The Summer Day
by Mary Oliver
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
Hello with another Mary Oliver poem. On this warm summer day, I am wondering: is there a way to see our paying attention and being mindful with our strokes, our tiles and ourselves as prayer? To see our appreciation as a contribution to the greater good? I realize that to me there is a connection. What are your thoughts on this?
I have been exploring Emiko Kaneko’s tangle KAAS, named after her favorite French singer Patricia Kaas. And wether we do or do not consider this prayer, it most definitely is paying attention and feeling excitement, curiosity and aliveness. Practicing the Zentangle method gives me experiences I am very grateful for.
So here you see Kaas on a tan 3Z, on white, on black and on white as a mosaic. Now how about color? I tried a hefty hack technique.
And… for the love of my six sided tiles and for life’s wonkiness… here’s wonky Kaas. And then some.
Keep paying attention!
