Farewell to My Brother, Slawek with Gold Hands

Slawek and Maja with baby tiger, 1960.

Once upon a time, in a faraway country my brother caught a tiger, a baby tiger, with cute fat paws and a big head. He held it tight, thought it seems that the tiger did not like it particularly. I looked on with a mixture of fascination and fear. I would not touch a live tiger, would I? That thing had claws! And big teeth! That's my favorite portrait with my brother from a trip to Warsaw Zoo. We know now it is not nice to the tigers to have them held by strangers, but then people did not know better and kids posed with baby tigers, like we did.  Our mom made our clothes, the stores had nothing interesting. 

My brother, Slawek, had cute face, blue eyes, beautiful smile, and curly hair. When we went somewhere together and I wore his old overalls, as I often did, living in his hand-me-downs, hand-made by Mom, people thought he was a girl, I was a boy, with my straight, almost white hair, cut short for convenience. . . 

Slawek and Dad on an autumn walk in the park, 1961.

So, now my brother is dead,  only 18 months older than me, he died of brain tumor on April 12, 2019, (born on July 25, 1956 in Warsaw).  His name was Radoslaw, "praising joy" but we called him Slawek for short, from "praise" or "fame"... I have not seen him or talked to him since our Mom died in 2013. It seems we had nothing in common, nothing to talk about, no common ground as adults.  But he did come to me to say his farewells in a dream. Well, he did not say anything but I dreamed of him and Dad, for the first time since 2013, and we went picking mushrooms. We were on a narrow strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street in front of the main wrought-iron gates to the University of Warsaw, on Krakowskie Przedmiescie. There is no such strip, it WAS a dream. 

There were birch trees and young oak scattered here and there, and a variety of mushrooms grew between patches of grass and dead leaves and pine needles. Red osaki, kozaki, kurki, golabki whit whit stripes underneath, maslaki, slimy and shiny, with leaves stuck to their "hats" and one huge porcini mushroom, "prawdziwek" the size of two palms together, partly buried, almost white, opalescent like a huge baroque pearl. I pulled it out, underneath it was all milky white, pristine, perfect. My brother and Dad came up to see what I found and Dad said, "Oh, look Majusiu, for once you won and you found the best mushroom. Of all the times you lost, now finally you won!" 

My brother did not say anything, just smiled. and nodded. Of course, he knew Dad was right. I won "for once" because Slawek was the master mushroom picker and could follow me in the forest and find beautiful prawdziwki (porcini, or king boletus) that I missed, distracted by birds, leaves, flowers, and by just being in the forest, with sunlight filtered through the branches. 

It was so nice to see them both in my dream. Dad was involved and talked to us and was not buried in a paper or a book (that's why I started reading so early and read so much, I wanted his attention and I got it if I sat by his feet reading huge spreading weekly papers, too serious for a young girl - Polityka, Kultura, Zycie Literackie, and something satirical, Krokodyl or Karuzela, forgot the title...) In my dream, my brother looked well, we were both in our sixties, as we are now, but Dad looked solid and serious as when he visited me in California in 1999, before he was shot by robbers and got so sick and weak, and tired of living... We were so eager to win his approval, like little kids. Nice to see you, thank you both for the visit. 

My good memories of my brother are mostly from vacations in the country, sailing, staying on family farms of Grandparents, in Trzebieszow, in Podlasie (Lublin district) where Aunt Basia, only 9 years older than Slawek, was our chaperone during trips to the narrow and shallow river Krzna, with both sides covered with forget-me-nots and yellow "kaczence" (buttercups) and in Bielewicze  (10 km from the Belarussian border) where the mushroom picking was the best, for the real forest was close by....

