“None of these things made me feel at all cast down. It was as though they happened to someone else, and I merely watched them.” —Way of a Pilgrim

“If we differentiate things according to their differences, everything is different from the other. If we consider things similar according to their points of similarity, there is nothing which is not the same.” —Kuo Hsiang

Benediction

Say the words you

Want me to say,

Whisper them into

My ear, the right words,

The holy words, the words

You want me to hear.

Cast away the present tense

The parting child constrains,

Build and forge the dying

Cause, the onward human

Breed, the wearing thin

Abrasion night in silent serpent

Creed, the mother’s fight against

Her chance decline, whose

Dominion liveth for ever,

Hold fast unto these righteous

Words and dole them out

According to their need.

Say the words you

Want me to say,

Tell me what we must

Do, to flail the ways

That come between us,

And fulfill their partial meanings

Until no empty cup remains.