Today, a favorite poem by Vermont poet Galway Kinnell who passed in 2014 and who was a friend of Heron Dance.
Saint Francis and the Sow
The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don’t flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
of the flower
and retell it in words and in touch
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;
as Saint Francis
put his hand on the creased forehead
of the sow, and told her in words and in touch
blessings of the earth on the sow, and the sow
began remembering all down her thick length,
from the earthen snout all the way
through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the tail,
from the hard spininess spiked out from the spine
down through the great broken heart
to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and shuddering
from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking and
blowing beneath them:
the long perfect loveliness of sow.
- Galway Kinnell
More here, including an excerpt of an interview of Galway where he talks about the work habits of creatives, and the need for downtime.
. . .
If you appreciate this work and can afford to support it, please do. October 1 it will become a paid Substack:
$5 a month
$50 a year
$150 Founding Membership includes two upcoming books
Meditations on the Beauty and Mystery of Life, A Gratitude Journal
Using An Art Journal to Probe Deep.
The cost of subscribing to both of my Substacks, A Pause for Beauty and Creativity as a Way of Life is twice that indicated above.
You can make a one-time or recurring contribution here. Any contributions received prior to October 1 will be credited against a subscription.
And thank you.