The Habit of Excellence

 We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence is not an act, but a habit.

~ Aristotle

All Words That Devour

Why do you boast of evil  .  .  .

The steadfast love of God endures all the day.

Your tongue plots destruction,
like a sharp razor,
you worker of deceit.

You love evil more than good,
and lying more than speaking what is right.

You love all words that devour,
Oh deceitful tongue.

from Psalm 52

Sleep Serene

Autumn Journal

[Part XXIV]
Sleep serene, avoid the backward
Glance; go forward, dreams, and do not halt
(Behind you in the desert stands a token
Of doubt — a pillar of salt).
Sleep, the past, and wake, the future,
And walk out promptly through the open door;
But you, my coward doubts, may go on sleeping,
You need not wake again — not any more.
The New Year comes with bombs, it is too late
To dose the dead with honourable intentions:
If you have honour to spare, employ it on the living;
The dead are dead as Nineteen-Thirty-Eight.
Sleep to the noise of running water
To-morrow to be crossed, however deep;
This is no river of the dead or Lethe,
To-night we sleep
On the banks of Rubicon — the die is cast;
There will be time to audit
The accounts later, there will be sunlight later
And the equation will come out at last.

~ Louis MacNeice

Devoured in Peace

TRUE ENCOUNTER

Wolf!" cried my cunning heart
At every sheep it spied,
And roused the countryside.

"Wolf! Wolf!"—and up would start
Good neighbours, bringing spade
And pitchfork to my aid.

At length my cry was known:
Therein lay my release.
I met the wolf alone
And was devoured in peace.

~ Edna St. Vincent Millay