Maggie's Farm

I can't get past the bad grammar. ick
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Oh! Thank you so much. Poetry. I'll be darned.

-5 for 'grammer'. It's "grammar".
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Jephnol,

I was reading Khalil Gibran when someone told me to read Rumi. I liked them both - Rumi's universality most, but Khalil Gibran got to me. Here is one of my favorites of his from "The Prophet": I love it.

"Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the kind whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

Is the shepherd not joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall wear the mark of the king?

Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into sun?
And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you shall drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.
And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.
And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance."
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Jephnol,

I read your comment and was quite moved by it. I was distracted and could not reply at the time, but the first thing that caught me was "renew my mind". It's been in my mind since I first read it, and all I can think about is how true that is. You made me think of a two-year bout with depression that left me unable to read, and that lead me to thinking about what I'd call reading to your 'renew my mind'. The word 'comfort' kept coming to me. I think had I been able to read, I could have cut that depression in half. But I couldn't, and when I was finally able to pick up a book and lose myself in its pages of narrative, I was comforted like nothing else could have done.... and, back to your words, my mind felt so renewed. From dead to alive again. I 'need' to read to put myself in another space. But that is only part of it - the pleasure of reading is what makes life good. Even when the books make you cry or recall sad events, it is still learning the wisdom of another's thoughts and applying it that makes it so cool. Sometimes when I read, I get kind of crazy that there's no one there to listen so I can read great lines aloud.

See where you took me? That comment knocked me out. The way you spoke so much with so few words.... mastery, Jephnol.

Thank you!
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