I need a little beauty today

It’s the first day of October today. Already! And in the midst of a season of change and anxiety over everything from climate change to politics to pandemic

I need a little beauty today

“It is a serious thing just to be alive on this fresh morning in this broken world.” — Mary Oliver, Invitation

My beautiful dahlia bouquet is beginning to fade but I’m still able to get some beautiful close-ups. Even the backs of the flowers are fascinating to me. And I always feel better when I read some of Mary Oliver’s words.

Though the weather is cooler, the colors outside are magnificent and there is beauty all around. I like taking walks in the cool crisp days of October and I plan to keep walking as often as I can as the season turns.

Today

 

Today I’m flying low and I’m

not saying a word.

I’m letting all the voodoos of ambition sleep.

 

The world goes on as it must,

the bees in the garden rumbling a little,

the fish leaping, the gnats getting eaten

And so forth.

 

But I’m taking the day off.

Quiet as a feather.

I hardly move though really I’m traveling

a terrific distance.

 

Stillness. One of the doors

into the temple.

   — Mary Oliver, A Thousand Mornings

“Maybe the desire to make something beautiful is the piece of God that is inside each of us.” — Mary Oliver, Devotions

“Still, what I want in my life is to be willing to be dazzled — to cast aside the weight of facts and maybe even to float a little above this difficult world. I want to believe I am looking into the white fire of a great mystery. I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing — that the light is everything — that it is more than the sum of each flawed blossom rising and falling. And I do.” ― Mary Oliver, House of Light

May you walk in beauty.