Does it matter whether you hate yourself? At least love your eyes that can see, your mind that can hear the music, the thunder of the wings.
Interpretation
Self-appreciation is essential, even in moments of self-doubt or self-hate.
Robinson Jeffers emphasizes the importance of recognizing and appreciating the beauty and capabilities within ourselves, even when we struggle with feelings of inadequacy. By focusing on our senses and the wonders of the world, we can cultivate a sense of love for our own existence and find joy in our unique experiences.
In practice
During a mental health awareness event, to encourage self-acceptance.
As for me, I would rather be a worm in a wild apple than a son of man. But we are what we are, and we might remember not to hate any person, for all are vicious; And not to be astonished at any evil, all are deserved; And not to fear death; it is the only way to be cleansed.
Nature knows that people are a tide that swells and in time will ebb, and all their works dissolve ... As for us: We must uncenter our minds from ourselves. We must unhumanize our views a little and become confident as the rock and ocean that we are made from.
Poetry is not a civilizer, rather the reverse, for great poetry appeals to the most primitive instincts.
I've changed my ways a little, I cannot now Run with you in the evenings along the shore, Except in a kind of dream, and you, if you dream a moment, You see me there.
You making haste on decay: not blameworthy; life is good, be it stubbornly long or suddenly A mortal splendor: meteors are not needed less than mountains: shine, perishing republic.
Death's a fierce meadowlark: but to die having made / Something more equal to the centuries / Than muscle and bone, is mostly to shed weakness.
That was what her parents did not understand—and had never understood—about stories. Liza told herself storied as though she was weaving and knotting an endless rope. Then, no matter how dark or terrible the pit she found herself in, she could pull herself out, inch by inch and hand over hand, on the long rope of stories.
Repentance and desires after holiness never be separated.
It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day.
Difficulties come when you don't pay attention to life's whisper. Life always whispers to you first, but if you ignore the whisper, sooner or later you'll get a scream
Over-anxiety ultimately banishes every trace of joy from life.
I can see in what you call the dark, but which to me is golden.
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