"A grain of sand is a desert, and a desert is a grain of sand; and now let us all be silent again"

There are innumerable ways to count grains of sand. Kalil Gibran is using a metaphor of the desert and the relationship of a grain of sand to the desert.

I am sorry that I cannot say more but the explanation that you want if one examines the poetry of romantics like Rumi and Gibran is in their cultural imperatives. The Persian culture of the time in which they lived and practiced their art is far removed from our experience. The only way to understand their work is by listening to their culture and the idiom that defines that world view. It is imperative for a reader of poetry to see through his or her lens the world and take from that experience what he or she chooses. Therefore the grain of sand may be each distinct person or place that you have known, or where you have walked, or the unfolding world that flows in the ebb and flow of life.

The images evoke connecting and inter connecting. We are interdependent and not separate and defined by the person as much as the place in which we are and the timing.

Poetry has distinct protocols for the genre, depending on where it was written and when. Each word is highly charged with meaning. In my poetry I am seeking to evoke a perspective of life and rhythm that is present and I resonate with artists who achieve the same end like Wordsworth, Gibran, Rumi, Hughes and Whitman.

One of my favorite lines is: "I burn my candle at both ends; it will not last the night. But ah my friends and oh my foes, what a lovely light." This is for me a mantra of my being. Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote this in the context of the meaning, scope and purpose of her existence. For me this calls us to profound sense and sensibility about what we choose to do and how we choose to accomplish the task of living our life. We can interpret that this is hedonistic but I choose to see this as a call to arms against the extinguishing of the flame and to rise above the din and clatter of the world to live well. I always say to my friends, "Go well stay well,” which I mean to ask them for purpose and to do the good. In all of my heroes there is a spirit of devotion to earth and a purpose in performing everyday miracles. One of my friends recently said that she has a bumper sticker that states, "Normal people worry me."

I am writing a compilation of ordinary thought because the way we face the simplest challenges, like boredom, means the difference between living well and disappearing into oblivion.