All of my life has been a relearning to pray—a letting go of incantational magic, petition, and vain repetition ""Me Lord, me," instead of watching attentively for the light that burns at the center of every star, every cell, every living creature, every human heart.
~ Chet Raymo in NATURAL PRAYERS as quoted in EARTH'S ECHO by Robert Hamma
Two hundred years ago Issa heard the morning birds
singing sutras to this suffering world.
I heard them too, this morning, which must mean,
since we will always have a suffering world,
we must also always have a song.
~ David Budbill, "What Issa Heard" in MOMENT TO MOMENT