“The world is full of magic things,
patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”

Guilty, guilty, guilty: I am a fan of W.B. Yeats, the Irish poet, and need this reminder, the all-I-need-to-know-I-learned-in-kindergarten reminder, to LOOK. Or the Yogi Berra  “dumb jock”-as-zen-philosopher koan: “It’s amazing what you can observe just by looking.” It’s amazing how much we don’t see, and discouraging how much natural, wholesome and otherworldly goodness we fail to notice because we’re fixated on the trashy, the tinsel, the temporary, the trite and the televisual. (That’s right, just call me “Mr. T”.)

So, how do we sharpen our senses? I guess we begin by using them, by trying to see the world with our own eyes, and hear its melody with our own ears, to paraphrase Baha’u’llah. Simple!

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was one of the greatest poets ever to write in English. He was also a playwright, politician, and a key figure in the renaissance of Irish culture and pride.