The forget-me-nots had sky blue small flowers, and grew in dense bunches, but had to be left where they were, they did not like being picked and put in a vase. Then, they wilted.  They liked humid shady spots, and we had to be careful while walking by, on our way to the "swimming spot" in our stream, which had sand and not mud on the bottom, for nettle often grew near forget-me-nots, and it was easy to be stung by its leaves. . . Walking on a sandy field road, through fields, meadows, under the soft blue sky with a skylark singing above, that was a delightful part of our adventures.  Perfect memory of perfect summers. The water in the stream was not deep, but clear. We had to be careful there, as well. There were leeches under the banks, and my brother picked crayfish sometimes. As with the baby tiger, he was far more adventurous than I. Yet, I ended up in California, in an entirely different world, different language, culture, and he stayed at home. . .

We spent an awful lot of time together during these summer vacations with Grandma and Grandpa. Once, Slawek found an old rusty rifle, leftover from one war or another, thrown in, wrapped in a rag, between the fence and a barn. Grandpa quickly took it away and hid it in a different spot, telling us to forget this dangerous thing. Often, when it rained, we went into the attic, to eat fresh walnuts, peeling yellow skin from the white flesh, and admiring the brain-shape of the nut. We read old papers, and played cards out there, or listened to adults below, who sometimes forgot, where we went. . . We run wild, spending days exploring, climbing trees, finding things, making up stories. Walnut trees were the easiest to climb and sit in their wide branches, talking. Cherries were forbidden, their branches too fragile to support even the weight of a child. Instead, we had to help Grandma remove pits from cherries, for her famous cherry confiture, the best ever - from her own sour cherries.  We ended up with hands and faces covered in red cherry juice...

She came to stay with us in Warsaw for over a year just before I started school, after our Mom took off, somewhere with someone, leaving us behind in that wooden house in a garden with sweet cherries (we could climb those and eat the fruit off the tree), and a lilac bush right outside our window.  We had fun together even in our Warsaw house in Jelonki, a subdivision for university staff.  Our bedroom was divided into two by tall bookshelves, but we could talk late into the night, while the nightingale sang in the lilac bush right outside. You could not go to sleep in those fragrant nights of May - the lilac scent was intoxicating and the nightingales, though sweet, so loud! Their song is really complicated, maybe that's why my first published scholarly paper was on birdsong in music? I even analyzed the nightingale's portraits by various composers across the ages... I love the nightingales until today, when I never hear them, only mockingbirds during the day, here in California.. But the scent of lilac carries for me the memory of a happy childhood.

School photos at the end of first grade of Maja, second grade of Slawek

I discovered exactly the right kind of lilac in Descanso gardens. So delightful!

Those were the times when children were to be seen not heard, and had to help when asked, without protest. So we peeled potatoes, pitted cherries, brought wood for the stove, or simply sat in the kitchen, watching Grandma or Aunt Basia cook their amazing dishes. We were banished from the house when the softest yeast-dough babka was resting before or after being baked. Any noise could startle the dough into collapsing. So we went  across the street to the orchard to eat apples straight from the tree (papierowka in July, kosztele in August were the sweetest), and to play with chestnut leaves, making weird patterns. We would look for softest, ripest klapsy pears, surrounded by wasps, who loved their sweet juice as much as we did... Or find flint stones on the sandy pathway. These were white and blue and had weird, twisted shapes.  Anything weird was worth notice.  Such was the childhood with my brother. The good times. 

In Bielewicze, when we had to climb to the loft in the barn or stable, to look for runaway hens, who made themselves nests up there to lay eggs undisturbed, Slawek was the one climbing up, to hunt through the dark corners full of hay and insects. I waited below for the basket to be carefully taken down. Some of these eggs were bad already, and if they broke the stench of sulphur would be nauseating, so we were careful in taking them down. Grandma knew how to tell, shook them and listened, threw away any suspicious ones.  These hens were quite wild and devious. They went everywhere on their own, and rarely settled into their own henhouse, it was fine as long as the dog kept foxes away. Up in the loft above the cows and horse, it was safer for them, anyway. Slawek was the one to bring cows from pasture; they were too wild and dangerous for me. Once he even rode on a ram, just for fun, while, again, I was watching from the safety of the porch.

