Poet, writer, and prolific translator Stephen Mitchell is learned and lucid in his translations. This volume, which has been in my library for nigh on three decades, feels to me as timeless as anything I have read, and I return to it again and again because it stresses the joy to be found through the shift in focus that comes through giving up stressful thoughts–through meditation, sudden insight, or through dawning awareness of the impermanence the imbues everything, through embracing “the dance.” I also appreciate the range of voice and culture represented by this slim volume. It seemed a good last offering with which to bring these “April Spotlights” to a close.
Context for My Poem, “The Beauty of Emptiness”:
I suppose that this last poem for the month–and the 240th one for me generated in April over eight years–appropriately regards the exhale, the release, the letting go as a natural process and one to be celebrated, rather than mourned.
With many thanks for your kind attention to my posts and poems this April.
Wishing you well,
LESLIE
Thank you for your comment, Hope, and for reading the poems this month.
All good wishes, Leslie
Thanks Leslie for enriching my April with your beautiful poetry and insights! I’ll miss my daily pause for your poems. Hope xo
Dear Lynn,
Dear Lynn,
Meeting you this year online and learning about your own work has definitely nourished my own work. I am glad–more than glad–my work has provided some consolation and joy at a time of grief for you. How lovely to know that you live on East 57th Street! I will have to check, but I think Amy Clampitt lived within 10 blocks of you…I shall check the return address of the envelopes she sent to me. Let’s keep in touch in the months ahead.
Warmly, Leslie
Thank you, Beth. So much. For all these 8 years of commenting on every poem. Your moral support and thoughts help me so much. Leslie
Dear Leslie,
I’ve looked forward to your posts every day for this month. and so April has not been “the cruelest month” which it started out being as I lost a dear friend on April 3rd who would have loved to have met you. Instead it’s been one filled with riches for the mind and the soul. Totally nourishing.
Thank you for your supreme generosity of so many gifts of poetry, photographs, rich texts, and “contexts,” It’s been awesome and inspiring to see how you are able to craft an incredible poem every day. I have saved all in my “Winona” file and look forward to getting some of the books you’ve introduced me to. Some I want to give as gifts. “In Praise of Good Bookstores” by Jeff Deutsch will be one of them.
I loved yesterday’s post “On Good Bookstores” and have perused the shelves of this fantastic resource, The Seminary C0-0p Bookstore. Had I known about it when I was a student at UW in the mid-’60’s, I certainly would have made my way down that steep staircase. It’s no small irony that I live on Eat 57th Street in NYC.
It has been heart-warming to make your acquaintance . Thank you for all of these riches.
Warm best,
Lynn Lawrence
A beautiful sacred poem you’ve given to us on this last day in April, Leslie. This is yet another way poetry amazes me: so few words; so much to consider. Stunning poem.
And I’m very pleased to learn about this book. I don’t know it and will watch for it. Clearly there is wisdom in it for any and everyone, including the non-poets, or admirer of poets.
CONGRATULATIONS on another April accomplishment! What a huge success.