Abandoned Bluebird Nest
THE SPIRIT IS TOO BLUNT AN INSTRUMENT By Anne Stevenson
The spirit is too blunt an instrument
to have made this baby.
Nothing so unskilful as human passions
could have managed the intricate
exacting particulars: the tiny
blind bones with their manipulating tendons,
the knee and the knucklebones, the resilient
fine meshings of ganglia and vertebrae,
the chain of the difficult spine.
Observe the distinct eyelashes and sharp crescent
fingernails, the shell-like complexity
of the ear, with its firm involutions
concentric in miniature to minute
ossicles. Imagine the
infinitesimal capillaries, the flawless connections
of the lungs, the invisible neural filaments
through which the completed body
already answers to the brain.
Then name any passion or sentiment
possessed of the simplest accuracy.
No, no desire or affection could have done
with practice what habit
has done perfectly, indifferently,
through the body's ignorant precision.
It is left to the vagaries of the mind to invent
love and despair and anxiety
and their pain.
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I appreciate you all very much and wish you a blessed and happy 2016.
xo,
Marion
3 comments:
marion, i'm so ashamed. i read the words before but through the cacophony of the holiday season i hadn't heard them until i read the word prayer. now i hear you and if anything i might think or feel might help...
(i love the stevenson poem. our children are our most precious gifts.)
love and strength dear friend)))
My sister just spent a week in the hospital and is now home, recuperating (thank God!). I was afraid we might lose her, so I understand your worries and desire for prayers. You can count on mine.
Here's to a better year for all of us in 2016!
Happy New Year and many blessings to you, Marion!
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