in the very long run any success devours - and perhaps also corrupts.
Pain can make a whole winter bright, like fever, force us to live deep and hard.
For me the moral dilemma this past year has been how to make peace with the unacceptable.
I long for the bulbs to arrive, for the early autumn chores are melancholy, but the planting of bulbs is the work of hope and is always thrilling.
Flowers and plants are silent presences. They nourish every sense except the ear.
Where joy in an old pencil is not absurd.