"It began in mystery, and it will end in mystery, but what a savage and beautiful country lies in between." - Diane Ackerman

White Flowers

Last night
in the fields
I lay down in the darkness
to think about death,
but instead I fell asleep,
as if in a vast and sloping room
filled with those white flowers
that open all summer
sticky and untidy,
in the warm fields.
When I woke
the morning light was just slipping
in front of the stars,
and I was covered
with blossoms.
I don't know
how it happened-
I don't know
if my body went diving down
under the sugary vines
in some sleep-sharpened affinity
with the depths, or whether
that green energy
rose like a wave
and curled over me, claiming me
in its husky arms.
I pushed them away, but I didn't rise.
Never in my life had I felt so plush,
or so slippery,
or so resplendently empty.
Never in my life
had I felt myself so near
that porous line
where my own body was done with
and the roots and the stems and the flowers
begin.

--Mary Oliver

"Look at everything as though you were seeing it for either the first or last time. Then your time on earth will be filled with glory." - Betty Smith

"God breaks the heart again and again and again until it stays open." -Hazrat Inayat Khan

"What we hold dear can heal the world." - Mark Nepo

"Be content with what you have;
rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing lacking,
the whole world belongs to you."
- Lao-tzu