Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Tantra Tatra (Thomas Merton)

Be still.
Listen to the stones of the wall.
Be silent, they try
to speak your

name.
Listen
to the living walls.

Who are you?
Who
are you? Whose
silence are you?

Who (be quiet)
are you (as these stones
are quiet). Do not
think of what you are
still less of
what you may one day be.

Rather
be what you are (but who?)
be the unthinkable one
you do not know.

O be still, while
you are still alive,
and all things live around you

speaking (I do not hear)
to your own being,
speaking by the unknown
that is in you and in themselves.

“I will try, like them
to be my own silence:
and this is difficult. The whole
world is secretly on fire. The stones
burn, even the stones they burn me.
How can a man be still or
listen to all things burning?
How can he dare to sit with them
when all their silence is on fire?”

In Silence by Thomas Merton

2 Comments:

Blogger Pietro said...

hi, im Pietro from Gallicano, near Fornovolasco...
in your profile i see "fornovolasco" and i write to you.

6:47 pm  
Blogger johnthebarman said...

Thanks for saying 'Hi'. I was there in November 2006. (See my blogs 'La Finistra' and 'Barga'). We visited the public caves but it was interesting to go to your blog and see your explorations. I hope to come back to visit the mountains.

I'm sorry I don't speak Italian.
Best wishes, John.

8:53 pm  

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