Everything was wilder there, stranger, out in the Belarussian "colony" - where houses were half a mile away from each other, at the edge of tall fir forest, with massive old trees, with a row of ancient pine trees marching down along the driveway. There was a nest for bociany made from a wheel on the top of one pine, struck by a lightning it had just the right broken branch on the top for the nest. Their clacking noises woke us up at 6 am, in time to go mushroom picking in the forest. There were so many different forests - the area where blueberries were thick in the undergrowth; the pine grove on sandy hilltop where you could find "goose mushrooms" if you dug in the sand, and "chicken mushrooms (chantrelle) that were visible from far away. There was a path framed by dense hazelnut bushes, and clearings full of wild raspberries and wild strawberries.

You could tell what kind of mushroom to look for by the types of trees and undergrowth. Oaks meant porcinis, prawdziwki. Birches provided shade to red-headed white "osaki." Pine on sand meant "gaski," but in wetter areas, there were lots of "maslaki" and "kozaki" in the grass. All children knew how to tell a poisonous mushroom from its edible look-alike,and we had lessons on each trip to the forest. If it was raining we stayed at home; Slawek liked carving boats from thick pine bark, and we put water into a big bowl and tried out our pine-bark boats. Sometimes he put a mast with a sail into one of them. He really had golden hands, could make them so well. Mine were always crooked, and listed to the side or capsized when I pushed them to go faster...

We went mushroom picking in Trzebieszow, too, and near Warsaw. Once, we took a train to the Kampinosy forest, and on the way back to the station, walked across a meadow, where the "kania" mushrooms were a foot tall with a foot-wide cap; each mushroom was the size of a pancake when we fried them in butter later that day... We felt like Liliputs in the land of giants, when we came across these enormous mushrooms. They are typically up to 10 cm tall and wide, and the patterns and shapes are very similar to the most poisonous white mushroom of Poland. Tricky...

We did not talk much during these wanderings in forests and meadows of the countryside. There was no need to talk. It was enough to listen to the breeze in the tree tops, to the birds sometimes singing, sometimes silent if a bird of pray was nearby... It was enough to be there, together.

We loved water, too, the lakes, swimming and sailing. We had a family sailboat with a cabin, and would occasionally take a trip to the lakes. Sleep on the boat, rocked by gentle waves, eat food cooked on the bonfire, mostly burned noodles in tomato sauce, and fried bread with melted cheese, the sailing staples.  Again, my brother was the captain, and I - a sailor, who tied knots, rolled rope, balanced the boat in the wind, and followed the lead of the captain... One "vice" I picked up at 16 and dropped at 18 was smoking, which I did only to prove I was a grownup, I hated that taste of an ashtray in my mouth. But it proved useful, when starting a cigarette for the captain on the boat. You had to sit with you back to the wind to even burn a match... My poem, "The Lake of Claret" from Grateful Conversations (recently reprinted in Quill and Parchment) was about him and those sailing adventures on lakes in the Mazury district, about the dark forests on the shores, waiting for us with berries in the thick  undergrowth, about our "grateful conversations never had, but now taking place..." 

The talent of my brother for carving pine-bark boats, grew into the ability to make furniture for his home, fix things, and work with his hands. He stayed in Poland and helped Mom with the summer house; I left for Canada and then for California. He was the one working hard and serving our Mom's whims, always at her beck and call. I was stubborn and distant. I did not even write too often. Yet, I was always her "Princess" the most beloved child, and he just Slawek, nobody special... Of course, he was special in his own right, with a talent for making things, building things, fixing things. I had a great brain, but two left hands, hopeless. He, less academically gifted, had magic hands. 

