Tonight, I finished Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince! I'd never read it before. It touched my heart so much. I think it was the perfect book for me to read right now, as I grieve my mother. This is a book about our responsibility for one another, as well as the sacredness and preciousness of the people we love, how loving them connects us to the cosmic and the eternal.
"'You are beautiful, but you are empty,' he went on. 'One could not die for you. To be sure, an ordinary passer-by would think that my rose looked just like you—the rose that belongs to me. But in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is she that I have sheltered behind the screen; because it is for her that I have killed the caterpillars (except the two or three that we saved to become butterflies); because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is my rose.'
My mother was my rose. In my mind, I see her all the time. I hear her laugh. My parents were my roses. Perfect, irreplaceable, utterly unique. As long as I remember them, they're still here. Inside me, we are together.
"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
"As the little prince dropped off to sleep, I took him in my arms and set out walking once more. I felt deeply moved, and stirred. It seemed to me that I was carrying a very fragile treasure. It seemed to me, even, that there was nothing more fragile on all Earth. In the moonlight I looked at his pale forehead, his closed eyes, his locks of hair that trembled in the wind, and I said to myself: 'What I see here is nothing but a shell. What is most important is invisible...'"
More of the Persian silk trees in bloom.
I love the shadows of the trees on the gravel driveway. The shapes remind me a bit of Matisse's cut-outs.
"On Your Own (Acoustic)" by The Verve
All I want is someone
Who can fill the hole
In the life I know
In between life and death
When there's nothing left
Do you wanna know?
You come in on your own
And you leave on your own
Forget the lovers you've known
And your friends on the road