La Dolce Vita | mlewisredford

Tags

2019, 6*, anger, Anita Ekberg, fountain, house, identity, La Dolce Vita, others, quiet, sitting, society

look at this one sitting to one side
smouldering

why does it sit there seething about
it it it, while others

get on doing stuff making
a world-wide society of life

with all of its crowns and repeated
acts of shame

look at their talent, their love,
their art, their smile

look at it, indulge in it; in fact,
step into the pool and hold up your hair

under the fountain for all to share
glue-like to the society in which I sit

quietly in my quiet house

drenched from under Bodhisattvacharyavatara VI, 76-77: [76] If someone is attuned enough to spiritual things to find delight and joy in recognising the appearance of excellent qualities and worth in another and praising them as a good person, and if this makes them happy and draws people close together, why then, oh (sulky) mind, don’t you join in with the recognition as well; why are you not rejoicing too and taking the same delight too? [77] (But isn’t feeling joy and delight an attachment, and therefore bad?) But this pleasure, this delight cultivated through praise of another’s virtue, is an entirely virtuous activity, a spring, a fountain, of joy, which is not prohibited, but, even, a precept, taught by those of Ultimate Quality and Worth, an excellent way to bring people together of which one should take full advantage.