The One "Before Whom Words Recoil"

"The purpose of all words is to illustrate the meaning of an object. When they are heard, they should enable the hearer to understand this meaning, and this according to the four categories of substance, of activity, of quality and of relationship. For example cow and horse belong to the category of substance. He cooks or he prays belongs to the category of activity. White and black belong to the category of quality. Having money or possessing cows belongs to the category of relationship. Now there is no class of substance to which the Brahman belongs, no common genus. It cannot therefore be denoted by words which, like 'being' in the ordinary sense, signify a category of things. Nor can it be denoted by quality, for it is without qualities; nor yet by activity because it is without activity—'at rest, without parts or activity,' according to the Scriptures. Neither can it be denoted by relationship, for it is 'without a second' and is not the object of anything but its own self. Therefore it cannot be defined by word or idea; as the Scripture says, it is the One 'before whom words recoil.'"

- Aldous Huxley (1894 - 1963)
The Perennial Philosophy

A Light From the Shadows Shall Spring

"All that is gold does not glitter,

Not all those who wander are lost;

The old that is strong does not wither,

Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

From the ashes a fire shall be woken,

A light from the shadows shall spring;

Renewed shall be blade that was broken,

The crownless again shall be king."

- J.R.R. Tolkien (1892 - 1973)
The Lord of the Rings

Hungry Beeches

 

"Why is the world full of color anyway? Sunlight is white, and when it is reflected, it is still white. And so we should be surrounded by a clinical looking, optically pure landscape. That this is not what we see is because every material absorbs light differently or converts it into other kinds of radiation. Only the wavelengths that remain are refracted and reach our eyes. Therefore, the color of organisms and objects is dictated by the color of the reflected light. And in the case of leaves on trees, this color is green.

But why don't we see leaves as black? Why don't they absorb all light? Chlorophyll helps leaves process light. If trees processed light super-efficiently, there would be hardly any left over-and the forest would then look as dark during the day as it does at night. Chlorophyll, however, has one disadvantage. It has a so-called green gap, and because it cannot use this part of the color spectrum, it has to reflect it back unused. This weak spot means that we can see this photosynthetic leftover, and that's why almost all plants look deep green to us. What we are really seeing is waste light, the rejected part that trees cannot use. Beautiful for us; useless for the trees. Nature that we find pleasing because it reflects trash? Whether trees feel the same way about this I don't know, but one thing is for certain: hungry beeches and spruce are as happy to see blue sky as I am."

- Peter Wohlleben (1964 - )
The Hidden Life of Trees

Reality is Not Symbols

"If you want to know what reality is, you must look directly at it and see for yourself. But this needs a certain kind of concentration, because reality is not symbols, it is not words and thoughts, it is not reflections and fantasies. Therefore to see it clearly, your mind must be free from wandering words and from the floating fantasies of memory."

- Alan Watts (1915 - 1973)

Land of Mordor

"And as the captains gazed south to the Land of Mordor, it seemed to them that, black against the pall of cloud, there rose a huge shape of shadow, impenetrable, lightning-crowned, filling all the sky. Enormous it reared above the world, and stretched out towards them a vast threatening hand, terrible but impotent: for even as it leaned over them, a great wind took it, and it was all blown away, and passed; and then a hush fell."

- J.R.R. Tolkien (1892 - 1973)
The Return of the King

Intimate Landscapes

"Though it is generally accepted that abstract art refers to those works inspired by the imagination of the artist rather than by objective reality, in photography, in which images are produced by the lens, this distinction is difficult to sustain. In the broadest sense of the term, an optical image is an abstraction from the natural world-a selected and isolated fragment of what stands before the camera. When the selected image is self-explanatory and does not imply more than what lies within its area it is usually referred to as abstract, that is, independent of its surroundings-a pattern of rock, for example, or lichens, or grasses. On the other hand, in the wider scenic view common in most landscape photography, the selected image implies a world outside the limits encompassed by the lens."

- Eliot Porter (1901 - 1990)
Intimate Landscapes

New Zealand Light #2

 "The Road goes ever on and on,
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
-Version 1-
...
The Road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
Let others follow it who can!
Let them a journey new begin,
But I at last with weary feet
Will turn towards the lighted inn,
My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
-Version 2-"

-  J.R.R. Tolkien (1892 - 1973)
"The Walking Song," The Lord of the Rings

Notes. Version 1 of the "The Walking Song" is "sung by Bilbo when he leaves the Shire and is setting off to visit Rivendell." Version 2 is "spoken by Bilbo in Rivendell after the hobbits have returned from their journey. Bilbo is now an old, sleepy hobbit, who murmurs the verse and then falls asleep." [Ref]

New Zealand Light #1

"We are all constantly in the midst of light. We are surrounded, bathed, and nourished by it. This miracle we call light can transform. It can teach, reveal, evoke, and heal. It speaks in many voices. We tend to see light as something that makes form visible, but light reveals much more. It reveals us. In the subtle, soft undulations of a snowscape illuminated by an overcast sky, in the raw presence of a backlighted, towering, ancient oak, both subject and photographer are revealed. Light makes visible the invisible. It can show us love where there seems to be only a rotting log or a solitary rock perched on a ledge. Sometimes the subject is illuminated by light, sometimes the subject is illumination itself. Then the subject itself glows; there are no shadows."

- John Daido Loori (1931 - 2009)
Making Love With Light

New Zealand Zen #3

"Walk as if you are kissing the earth with your feet...
Every step makes a flower bloom.
...
When a leaf falls from a tree,
when a river flows to the sea,
when a bee flits from flower to flower,
it happens without "action" or "doing."
Nature is simply being.
In the same way,
human beings should simply be.
...
... when we look out at the world,
we are nature gazing upon itself."

- Philip Toshio Sudo (1959 - 2002)
Zen 24/7: All Zen, All the Time

New Zealand Zen #2

 

"I asked the leaf whether it was frightened because it was autumn and the other leaves were falling. The leaf told me "No. During the whole spring and summer I was completely alive. I worked hard to help nourish the tree, and now much of me is in the tree. I am not limited by this form. I am also the whole tree, and when I go back to the soil, I will continue to nourish the tree. So I don't worry at all. As I leave this branch and float to the ground, I will wave to the tree and tell her, "I will see you again very soon." That day there was a wind blowing and, after a while, I saw the leaf leave the branch and float down to the soil, dancing joyfully, because as i floated it saw itself already there in the tree. It was so happy. I bowed my head, knowing that I have a lot to learn from that leaf."

- Thich Nhat Hanh (1926 - 2022)
Peace Is Every Step

Note. I saw these little Zen leaves at Queenstown Gardens in New Zealand. Of course, since New Zealand is in the southern hemisphere, our (i.e., northern VA's) spring is its autumn, we were treated to a spectacle of color and recently fallen leaves, not just at Queenstown, but throughout our stay on the southern island. The mostly 50/60ish degree weather was also a welcome respite from the looming 80/90ish weather we typically get where we live (and are now experiencing after we got back from our trip). Here are a few more leaves that caught my attention in Queenstown.