Here, a digression about trees. According to the Celtic Calendar of Trees my two "patron" trees are Birch - with white trunk, delicate triangular leaves shivering in the wind, golden in autumn - and Apple Tree - humble, and fruitful, with white pinkish flowers, and being of service to people. I eat apples daily. The favorite cake of my kids that always turns out great and I bake at least three times per year (for their birthdays) is "Szarlotka" - apple cake, a kind of apple tart, based on my Mom's recipe.  In Bielewicze we used to climb a tall ancient birch tree with Slawek and sit on the branches near the top, watching the world - flat fields, sandy field roads, edge of the forest, and clouds in the sky - from the elevated vantage point.  My parents planted a copse of birches on their plot of land at the summer house, and grew mushrooms there, too, wild mushrooms, to have their own mini-forest. 

My brother's two "patron" trees were the stately Elm (bold, beautiful, harmonious, well organized, and open, full of passion) and the Holly, green year-round, with hard wood, smooth, shiny yet prickly leaves, and beautiful red berries, its bright hues gave rise to English Christmas colors, of red and green. Holly meant firmness, endurance, stability - all traits of my brother.  And to think of other signs, in Zodiac, I am Capricorn, he - a Lion. No wonder we did not get along as grown ups.  In Chinese Lunar Calendar, I am a Fire Rooster, vain about clothes, passionate, with a quick fire of intelligence and a talent to lead (who knew?). He was a Fire Monkey, mischievous, intelligent and clever. So we did have something in common, after all, besides our blue eyes... Fire! 

Sitting by the bonfire, singing sea shanties and Polish songs late into the night at the lakeshore... Or, back home, dancing all night, rock'n'roll style, as I'm flying through the air, with my wide skirt twirling around, and he holds me firmly, the best dance partner ever, my brother...  The first dance we shared and I still remember was in Trzebieszow, when Grandpa played mazurkas and obereks on his fiddle and we danced around him, full of joy and exuberance, while our shadows danced on the walls around us. (This image made it into a poem, too, "How to make a mazurka" from Chopin with Cherries, reprinted in Grateful Conversations).

So that's how I want to remember him. Remember only what should not be forgotten, forget things that no longer matter, who was wrong who was right, who was loved, who was not...  Death is the great equilizer: once done with this school of life, we are done with making choices, having opinions, and being better or worse, wrong or right.  There are no winners or losers anymore. No regrets. No sorrows. Everyone wins. 

At the funeral of our Mom, Henryka Trochimczyk

After a hard life, too short and too hard, my brother found his rest. He joined our parents, and now I am alone, and far away, and living in a different world  from what they knew or were a part of. The world we lived in and shared is gone. Chernobyl put an end to mushroom picking in Bielewicze: too much radioactive cesium.  Deaths of grandparents and parents emptied the ancestral homes.  The sailboat burned in a fire, I think. Let me finish this farewell to my brother with a childhood rhyme:

"Niezapominajki to sa kwiatki z bajki

rosna nad potoczkiem, patrza modrym oczkiem

no i szepcza skromnie: nie zapomnij o mnie"

"Forget-me-nots are flowers from a fairy tale.

They grow near streams. They look with blue eyes

and they whisper, humbly: please, do not forget me."

For farewell, since he never visited me here in California, was too busy, working too hard,  taking care of things in his life without time for vacations, I posted an album of spring flowers from Descanso Gardens, with lots of lilac and cherries.  Here are some more paths we did not walk together, benches we did not rest on, side by side. Farewell, my brother. 

 

 

NOTE: Most photos are from California, Descanso Gardens and the High Sierras that stand in for Mazury lake district. Julien pear orchard replaces the klapsy tree (different type of pear though), Descanso birches among azaleas and forget-me-nots stand in for Polish birch trees. I did not have a camera of my own in Poland, and there were no cell phones with cameras then either! 

Past, Present, and Future - Gifts for the Arrival of a New Baby

Is there anything better in life than holding a child in your arms? Your child, your grandchild?  I am blessed to have witness a miracle recently, a miracle that changed my existential status. From now on, I'm a Grandma, Babcia. 

