Proper balance

It occurs to me that there is a proper balance
between not asking enough of oneself and asking or expecting too much.
It may be that I set my sights too high and so repeatedly end a day in depression.
Not easy to find the balance, for if one does not have wild dreams of achievement,
there is no spur even to get the dishes washed.
One must think like a hero to behave like a merely decent human being.

        May Sarton, Journal of a Solitude

Don't give up

 Life's perhaps the only riddle
That we shrink from giving up.

        W. S. Gilbert, Bab Ballads And Savoy Songs

Yom Kippur

Should I not atone for the sins I have committed,
All that I have ever said will be a lie.

        Milarepa, The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa

 

 

 

 

 

Check it out

Librarian is a service occupation,
    gas station attendant of the mind.
        In an earlier age, I might have made things.
            Now I only make things available.

                        Richard Powers, Gold Bug Variations

 

 

 

 

 

FIne line

There’s a fine line between audacity and idiocy.

        Jim Butcher, Turn Coat

 

 

 

Walking wounded

It is often said that the Church is a crutch.
    Of course it’s a crutch.
        What makes you think you don’t limp?

                William Sloane Coffin, Jr., Credo

 

 

 

 

Poem: In conversation with myself (2:49am)

I’d like to go back to sleep now.
Oh, I don’t think quite yet. We have things to talk about.
I don’t want to talk. I want to sleep.
Or we could play a fun game.
Or sleep.
Nope. Fun game time.
What’s the game?
It’s called “Your life is a complete failure.”
That’s not a fun game.
It is for me.
But aren’t you me?
Yes and no.
And can’t I control you?
Good luck with that. Let’s review your twenties.
Please don’t.
You poured a pitcher of beer on your head at a happy hour with your boss present.
Oh Christ.
Then you . . .
Nope . . .
C’mon. I love this one. You said, “Look at the rack on that waitress.”
I didn’t know she was his wife.
What about that time, in a meeting, you thought Arkansas ended with the letter “w” . . .
You suck.
And wrote it on a whiteboard in a staff meeting and everyone laughed. At you.
I’m going to sleep.
Fine. Good night.
Really?
Sure. Sleep well.
Oh. Okay.
Lyme disease.
What?
Nothing . . .

        John Kenney,  Love Poems for Anxious People