I’ve read the words of men who walk where understanding grows: who’ve passed beneath the tree of wisdom and had its shadow grant them peace, briefly though it be.
Look in their eyes and you will discover glimpses of eternity. With them you sense the present is infinite, and events the actors which provide a change of scenery. In life there are many theories but few explanations. With time I discovered that we will know more than we can say, and understand beyond our powers of expression.
Sometimes on a crowded street or in a café, half hid from view, I might a man or women see, and tell myself, “They’ve been there, at the borders between eternity and the commonplace. Compassion is their constancy, wrapped in the scarf of hard experience. Hopeless though the venture is, they watch the pageant of our passing lives and see it stained by human greed, recognising, all the while, that knowledge of the timeless kind is often touched by melancholy.”
countingducks 
they always carry a thread of hope within them no matter the circumstance –
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“With time I discovered that we will know more than we can say, and understand beyond our powers of expression.”
This is Truth. With a capital “T”…
Bringing your poetic voice to the visceral experience of real life – the hallmark of a writer. Well done, Peter! Profound, honest, deep, and wise, without going truly dark. I am, as ever, moved by both your wisdom, and your expression of it! Thank you for sharing this gem; my Monday is better for it. I will keep it close to hand for multiple readings today… 😀
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I agree.
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A good one mon!
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This is so profound it will take a dozen or so readings before I grasp its genuine intent. In the meantime, I will content myself at the commonplace end of the spectrum.
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Good stuff… and may the tree’s shadow give you peace…
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Quite a remarkable piece, Peter. Within us all there is a sense of peace and understanding, problem is how we tap into this. Sometimes it pains me to think of the potential that we have as a species and how much we lay to waste.
A powerful and thoughtful piece.
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I think this is one of your most powerful pieces yet. Very moving.
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Nice to know there are still a few good ones out there!
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Beautiful, Peter.
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Oh my, this is very lovely–and remarkable, as another reader commented.
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Peter,
you are deep and beautiful.
How are you, dear? x
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Poignant… experience teaches us much. We see the mistakes of the past, we see them re-employed in the present, and we project potential outcomes not of the good kind.
To live in America in 2017 is to live the experience of seeing the worst of us embraced as the way forward. Divisiveness over cooperation, bigotry over diversity, greed over the welfare of many and the one.
I grew up in a time where we looked at the ugliness of the past and declared it was not the future we wanted. Alongside horrible things, optimism we’d build a better society took root. Now, I’m a crone and the past that never quite let go has been fertilised and watered.
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Dear Counting Ducks,
I was using the wordpress blog so far. and was getting all your posts reported. Now I have changed over to mikerana.com. It is a blog made using the wordpress. I would not like to lose your connection.
Please visit this log and connect. And tell me if you have any difficulty.
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