These words seem rather abstract at the moment, as I think of my own Grandmas/Babcias and how ancient they seemed to me, when I was a child spending summer vacation in their village homes, eating strawberries and cherries in their gardens and orchards... No matter, age is not important. The new life of the new person just entering the world and opening his eyes to see the universe - this is what is important.

To welcome my Grandson, Adam Marcin (born in September), I spent the last month before travelling to Poland for this monumental occasion writing a long poem, entitled "I Give You the World" and illustrated with all sorts of photos - of family life and things I love to take pictures of, leaves, petals, clouds... There is a lot of personal material in that book, so I'm not going to make it publicly available. In fact, it has been printed in ten numbered copies and that's it. 

But some fragments of the poem can be pulled out to become independent pieces, and shared with readers. So here they are.

I Give You the World. A Poem for Adam

1.
I saw you 
with eyes closed
smiling

waves, shadows
changing direction—
where are you?

Adam, the first man
I give you the whole Earth
to name

2.
I give you my world with veins of gold
slicing through the drab clay of hours,
drops of amber hidden in sand,
bright turquoise among slabs of granite,
and pure diamonds in charcoal.

3.
I give you the strong scent of the Electron rose
with its hue of vermilion flames.
Here’s the gift of wings of the butterfly
shining yellow on a pink hibiscus
and the busy buzzing of bees
in the crape myrtle tree,
overshadowing my Sun-Land patio.

Can I also give you the ancient linden tree,
all awash with the bees gathering nectar
in my Grandma’s yard in Bielewicze—
the sweet noise of honey and July?

Careful, don’t catch any bees!
They die as they sting you.
Better save them from drowning
in the pool, bees are precious
they give us honey and fruit, lots of fruit.

4.
I give you rocks in the riverbed, 
white, grey, and veined with pink —
so you step on the solid foundation
and grow up with both feet on the ground
strong and stronger each day.

I give you water laughing in the stream,
so your laughter spills over 
the waves of air, lightly, in silvery droplets.

I give you the hummingbird’s feathers
ruby–red and emerald green —
their feisty owner suspended in mid-air
on invisible wings, drinking nectar
from a butterfly-shaped flower of bougainvillea
in the intense shade of magenta.

5.
I think you will love
my gifts of the pink grapefruit 
and juicy oranges fresh off the tree.
This one is funny! It wears sunglasses 
made of shadows. It is good to laugh at shadows…
And look! Is this a flower or a bird in paradise?

6.
I give you the patience of a lizard, sunning itself on my pathway, 
and catching flies — no, I do not give you the gift 
of catching flies,or maybe…  it could be useful!
Well, let’s stay with the hard-working habit 
of waiting for the right moment—Yes, do everything 
at the right time— do everything right.

You may like the intense hue of the California poppy
a wildflower of the hills. As orange as laughter,
with delicate green leaves of the spring, it comes back
year after year, without rain, after fires.  
Like this poppy, never give up!

7.
I am sure you will like the taste of red cherries 
right off the tree in Jelonki, in my childhood garden
later demolished  to build a street for those tall 
apartment blocks that are as ugly as machines 
to live in—but cherries, ah, cherries, with juice 
flowing down your fingers and your chin—

I give you all the riches of the clear, crisp air
in the fall, when gingko, maple, and poplar
leaves are yellow and crunchy under your feet,
when the last peaches are getting wrinkly
and too sweet on empty branches in the orchard.

8.
I give you the heady scent of needles
on the Christmas tree, a Douglas fir covered
in handmade ornaments, hidden behind
a mountain of gifts in crinkly wrapping paper
green, red, gold, and navy — next to a row
of stockings waiting for chocolate on the mantel.

