Celebrating the work of Rainer Maria Rilke, born on this day in 1875. 5th December
"Everywhere transience is plunging into the depths of Being… It is our task to imprint this temporary, perishable earth into ourselves so deeply, so painfully and passionately, that its essence can rise again, “invisibly,” inside us. We are the bees of the invisible. We wildly collect the honey of the visible, to store it in the great golden hive of the invisible."
—Rainer Maria Rilke, writing to his Polish translator about writing the "Duino Elegies"
Found on Facebook, who seem to be going for dominance over our photos, or at least the free use of....
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Yesterday we went to the Dog's Trust centre just outside Basildon, the dogs live in five star comfort, glass fronted small rooms with baskets full of blankets and plenty of toys, they also have an outside space. No Angie though, the collie I had come to see, she is in training and it sounds like it is going to take a long while. We both fell in love with Benji's brown eyes, he was a bassett/hound cross, but probably not for us as he had high energy needs and complete training from scratch!
Sad place even so, unwanted dogs always pull at the heartstrings, two elderly dogs to be housed together, young flighty collie, and bulldogs stare back at you. Since my daughter has started working for Tia Greyhounds the plight of the unwanted greyhound and the unscrupulousness of owners who race these dogs and then abandon them (it is all to do with gambling) slowly unravels itself.
Today it is cold, woke up to frosted green and blue skies, and the starlings busily demolishing every bit of bird food in sight, they are supposed to be on the danger list, but to see the flocks overhead it would seem that they breed prolifically.
Dog rescue centres are almost unbearable aren't they? Every dog - young, old, gentle, fierce - they all look at you with pleading eyes. I agree with everything you say - I read somewhere that of all the animals on earth the only one which has really crossed the divide and attached itself completely to man, is the dog. Why then do we treat them so badly. When I think of my Border Terrier and the lovely life she has - my heart bleeds for all these unwanted ones.
ReplyDeleteI absolutelylove your new header by the way.
It took me ages to pluck up courage to go there, LS was very surprised at the modern clean buildings and the way the dogs were looked after, lots of people around. As for the photo, it is very pretty along the river when the cow parsley is in bloom, we have only visited the church in the gloom of winter, and it was locked at the time.
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