Saturday, February 24, 2018


Lilies -- as tall as ourselves and more lovely,
   and full of fragrance, and long orange tongues,
      and those playthings the bees -- stood in

a neighbor's yard, a thick, ramping
   hedge of them.  You could not help but see
      that to be beautiful is also to be simple

and brief; is to rise up and be glorious, and then vanish;
   is to be silent but as though a song was in you only it
      hasn't yet been heard . . . .

-- Mary Oliver

Saturday, February 17, 2018


The moon floats above the pine trees
as you sit on the veranda in the cool evening air.
Your fingertips move lightly along the flute.
The melody is so lovely that it makes the listeners weep.
But wisdom's flute has no holes
and its ancient clear music is beyond emotion.

-- Hsueh-tou (980-1052)

Saturday, February 10, 2018


The fact that children make beautiful music is less significant than the fact that music can make beautiful children.

-- Cheryl Lavendar

Saturday, February 3, 2018


All of music is an attempt at communication between human hearts and minds; at the very minimum the creator reaches out to and through the performer, and both of them reach out to the listener . . .

-- Robert Shaw