Please, accept the fragrance of resin melting in the hot sun, flowing 
in large drops down the branches of my juniper and cypress —
and down the trunks of pines that lined the sandy road to 
your Great Grandpa’s family house in Bielewicze,
where storks welcomed sunrise, ferns unfolded 
and stretched  in forest shadows, and silence rang 
like crystal bells at noon.

This is the time for trees to dream of sleep 
and for birds to map out long flights 
along mountain ranges, above green waves 
of forests, white-crested waves of the ocean,
soaring on waves of air.

9.
I give you the chirping of the cricket 
behind my chimney — their summer song,
the kind my Grandma heard in the freezing,
snowy winter in Trzebieszów—
I wish you always have a cricket 
behind your chimney— let it sing,
if it wants to sing!

10.
I give you the majesty of sequoias, tall and ancient
with heads in the sky, roots stretching down 
inter-connected. Solid, immobile, above and beyond 
it all. Theirs is the gift of nobility, strength and resilience.
They do not die in forest fires — just get singed and grow
new branches — that’s what I give you today.

11.
When you grow a bit bigger I’ll give you wings 
to fly in planes, across oceans to distant cities —
London, Paris, Rome, Barcelona and the City of Angels, 

and to the white coral sand under coconut palms 
on Pacific islands, and to the waterfalls 
and volcanoes of Hawaii—Come on! Grow! Let’s go!

We’ll enter magnificent cathedrals 
and listen to angelic voices and heavenly 
sawing machines of Johann Sebastian Bach.

We’ll climb the world’s most famous tower
To look down at the rooftops and streets,
Eating ice-cream, and almonds, and crepes.

We’ll admire crystal mirrors of rococo palaces
with the thrills and trills of coloratura sopranos 
and the Magic Flute by Mozart.

We’ll waltz in the rain with Chopin 
and rest under weeping willows
of his Mazovian plains. We’ll visit the willows

reflected in Claude Monet’s ponds, 
full of clouds and water lilies. We’ll spend
the dawn and the dusk in his garden.

At noon we’ll stand in the rainbow 
of stained glass windows on stone menagerie 
carved into the floor of Sainte Chapelle.

We’ll travel through the primary colors 
and black lines of Mondrian to the upside down 
world of Magritte, where dawn and dusk 

are the same.  I wonder if you’d share 
my admiration for the smiles of Gothic Madonnas 
with blue-winged angels in gold-relief heavens,

nodding to the swinging rhythms of Brazilian samba 
and classical jazz, the luxury of mellow voices.
Ella and Frank forever.

12.
I give you the rush of understanding,
the “aha” moment when you get it 
and things fall into place where  they 
should have been from the start.

Stuffed into this junk heap of ideas
is a gift of making cosmos from chaos
in the pristine, strong light of your mind.
And don’t forget the white kernel 

of fresh walnut after you peel off its yellow 
wrinkly skin. All the bitter flavor is gone, 
only sweetness remains —
just like in life, when lived right.

So yes, I do give you the true gift 
of living right, capturing each moment
and dissecting it into what to keep
and what to discard.

13.
My gift is unique and hidden.
You’ll find it inside you, when your bare feet 
touch the new grass and your eyes follow 
shifting clouds in the blue-grey Polish sky.

This is the gift of seeing and knowing 
what is true, how grass grows, how clouds 
become scarves for the hills, sneezing in winter.

How to be present to changing sunlight 
on the mountain slopes with patches 
of shadow moving through distant canyons
and meadows.This is my gift.

14.
Of things I have not touched 
with my feet or the palms of my hands
I share with you Norwegian fjords 
and Alaskan glaciers, the glistening
black-and-white skin of my totem orcas, 
the whale-song and dolphins.

Play a tune on the teeth of a plastic comb,
immersed in water and a dolphin will come 
to investigate this new language 
of clicks — and will spit water on you 
if he does not like what you have to say—
maybe a dolphin’s insult?

They are smarter than humans, you know.
So, instead of playing, set them free. 
Yes, please, do.

