats studied to be a surgeon,  but  chose poetry over medicine and wrote these words of intense beauty to Fanny:

“I almost wish we were butterflies and liv'd but three summer days - three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain.”

― John Keats, Bright Star: Love Letters and Poems of John Keats to Fanny Brawne

Or this:
My sweet girl,Your Letter gave me more delight, than any thing in the world but yourself could do;...
  I kiss'd your Writing over in the hope you had indulg'd me by leaving a trace of honey - What was your dream? Tell it me and I will tell you the interpretation threreof.

Ever yours, my love!
John Keats.

Love More

Love More, Hug More.   "Let the armies of those you love engirth you", said Walt Whitman.
Don't let darkness destroy you. Even though she was surrounded by  darkness, Sharon van Etten came out of it and found the answer. When faced with personal  pain, the answer is Love More.  Listen to her song called Love More:

When you turn to the path in life that leads toward the light of love you become a different person. You let the negative experiences change you, but not destroy you.

Beyond the existing horizon of your experience are countless possibilities you have not yet considered.

What are some of the experiences you discover when you love more? Find more inspiriation on a website called "Love More Fear Less"

Sunrise in the Sky

"There's beauty in a silver singing river,
  There's beauty in a sunrise in the sky."
  (from Bob Dylan's Tomorrow Is A Long Time)



Rivers of Love

 

Bob Dylan - Tomorrow Is A Long Time 

Bob Dylan saw beauty in many things and yet he Knew the Greatest beauty was Looking at the face of his true love. This painting by Valentina Plischina  suggests that the beauty of the river is caressed by the "Man In The Moon." It is a powerful image. For sometimes, love connects the sky to the earth.
Would you be willing to jump into the river to look into your "true love's eyes" ?
  Bob sings this lyric from 2:51

To The New Year

    It is now five days into the New Year.  Some of us watched "the ball drop" in Times Square in New York City. Others  sang songs, toasted each other with champagne or shared a midnight kiss. The  poet below has another idea. He welcomes the New Year  with the first ray of light, not at midnight.  He listens for a lovely voice, then hears a dove's song.

To the New Year

By W. S. Merwin

With what stillness at last
you appear in the valley
your first sunlight reaching down
to touch the tips of a few
high leaves that do not stir
as though they had not noticed
and did not know you at all
then the voice of a dove calls
from far away in itself
to the hush of the morning

so this is the sound of you
here and now whether or not
anyone hears it this is
where we have come with our age
our knowledge such as it is
and our hopes such as they are
invisible before us
untouched and still possible

The poem itself is a wonderful description of a new year’s dawn bringing new hope.The change that we hope for stirs within each of us. It is not  found in the loud, midnight swaggering, but in the stillness and hush of the morning.
   Victor Hugo said:

“To love beauty is to see light."

Image of Love and Beauty

 What do you hope for this year. I hope to live in peace and to  love beauty. I hope the sound that awakens me will be as sweet as the call of a dove far away . I hope  love will touch the tips of our hair (our  high leaves) and find its way  to reach inside all of our hearts.

Apple

The days are getting colder and the nights even more so. Baking feels right. Here is a recipe for apple cake. Serve it to someone you love and put this quote from Song of Solomon next to their plate. Better yet, send this greeting card and make this cake your regular winter lovesong.

Fabio's Apple Cake

Recipe by Fabio Viviani

Yield: 8-10 servings

Ingredients:

3-4 very ripe Red Delicious apples, peeled and cored

1 cup all-purpose, unbleached flour

2 tsp baking powder

2 large eggs, plus one yolk

¾ cup granulated sugar

zest of one orange

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

½ cup extra-virgin olive oil

2 tbsp golden brown sugar

powdered sugar, for dusting

fresh mint sprigs, for garnish (optional)

Method:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a 9-inch round springform pan.

In a food processor, pulse apples until pureed but still chunky (the apples will oxidize, turning brown, but it's perfectly fine.). You should have about 3 cups of apple puree. Set aside.

In a small bowl, mix flour and baking powder. Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, add eggs, sugar, and beat on medium until incorporated.

Add orange zest and vanilla and beat on low speed, increasing to medium, then high, until the eggs are foamy and light-yellow in color.

Reduce speed to low and gradually add the olive oil in a steady stream.

Add pureed apples and mix until combined.

Gradually add the flour mixture.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula, and mix again on low speed until all ingredients are evenly incorporated into the batter. Do not over-mix.

Transfer batter to the prepared springform pan.

Sprinkle the top with brown sugar for a crunchy crust.

Bake for 1 hour, then cool in the pan for 10 minutes.

To serve, remove the sides of the pan and place on a platter.

Dust with powdered sugar and garnish with a mint sprig.

MANGIA!

For That Special Someone