the church of nouns and verbs

 

Paul Gauguin, By The Stream, 1885

There’s a place in my yard where I can watch
the sun set between the trees. Evening comes on
as slow as can be, and a cool breeze blows away
the summer heat. My granddaughter runs up,
she wants to draw on the patio with chalk.
Soon, she'll want a small story as well.
Breathe, James, breathe. The gifts of this life
are all around you, every day, and if you slow down
and look, you don't have to miss any of them.

-

Welcome,
This is the church of my nouns and verbs,
The temple of my similes and metaphors.
I have prayed here for so long
That I am now an old man.
Growing older rather slowly and giving thanks.

-

In the room of seven windows, one window faces your doom;
there's no escaping it, look through that one first. Or not at all.

The second window looks at what you have learned,
so naturally another window faces that
which you have failed to learn.

It's a life, we're human. things don't always turn out well,
but sometimes they do, and so the other four windows
open to possibility, coincidence,
those things that are random, and reason.

May I offer my advice? Open them all, open them wide
and be ready to fly away on whatever wind blows through.

-

james lee jobe

Dexter Gordon, Lady Bird 

Jazz is a living music.

Dexter Gordon

There is nowhere to arrive except the present moment.

Thích Nhất Hạnh

I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures.

Lao Tzu

However many holy words you read, however many you speak, what good will they do you if you do not act on upon them?

Buddhist Proverb

Ahmad Jamal Trio, Darn That Dream 

Rambling free beyond the world enjoying the natural shapes of things a shaggy eight-year-old duffer scraping out a living selling tea. He escapes starvation, barely, thanks to a section of bamboo, a tiny house with a window hole provides all the shelter he needs. Outside, carts and horses pass annulling both noise and quiet inside, easy talk at the stove banishes notions of host and guest. He lives under a row of tall pines beside a temple of guardian sages where the pine breeze sweeps clear the dust of fame and profit.

Baisaō 1675-1763 CE

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-jlj