15.
So, my dear first-born grand-son
son of my first-born son, I give you 
the colors, scents, and flavors
of fall, winter, spring and summer.

Know that what becomes old dies out,
letting flowers blossom and turn
into the delicious golden fruit 
of experience and memory.

Well, I never thought of memory as a jar
of pickled pears with cinnamon sticks 
and cloves ready for a winter feast.
Apparently, that’s what it is.

Thus, I give you some pickled pears 
of your Grandma,great-Grandma 
and other, greater grand-Grandmas,
with family recipes and stories to keep.

16.
I give you the bells of sailboat tack 
ringing against the mast on your boat
in the harbor, waiting for another adventure 
on gently undulating grey waves of a lake.
That’s for a summer day.

For winter nights, I give you 
ten billion suns in each of ten
billion galaxies as your playground.
You will find your way from sun to sun.

17.
I give you the shape of hand-written letters,
the spirals of sunflower seeds, and a snail shell,
the cycle of seasons, the living breath of our planet,
the fractal veins on a rose petal and on 
tributaries to a river you will see from the orbit
through electronic eyes of machines.

I give you the multitude of seeds 
in a pomegranate, each seated 
in its own ruby-red juicy pod, 
squished into the tightest space.

This is how tight knowledge 
will be packed into the neurons and cells 
of your brain,so you can squeeze 
its sweetness into words 
of supreme wisdom.

18.
I give you the gift of my language, many languages, really —
Two for certain, maybe three, four, five, or six 
I could have spoken if I tried harder, made more time.
So now you can do it —learn more skills, get more knowledge,
expertise, beauty. Let’s not forget beauty, the true meaning 
of life—see the snowflake star crystals melting on your glove? 
That’s what it means being like the lilies of the field that are clothed in glory 
and stretch their heads to the sun, breathing in the morning dew,
absorbing the golden essence  of life with each leaf, root, and petal.
So, there.

19.
I wish you the murmur of waterfalls
and the silver resonance of Tibetan chimes,
slowly swirling through the evening air
with the smoke of frankiscense.

I wish you the halo of light-filled sound 
and the brightest fragrance to keep you 
enveloped in a shield of light,
your armor against the dark.

I wish, I wish, I wish for you 
the most precious gift
of them all —the great 
river of light and 
the luminescence
of golden white love.

20.
I give you all the beautiful and good things I can find.
What you do with my gifts is yours only—
store them in the treasure chest
of your allotted time to do this and that,
and this much, and just enough.

May every step lead you to greater 
understanding and compassion 
for all living beings,to greater 
wisdom, higher awareness,
and more intense connection with all
others— plants, animals, people.

May your song echo widely
across the Universe.
May you learn to sail and swim,
and climb mountains,
and write sonnets, or paint, or plant.

May each day be full of hours
flowing by, like the feathers 
of a peacock—in delight and bliss.

21.
I give you the invisible secret of the universe —
cords of light tying it all together,
sand, stars and waves, tree roots and clouds.

The warm softness of the nose of a puppy 
or a baby kitten—would you like dogs or cats? 

And a myriad of happy eyes, looking at you
with the warmth of affection —
all one, all one, all one.

22.
I give you the gift of compassion,
the hazel light shining inside.

Close your eyes —you will see it 
in silence —you will hear it

in your heart’s gentle whisper
of love, nothing else, only love.

23.
So, I wish you the gift of un-feathered flight, 
the treasures of night sky, diamonds scattered on the water 
by sunlight as you swim in the lake.

The pearls of what, exactly? You go figure out 
your pearls, get together your plan for your life 
and own it.

Don’t forget where you came from
and why — to link, connect, span the globe 
and shine, yes, just to shine.

May the beautiful luster of your un-excelled essence 
be known to all. See, I just read the story 
of Buddha and I’m writing like one, already – 

with millions of suns, dazzling star crowns,
constant bliss, serenity, supreme joy, and the lotus 
of wisdom dissolving into clear light.

