Thomas Merton Quotes About Birds

Quotes about: Birds

• The sky is my prayer, the birds are my prayer, the wind in the trees is my prayer, for God is all in all.

  Thomas Merton

  Prayer, Wind, Sky

  Thomas Merton (2011). “Thoughts In Solitude”, p.107, Macmillan

• When we are alone on a starlit night, when by chance we see the migrating birds in autumn descending on a grove of junipers to rest and eat; when we see children in a moment when they are really children, when we know love in our own hearts; or when, like the Japanese poet, Basho, we hear an old frog land in a quiet pond with a solitary splash - at such times the awakening, the turning inside out of all values, the "newness," the emptiness and the purity of vision that make themselves evident, all these provide a glimpse of the cosmic dance.

  Thomas Merton

  Life, Children, Heart

• For the birds there is not a time that they tell, but the point vierge between darkness and light, between being and nonbeing. You can tell yourself the time by their waking, if you are experienced. But that is your folly, not theirs.

  Thomas Merton

  Wisdom, Light, Bird

• When we are alone on a starlit night, when by chance we see the migrating birds in autumn descending on a grove of junipers to rest and eat; when we see children in a moment when they are really children.

  Thomas Merton

  Children, Autumn, Night

  Thomas Merton (2007). “New Seeds of Contemplation”, New Directions Publishing

• Zen enriches no one. There is no body to be found. The birds may come and circle for a while in the place where it is thought to be. But they soon go elsewhere. When they are gone, the "nothing," the "no-body" that was there, suddenly appears. That is Zen. It was there all the time but the scavengers missed it, because it was not their kind of prey.

  Thomas Merton

  Circles, Bird, May

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