This morning I looked out the window and saw the sun shining through the seedlings hanging on my maple tree against a bright blue sky. I wasn’t able to capture exactly what I saw but I hope this will add a little beauty to your day.
From John O’Donohue:
Only if there is beauty in us can we recognize beauty elsewhere: beauty knows beauty.
My favorite ornamental tree in the neighborhood finally came into bloom.
We turn again to Frederick Turner for today’s inspiration on beauty:
A beautiful thing, though simple in its immediate presence, always gives us a sense of depth below depth, almost an innocent wild vertigo as on falls through its levels.
There are still a few showy daffodils out there. I especially liked how this one looked against the purple shrub blooming behind it.
Today’s quote from John O’Donohue:
When we see beauty in sensible things, we are grasping their secret, living form.
The wild poppies are not out yet but there is a house in the neighborhood that always has some blooming a little early.
And today John O’Donohue tells us that:
The beauty of the earth is a constant play of light and dark, visible and invisible.
I found lots of Grape Hyacinth blooming on my walk yesterday.
And back to John O’Donohue:
Beauty inhabits the cutting edge of creativity – mediating between the known and the unknown, light and darkness, masculine and feminine, visible and invisible, chaos and meaning, sound and silence, self and others.
The neighborhood Tulips are loving the sunshine. The challenge on a day like to day is keeping my shadow out of the picture.
Today’s quote is from Frederick Turner:
The beautiful can exist at the edge precisely because it has nothing to lose and everything to give away.
I’ve been trying to actually get some house and yard work done but then I remember I’m supposed to post an image and I’m all out of energy. But I spent quite a bit of time polishing this one and adding textures to make it look better than it did out of camera.
I didn’t have to go far in today’s reading to find a great quote from John O’Donohue:
The beauty of the earth is the first beauty. Millions of years before us the Earth lived in wild elegance.
The little Maple tree in front of my house is just bursting forth with new life. There must be thousands of these little seedlings on the tree right now.
And today from John O’Donohue:
The earth is full of thresholds where beauty awaits the wonder of our gaze.
Staying in where it’s warm today but here is another tulip from yesterday.
Today’s quote is from Plotinus written in the 3rd century:
This is the spirit that Beauty must ever induce, wonderment and a delicious trouble, longing and love and a trembling that is all delight.
Here is another one from yesterday’s stroll in the park. Tulip tree reflecting in the lower duck pond.
So, my new strategy on the quotes is to just read the next section in John O’Donohue’s book on Beauty until I find something I like. So from now on just assume the quote is from John O’Donohue unless otherwise noted.
Often it beckons us from afar but hold us off until our hearts become more refined and receptive; then beauty draws us into her mysterious invisible embrace.