I Can Only Become Perfectly

You Have Got Me Walking Up And Down All Day Under Those Trees, Saying To Me Over And Over Again, "solitude, Solitude." And You Have Turned Around And Thrown The World In My Lap. You Have Told Me, "leave All Things And Follow Me," And Then You Have Tied Half Of New York To My Foot Like A Ball And Chain. You Have Got Me Kneeling Behind That Pillar With My Mind Making A Noise Like A Bank. Is That Contemplation?

For Language To Have Meaning, There Must Be Intervals Of Silence Somewhere, To Divide Word From Word And Utterance From Utterance. He Who Retires Into Silence Does Not Necessarily Hate Language. Perhaps It Is Love And Respect For Language Which Imposes Silence Upon Him. For The Mercy Of God Is Not Heard In Words Unless It Is Heard, Both Before And After The Words Are Spoken, In Silence.

Zen Enriches No One. There Is No Body To Be Found. The Birds May Come And Circle For A While In The Place Where It Is Thought To Be. But They Soon Go Elsewhere. When They Are Gone, The "nothing," The "no-body" That Was There, Suddenly Appears. That Is Zen. It Was There All The Time But The Scavengers Missed It, Because It Was Not Their Kind Of Prey.

Place No Hope In The Feeling Of Assurance, In Spiritual Comfort. You May Well Have To Get Along Without This. Place No Hope In The Inspirational Preachers Of Christian Sunshine, Who Are Able To Pick You Up And Set You Back On Your Feet And Make You Feel Good For Three Or Four Days-until You Fold Up And Collapse Into Despair. Self-confidence Is A Precious Natural Gift, A Sign Of Health. But It Is Not The Same Thing As Faith. Faith Is Much Deeper, And It Must Be Deep Enough To Subsist When We Are Weak, When We Are Sick, When Our Self-confidence Is Gone, When Our Self-respect Is Gone.

The Logic Of The Poet - That Is, The Logic Of Language Or The Experience Itself - Develops The Way A Living Organism Grows: It Spreads Out Towards What It Loves, And Is Heliotropic, Like A Plant.