Bring me a pearl from the bottom of the sea without getting wet.
~ Zen koan

Man knows that there are in the soul tints more bewildering, more numberless, and more nameless than the colours of an autumn forest… Yet he seriously believes that these things can every one of them, in all their tones and semitones, in all their blends and unions, be accurately represented by an arbitrary system of grunts and squeals. He believes that an ordinary civilized stockbroker can really produce out of this own inside noises which denote all the mysteries of memory and all the agonies of desire.
~ G.K. Chesterton

The important point of spiritual practice is not to try to escape your life, but to face it — exactly and completely.
~ Dainin Katagiri Roshi

You may call God love, you may call God goodness. But the best name for God is compassion.
~ Meister Eckhart

… Suddenly I realize,
That if I stepped out of my body I would break
Into blossom.
~ End of James Wright’s famous poem A Blessing