24.
If you are an artist at heart,
make a living, be grateful
for your gifts,and give back in kind.

If you are an engineer, invent things 
to help people,or animals, or plants,
or to heal the water and air.

Make them happy, hear their song —
that’s what we want most of all,
to be happy, to love, to be loved.

When you choose,  choose wisely
and follow your heart,
always follow your heart.

Since boys love machines, I thought I'd add to this tribute to the newborn a humorous short story that's a life lesson in old computer language. 

I find it amusing and accurate - this is what we all have to do:  

Install LOVE on the HUMAN Computer

by Author Unknown


Customer: I really need some help. After much consideration, I've decided to install LOVE. Can you guide me through the process?

Tech Support: Yes, I can help you. Are you ready to proceed?

Customer: Well, I'm not very technical, but I think I'm ready to install it now. What do I do?

Tech Support: The first step is to open your HEART. Have you located your HEART?

Customer: Yes, I have, but there are several other programs running right now. Is it okay to install while they are running?

Tech Support: What programs are running?

Customer: Let's see... I have PAST-HURT.EXE, LOW-ESTEEM.EXE, GRUDGE.EXE, and RESENTMENT.EXE running now.

Tech Support: No problem. LOVE will gradually erase PAST-HURT.EXE from your current operating system. It may remain in your permanent memory, but it will no longer disrupt other programs. LOVE will eventually overwrite LOW-ESTEEM.EXE with a module of its own called HIGH-ESTEEM.EXE. However, you have to completely turn off GRUDGE.EXE and RESENTMENT.EXE. Those programs prevent LOVE from being properly installed. Can you turn those off?

Customer: I don't know how to turn them off. Can you tell me how?

Tech Support: My pleasure. Go to your Start menu and invoke FORGIVENESS.EXE. Do this as many times as necessary until it's erased the programs you don't want.

Customer: Okay, now LOVE has started installing itself automatically. Is that normal?

Tech Support: Yes. You should receive a message that says it will stay installed for the life of your HEART. Do you see that message?

Customer: Yes, I do. Is it completely installed?

Tech Support: Yes, but remember that you have only the base program. You need to begin connecting to other HEARTs in order to get the upgrades.

Customer: Oops. I have an error message already. What should I do?

Tech Support: What does the message say?

Customer: It says, "ERROR 412-PROGRAM NOT RUN ON INTERNAL COMPONENTS." What does that mean?

Tech Support: Don't worry, that's a common problem. It means that the LOVE program is set up to run on external HEARTs but has not yet been run on your HEART. It is one of those complicated programming things, but in non-technical terms it means you have to "LOVE" your own machine before it can "LOVE" others.

Customer: So what should I do?

Tech Support: Can you pull down the directory called "SELF-ACCEPTANCE"?

Customer: Yes, I have it.

Tech Support: Excellent. You're getting good at this. Now, click on the following files and then copy them to the "MYHEART" directory: FORGIVE-SELF.DOC, REALIZE-WORTH.TXT, and ACKNOWLEDGE-LIMITATIONS.DOC. The system will overwrite any conflicting files and begin patching any faulty programming. Also, you need to delete SELF-CRITICISM.EXE from all directories, and then empty your recycle bin afterwards to make sure it is completely gone and never comes back.

Customer: Got it. Hey! My HEART is filling up with new files. SMILE.MP3 is playing on my monitor right now and it shows that PEACE.EXE, and CONTENTMENT.EXE are copying themselves all over my HEART. Is this normal?

Tech Support: Sometimes. For others it takes a while, but eventually everything gets downloaded at the proper time. So, LOVE is installed and running. You should be able to handle it from here. Ah, one more thing.

Customer: Yes?

Tech Support: LOVE is freeware. Be sure to give it and its various modules to everybody you meet. They will in turn share it with other people and they will return some similarly cool modules back to you.

Customer: I will! Thanks for your help!